Almost a week! Life has been good but busy, BAU.
A friend wanted to go Aurora Borealis hunting, so last minute we jumped in and drove around all night over the weekend around the mountains and desert to try to catch something. Alas, we didn't find Auroras, but we had a great time and he still took some killer photos (he does photography as a hobby).
Here's me under the milky way (probably around 3 am)
and another one that looks awesome. Sky outside of the city is truly beautiful.
I'm old though, so it was exhausting and ended up resting all of the next day, but still had a great time.
As usual still managed to steal time for arts!
Term 4
Farily straightforward, finished the environment reference study. Lineart + painting.
Here's my setup when working on this exercice. I dunno why I took it, just sharing I guess.
Here's the reference. Amazing artist, not sure who it is, but I really liked it.
And the final work for this study.
Tried to use some different brushes, which was interesting, I'm usually more about inking and standard cell shading, so it was an interesting change of pace. Nowhere close to the impressive brushwork of the original, but still pretty good I think.
As usual, learned a lot, colors, some brushwork, some detail and boat structure and much more. I stopped packing in detail at this point (Probably could have refined those ropes a bit mroe and add some more as well) as I felt I had learned everything I could, so decided to wrap it up.
Next up from the weekly companion is "Study (copy) the stylized lower body anatomy of 5 characters from professional artists/shows/games you like (references ideas: Capcom concept art, Marvel/DC comics, fighting manga, fighting game concept art)"
Not sure what I'll use for references, but we'll see what we do.
Manga
One more page! 6 out of 10 for chapter 30 done!
1) 7 frames here! But the structure works well for a back and forth conversation and these are fairly small and simple. Added the cigar to add some clear "movement" to the sequence, which is better than just having the characters stand there talking. Also used a bit of zoom and head turning for the same effect. Also used the BG texture and gradient to have clearer spatial placement.
2) The dialogue here was originally very different, I changed it almost last minute as I felt this was more appropiate and forshadowed following events better. Originally, with the same page art and structure, the conversation was around how there's a mole or traitor among the mafia group, but I felt this kinda didn't fit the situation and would be better used later. This feels more relevant for what the reader has seen so far and also adds context and setup for what is to come.
3) Used a few new brushes to try the smoke effects. Turned out alright, not sure if I'll keep it, but it was cool to test.
As a last addition, I refined the captain's design a bit more. You can also appreciate his size with Seki's shadow for reference.
Tall fellow. It's bound to get refined further later, but I'm satisfied with the base concept and outline for now. Unlike the girl assassins, his initial appearance is not much of a secret, but as with most of the stuff in Nozomu, there are a number of surprises in store for when we finally get to tackle him.
That's all for now! Thanks for stopping by! All you guys progress and art is very inspiring to keep grinding! Hope everyone has an excellent rest of week and weekend!
