On monday I was in the mood to just draw a couple of pieces with pen and no rough draft. Some were good, and others were a bit off… The original drawing of Naoko was ok, but I decided to clean it up digitally and make a simpler version by using less lines and details and rounding out some areas.
This painting is influenced by the poster of “Maboroshi no mizuumi”, it reminded me of the first episode of Ranma where we were shown how diligent Akane was in her training. Looking at the plot of the movie though, it has a rather sad plot. That was a bummer. I wanted to do an 80s anime style where I try to replicate Ranma 1/2s look.
This is an edited version of the battle between Touma and Gunha vs Misaka who has been used for the level 6 shift project. I made the colors a bit darker and more vibrant. I also re painted a couple of areas to add more details, lighting, shadows and changing a couple of details.
A painting that I painted last minute. Was a bit busy but I just barely made it. Hope you guys had a great Earth day. Hopefully everyone is still protecting her. I’ve had the idea that Master Asia from G Gundam and Earth chan would pair up nicely (those who have seen G Gundam know why). I don’t blame Master Asia for his decision to execute his plan. I mean, who wouldn’t want to protect her at all costs.
My entry to the pixiv SUKI1 Chinese Zodiac contest. My entry is for the Ox category (the other category is for the challenger animal). This took a bit longer than I thought it would… Although I did learn some new techniques that sped up my process though. But because of all the details I guess it was bound to take a while, specially since I had to research and come up with certain design elements that would fit the outfit I came up with and the contents of the basket. Hopefully it is pleasing to look at.
The idea I originally had was of Goku returning to Mexico but I decided to to have Bulma tag along this time. In fact, she was the first one to be painted. Well, her car was, then her. The car is from the first chapter of Dragon Ball. Looking online, it seems the car is a Renault 5 Turbo. I’m always amazed at how compact and round Toriyama draws his cars, they look extra cute. The background was painted first which was done very roughly but I wanted the focus on Bulma and Goku so that’s fine.
About 1 or 2 years ago I wanted to make a painting of a Testarossa at night, when I didn’t quite get color theory and how it interacts with each other. So of course that didn’t go very well. But to my surprise, only using the manga panel for reference I managed to paint a good rendition of a car in a night scene with lighting effects and all. Maybe I should give that Testarossa piece another try at some point.
The Renault was apparently meant to be a rally car before it was released as a consumer car so I wanted Bulma to dress like she is travelling across Mexico. I really liked her outfit from chapter 5 (when they first met Oolong). Looking at more panels, there are a couple of details that I could have added but since she is kind of far away it should be fine. As for Goku, I had to think for a while about what he would wear, and I decided to give him a jacket reminicent of Jackie Chan’s jacket from Police Story 4. Looking at Jackies jacket they aren’t really that similar except in the color but I still think it looks good on Goku. As for what Goku is eating, I had him eating some Churros and buñuelos.
I wanted to once again give the 90s anime aesthetic another try today. I painted Saki using Photoshop and the background with Corel Painter. For the texture that makes it look like it’s being shown in an old tv I used the Photoshop filter (I believe it was noise) which gave me just the right textured I wanted. I could have gotten away with it if I had muted the colors a bit more but this works even better.
Saki’s outfit and dance moves are quite amazing in this pv. I wonder if she would ever consider doing a solo career? I’m just glad she is still active online though, I really enjoy seeing her Kendama progress.
Today was a rough one but I managed to make some time to draw. Today I decided to draw one of the planned drawings I talked about a couple of days ago. I had to composite many reference pictures that I had screen captured before October I believe. I was unsure if I should draw her at a closer view or not (if I had I would have had more time to add more details and ink/hatch the drawing). But I really wanted to draw Saki’s outfit from Otona na no yo! She looks like a really cute doll. Personally I believe she had the best outfit by far for that music video. While I was looking at the screenshots of the mv (it took me a while but I captured all scenes where Saki appeared, most of the video), I got to compare everyone’s movements during the dance scenes. She can really move. Her dance moves are powerful and cute, I don’t really know how to describe them but the flow and execution are definitely top notch. No wonder she is the captain.
Today I accidently matched with the prompt for today, I didn’t even notice it till I was about to upload it. Anyway, these past few weeks Saki has been posting videos of her practicing with her Kendama. Meanwhile in To Aru Kagaku no Railgun they finally covered the Indian Poker arc (this season was amazing, kind of a shame that they sort of messed up Index though). I wanted to have them do perhaps some more dynamic moves but I think one where they match each other and are both just chilling and enjoying their Kendama. Time is a bit limited till I finish those three essays so I will have to leave this piece in it’s line art state for now. I’ve been wanting to actually do some more drawings of both Saki and Saten so this was a good excuse to finally do it. More drawings of Misaka’s wingman and Captain will come in the future of course.
It’s been a while since I last painted with watercolors. Truth be told, I was really afraid to go at it. But after looking at a couple of pictures from one of my favorite artists, it gave me that push to just start painting. The artist I’m talking about (and that I have mentioned before a couple of times) is Little Thunder. If you haven’t seen her work I really suggest you go and check it out. It’s absolutely beautiful and definitely one of my artistic inspirations. I tend to overwork my paintings and not use color theory to my advantage. I still don’t fully comprehend it but I do know when colors look right when used with each other, so I have at least developed my color abilities to that level. Having said that, I still was guided by Little Thunder’s artwork as I painted.
I really like Japanese 80s music, and one of my favorite artists during that time is Naoko Kawai. Her voice and music are amazing and brings me joy when I listen to it. On top of that she is super cute. So of course I would do another piece of her. This time I wanted to try something a bit more difficult that had various variables, and well I just plain liked the photo of her in the Jeep. I was surprised I was able to finish the painting so fast. It was three days, (a few hours on Wednesday for the rough draft, Thursday I finished the rough draft and focused on inking, I then got all my courage and actually started painting today Friday). I really love the way watercolors look. It changes my art style quite a bit. I’m planning to do more paintings but October is coming so that means Inktober, plus I need to write three essays… It’s gonna be a rough month. But I’ll give it a shot. I was amazed when I saw Little Thunder finished a drawing/painting in 15 minutes. That’s a good goal to aim for.
I recently saw a video of this other artist using photoshop’s color balance ability to change the color of a black and white painting. So I wanted to try it out. I’ve been craving to do another Momoko art piece so I used this chance to do so. I first painted Momoko using ink and my brushes. When I was content with the final painting I then went ahead and tried out this method. It definitely works, although maybe my painting wasn’t defined as well since some sections were too light and I had to add some more layers to get the right values. Overall I’m quite impressed, although I much prefer to just paint in colors right from the start so I can learn the process better for when I make future paintings later on. But at least now I know new technique just in case.
You can see both versions if you click on either pixiv or twitter.