Dragon Portraits

The past month or so I've gone easy on myself and have been doing small projects for fun and trying new techniques. Like this dragon sketch I did for the Inktober challenge. Why? Because dragons.

A little process:

http://justicedraws.tumblr.com/

"Something That Never Comes"

In the distance I searched,

In a place where there was only emptiness.

A vast land filled with fog and broken dreams.

I sacrificed my search of hope to at least find sadness,

But found nothing.

I was embraced by the chasm of depression,

Happiness polluted by hollow words.

Footsteps that could no longer be lifted off of the ground and knees that have grown roots,

I was lost,

Nobody came to my aid,

Instead I was left to weep for an eternity as I searched for infinity,

I dipped my hands into love and only felt what it is to be broken,

I am lost.

I have chosen to forget emotion,

Give up attachments and plea for nothing.

I have taken refuge in isolation because it is the only love in which whom has not fully destroyed me.

Isolation is my only guarantee, and you,

You told me I could find you in the midst of these times,

But I have long forgotten life in my search through poignancy,

Looking for another answer besides that nothing will come.

Hope belongs to us all,

But it was stolen by manic disbelief, dismembered and left in areas where creatures now lurk. In places we once found beauty and are now too afraid to go.

Incapable of progression due to the comfort of isolation, we can’t be hurt if we have nothing left to give nor can we be hurt if we have nothing left to be taken.

I yearned that I could find an emotion that is somehow connected to forgiveness,

But as I search through these limitless planes,

I have forgotten what hope was.

Forgotten what my search entails and have embraced the only understanding that I am assured.

Who Am I?! - A Post About Style

Hello, good people of Blogger / art lovers! You haven't heard from me on the blog before, so a quick introduction: I'm Marissa. I graduated from CCAD last May (hard to believe it's been nearly a year) and have been working on the Creative Services team at Victoria's Secret as their illustrator for about 8 months now. I also moonlight as a freelance graphic designer. Needless to say, I've kept quite busy and haven't had much time for personal art. Which is why I thought I'd make my blog debut more discussion-based.

Let's get the ball rolling with a few thoughts about style. Let's start with how you get it.

Step 1: Go through an identity crisis. If you're in school, at some point you will likely end up in the fetal position on your floor because you think you don't have "style." You don't know who you want to be as an artist, and you don't know what the hell you're going to do about it. But this identity crisis is a rite of passage for creatives. If you never go through this stage, you'll never evolve or grow as an artist. Cherish this mental breakdown, y'hear?!

Step 2: Before you figure out what your art is, figure out who you are. I had the identity crisis in my junior year. Up until then, I was completing assignments in a purely academic style. But somewhere along the line, it got harder to solve creative problems. Making art wasn't even fun anymore because I spent more time trying to figure out what style I wanted to work in than I spent executing the art. What helped me figure out what kind of art I should be making was visually mapping out a chart of myself--my likes and dislikes, and all the things from childhood that influenced me. It helped me realize that I love all things humorous, people & animals, and pop-culture. I also made a list of artists whose work I admired (Peter de Seve, Carter Goodrich, Bobby Chiu). I realized then that everything I loved could be summed up by one word: Character. After that, I decided to base my work off of characters and incorporate humor into everything I did. 

Here's my chart:

If you think you don't have style, think again. Your style has always been there. It's the way you make marks on the page with your pencil, pen, stick, whatever. It's how you lay down paint with your square brushes, your rounds, your filberts. It's your color choices. Subject matter. Where you make the light source in your compositions. I promise you that you already have it. Just do some digging.

Steal it 'til you feel it. If you still insist that you don't know what your style is, steal it. Now, I hope you didn't hear that as "go make shitty rip-offs" or "steal with malicious intent." I mean in your own private time, try doing some studies. Do you like Rockwell? Try painting a head study by him. Or anyone else you like. Chances are, by painting or drawing like someone else, you'll pick up on a new technique they did, and if you like it, you can incorporate it into your own work. And once again, please don't make shitty rip-offs. I speak for the whole art community when I say this: We're not dumb; we will know where it came from, and we'll secretly (or publicly) hate you for it. 

Switch brushes. Sometimes when you're stuck, all you need to do is switch brushes. If you've been using a round all your life, pick up a square. If you like a pencil, trade it in for an ink pen, maybe even with a brush tip. Try switching medias entirely. I used to draw only in pencil, and worked very tightly and accurately. I took a watercolor class in my junior year that forced me to work more freely and not worry about erasing mistakes. Ultimately, it helped me loosen up, develop a more painterly style, and leave behind my fear of laying down color.

Make terrible art. Get the crap out of the way. Make some really lousy artwork. You have to go through the process of making things terrible before you can expect to produce anything good.

