Not Resting On Laurels

I have not been completely slack in my art making. If anything, I've turned on the afterburner.
I post to deviantArt or Tumblr far more frequently, check those out if you haven't yet.

The situation at the day job has gone from bad to worse. The part time job has turned full-time as far as hours go, but without the benefits of such. My calculations show I have made less than minimum wage for November. Not sure whether night shifts will earn a higher salary, we'll see when the pay slip comes in on the 10th, I guess.

All this extra work is leading to a lot of stress and fatigue, but I realized that making more art is my best bet to get out of it, so I've decided to dedicate an additional half hour or so a day to it. I've learned that giving myself small goals such as that is the best way to stay motivated and working.

Been using the time to model an airplane / spaceship design I came up with for the back of a new batch of business cards. Started with some speed paints to visualize the idea, moved on to silhouettes and found a retro-futuristic design I liked, fleshed it out some more, tried different patterns on it, and taken it to 3DS Max.
I got the basic shape down, and I'm currently working on the hanger environment for it to sit in, but might came back to refine the shape once I see how the lights work on it.

  For my speed paints, I decided that after a year's worth of them, it would be worth while to do studies from my growing photo library, with the occasional completely imginative work.
A few favorites:

I need to get back to art

GDC Europe and Gamescom did not disappoint. Met friends from last year, made a few new ones. Showed my portfolio around, exchanged business cards, expanded my Linkedin network and came home with plenty of swag.

Already planning on how next year will be better. I need a bigger bag for all the freebies, might try to contact people ahead and see if I can score more free stuff - the kind that goes to the media and business guys. My feet will and back will be sore, but there isn't much I can do there.

It's been super busy at work since I returned. Only 2 operators to cover 2 shifts per day, people on vacation because of the holiday, a secretary that was so fed up with the way she was treated she quit and with new stores coming in with teething problems, I haven't had time to do more than the daily speed paints.

Hope the new operator is integrated quickly and I'll have some time to work on my own projects.

I may even take the advice I was given and try to freelance, or do some pro bono illustration... We'll see.

The sensor ship didn't quite make it into the portfolio. I mainly blame the extreme perspective. At least I got a nice background out of it.

Enough chatter, time for the speed paint update:

ANSC Trade Counter Front Rev. 1

Finally got critique on these cards, which I kept at the back of my mind, but had to open and take a look to remember what she was commenting on. No.2 one, with 1 at a close second. I agree with the choice, I think the art nouveau style fits well with the concept, and would be a good challenge. I'm already seeing things I want to change, and I will work on the back as well.

I'm also going to sneak into the Susanna Dickinson museum in the mornings. My sketches are still being passed around and reviewed, but I need to familiarize myself with the idiosyncrasies of Blender.

Austin Nature & Science Center Trade Counter card sketches

I volunteer at the ANSC, been watering the trees every Monday morning for the past month or so.
Of course, my main reason for starting was to help out with the art/design/software side of things, but I get distracted when I work from home.
I finally got around to finish the first round of sketched for the redesign of these cards.

The editor of Origin Magazine told me she would love to have me as an intern, but that was a couple of weeks ago, and I'm still not sure how it'll pan out. This job limbo sucks, but I hope something does work out, and I can move into my own apartment.

Spring. Broken for the week.

It's 9:28 am, I haven't gone to bed yet.
When vacations roll along I turn nocturnal. Snowed last night. Where did that come from? Well, it did snow the morning of Easter last year.
Working on my website (again.) Sent out a bunch of internship requests, covering the San Fransisco area. I plan on expanding my search area and sending more.
Still working on my Styles piece, did some of the advanced structural redraws.
Almost done with Color Concept, just waiting for my "steam" to dry.

Watercolor of Bob, core shadows. I'm very happy with the head, although he has a bigger chin in life.

A series of happy accidents lead to a rather pleasing INTJforum challenge. The idea of having a larger than life animal licking "home sweet home" was always there, but just how big it is was the result of a search for reference. Color picking from a photo taught me a little about what was going on, and the broken vignette came to be once I realized I was zoomed in.

 

Working on a series of harpies for figure drawing class. At first we chose a background, then we added a background, played around line quality and rhythm, and in this case, we tried to convey a feeling with our value structure.