dominance war iv

Well hello there! It has been a very long time since my last post and I apologize. But now you get to see what I've been up too!

I've been taking part in an online art contest known as the Dominance War. This is a huge competition with some of the most talented artists I've ever seen! It is a game art contest with both 2d and 3d challenges. Since I am focusing a lot on 2d these days I decided to try my hand.

As part of the 2d challenge I had to create a character based within the Dominance War universe. They gave us a short story and made available to us a list of races and classes to choose from. The big theme this year was demons. So what did I do? I went with the most overdone race and class there ever was. A Human Warlord. Haha!

Here is a link to My Online Thread at CGSociety that holds my progress for these last two months.

The final image did not at all come out like I had originally imagined. I ran into a ton of compositional issues throughout the process and made many compromises along the way. I learned a lot about my process that I can now improve upon. And I was reminded once again to flip the picture often to make sure your composition is strong. I got tunnel vision and forgot to do that with this one. However, in the end, it came out alright and I think the experience was worth it! Enjoy!

and another painting!

Hello everybody! I know that I have not updated this blog in a long time. I've been extremely busy with an online art contest. When it is complete I'll be sure to post about it! Until then, be blessed!

more painting

rufus

The rufus is an animal that has black fur with blue spots on its legs and arms. Its tail is shaped like a brick which it uses to launch closets. An adult rufus may weigh more than 89 pounds and stand over 100 feet high.

ogre concept

This is a concept painting I did for a friend of mine. It was just suppose to be some big monster guy with armor! It was a lot of fun and I think it came out pretty nice. I was also thinking of selling some prints of this sometime in the future. We'll see!

digital figure paintings

disney sketches

This past Monday I went with a friend of mine to draw at Disney's Magic Kingdom! I must say, it was great to have company!

radioactive

Run for your lives! The radioactive worm slug thing is attacking! Hah! This is a 3 hour speed painting I did during training at work today!

the remainder

I've added the Loner now! Not sure about the color scheme though!

Here is a quick look at the General character all colored up as well. I'm not even sure if I'll be sticking with his costume design at this point. But I decided to color him regardless! The color scheme is fun though. Hah!

the girl cell

Here is the girl colored up using the cell shading style. Because these are going so quick I think I will try to knock out the other two characters today. Stay tuned!

droid cell look

Here is another attempt at cell shading. I'm starting to kick myself for running out of room in my original drawings and not drawing the feet as a result. Next time I'll flip the page vertical to draw! So again, I'm trying to decide if I'll go this route with coloring the comic. We shall see as I am not fully convinced yet.

cell shaded study

I'm going to try a number of different ways to color these characters to determine the most efficient and pleasant path to take for the comic! This is actually the first time I've made anything cell shaded! More to come!

comic genesis

So recently I've been designing these characters for a comic I am making with my brother! My brother is coming up with the story for the purpose of giving me something to draw. Great guy! I must say that I am very excited about this. We decided on a fun setting and time period in which to place the story and now I begin the concept phase!

Here are the beginnings of the five main characters! I plan on posting updates here on the progress of the comic. Everything from location designs and prop designs to villain designs! All coming soon! Actually, first my brother has to tell me what those things will be, and then I'll draw that stuff. Stay tuned!

bearded

Hello world! Here is a painting I did for my brother this morning! He asked for a 'drawing' of himself with his late beard. I'm not sure why I did a painting instead, other than I somehow thought that's what he was implying.

This painting took three hours. It was a lot of fun!

exosquad

Our training theme at work today was 'Your Favorite TV Character'. I don't know if any of you remember Exosquad, but I thought it would be super cool to draw one of those characters. Now, this is JT Marsh, and even though he's not my 'favorite' of the Exosquad gang, I thought he had a pretty cool haircut! So I chose him.

Also, it was my intention to create an image that was fun with dramatic foreshortening. It could still be pushed farther, of course, but I am pleased with the result.

You may also view a process gif by clicking here.

coming soon...

I have plans to make a website! Now I'm not sure how soon I'll have it up and running, but at least now I have a splash page! Check it out! www.numabrush.com. The website will serve as a more specific online portfolio, while this blog will cover all the fun stuff found along the way!

