Woman's Profile

Juri duty: roughs and clean-up

Continuing my recent love affair with Street Fighter, I've wanted to do a pic of Juri Han for some time. It's hard thinking up an original pose because a lot of artists have already done so well! I did a little 3-inch thumbnail in my sketchbook of a Tae Kwon Do-ish stance that I dug, and did my best to re-create it in Manga Studio.

Manga Studio supports layers, but each layer is defined by specific type. A raster layer (as opposed to a bitmap or vector layer... it gets a little technical) works best for sketching. I really enjoy the feel of the pencil tool with the wacom. There seems to be a more natural variance with pressure and direction than Photoshop's brush tool. Using a grey-blue is just a personal preference, tho it does work nicer for inking overtop.

In this instance I did a rough for pose and then moved to a new sketch layer to define details before inking.

Portrait 3

Alien Invaders!

Another Sketch

Self Portrait

Yep, that's me.

Cammy: Cannon Spike!

Cammy: Inks

Ah yes, over to Manga Studio. I do pencil quite a bit right in Manga Studio, just not this one for whatever reason. I was really pleased with the results :-)

FYI, I use a darker background color cause it's easier on the eyes.

Cammy: digital roughs and clean-up

This is in Photoshop, with Wacom. Due to the pose I was making good use of canvas rotation.

Ink samples from Manga Studio EX

I've pretty much locked down on inking my work with Manga Studio over the last couple of years. It still takes practice but I've (hopefully) been moving out of the technical learning curve into the artistry phase. The pen tool is where most of this takes place and it has some really cool settings to establish a style alongside personal tastes.

Here are some examples of what the settings (checkboxes on the tool prefs) allow. You'll see a very loose pencil sketch posted as the base, this was actually pencil on paper scanned from my sketchbook, but I also enjoy Manga Studio's pencil tool and may post on that separately. The Assisted "Stroke In" and "Stroke out" is largely what is in play; different pen tips do affect the line but not as dramatically. I like the swashy, thick strokes akin to the brush of my dream artistic ability, tho I don't think software is any kind of a shortcut to good old fashioned work. But it sure helps :-)

Stroke effect can come to bite you as you are giving up some of the control, but extended use eventually teaches a nice give and take. As you see above, I'll use a combination of stroke effect and a raw tool to get where I like. Using only the stroke in/out effect takes a little life out of the drawing but is clean. Going under your own hand-- using the pressure sensitivity of the stylus to determine stroke-- relies more on your abilities and retains personality. At least that's what I'm getting from all this.

The Secret to American Cuisine

Be my Valentine!

They say, "you're no bunny until some bunny loves you." Well this bunny has nothin' but love for everyone!
Extra hugs and kisses to my special bunny, Vicky :-)

2012: Year of the hand

The hand has vexed many an artist, it is a detail of anatomy that often requires as much attention as the body whole. Hands are magical in their ability to relay gesture and emotion all by themselves, and I as an artist marvel at other artists who make it look so simple.

After years of research and observation I've learned the secret. The trick to hands is... draw hands. Like, all the freakin' time. Over and over again. My own hands are passable but often times one that comes out good is more an aspect of a pleasant accident than stalwart study. So this year I'm devoting extra time to study the hand, and basically make an effort to draw so many god damn hands I can at least reach a halfway-decent comfort zone.

I'm not looking to master, as that's a lifetime's pursuit. But I am looking to improve and improvement comes through continued study and practice. Don't worry, Cup Doodle won't become a repository of endles hand doodles, but I'll surely throw some up now and again.

Pretty and lips

That 80's flair

Drew this one at a recent Drink and Draw, actually inked on paper :-O

Zombie doodle

Drawing Bo-Katan: Colors and Presentation

Here is a clip of the rendering without all the Photoshop nonsense:

I know, I know, it seems like a huge jump from the last stage, one day I'll have to spend a little more time outlining the coloring process. All coloring is done in Photoshop, which also offers some valuable tools to  fix things up outside of colors. Some of the adjustments I made after the inks were with the bent knee and a subtle perspective correction (with 'distort') that helped the overall proportions.

In the end I felt it to be a successful piece, at least for being my first attempt at the character.

Drawing Bo-Katan: Inks

Over into Manga Studio now, which is pretty fun at this stage of the drawing. Was really pleased with my inks on this, a somewhat rare occurrence :-P

Drawing Bo-Katan: Cleanup

Knowing I was going to ink this and that the outfit had some very specific details, I spent a little more time refining the roughs. Was also irked by those funky kneepads, so I whipped up a dirty 3D model for help. A little creative licence here, too, just felt like putting something a little bulkier than the model showed.

Drawing Bo-Katan: Pose and Roughs

This was done on a Wacom in photoshop. Loose roughs for the pose and then a little refinement before the detail stage.

Drawing Bo-Katan: Reference and Sketching

Saw this character on a snippet of Clone Wars and was quickly drawn to her, so of course popped around the web for a little reference. The sketching was just to get a feel for things, specifically how that armor would work in a drawing. I also love the design of the classic Boba Fett helmet, and the variations of the Mandalorian armor that artists have been creating over the years.