Mini-Paint: Action Figure / Still Life

Mini-Paint:

Still Life

Hey, it's another Mini-Paint!  Rather than just featuring one Star Wars (in)action figure, this painting is a still life of several nerd-based toys and such, gathered together.  In this case, it is a ceramic Chewbacca cup which I use as a paint brush/pen holder; a Hulk Funco Pop toy; and a GONK/Power Droid action figure (see?  I had to get a Star Wars (in)action figure in there somewhere...)

This is another in the paintings I am getting ready for a small art show in September 2019, which I am doing with my daughter down at the Middleton Library in Middleton, WI.  The (in)action figures are for the Children's section, while in the other part of the library, I will be doing more mythological based pen-and-ink drawings.  So, we'll see how that goes, as well.

Fingers crossed, I'm hoping to have 4-6 (in)action figure paintings--of which I'm on target with 5 of 'em so far.  And for the mythological drawings, I'm also hoping to have 4-6 of 'em done, too.  Again, we'll see how that goes...

* * *

STEP ONE:  I started with an 8" x 10" piece of matboard, over which I painted a mixture of matte medium and blue casein (it's a paint that uses a milk-based protein as a binder--it's a lot like acrylic paint) as an ad hoc gesso for the painting.  Using a Blue Violet colored pencil, I did a rough sketch of the still life I set up.

* * *

STEP TWO:  Here is the first layer of paint thrown down to give a sense of what the painting was going to be color-wise.

* * *

STEP THREE:  I'm not sure if it was too much matte medium/casein, but the gouache kept wanting to "lift off" the painting more than usual, where I would touch the paint to the board, but then the layer of paint would kind of dissolve or run off down the board.  So, that was a bit of a pain in the @$$.  But, after enough patience and persistence, I was able to get the painting finished.

Hmmm, I should have thrown more shadows in the background for the pens and paintbrushes.  But, then again, it was already a pretty dark painting.  Oh, well...

* * *

Done with Gouache on 8" x 10" primed matboard.

.

Unwanted Valentines: Power Droid / GNK Droid

Unwanted Valentines:

Power Droid / GNK Droid

OK, fellow nerds, it's time again for "Unwanted Valentines"!  Alas, Valentine's sneaked up on me this year and I got off to a bit of a late start.  Sigh, I had such beautiful plans...  

Anyhoo, for this one, it is the Power Droid/GNK Series Droid from "Star Wars".  Y'know, the droids wandering around in the background that only say "GONK!" (yeah, yeah, I know there is one being tortured in Jabba's palace that doesn't say "GONK!", no need to correct me).  I always thought they were amusing and they hold a soft spot in my heart--and even softer head.

And, while working on this GONK Droid card, I got another idea with the GNK Droid which I'll (hopefully) be posting soon.  For now, I have at least one other nerdy Unwanted Valentine to get done... ONWARD!

* * *

STEP ONE:  Here are the digital pencils.  Originally, I did them with a 9 pt. hard brush on a 1,500px by 2,100px canvas at 300dpi.

* * *

STEP TWO:  The digital inks, again, mostly done with a 9pt hard brush.  I used some guidelines underneath for perspective and to make sure things were (mostly) square, but I also wanted it to look hand-drawn.  So, I didn't bother using shift/ruler tools and the like for the linework, but just drew everything overtop the guidelines.  Lots of drawing and re-drawing and re-re-drawing lines until I got them close to right.  Bleh.

Well, except for the word balloon.  By that time, I was near to the end and just said #$@!! it, I'll just leave the word balloon as a stroked shape and be done with it...  :-P

* * *

STEP THREE:  Coloring was done over top the digital inks on a Multiply Layer.  After it was done, I dropped the resolution down to 200dpi, so the canvas dropped to 1,000px by 1,400px for a smaller upload size.  Ta-da!

* * *

Done digitally with Photoshop.

.