I made two different variations, but I decided to go with the black background version. I like them both for different reasons. Who knows, maybe I’ll alternate them!? It holds a similar design to the actual header of this blog. Look close! It's the same leaf!

I recently went to visit some friends in KC and I got to spend some time at Hallmark. I saw so many twirly vine things that I decided to have them growing out of the bottom of my leaf! I'm not the strongest designer, but a man has to start somewhere! Hah!

expressions

These are some expression studies from the other day. The more I look at them the more I laugh! It was certainly good practice! What's with the Mr. T hair cut?? Hah!

a day at disney

This past weekend I went with a friend of mine to the wonderful Epcot Center! Because Epcot has such an awesome variety of architecture it never gets boring! The tough part is finding a shady place to draw from because it gets really hot! I almost melted from the heat last time I went. This time I was able to find an awesome spot with an amazing breeze to just draw for hours! Here are some pages from my sketchbook.

rabbitz

This is a quick painting done in response to a certain Jen asking about rabbits. Hah! I amuse myself! I painted from a crazy bunny photo found in a google search. Hilarious!

cyborg juan

A co-worker of mine, Juan Chavez, asked me to design him as a character. This turned out to be a real challenge because he gave me complete freedom. I thought the freedom would be awesome, but it was so painful! I had such a hard time trying to figure out how to make him look.

I enjoyed working with the colors the most. I feel the weapon design leaves something to be desired, but hopefully when Juan creates this guy in 3D he’ll make some fixes where my design is falling short! Go Juan!

sketches for a bust

I'm going to be sculpting a bust over the next 7 or 8 weeks as part of an open sculpture class I'm taking. Today I did some preliminary sketches to help determine the look I am going for. I wanted essentially to sculpt a beautiful woman with long fun hair. I'm not sure which one I'm going to go with, so we'll see! I plan on posting the final sculpt when I'm done.

some figure

Today we had a figure drawing session at work. It was a blast! The gestures were anywhere from 30 seconds to 1 minute. The more rendered sketches were from 5 to 10 minutes. I used ballpoint pen on copy paper. (forgot my newsprint at home)

those eyes

I did this in the morning at work during our speed session. This one's from a mirror and I love it! Working from life creates such unique results. This isn't a perfect representation of me, but you can see the likeness for sure, and that is what makes working from life so awesome. No two drawings are the same! There is always a new interpretation! Yea!

abandoned circus

This was a three hour speed painting I did as a part of a work training session. It was a blast!

I started painting some rough thumbnails to zero in on my composition. I also created some custom brushes within photoshop to speed up the process. This was very exciting for me because I do not paint landscapes often. I may post some tutorials on how I created the photoshop brushes if there is some interest.

wonderful forms

So along with the human body, I absolutely love all the different creatures and animals that fill this earth. I find them to be another source of endless inspiration for the imagination! Just look at the Ninja Turtles. What an amazing concept. Add some ooze to any animal and you got a brand new character! Endless possibilities I tell you, endless!!!

These animals were just painted from some photos I googled. I found the shark to be a very fun challenge to recreate. The horse is pulsing with strength and the rhino is so heavy his shadow is slouching!

the barton!

This is a co-worker of mine. Haha! Bless him!

wrinkle flow

We went through four sessions of cloth training at my work a couple months ago. This sketch was from the first session where we studied how wrinkles work in cloth on a live model! This was a lot of fun.

foot study

This is a study for a foot I painted in 2 hours as a part of a training session at my work. Wonderful colors to work with!

the general

This is yet another character from the workings of my story. This guy is a mighty hero! I'll probably talk more about him on another occasion!

I can't go very long without doing a character design, what can I say?

tmnt

This painting was birthed out of a challenge given to me from my friend Nate! He's one of the coolest people I know by the way:) Check out his site! [http://www.studion8.com/]

We were talking one night and remembering those days as kids when we would go nuts drawing from the richness of our imaginations. (And also how awesome the Ninja Turtles were!) Then we were kicking ourselves, asking where our love for making art had gone. Then Nate challenged me to a drawing duel and called me out. We had a couple days to create a Ninja Turtle drawing that comes from the same creative source as our childhood, uncompromising and rich imagination!