Preston Blair Top hat gentleman practice

Next construction of head practice.
My image at left and Preston's at right.

Below image is Preston's in orange and my attempt in blue. Sorry that it's a bit hard to see.
What errors that strike me most in my attempt are the face is longer than Prestons and the negative spaces between forms are to wide. Not in all cases, but more than enough.

For Preston's image I have put in red lines which denote (guide lines) and the blue lines are for the negative spaces (or gaps between forms). By doing these two measurements I could more closely see where I had gone wrong in copying Preston's work.

For now I can see that my negative spaces are out. And I think this is related to the fact that my face shape is vertically to long - which then pushes all the other elements out.

**Noticeable areas of error - my ears are too small which then makes the hair too long. Also the negative space between my eyes are too far apart - even though the placement of the eyes are fairly close.
Well - that's that for now. More to come soon.

Sad Lion Cartoon

Sad Lion Cartoon

This image is a continuation from this image posted here.
I am hoping to continue in this style and create some more characters, soon.

Words that - Disney books

Words that - Disney books

To find inspiration/ beautiful draftsmanship

Often when I am starting an illustration/character design - one of the first places I will go for inspiration is here, with these books.
Besides the fun and energy contained within each of these books is the draftsmanship of the drawings/illustrations, which is just next level. Something for which I aspire too as an artist everyday.

I was fortunate enough to have these books as a child and as a result have very fond memories of the pictures. Even today, I can still remember certain images which have been etched into my mind. Goofy spiralling down a ski slope, Donald Duck losing his mojo at the kitchen sink. Great stuff.

These next set of images I found online (original's), found here comicartfans.

Happy Lion Cartoon

Happy Lion Cartoon

Inked in Artrage and also added some flat colors using the roller brush (nice textures). Then I added some last minute little details in Photoshop.

Above image inspired by Tex Avery's 'Slap Happy Lion', 1947. Classic cartoon funny.

Also inspired by the 1976's 'Words that do things' Disney book, for children. The images are really fantastic and I love the rendering too.
To see more on these Disney books, click on this link Words that - Disney books from another post I have done.

Will post up soon a tutorial for using Artrage.

Hellboy baby cartoon

Hellboy baby

Inked up in Clip Studio Paint then rendered out in Photoshop.

I have been using Hi-Fi color for comics, a great resource for learning how to paint in a comic style.

For the Hi-Fi book, I used this one found here

Definitely recommend this book. You can still purchase as an online version. Just follow the above link.

The basic idea behind rendering in the above style is to paint with light. To do this you use the mode 'screen' - which essentially adds light to the base color.

Here's a close up screenshot of Hellboy baby which shows the base color (which is generally a de-saturated mid tone) and the accompanying screen color (saturated orange). 

With the color (orange) selected, you then use a brush with mode set to 'screen'. Then you start applying the brush to build up areas and give the piece that illuminated feel.
The actual brush is 'soft' with a slight texture.

**USE OF OVERLAY in layers

As I completed each body form, in this particular example - the face, I made a copy of the face and changed the layer mode to 'Overlay'. See below for example

I felt by doing this, it made the image pop more. We'll, I hope it did.

I definitely recommend if you are interested in learning more about this technique for rendering, to get the book. It has heaps and heaps of tutorials. I mean heaps.