Dream Portfolio/ How to Discover Your Style class

megpadgett

@Elinore-Eaton This is a really great analysis, and something I have on my to-do list as well. It's such a straight forward, valuable exercise!

Keep it up!

Heather Boyd

@Elinore-Eaton

I am in the process of doing this as well. You have many works and you will get where you want to be soon enough.

This is a really great analysis! I thought of an artist you might like when I was looking through your dream portfolio: Kay Nielsen. Also a Golden Age illustrator, so I think his work is right up your alley.

NessIllustration

Here's another observation from your dream portfolio work: a lot of texture going on! All the images in your dream portfolio really rock the dreamy texture which I think helps a lot in giving it that ethereal look you seem to favor. In your own portfolio, your traditional illustrations have that too but your digital ones do not! Your images 2,3 and 4 specifically really seam to stick out in comparison to your other illustrations and to your dream portfolio. They have a very clean and polished digital look to them.

Elinore Eaton

@Alicja-W Oh yes! I LOVE Kay Neilson. I also love Arthur Rackham and Ivan Bilibin, and it was interesting doing this assignment and really considering style and their work, I realized that the heavy lean on line work with those guys I think reduces a soft dreamy quality that I'm realizing I really personally like creating. For me, it also flattens the images in a way that makes it harder to make light and dark the star of the show, which I am realizing is something Iove doing.
Such a valuable part of doing this exercise was looking at a lot of work I love and have loved for a long time, but distinguishing whether or not it's something I want to emulate, of what parts of a style I like, and why. So, I'd almost like to take some of Arthur Rackham, Kay Nielson, and Ivan Biliban illustrations and "paint them in your own style" without the heavy line work and with more focus on lighting...could be a neat exercise.

Elinore Eaton

@NessIllustration Ooooo, thank you for the observation! It's interesting the images that you are comparing are my oldest in the bunch (2, 3, 4) and my newest (the King Arthur paintings.) I have fallen in love with how other artists use texture, and I think I'm trying to figure out how that is going to work for me.
I'm definitely going through a struggle in style between medium and wether or not to lean more heavily on digital or traditional. <Le Sigh>

NessIllustration

@Elinore-Eaton I don't think you necessarily have to choose, you can do both traditional and digital I find that they kind of feed each other, traditional teaches me about digital and digital teaches me about traditional! You can also incorporate some of those textures you like in your digital work, without having to switch to traditional.

Elinore Eaton

@NessIllustration I'm glad you think so! I think I can do both too, just need to find the right balance and keep the style consistent. I'm looking forward to exploring more and getting it dialed down. I find I do one for a while and then the other, and as I hop back and forth they always inform and help eachother get better. Like huge leaps in improvement in one after I hang out in the other for a while. So, I think you are right.
I'm curious how you think I might incorporate the textures more in the digital. You mean like scanning watercolor textures in, and using those in digital, or emulating those kind of textures straight through with digital?

NessIllustration

@Elinore-Eaton Both are possible, it really depends how you like to work. I use a lot of watercolor textures and brushes in my digital work (since in the traditional realm, watercolor is my medium of choice). But I've seen a lot of artists use textured brushes in the digital paintings (it's very common to see this in children illustration, actually). Some of the examples from your dream portfolio are digital after all, and they have texture. I really like Kyle Webster's brushes (free to download with Creative Cloud), he has a great range of pastel, chalk, oil, pencil, watercolor, etc.

Elinore Eaton

@NessIllustration Cool, thanks for your insights!
Love Kyle brushes too.