First

Hey! I have been getting into oil painting lately and I just love it. Plus the cool thing about it is- even though it's considered old school (b/c of digital painting) it  reinforces new techniques that I use all the time digitally. A must try for any devoted artist. This is my first portrait attempt.

A good Habit

So I was working on some projects this week as normal when I actually got a chance to do some  personal work.  Besides design, illustrating (and painting) is my second favorite aspects of art. So I thought it would be beneficial to mention a tool that I use over ,and over again that helps me with projects.  For those of you who have been drawing alone time you probably know what a turnaround is. However, if you don't, let me show you.

This is a turnaround for a children's illustration I am working on. As you can see it's just a rough drawing of a character concept from all the  view points in which you might see the character. It's really easy to do because once you have the front view- form there  you can imagine what the other angles will look like. Plus if you need a little help  developing the concept you can always draw guide lines highlighting certain parts of the body such as the hip, shoulders, etc... This is good practice because it helps you be more creative with your character concepts and reinforce drawing characters standing which is something the artist uses almost 70% of the time with slight variations (such as arms or head turning).

Here is another turnaround for a more adult project I am working on. Once when you get this down pack, and  have more time, you can remove the line working and develop the values more for a painterly effect! So, as you can see this is a good habit to get into doing before each project and is a must anytime you plan to draw the same character for a story more that once. Try it out!