Current Projects & Milestones

carlossketches

Hello Everyone,

I wanted to start a cheerleading area for everyones projects. Pretty simple. Write down what you are working on and then give us updates as you reach milestones.

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." -Laozi

bharris

Nice idea! I guess I'll go first. Working on laying down tone for the Dec 3rd Thursday. This is my first time working with this painting structure and my first time working in Photoshop. I'm watching the classes as I go and putting a lot of new knowledge into practice!

carlossketches

@bharris What does "laying down tone" mean? First time using Photoshop!! That sounds like a Milestone to me, congrats!!

Rob Smith

@carlossketches Great idea!

Bobby Aquitania

@carlossketches " laying down tone " is one of the 10 Steps of Will Terry's Digital Painting course. He does it doing grey scale in the picture over all before he colors it, much like old master oil painters did this with the technique known as Grisaille which Will admits to in the video...

carlossketches

@Bobby-Aquitania Thank you for the explanation. Oh yes, I've seen other artists do that.

Bobby Aquitania

You're very welcome Carlos, actually it was the one thing I discovered at the end of my day yesterday... I spent the whole day doing color tests over my inked drawing, and realized in the end, it was missing tone, which I was trying to create with color. Which is possible, but harder to do... And I've worked that way in the past, it just never occurred to me to do it in the style I was trying to create.

By the end of the day I was exhausted, but had reached the conclusion that tone was what I had to add this morning. And wouldn't you know it worked like a charm. So my final will have a layer of grey tone, and then I will color overlay the color in on top of that, and finally add the whitest highlights on top of the entire piece.

I'm pretty excited that it worked. The style is easy to do, and fun, and I finally feel like my piece is working.

So many great artists here, you wonder if the style you want to use is good enough to compete. But I think the main goals of 3rd Thursday are problem solving, and fun of course, winning the free course is just gravy! I am capable of a more painted look, but that style is a long process for me, that I mostly apply to concept art, portraits or superhero work.

For Children's Book Illustration, I prefer the whimsy of a simpler style... well one I am hoping to become more adept at. In the end when in doubt, listen to @Will Terry, he knows what he's talking about... The 10 Step Digital Painting course, and his course on Mixed Media are game changers!

carlossketches

Project: First 3rd Thursday
Project: First Digital Painting

Milestone: Started painting in Affinity Photo App

Lynn Larson

Awesome idea Carlos! Here are my current projects..

December 3rd Thursday
Art for my brother's Kickstarter that hasnt started yet
Illustration for my mom - she wants something that can be turned into a skin for her computer. She said the words every artist hates - "Oh, just draw me something"

carlossketches

Milestone: After about 6 hours finished my first digital painting!! I've got a lot to learn.

Ace Connell

I'm going to try and do a caricature portrait, then paint it digitally but by using the Dutch Flemish technique as close as possible that some of the masters used to use with oils. I just want a super traditional look from it but all digital and on one layer.

Ace

carlossketches

@Ace-Connell sounds interesting!! keep us posted

amberwingart

Great idea! I've got a couple of projects I'm trying to get the energy to start, but I'm finding it really difficult to get myself to pick up my pencils for the last 2 weeks - I feel like I'm in a slump. So anyway, here goes: one project is a donation drawing for a little girl who volunteers for an animal shelter whose building just burned down last week, killing 50 dogs and cats who were inside. She was especially close to one of the cats and one of the dogs, so I'm going to do a drawing for her of them dancing together in a forest (she taught her dog friend how to dance before she died)... The other project is another donation drawing of the 50 furkids who died in the fire - it's for the rescue...My work is whimsical & I think the highly emotional nature of these projects is making it tough. Sorry to be a bummer everyone!

carlossketches

@amberwingart great projects. wondering what's keeping you in the slump? my advice is keep a schedule even if it's just 15 min a day of sketching/drawing/brainstorming. be consistent even when you don't feel like it.

keep us posted!!

amberwingart

@carlossketches That's a good idea - I'll give that a try!

Katrina Fowler

Current Projects:

3rd Thursday project (December)
Marco Bucci critique one Illustration (Due Jan 9th)
Local SCBWI critique 5 Illustrations (Due Jan 23rd)
Slam out 10 - 20 portfolio worthy illustrations (Feb-April)
Create stunning portfolio for conference (Due May1st)

Milestones:

Painted (traditionally) 10 pieces in 1 month for Portland's 'Big 500' show.
Sold nearly $1000 of paintings a local show.
Approached by writer to illustrate her up coming book series.

carlossketches

@Katrina-Fowler Lots on your plate!! Keep us posted.

Congrats on your milestones!! Do you prefer working in traditional or digital mediums? $1K in sales, that's awesome. That's one of my goals to make $1000 a month from my art. I think it's gonna be a while but baby steps should get me there. So cool about the potential comic book series. Round of applause for you!!

Dulcie

@Katrina-Fowler Great achievements, you must be so pleased. I've signed up for the Marco Bucci critique session too, should be good!

Current projects:
Designing wedding-themed papers
Painting for Marco Bucci critique

My next sort-of milestone for painting, is to sort out my edge control. I have a tendency to use soft brushes a lot and I get fuzzy edges, I then have to fix it afterwards. I think I could do a lot better when laying down colour. I don't know if that's a bit vague but hoping to improve there anyway.

Stephanie Hider

Current projects:
Finish 3rd Thursday
Paint at least 20 images that are children orientated before the 23rd of Jan. there is a critique locally here for SCBWI
Get actionable poses and expressions down
Finish up all of the courses currently offered here
Create leave behind sheet/postcard and business cards for illustration vs my design ones now

Milestones:
Created a separate space from my design portfolio to house a blog of my illustrations in progress or complete
Finished 8 courses here
Created a drawing or painting daily for weeks, the first time in 20 years