I decided to take some time and test my digital skills. when I started my illustration degree my practice was all realistic paintings and pencil images. through my degree that was lost I came more focused on comic book style. but with previous contract work it made me realise that I still need those realistic skill in my portfolio but after learning that the industry is heavily digital I had to test if I could digitally paint an image and still get the same results as I would with my analogue illustrations.
I wasn't feeling too confident as I have never done a realistic portrait digitally and I've not touched realistic illustration for at least 3 years as my practice has been almost 100% comic style.
So knowing that this was something that I had to do ad practice on, I needed to find an image that inspired me and gave me the drive to make a good drawing. Even though I'm trying my hardest to come away from the hole fan art I felt that for practice I need to work on something that I enjoy I don't want the practice stages to be a chore I need and image I can recognise. I had thought abut doing digital paintings of Georgie, mates tutors but that didn't actually appeal to me as much as drawing a something from my childhood...ya guessed it! STAR WARS. Han solo was my childhood hero but I didn't want to draw the younger Harrison ford but the older one. choosing the older one would be more challenging. the creases the age, the character all would be a good test. also ford has a deep eye set and a wonky nose and a killer grin...if not drawn well this would just turn out a bad representation. again this would be a good test. my attitude to this test is ' if your going to do something, go all out and do it well. I looked for what I thought would be the hardest drawing. high level of lights and shadows, fabrics, double light sourses.
I chose this one in the end because it ticked all the boxes I was looking for in a challenge. the heavy light source from the left nad side the second light source hitting his right cheek bone the heavy shadows around the eyes and nose. the only downside was that I couldn't find a bigger image of this so I couldn't blow it up to get the detail.
I knew that the project would take me days but due to work commitments and other projects I didn't want to spend more that 3 days on this painting. and were I am up to on day 3 is where ill post it and work on the painting if it's not finished I'll spend an hour when and where i can to finish the painting.
the painting took me 18 hours over the space of 3 days to get to this level. I'm happy with the results so far. for me the face is looking realistic and the clothes the most time-consuming factor of this project was the hair the hair is about 10% complete but when finished I think it will finish the image and make it look more realistic. through out this project I learnt more about digital painting and how to translate an analogue technique into a digital one.
below is a link to my development of the painting. a video of screen shots taken at key moments of the developmets
I got to spend a little time on the hair and back ground.
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