Know the basics first. This is something I feel very strongly about. I'm a firm believer in knowing how to draw something objectively and accurately before you experiment with exaggeration and stylized shapes. Before you stylize something, you still need to know the rules: how light behaves, what colors go well with each other, etc. etc. A while back, I watched this amazing video of Picasso painting. Lots of people think he just couldn't draw realistically. What they don't realize is that he painted things realistically first, and then painted over them in his stylized manner. Like him or not, he really was a master and knew what he was doing. So be a sponge. Soak up all the information and learn how to be a good representative artist first. Then you can march to the beat of your own drum.

I'm going to stop here tonight because it's getting late at night here, and there's just so much more to cover! For a future post on Style, I'd like to address a few more questions, like:

• What happens to my style when I start working for someone? Do I get to keep it? Do I have to give it up?
• Is it okay if someone asks me to work in the style of another artist?
• Is it better to have one style, or many styles? 

A final note for tonight's post: I was watching Zoolander tonight and realized that finding your style is kind of like Zoolander finally being able to turn left and reveal his "Magnum" look at the end of the movie, which is the best thing he's ever done. Some of you might actually have this amazing "Aha!" moment when you find your style. The clouds will part, etc., and you will scream, "THERE IT IS!!!" For others, it will evolve a bit more slowly. But in the end, it will all lead to your very best work. It will be beautiful! 

For your enjoyment, the glorious Zoolander clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx9O6q0pDAU&t=0m40s 

Poignant Existence - Final

 

Poignant Existence - Travis Hayes

I'm happy to say that, I'm finished with this piece! Due to traveling, commissions, and other random events. I've stared at this piece much too long. But Overall, I'm happy with the results. Due to prior posts I wont go into detail of progress or anything of that matter. This piece, along with future pieces will be partnered with poetry where you can find on my website: www.travishayesillustration.com

Also, I think that I've decided that this will be my last piece done entirely in Photoshop. I feeling of holding a brush is something I miss oh-too much.

Justice Drawings

Fishin' 2013

The past few months since summer ended have been interesting to say the least. I moved back home, visited NYC frequently, went to a lot of art events (Illuxcon, Art Out Loud, etc.), met more great artists, started drawing and practicing a lot more and got an internship with a studio back in Columbus for the new year.

In October I took part in a drawing challenge created by Jake Parker called Inktober. Every day of the month of Inktober October hundreds of artists would do a drawing in ink. Every. Day. I chose to do it to improve, grow and form positive habits because that is what it was all about. Here are a few of the drawings that came out of it:

Smaug (Not from Inktober but fit the subject-matter) 

Things slowed down during the holiday season and I stopped working on personal projects I set out for myself. Now that I have an internship with a possible full-time job lined up I can start again with a pair of fresh eyes on the work I have.

Next post I make will be about all my personal projects that involved robots and other industrial works from the past year that need finishing. Keep on making kick-ass work everyone.

-Justice
justicedraws.tumblr.com

Poignant Existance - Beauty in Darkness

Happy new years. O.O

Hopefully everyone gets a great start to their year and it is full of many successes. The key to that is, work hard. And.. "Photo references, photo references, photo references" E. Fortune/Chris Payne.

For this piece, I've had a bit of a round-about time. Originally, I had wanted to do a quick, simple study in reference to Chinese paintings. As I did the thumbnails, I had wanted to focus on more of the concept and the idea of doing a traditional painting.

The idea behind this piece originally started as someone in a place that does not really exist (limbo, I suppose) while grasping on to the last feeling left . While brainstorming, I realized that it's a difficult task to objectify an emotion to hold on to - so doing what I tend to do... I used dying/growing plants as emotional references. =] The flower being held will be the last living/colorful flower, while the rest will be muted/withering.

While working on the traditional piece though, I had made a few mistakes that I wasn't too fond of and realized that I didn't fully think of everything and had jumped the gun a bit too quickly due to excitement of being able to touch brushes again here in China. (Not showing photos of that..)

Another issue that I tend to run into is, it is hard for me to fully plan a piece. Which is why I think that I work better in photoshop for the time being. I enjoy being able to move small things around, turn and adjust, add and take away as I'm working on it. For this piece in particular, I get to figure out how many flowers/rocks I want as I finish everything as a whole instead of having to plan every rock, which isn't always the most fun. && Along with this, if I do decide to adjust the color back to the typical brown feel of traditional Chinese pieces/make a variant version, photoshop makes it a much easier task until I'm confident enough for those long term traditional commitments.

During the process, I feel that it's nice to step back, turn the painting around (which is done frequently), and figure out what needs to be done. I like to take notes while working so that I'm able to remember/be as nit picky as I need to so I understand how much I have left to do.

Lastly, I think that it's nice to keep a mood board around. It helps me remember that these other people are amazing artists, and my work needs to fit into the mood board and not show a lack of quality.

So, to 2014.. I wish you all the best. To making art /raises glass\.

P.S. -- I agree with Luis, the lack of being around creatives is tough. So, thank you all for this blog & let's make history. I am humbled <3