Welcome back my dear readers, thanks for coming back for more updates on my artistic journey.
After learning how to draw for 4 years, I still keep exploring unusual ways to paint artwork and not quite settle with a particular art style yet. I'm finding the exploration process extremely entertaining somehow! Here is how I'm playing with art on a daily basis:
It all comes from randomness! For instance, I decided to pick just one "strange" brush from the recently released "Fall 2022" brushes of Kyle Webster in Photoshop to do a daily figure painting practice. It turned out weird for sure yet fascinating to me.
I like how graphical this looks with the white border around the artwork and the look of the "Jungle Gym" brush stamp (like a logo).
Whenever I spot a cool reference image, I immediately go to HeavyPaint to play with it. I personally like how painting in HeavyPaint can give me interesting abstract results. In this app, I don't draw with lines, but with shapes and colors instead. It has easiest and fastest way to do a whole painting using lasso tools, which can take quite an effort in Photoshop. Somehow, this frees up my mind and opens more possibilities. There are no layer blend modes like most software, so I have to thank my Fine Art training days as they provide me the ability to pick colors straight from color wheels to paint lights and shadows in one layer only!
Only one drawback now with HeavyPaint is the lack of a selection tool to move a particular area of my artwork. That's why this app (at this point in time) is good for plein-air painting or panting based on an art model or a reference photo because it's not that forgiving (just like real paints) when it comes to shorten and lengthen an arm, for example, during the painting process.
Did I tell you I'm really into magical stuff? That's why stuff like "Avatar: The Last Airbender" was among my favorite animations. Coincidently, Kan Liu is making "water-blending" characters. This clicks to me so much that I'm learning from his tutorials on Patreon now. This helps transition my Fine Art painting skills into a more approachable art style. His art, in my opinion, is a perfect combination of anime and realism.
I'm following his 8-hour timelapse video to learn how to paint the "Kan Liu" way. This is just the result of the first 2 hours of the video, yet it has made me feel so pleasant!
Meanwhile, I was watching Lycoris Recoil is on Netflix and I really impressed with the way Takina made her entrance. Thus, here comes my fan art of "Gun Blazing Takina" in HeavyPaint.
I came up with this pose in Photoshop before going to have fun painting in HeavyPaint and coming back again to Photoshop to throw more random adjustment for fun. This is why I love painting process (digitally or traditionally). It's that freedom and randomness I love so much!
While I do enjoy lots of colors and textures variations in my painting, I'm also trying to do a flat coloring anime art style with mostly the classic hard/soft round brush in Photoshop for a change.
It was such a nice change to do this kind of artwork. It was tricky at first because I have to rely a lot more on drawing clean line art to make this style truly work.
By the way, I've just got Painter 2023 at an insanely discount price this Cyber Monday (only 99 USD for the one-time payment to upgrade from Painter 2022). I'm glad I did not pay 429 USD to buy it at full price as it's basically like a whole month salary of a typical office job here in Vietnam. Thank to Wesley Gardner's tips on his YouTube channel, I got a whole bundle of the Painter 2022, After Shot Pro 3, Paint Shop Pro 2022 and other mini stuff from the Humble Bundle's charity sale for only 30 USD in October. What a magical deal indeed! So, please keep an eye out for next year's October at Humble Bundle's sale because it may happen again.
Anyways, thanks for reading my blog each month, my dear readers! Have fun with your journeys!