The War of the Worlds

It's a bank holiday weekend! A lot of my friends were heading out to get drunk, but not me. No, sir! I spent the weekend with my face in Photoshop (again). I like to spend my free time as a Digital Artist ;) So for me it was Digital Art weekend!!

Often when I sit up Photoshopping through the night I end up listening to Jeff Waynes - The War of the Worlds. So, I wanted to design a photo illustration as my own piece of fan art. Here's the outcome :)

The designs of the tripods came from a different photo illustration that I completed a couple of years ago. Originally the characters were called Roborgs. They're an inquisitive martian race who are wandering our planet and researching. But for this weekends artwork I turned them into the violent martians from the War of the Worlds.

Here's the process shots.

01: Take photo of Thames river. Try to place recognisable, iconic landmark in the background.

02: Generate HDR of photograph and push contrast/saturation levels to create a more illustrated feel.

03: Sketch loose ideas onto the photo. Work out best character placings to create a comfortable composition.

04: Remove photo and begin illustrating and finalising the design of the character. 

05: Continue the same process for the remaining characters.

06: Complete the first layer of colouring. Select colours that complement the original photo.

07: Second layer of colouring is to add colour gradients, creating a sense of weight and dimension to the characters.

08: Composite the illustration with the photograph by adding shadows where the characters come in contact with the objects in the photo and adding the same grimy textures to the characters. 

09: Add natural light to the illustration and colour correct the entire image. I went for a slight sepia tone to give the image an aged look.

10: The complete image. Finer details have been incorporated into the image and typography used for the iconic title. 

Cinema 4D - Beginnings

This weekend I decided to learn a 3D package. I've always admired other artists 3D work and wanted to learn a software package well enough that I could integrate 3D into my own work from now on. I've chosen to learn Cinema 4D because it runs natively on mac, but more importantly because its nice to look at, has a tidy layout and seems more friendly for designers. I thought that Maya and 3DS Max looked a bit too nerdy.

I spent most of day one (Saturday) studying google and youtube for tutorials on how to navigate my way around Cinema 4D. I learned a lot about modelling and stopped there. Next I'll learn texturing and lighting. After spending the day studying I walked away with this.

It's nothing to shout about, but it was encouraging to see this after one day of effort. 

I spent most of day two (Sunday) out, but when I came home I wanted to get my head straight into Cinema 4D and see if I could create a model from scratch. I had an image in my mind that I wanted to create and this is the outcome. The model looks very similar to how I hoped it would end up. But the textures were nothing like what I hoped for. So, I really need to learn that next. I also had a few dodgy polygons that are hidden by the lighting. Overall I'm pretty impressed with how intuitive this software is and what it allowed me to achieve in two days. Back to work this week, then hopefully get some more time 3D time next weekend :)

Please find my main portfolio at www.leontyler.com 

Switchin' it up (again)

Happy weekend, everybody! This is a quick post to say that I'm changing my network around a bit. From now on my actual portfolio website can be found at:

www.concretesoldiers.com

But, this page won't become redundant and will continue to be my blog page. But, instead of just my work, I will use it to post anything and everything inspiring that I find. Expect to see a lot of music videos posted here and various art from other people. So stay tuned and please take a moment to visit my new site. Any feedback on it is welcome through the contact form!

Thanks!

Street Art: Shoreditch

Quite regularly I hit Shoreditch to check out the constantly changing street art and graffiti all over the walls. I went out this weekend with the intention of testing out a new lens I bought. But, actually ended up shooting some video. When I got home I decided to stitch the footage together and make a little Street Art / music video.. Enjoy..

Audio: The Herbaliser - Battle of Bongo Hill

This is Kitten

Another character illustration for my sticker project. For Kitten I wanted to push the detailing of my characters further than I have previously and aimed for a sexy, stylish hottie with plenty of attitude. I used to try and keep the simplicity of my characters down to quirky shapes and vibrant colours. This year I'm going to refine my colour palettes and spend more time on the finer details. I'm not really sure what a good amount of time is to complete a character like this. But, Kitten took me a day and a half to complete. 

Hopefully, once printed, she's going to *pop* from the urban environments she'll be stuck in :)

..and the process shots.

The Warrior Stance

I'm currently working on a series of characters for a sticker project. It's all about pushing my Photoshop style and getting back in the character illustration game. There's a lot of great graffiti and street art around east London. This year I'm aiming to carve my place in the scene!

..and a set of progress images.