Copernicus

I recently flew up to Savannah, GA to visit my best friend for her birthday. And thanks to procrastination and World of Warcraft I stayed up all night packing before my flight and went sleep deprived the whole first day of visiting.

Amazingly enough, I discovered that the secret to productivity is simply "not to sleep." And here I thought artists lost sleep because they were too busy being creative. It's actually the other way around. Silly me. ^^

So here's one of the things I scribbled out in my sketch book while chilling in the costume department at SCAD. 

This is a redesign of my character Copernicus. He was the second character I ever made and needed an overhaul from his early Pokemon-influenced design. His body structure is mostly based off of a goat.

Hugable gryphons are hugable.

I recently updated the website with a painting of a couple of cuddlefaced Wrennec gryphons. So to continue the darble trend, here's a commissioned sketch of a Sparrow/Bunny Gryph.

Bunny feets are so BAWWW!

Happy Holidays! :D

Even though I skipped a year this is turning into an annual thing. :) I like making paper ornaments that everyone can print and share. It means my Yule gifts aren't limited by my workload or the names on my card list.

2010 was a hard year for a lot of people. Here's hoping for a better 2011! :)

Jackalope Show coming up!

JACKALOPE SHOW @ Stage84

9118 W State Rd 84, Davie, FL

Working on a new piece for the up and coming Jackalope Show! My theme will be a 'Prehistoric Jackalope based on an extinct specie of antelope that is said to have resembled a rabbit.

 Some past Jackalope sketches:

Mangrove walker sketch.

I imagine them as very large slow moving and gentle, filter feeders.

Dragon sketches

The greatest creatures that ever lived (in our hearts). It thrills me to see how Dragon artwork has evolved and grown since the internet. :)

Researching mythological creatures.

 I felt like talking about something that I find to be a crucial step in painting believable fantasy art. It's something that I know a lot of people (including myself) are guilty of skipping over.

Research.  

It may seem silly to have to research for a fantasy painting.  But keep in mind that even if the subject isn't real, it still has a whole lot of grounding in reality. You'd be amazed at all of the little details and nuances that can be over looked when working strictly from your imagination. Not only realistic lighting and  believable anatomy, but details that make up the character itself. Especially when dealing with subject matter from folklore and mythologies. There is usually a lot of history to characters from stories. These histories are what give characters their personality and make up who they are. And these things that should be hinted at in the art representing them. I'll use my sketch of Melusine as an example of the method of research I prefer to go with:

- First I read up on everything I can on the subject matter. I check all sources of media, from the internet to books and movies. Be more careful with movies though, as they tend to stray from the source material a bit too far in order to hit a certain rating or appeal to a broader audience.

- Then, I sketch out my idea. The mermaid picture to the left was my first sketch after reading up on the story of Melsuine. I knew she was a mermaid in disguise who liked her privacy in the bath, but until I had gone back a re-read the story I had forgotten that she gave birth to mutant children. That ended up adding to the composition of the piece, with the portrait of her family.

- After having the general idea of what I want to paint, including everything I felt was important about this character, I go back to the research and do life drawings and sketches based on the features of the character or creature. I looked up what types of snakes were local to the country the story belonged to as reference for her tails. I even got in the bathtub and took a reference photo in the pose of the sketch in order to understand the proper anatomy and how lighting would play off the character. (The painting was never finished, but the research is all still there if I ever find the time to go back to it.)


Fantasy art is one of those subjects that gives us artists a lot of creative freedom. But keep in mind that the more realistic you can make your imaginary world, the easier it is for your viewers to find themselves able to believe it. :)

Centaurs & Flying Monkeys

Messing with some centaur designs.

I like the idea of them having multi-toe hooves. It makes sense to me that they'd have at least four toes on their feet if they have five fingers on their hands. After all, a centaur isn't just a human glued to a decapitated horse at the waistline. It's a whole species.

*steps down from her soap box*

 X-posted from Deviantart:

The Spot-nosed F-monkey is one of the lesser known species of Flying Monkey. Though, due to their naturally calm demeanor, they are very hand friendly and easy to train. Their popularity in the pet trade should start to pick up with the help of good breeding programs making them more widely available across the country.

Meet Knuk

I wanted to make a gryphon character of my own to play with Sage's gryphon character Jhator on the Totemlands Forum.


He's still a sketch for now, but you get the idea. Fleshing him out will be the fun part. I will use reference for the actual character sheet so his wings actually look like hornbill wings and such. :p