Finally, we are in the tail end of the summer, there’s only three more days before we finally enter the fall season! Heck yeah! I like this outfit that Momochi used in her “Off Momochi in Okinawa” blu ray. I think it really fits the lowering temps. I made two versions, a more realistic version and an anime version where I simplified certain aspects of the face and enlarging the eyes. Using outlines helps make people pop out, but I wanted to see if I could make it look good without them.
Here is another ink painting using Corel Painter 2023. I do wonder though, can I get similar effects just using the blending sargeant brush? I guess mixing brushes are now part of my style because I wish I could blend instead of having to glaze over and over. Its not supper time consuming, but it would be quicker to blend. Either way, monochromatic paintings are quite soothing.
I really love the ad for the Yamaha SHS-10 or the Sholky (which appears to mean shoulder keyboard) with Yuki Matsushita jamming. The actual CM is even more fun and has some fun poses that I want to draw. I’m no musically inclined so I wonder how a shoulder keyboard stacks up as an instrument?
This is the ad used as reference (seems like there was also another variation):
and this has the CM I was talking about:
On another note, I had long had two things that I needed to do. Buy a new chair and modify my desk. My old chair I bought because it was a drafting chair which was high enough to match my desk but it was super stiff and limited the amount of comfort over the day. It was torture after a while. The desk had a rather tight entrance where I could barely come in with my chair. I put up with it since I didn’t have any arm rests, but when I finally bought my new chair, the arm rests were needed to connect the backrest to the seat. After about two weeks of use I became very aware of the lack of movement I could do, specially with the arm rests. On top of that, the right arm rest was getting scratched up (it has that fake leather), so before it became worse I had to finally address the desk.
The plan was to have the side walls point outward, and that was it. So after my other job on Sunday, I just decided to go straight into it and hack the side walls off which also house to input fans, the i/o and bluray player. Luckily it seems I had the forethought to make it easy to remove when I built the desk. Surprisingly it took me about have a day to modify the desk and get it built up (for the most part). But when I reconnected everything and turned on my computer, the screens were black…
It was already pretty late so I called it a day and would figure it out the next day. So it took me half the day to finally figure it out, the monitor switching program had forgotten all of my settings and was having problems with all five screens connected. I noticed this all before I switched my gpu to the motherboard from the stand mount. That was annoying. The next part was my drives, half of them were no longer visible. Doing most of the basic troubleshooting didn’t work. That’s when I decided to check if it was seated correctly on the motherboard. It wasn’t. The last problem left was the audio. First there was no audio and when I finally got that working, the sound was too low. As of now, I have yet to fix this. I tried resetting the drivers, updating, but nothing worked. Who would have thought that modifying the enclosure of a computer would create so many software issues. Despite everything, for only two days of work it was all worth it. I’m using a super old receiver I got from thrift store which I was planning to upgrade anyway. So I will fix the audio later. There’s some small details left, but the desk is essentially done. Though I have to figure out what do do about my lightbox which will no longer work with these new dimensions.
Playin around with screen tones and stacking them gives some cool effects. Hatching gives even more variety but I didn’t do it in this drawing. For the newspaper I was going to just give it some texture with screen tones but decided to use the newspapers from the promotional video and edited to make it fit this drawing. In the original line art, I didn’t have the tuxedo men but it felt off without them.
For the Momochi Pose line art I decided to ink it and hatch it.
Yesterday I went to Meow Wolf. Inside was an art display by Future Fantasy Delight. The black and white art really popped and looked amazing. It was obvious that the artist had a lot of inspiration of anime/manga and Mexican culture (such as with the Mijo Miho character). I really need to make more black and white drawings.
There were a couple of areas that I did have to edit digitally and other areas that I had to clean up. Cheap Paper is cool to practice with, but I should seriously stop using it with my dip pens. The sharp tips lift up a lot of of the paper fibers. The areas that I inked were done using a brush. One thing I don’t like when I scan my artwork is that the light from the scanner exaggerates the dimples/texture in the paper. To the point where it creates blank spots. This happens as well with watercolors. I wonder if this is why some artists prefer to photograph instead of scan.
I finally finished making my new lightbox so I can now transfer line art as many times as I want so that I can practice more traditional styles.
Since I want to use my lightbox but don’t like having to move everything over and over again, I think it’s time that I finally make the lightbox that will fit in the desk opening. For that, I will scavenge the light and parts of my old lightbox. It took me a couple of hours but it was worth it.
This painting was done using my Holbein Watercolors. I like that I can play around with the opaqueness and vibrancy of the colors. But it’s obvious that I need to practice more. As I was painting I noticed that Momochi’s left (to our right) eye was misaligned. So when I was done painting I modified it digitally. I was going to leave the background blank but decided to add some blue brush strokes to emphasize the cold temperatures.
I want to try using the brushstrokes and colors that Alpay uses. They are amazing. But I also want to do ink drawings… Meaning that it would be a great if I transferred my line art to another paper. This calls for the use of a lightbox.
So I have a lightbox I built quite a while ago, but it takes a lot of space. It no longer works with my current setup. But, the desk I built has a place left open so that I would slide in a lightbox but I never built it. I think it might be time I scavenge the lights and built a smaller version that can dock into my desk.
Time was limited today so I drew a quick sketch. It has been snowing pretty consistently lately where I live, so I want to make more snow based artworks before we move into the spring season. This time I wanted to draw Momochi skiing from her time in Country Girls. She was really in her element it seemed when she was doing it in the DVD Magazine vol. 2. I wonder if she went skiing often?
I’m not sure what I will do with this line art. I could shade it with pencil, transfer it to another paper and paint it with watercolor or paint it digitally. We’ll see.
Despite the end of last year being quite dry, the start of this year has given us quite a bit of snow. I quite like the athmosphere this creates which is why I decided to use it for the painting this time around. The line art was done for Inktober 2021 day 27 which can be seen here:
The model for this painting is Sayumi Michishige. I really love the outfit and colors. I debated on how I wanted Sayu’s colors to be overall. Light and faded, or darker, affected by the scenery. I opted for the darker route.
Reference photo of Sayu can be seen here (7th Photo):
Managed to finish it. Went for a more anime look. I didn’t quite like the way last years version looked. Looking at it again though, I’m feel it just needs to be refined and it can look much better.
In any case, I wanted to just draw from memory this time to come up with the scenario and poses. I wanted the poses to be a bit more interesting. I debated on whether to have Goku swing from the awning by his tail or hanging by the counter (I of course went with the counter idea). As for Bulma I decided to have her ordering some food. I went for a pose that made it look like she was fidgeting and moving about due to the cold. I went with her outfit she used when they first met Oolong. Which is freaking cool and iconic. I just modified her socks to tights due to the weather.
This year has been something, but I feel grateful that I can still keep going and making my art. Hopefully you guys are doing well. Not much we can do but keep pushing forward. Here’s to a better year. Thank you everyone who has continuously looked at my work and liked it. I hope I can make more art that will bring some positive emotions in the future.
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