The Totem Pole

Post time again. 

It's really getting cold outside by now over here, it's around -15 to -20 degrees Celsius and needless to say, almost too cold to start any canvas painting on the balcony. So, I'm going to take a break from the canvas projects for a bit until I get the strength to fight the coldness and pursue a new project. This gives me a good opportunity to sit on my ass and learn to master the crafts of digital art! My trial version of the Painter Lite just expired and I still haven't ordered my Painter X3 or 12 yet, so I had to download the trial version of the Painter X3 (the newest version). You can see the interface below if you are interested.

I wasn't really sure what to draw yesterday, so I thought I would take something familiar and what I usually enjoy to draw on paper. So I ended up with a totem pole which seemed to be a good choice at the time. A great thing about the Painter X3 is that it has all types of pencils (2H, 2B, 6B etc.) which is great for sketching and doodling before actually beginning your 'painting'. The Painter Lite did not have this - well, it did, but it was quite annoying to draw with meaning that it wasn't meant for actual sketching - which I didn't particularly value. Also, the real deal Painter has the lasso tool, the magic wand and a massive amount of choice in brushes (I don't find that as necessary, I usually just stick with a few key brushes like the Digital Airbrush or the Acrylics). Anyway, this is what I came up with with a quick sketch and with the beginning of coloring. 

I used my old totem pole as an example, just to see how well I could imitate it digitally taking a few liberties here and there. With the sketch I used the 2B Pencil, which worked out great for sketching and I managed to get nice fine lines which I couldn't find on the Painter Lite. I also darkened my background 'paper' color to a light grey, its just easier on the eyes.

After sketching my figure, I added a new layer and called it 'color' and began blocking in my colors and filling in the finer aspects with an Opaque Detail Brush under the Acrylics section. Also, another cool thing in X3 is that you can choose different qualities for you layer, for example, I used a gel layer which showed me the outlines of my pencil sketch (as you can see on the picture above) which turned out to be pretty useful after all. 

 Even though I had started on my colors and found a general form for my eagle, I still wasn't too satisfied with the look of the whole thing, so I added a new layer again and started modifying the shape of the blocks and what I came up with was quite different from the original. 

Here, I've started on my slightly finer details and beginning to find the form and shade I'm looking for in my totem pole.  I decided to get rid of the cat's face for now and find a new look for it that wouldn't be as cat-like and more native or something like that.. More simplistic and not 'anime' type, you know. I'm still contemplating on the whole idea, I never did get too satisfied with the coloring of my totem poles... But I'm working on it. 

Another thing I thought was cool when I wen't to hide my 'color' layer for one reason or another and I came across this here. 

I don't know why, but I found this picture or.. whatever it is, pretty cool and interesting. I hadn't even known it myself but there it was. I particularly liked the wing, don't know why. Anyway I thought I would share it since those are the little things that give you ideas to greater things. Experimenting is key to success...right?

Alright, unfortunately after this I got a bit sidetracked due to the Australian Open going on right now and you know, all that other stuff so I ended up procrastinating and not achieving much. However, I did kinda finish the other wing and added some depth to the 'torso'. Just to demonstrate where I was left off I'll add a picture below for you to see. Sadly, it's too late for me to delay my post so I won't be able to show you the final outcome. I still have the background and detail left... Check it out next week though!

Here we go. I'm too frightened to add the eyes because I can't seem to get them right by any chance. I will get there, I will... If you notice up there in the left  corner you can see that I am using the Blender Palette Knife to mix the colors together to achieve a more smooth look.

Anyway, that's all for now, get back to work.