Chuckry's sketches & WIP's

[chrisc]

thanks Ryan!

[Zombie Dave McCaig]

Ryan, your avatar is the awesome too.

[Ryan]

Thanks Dave! I love the word moogly as much as a heterosexual man can love a word. It makes me laaaaaugh.

Hey Chris, if you don't mind me asking, what was your process like on the Fett illustration?

[michael-e-w]

If I don't post and kill this thread, will you please do the other two FF? Oh, shit... wait a minute...
No, but seriously, Chris, I really like a lot of stuff in this thread and shoulda said so instead of just lurking on it.

[chrisc]

Thanks Michael! I'm gearing up to do the rest of the FF. Just gotta find the time.

Ryan: I was originally going to do the Fett illustration in a more cartoony style (like Spidey vs. Venom). Part way through I decided that this might not be appreciated by the convention people & the guests etc. I did a couple of rough sketches (in Photoshop) for the client, one close up & one full body leaping shooting Fett. I laid these into a mock up of the ad to see which worked better. Then I just blocked in the colors and part way through changed it from cartoony to more realistic. I painted the figure flat, on one layer, and took time off between painting sessions to give me a fresh eye & renew my motivation.

I hunted down a lot of reference, but wasn't too slavish to it. Also, there was a lot of variety in the reference, so I probably didn't get all the doodads right. Once I was more or less happy with the painting, I darkened it, upped the contrast a little and threw a dark, gradient wash over him (on a layer) to draw focus to the gun blast (which was also done on a couple of layers). I use the default PS brushes, usually hard round ones, sometimes with wet edges, and varying degrees of opacity, and modes.

If I'd had more time, I would have done a tighter pencil sketch, then a greyscale PS painting, which I would have tinted with color, once the rendering was complete, and I was happy with the values. I should try to do a step by step one day.

[michael-e-w]

I should try to do a step by step one day.

Yes, yes you should!

[robliefeld]

Chris,

I am a huge, longtime fan, I first encountered your work in Grant Morrison's X-Men run.

Just wanted to tell you what great work you produce and this thread in particular is amazing.

I agree with Bucce, you should have these published.



rob

[chrisc]

Hey, Rob! Thanks for dropping by. The Xmen stuff was fun to color, especially Quitely's work.

You may also remember me as a part of Digital Chameleon back in the day. We did Youngblood & a bunch of other stuff for you and some of the other Image guys.

[MBirkhofer]

That last one is great Chris.

[Ryan]

Thanks for the info., Chris! I'm always interested in other artists' process.

[robliefeld]

Hey, Rob! Thanks for dropping by. The Xmen stuff was fun to color, especially Quitely's work.

You may also remember me as a part of Digital Chameleon back in the day. We did Youngblood & a bunch of other stuff for you and some of the other Image guys.

Chris,

I remember Digital Chameleon, but they were never as good as you bro.

That X-Men stuff was great, great modeling, color palette. Nice to meet you.



rob

[ramshifter]

Chris, i know you're a busy fella and the whip is always cracking..but i was wondering if you've worked anymore on your "drowned" piece..that one has such a cool vibe.

[chrisc]

Haven't done anymore work on the drowned piece yet. But I'm hoping to finish it by the end of the month. I'm half way through a step-by-step on a Poison Ivy illustration though. Hopefully, I'll finish that one before the end of the month. Thanks for checking in!

[ramshifter]

i bet you were goin' to take a six month sabbatical from it..then you were like "ohhh yeah, that drowned piece." hahaha... awesome awesome awesome when you post art.

[chrisc]

Here's that Poison Ivy step-by-step (sort of), that I mentioned earlier.

I used photo ref in this case, but I prefer not to, unless I get stuck on something like an anatomy problem, or foreshortening. I also use default photoshop brushes, at varying opacities, set to either normal, darken, multiply, overlay, or color. I like to switch between the pencil and the brush tool.

From time to time, I flipped the image, horizontally, to see if anything was too wonky. If so, I'd try to fix it, then flip the image back. After the greyscale was finished, I converted to RGB, then tinted/painted the color.

All told, this illustration took about 3.5 to 4 hours.

edit - I didn't realize I was limited to 3 attachments at a time. So, the final color illustration is on the next page.

Poison Ivy spread 01.jpg (47.99 KiB) Viewed 2978 times

Poison Ivy spread 02.jpg (56.93 KiB) Viewed 2978 times

Poison Ivy spread 03.jpg (103.43 KiB) Viewed 2980 times