I have been drawing for as long as I can remember. This is the reason I became a designer. I feel my skills as an illustrator has made me a better designer. Below are few projects I've worked on. I used all Photoshop to make these digital paintings.
Illustration is one of the most difficult disciplines around. People will acknowledge this but few actually know the training someone has to go through to achieve a mastery of the subject. And even with a mastery of the subject, it does not mean there is much much more to learn. Every time I have illustrated something, I learned something new. Working within Photoshop gives me even more tools to work with. For those not in the know, using Photoshop would seem like cheating. I can say, it’s far from cheating. Much like a painter’s brush, Photoshop is a tool. I cannot call a mechanic a cheater for using a wrench because he doesn’t choose to turn a nut with his bare hands. I am always learning, and I will never stop learning. Illustration has taught me to always be humble, to always be a student.
One of the funnest challenges for me is designing a character. Not only does it entail more thinking then say painting a portrait, but it requires planning and forward thinking. Each aspect of the character must be integral to his personality and his personality should tell a story. This should be conveyed in the final painting.
Technically this painting is finished. To achieve a photographic look, I broke the painting into 3 layers, red, green and blue. I moved the red and blue layers one pixel to the left and right, respectively to achieve pseudo chromatic aberration; this is usually a flaw found in camera lenses that causes different spectrums of light to shift. I then proceeded to add some noise, thus mimicking a printed photo. This trick is very subtle, but very effective.
I find it helpful to start off a character design with thumbnails. I limit myself to about 1 minute per thumbnail and try to move quickly. Its a great way to get the mind going before deciding on a final character design. I usually go back to these thumbnails and finish other characters I found intriguing.
By this stage, I've chosen 3 characters enhance. Most of the detail should be chosen and laid out.
This is the final stage, the Character should be rendered.
I always felt I was influenced by Star Trek in this rendering. I went ahead and added another character and was quite happy with the final result.
