Skater Piece

This week's post is a self initiated piece that I thought up. The purpose being to try and work on painting a little bit more and adding shadows. I wanted to do a skateboarder piece that conveyed a sense on motion, and that had lighting as a big component as well.

1) I started with a couple of ideas in my sketchbook using different angles to see what worked the best (see below)

2) I have been trying to experiment with which works best, and I think that in the end, starting with pen and pencil is best, and then moving to digital. So, start with pencil, then ink the drawing, clean up the drawing. Ultimately I think that I am going to go with the good old pen and pencil tactic. I like the way that it feels...and gives a more natural result. (see below)

3) Once scanned I start with the tones. In this case I started with the sky. In the beginning I was setting the layer to multiply and then setting the opacity at 79%. I'm not sure why I was doing that. There are so many different options in programs like Painter and Photoshop, that each method/push of a button can result in a different end product. Now I think I am just going to set it all at 100%.
I first started with the sky and the background. (see below)

4) From there I moved to the background, the sidewalk, the road and the actual skater himself. There are a ton of brushes and effects that you can use in Painter. However I pretty much only stick to one brush/technique to give consistency between all of the work that I do. (seebelow)

5) Lastly, I added lighting using the digital airbrush in Painter. I like the hazy effect that it provides that makes it look like real lighting. I also added a blur effect to give the sense of motion. (see below)

I really liked the way that this one came out. I think that next time I am gonna try color and see if I can get that going.