Well...here is the finished product. All vector artwork originally and then turned to a jpeg for the web. I used an feathering effect to soften some of the edges.
Recently in digital art Category
This is another way to approach rendering. First I sketched the creature in pencil, and then scanned it, traced it with the pen tool, and started filling it with color and details. I want to try and make as 3D as possible, but my skills are still pretty limited. So, here it is so far....
This is a spilled nail polish bottle that I am rendering from scratch for my computer illustration class. I haven't been showing anything from this class because I haven't done anything worth showing. This isn't very exciting either, but I thought it would be fun to show a rendering in process.
I am using Adobe Illustrator CS2, and it is a vector based program. A vector program is unlike a pixel program (Photoshop,) because it makes paths instead of pixels. I am fairly ignorant of what that really means, but I do know that vector art can be enlarged or reduced without losing clarity. Pixel art has constant resolution problems. What you see here has been pixelated to be seen on the web. I have saved the original in vector form so I can keep working on it.
The entire illustration is made up of rectangles and elipses, except for the spill, which is just drawn by hand. I start with the big shapes first, and create a stacking order of details on top. You can see the gradient used in the top really starts to make it come alive. Let's see if I can keep it up with the bottle and the spill. of course, there is also going to be a double shadow being caste and lots of glistening highlights. You would not believe the time this takes.
I couldn't resist trying to color them. I am sure I like the black and white better, but I am a student of Photoshop and Illustrator, and I am bound and determined to learn these tools.
I am enrolled in a computer illustration class, starting next week. I am so excited to get more info, and find ways to use these programs in my work. I have so much to learn!
Here are the original drawing and the played with drawing. I opened the original this time in Illustrator. I selected it and ordered the "Live Trace" command. It took forever. I really wanted to color it, but it was in a black and white mode(I haven't figured out why), and because everything took forever,(the file is HUGE), I gave up trying to change it to color and ended up with that gray tone. Then I thought, "OOOOO, nice! I'll throw it into photo shop and use white brush strokes on top of the gray! fun!
Then, I opened the drawing in photoshop and added some gray tones....
Using various brushes with different opacities, I can play around with the original drawing.
I am enjoying trying to find ways to keep my digital art "warm." I have often found lots of digitally created art to be very slick and sometimes too cold for my taste. I am not a slick illustrator in any media, so, it is my challenge to find ways to keep my art looking like it is hand done.