OMAC (One Man Army Corps)

O.M.A.C. (One Man Army Corps)

I know I've spoken before about my extreme fondness for the Kirby created, Mohawk-wearing warrior of tomorrow, O.M.A.C. (One Man Army Corps), and even use the Charles M. Schultz mash-up of O.M.A.C. for my avatar both here and at work.  Originally, I was going to use O.M.A.C. for a New Year's picture, with the iris/pupil "O" in the eye on his chest being the "0" in 2016, but his expression seemed a little on the serious side, so I decided to move it to later in the month.  I'm sure I will be doing more with O.M.A.C. in the future.

However, there is something about my drawing of his Mohawk while looking at it straight on that sort of bothers me.  It reminds me of something... I can't quite put my finger on it.  Oh, wait, I think I know what it reminds me of...

OH, NO!  NOT THAT!  ANYTHING BUT THAT!

Sigh...  Oh, well.  For those interested, here are the steps in drawing.  

(NOTE: While I really like "Fifth Element", Chris Tucker's character, DJ Ruby Rhod, is SUPER annoying.)

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STEP ONE:  Here are the digital pencils on a 1,000px by 1,400px canvas at 200dpi. 

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STEP TWO:  Here is the grayscale laying out the general form, as well as some of the light and shadows.

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STEP THREE:  I cut out the figure and did the background, and then did the flat colors over a MULTIPLY Layer.

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STEP FOUR:  I added the final highlights and shadows over the flat colors, and painted over top of everything with several Normal Layers.

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This was done with Photoshop.

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Pan's Labyrinth Starring David Bowie

Pan's Labyrinth Starring David Bowie

OK, this was an obvious mash-up of the Pale Man from "Pan's Labyrinth" and The Pale Duke, David Bowie, as Jareth from "Labyrinth".  I've had on my list of things to do for a while and given the recent news of Bowie's death, I figured I'd do it as a tribute.

I was a fan of his music, as well as acting.

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STEP ONE: I did the digital pencils on a 1,000px x 1,400px canvas at 200dpi.

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STEP TWO:  Next I laid down some rough values with a grayscale over-painting.  I really liked the sketchiness of the drawing at this point and almost left it at this stage and was tempted to just finish it as a black-and-white drawing.

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STEP THREE:  After creating a MULTIPLY Layer, I laid down some flat coloring and decided to keep going with color.

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STEP FOUR:  I created a bunch of NORMAL Layers--one for hands, one for the face, one of the hair, one for the clothes, etc. and added highlights and shadows to the flat color layer with a Oil Pastel brush in Photoshop.  And, yeah, I decided not to include Bowie's blown out pupil on his left eye (it looked--no pun intended--a little distracting).

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This was done digitally in Photoshop.

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A New Year, A New Hope...

HAPPY NEW YEAR - 2016!

A New Year, A New Hope...

Well, another year has come and gone with the usual mix of minor accomplishments and regrets.  I have made the usual retinue of resolutions to break for the New Year, and I'm sure y'all have done the same.  Here's to hoping all goes well for everyone!

I also want to take a few moments at the top of the new year to thank everyone for stopping by and gawking at my modest Blog, as well as the words of encouragement from many of you!  You are all much appreciated!  :-)

I have a stack of odd-sized, scrap pieces of hardboard which I gessoed.  From time-to-time, I'll grab one and paint a picture from a magazine that catches my eye, or something of the sort.  Nothing too fancy, just for warm-up or to try and work on some art skills for an hour or two.  Use it or lose it, don't ya know?  

In this case, it was a picture of Luke Skywalker from the original "Star Wars", which seemed like it would work on this Blog--I even thought of a semi-clever title and everything!  The painting was done with casein (it's sort of like acrylic paint, except it uses a milk-based protein as a binder) on a 4" x 5" gessoed hardboard, using a #10 Flat brush and #10 and #12 Round brushes. 

If I were smart (and I've never been accused of being such), I would have taken pictures/scans as I went along to show the progress, since many people like to see the process (I know I like seeing how they got from point "A" to point "B", myself).

If people like 'em enough, I may post more in the future.  We'll see, I guess.  :-)

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Done with casein on 4" x 5" gessoed hardboard.

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