late inktober drawings, 60 s gestures and Bammes studies

here's a greyskale sketch done for fun and trying to implement the composition knowledge I hope I gained in the last couple a days

hey guys,

i needed a break from the anatomy so i tackled the other big issue i suck at: composition. So I did some composition studies of old masters (mostly Bierstadt and Bougereau) and tried to simplify some landscapes.

Also I did a 15 min color sketch where I wanted to test out some of the principles I read about here: http://muddycolors.blogspot.de/2012/08/composition-basics-value-structure.html

It is the one below with the colums and the jungle theme (not the one with the arc, that was a photo-study). The main goal was to creat a simple 3 or 4 value composition and then NOT loose it while dropping in some color and light.

Another thing I studied was painting fleshtones. There was a great post about that over at muddycolors too http://muddycolors.blogspot.de/2015/10/a-reoccurring-question-about-painting.html

I also applied a method of studying I found for myself some while ago. Instead of looking at the ref while painting, I look at it for a while, then hide it and paint what I remember. This way I feel like I have to be more concious and don't just go through the motions of copying. The result can be a bit more disappointing, but I feel like it helps me. And lastly I tried to do the copy starting with blue, yellow, red, black and white and mixing my colors on the photoshop canvas. That way I had to think more in terms of temperature and primary, secondary and tertiary colors.

and I am still working on the crest for the green faction. I am not happy with it, too much of a swastika going on here :(

I am currently learning mostly anatomy and figure drawing, since that is my weakest spot at the moment. I can recommend reading through Bammes, not only for the anatomical knowledge but also for his advice on sketching and drawing. I got me a copy of this: http://www.boesner.com/buecher/buecher/zeichnen-und-skizzieren/zeichenschule and I like it a lot, although his German is sometimes hard to understand. I really have to concentrate or none of the informations sticks to my brain...

Cheers,
Flo

Evil, soul consuming killer-robots

And here is the crest for the faction.

I can totally recommend doing these crests, when you design a race for a game. It helped me to ask the right questions about the design. What is the race about? What adjectives are fitting? How can I show these things with form and color? From here it should be easier to develop the other units.