Ballerina - Complete

This was a fun picture to make. Ballerinas are delightful to watch, and equally enjoyable to draw.

Ballerina - WIP

Yes, I'm back to the ballet theme again! :) Here are some studies I did while watching ballet performances.





So what are the sketches for? Figure drawing practice and warm-ups for my next picture, a sequence of dance moves starring this character. I should be finished with it tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Treasure - WIP

Here's the next piece I am working on for my portfolio. This one will be getting a black and white treatment rather than color.



By the way, for any artists who want to take part in the daily speedpainting exercises I've been doing, here's the photos so far. Aside from the photo of the dog (speedpaint 10, which was taken by its owner), they are all my photos. I've been selecting them based on various challenges (fur, foliage, water, reflections, interiors, lighting, etc). If you decide to participate, I recommend focusing in on a portion of the photo rather then trying to paint the whole thing. Have fun! :)

Red Shoes - Complete

This image was originally done in color, but upon completion, I found that the color detracted from the focus of the piece, her red shoes. So, I put a mask around the shoes and turned the rest grayscale. I think the result is more effective. Though it's a little bit sad to spend all that time coloring just to throw out colors at the end. Eh, c'est la vie!

Speaking of which, here is the original color version:

I tried to make everything gloomy and gray except for the girl, but I'm not too happy with how the colors turned out (another reason I went grayscale). Any opinions on it?

Red Shoes WIP 3

Clean lineart, ready for coloring.

Red Shoes WIP 1

Here's my next project for the portfolio: A mock book cover based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale The Red Shoes. From my childhood, I recalled the story being about a girl who puts on a pair of red ballet slippers that force her to dance until she dies from exhaustion. Upon reading the actual story as part of my research for the illustration, however, I was surprised to learn that the original version of the tale is quite different, with some pretty heavy Christian symbolism and morality. In any case, the story has some nice visual elements in it.

Yesterday I did some warm up sketches of dancers and ballerinas. Ballerinas have wonderful poses with strong silhouettes. Very inspiring. I hope to capture some of that in the final piece.

Afterwards, I started working out some thumbnails, figuring out how to arrange the visual elements I wanted to show into a compelling book cover. I settled on the one with a star next to it (lower left corner), and serendipitously stumbled upon a back cover design as well. I think it'll make for a nice companion piece.