Long time no journal!

Yeah sorry for that, probably contributing to my gallery dropping off the face of the earth a bit.

This semester begins my senior year at CCS and it's amazing. Senior studio is when the real juices flow and nothing is better. My current portfolio will be a mixture of illustrations concentrating on background elements and will then evolve into concept art. One of the suggestions the class made is that if I am going to stick my head above the sea of digital artists that do characters and such, then do the work they don't do as often, such as backgrounds. So this begs the question, how can you give scenery as much character as a character?

Syd Mead visited our school last semester and his artwork is stunning in person. Details so fine that you have to get two inches from the gouache painting to see them. His images are very playful and his color and perspective are spot on. What he told us is that when you want to make a world believable, you have to believe in the world you are making. How can you accomplish this? Well, what do the peoples in your world use? Small personal items and such can create a more convincing world. What do the common people wear? What is in fashion? Where do they live, what are the resources and what do they do in their spare time? All these questions you can ask yourself and then translate them into your stories and your illustrations.

Imperfections are important too, having things glossy and beautiful is nice, but imperfections create reality.

Let's chat about art 'n shit.

-Toni