I was teaching class this week and I was musing with one of my students about the process of creating art. He complained that all of his illustrations are simply taking him way to long to execute, and when he finishes, the end result is never quite what he had hoped.
As I watched him work, I noticed he fell into the same pitfalls I did as a starting artist. He immediately starting jumping into the detail of the surface area of his character, meanwhile completely neglecting the overall form and structure underneath. I reminded him, “Big shapes, start with the big shapes.” I told him fill up the entire composition with color and value first, as quick as you can, so that there is paint (or pixels) on the entire surface of the canvas before jumping back in to work on the details. Think about the basic forms, how light and shadow works on those basic forms, and try to break down the complex forms into those simpler forms. Render them accordingly, THEN add detail.
I also reminded him that it is crucial that he starts detailing at the center of interest first, usually the face. Get that nice and tight and correct, and let everything else be subordinate to it. This way, if you had to stop at any point in the process, the piece will have a level of finish to it.
When I arrived home, I decided to challenge myself to the same standard. Could I create a four-hour illustration, following the exact same advise I just gave? I sat down and this is what I created.
After exploring different compositions through a series of quick sketches, I quickly rendered the line art in pencil, scanned it in and started painting digitally. I separated my values, blocked in colors, kept everything pretty flat, as I worked into the composition, knowing I would stop myself after four hours. We had some cool Photoshop brushes we just downloaded that I used and I brought in some scanned textures to add to painting. After four and a half hours (so I went over a little, I blame the dog in the corner, it wasn’t in my original concept sketch), I saved the final file and called it finished.
The piece is inspired by the fond memories of growing up with a trampoline in suburbia Aurora, with four brothers and lots of neighborhood friends. It is titled “Rise Above It”.
