Male character final design.

Here is my final design for my male morphine addicted character. I made his eyes tired, deep and haunted and his cheek bones and facial features high and gaunt. Now both my main characters are done I am going to move on to the main illustrations of the pair. So looking at body shapes and stances is the next step. 

Man character design

I have concentrated a lot on creating my Dagon character as he is very detailed and needed a lot of attention compared to the main male character in the book. 

Main characteristics of the male described in the book (not a lot so once again a lot of freedom)

Quick sketches

I layered tracing paper adding more and more facial features to show his move from healthy young male to haunted morphine addict.

More sketches

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters

An awesome book. The classic amazing novel Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen that has been changed up and mixed to make this unbelievable book by Ben H. Winters. Having this around my house I decided to take a look as it relates to what I am drawing.

The following images are some pieces from the book, the pieces are by Eugene Smith..

I love the calmness of the monster as it chows down on one of the crew.

The shape of mouth and squinted eyes adds so well to the ferocity of the beast. 

When giant lobsters attack

This is my favourite piece from the book, the gigantic monster with all his claws and tentacles, all the makings of an extremely scary monster yet his face is calm, some what bored or not bothered? I love it!

Aquaman!

As I am looking at a water beast and also toying with the idea of maybe setting the art work out as a coming I have decided to look through some comics of mine. Aquaman is one of the obvious to stand out. 

Brilliant colours! 

I love the effects on the water here 

I chose these pages so I could look more at methods of layout 

Interesting method of layout here! 

Monsters!

I was recently borrowed a bood called Monsters: A bestiary of the Bizarre by Christopher Dell. I have been looking at the amazing images of classic portrayal of monsters throughout time.

The illustration of this female dragon is amazing, I love her stance and the way the artist has chosen to but scales in some parts such as the legs and arms but not in others such as the chest and stomach. 

This piece is very intricate and detailed and pulls you in to look at every different feature and character. 

This page shows us how humans have used astrology and monsters together through time.

I love this piece! The grey tones set a solemn tone yet calm but still sinister. The dark eyes make the piece complete and scary.   

Sea monsters!! A wonderful brightly coloured Kraken/Octopus creature.

I love the piece on the left page, it shows us chaos in the waves and the face of the sea monster yet a sinister calmness of the stance of the man looking at the monster, maybe a stunned or shocked pause, makes an extremely interesting piece. 

Adding Brusho scan to Dagon

As I liked the colours of the Brusho tests I did I decided to scan it in to the computer and digitally edit it to become the skin of my dagon...

Here is the scanned image added to a layer behing my final Dagon face.

I then edited the scanned image to fit to the face then played with brightness and contrast to make the colour paler in order for detail to be able to be added without looking to lost among the dark tones.

I also played with curves until I came to a final tone that I liked the most, but I found that some patches seemed darker than others, I like this but I want the dark patches to be in relatable places, so in wrinkles and more darkened areas. 

To make the dark pieces in the face look right, I decided to use the burn tool to add more shaded appearances in the darker areas of the face.

My next step is to fix the teeth, eyes, mouth and horn then add a layer of detail which I will sketch by hand. 

Scooby Doo!

Scooby Doo, as silly as it may seem, is a brilliant place for me to look when looking for features that would work well with my Dagon. As the childrens show is something we all grew up with and love it can shape many inspirations, so why not? Looking at the sea monsters from the show has helped me come to some ideas, simple things like the position of the scales, teeth and extra features is demonstrated in the programme many a time. 

Pure awesome. You cannot deny it.

Dagon Process: Colour

Here are some scanned images from my sketchbook, I have been looking at different colours I could use for my Dagon.

 On the first who I played with water colours and soon realise that I was not going to get the desired effect with such pale tones. I then moved on to playing with Brusho, I found that I love the effects and tried a variety of different colours.

The green Brusho has come to be my favourite one, I plan to use this and carry it further to the character. My only issue is that the colours are very dark and I may lose some of the detail in my character. To avoid this I am going to scan in the page where I have used the green Brusho and tone it down to a point where it is still dark and shows the darkness and sinister elements of the character but does not drown out the details I want in the final pieces. 

Visual Culture Research task: Ancient Egypt

I am going to research in to Ancient Egypt and how the Egyptians communicated through their paintings and carvings, mostly relating to their religious and spiritual beliefs.

Above is an ancient Egyptian piece depicting the Goddess Nut, Nut is arched over the world as she is the sky. In ancient Egypt the Gods and Goddess's were sometimes personified as elements, Nut is one of them. She is shown here to be a slender female arching to protect everything under her. Around and under her hieroglyphs and figures are shown to be giving her respect. One of the symbols near here is the Ankh. A symbol showing eternal life and life flourishing. The eye of Rah is also shown.
In this piece the creator is communicating to us that their beliefs are that Nut is an almighty force and that everything under her flourishes and is powerful, this shows us the importance of Nut to the people of ancient Egypt. 

Above is a carving showing a master with his slaves. Power is the main element communicated to us through this piece. The master is clear as he is holding his slaves by the hair. Another way to see power through this piece is the size difference in these depictions, the master is twice the size of the slaves and this shows he is more value to society and higher up. The slaves lives are shown as worth less than half of the masters, this shows us that in ancient Egypt that slaves where possessions.

In tombs depictions of the masters and their day to day life including their slaves were carved and painted on the walls, this was to that these luxuries would be in the masters afterlife. It was thought that whatever was placed around the tomb such as the paintings, carvings and furnishings, these things would be in the afterlife of that person (who was in the tomb) and the persons afterlife would be as it was in the previous. Wealth and power would be carried on. 

Above is a painting that shows us what the ancient egyptians thought would be carried out after death before the person could carry on to the afterlife. In the middle is the dead souls heart being weighed against a feather while Thoth the ibis-headed scribe God looks on and takes the results. If the persons heart is pure they will pass on to the afterlife, if not Ammut, the half crocodile will devour the heart. Anubis is at the scale weighing the heart against the feather, the feather represents Maat, the Goddess of truth.
This communicates the beliefs of the people of Ancient Egypt and what they believed would be coming after they have died and before they can move on to the afterlife.  

Dagon character

Dagon Character Face

After mirroring my sketch, lining and fixing this was the final outcome. I added the horn (which I am still unsure on) and completed finishing touches. I am almost happy with it, but I think I want to change the horn and re-sketch the piece by hand using the digital piece as a base. I prefere the scratchy look of the original sketches and the other pieces I have created, I want the pictures to match the tone of the book. And as the book is very old and dark, I want the pieces to be scratchy and sinister. 

Hieronymus Bosch

Hieronymus Bosch (1450 – 9 August 1516) is a brilliant artist, in my opinion the first of his kind. He created many pieces depicting hell and horror. His work is brilliant, vivid and detailed. 

The Garden of Earthly Delights.
This tryptic shows light, bright colours in the centre and left panel and dark, dim colours in the panel to the right. Setting the tone for the imagery placed in those panels.

A small piece from the above - The Garden of Earthly Delights.
Hieronymus Bosch's work is very cleverly put together, he seems to have an extremely creative mind that can put together a tonne of random creatures, objects and elements to create an interesting piece that draws you in.

Another selected part of The Garden of Earthly Delights.
There is so much to look at in this piece!

Another depiction of an afterlife in hell.