I spent most of this Wednesday afternoon beating my head against a wall as the saying goes. In my case that figurative wall came in the form of a drawing that just wasn't working.
This week I'm participating in an initiative of artists supporting fellow artists on @nftshowroom, organized by @nikkinicole. It's been a blast so far. @nikkinicole is providing some great feature write-ups on each of the artists involved as the week goes by. Check out her blog to follow along and see some great art! Saturday is my day to be featured... and seeing all the great stuff from the rest of the participants has me feeling the pressure for sure. I wanted to mint a new NFT for the occasion but wasn't entirely sure what to do.
I settled on revisiting a concept sketch I'd done some time ago, featuring an iteration of the dryad character Julie in my comic, "I Thought It Would Be Zombies..." For hours I worked on a new rendition in my traditional comic book style trying to create a more finished piece out of it.
Nothing was working. Composition, draftsmanship, anatomy... Perhaps the biggest drawback to working digitally is that I don't have a paper to crumple in frustration. Hitting the delete button just doesn't have the same psychological closure!
After a bit of rest I regrouped and decided to try something completely different. Thankfully I'm enthused by the initial result and think it's a pretty promising start!
My regular style is for lack of a better word... pretty anal. I slave over every little detail, like nice clean ink lines, etc. This is a big departure for me as I just experiment with a bunch of new tools and brushes and start playing with texture and line.
The style that I'm somewhat mimicking here is artist Carne Griffiths. Carne paints with ink and tea! I saved a sample of Carne's work in my "inspiration" file after seeing it in a recent issue of ImagineFX magazine and rediscovered it as I tried to push through my art block today.
I can tell already that I'm also channeling a bit of my inner David Mack and I'll probably try reference his work as well as I continue to play with this piece.
I have a long way to go yet, but here's hoping it all comes together and will be my next NFT released this Saturday! Wish me luck!
Below is the initial sketchbook entry that's serving as the springboard for my little experiment here!
Should I be able to complete this to my satisfaction, I'll for sure be sharing the final version this weekend and you'll have an opportunity to purchase the NFT if you so desire!
As always, thanks for reading and if you have any questions or feedback hit me up in that comment section!
-Bryan "the Imp" Imhoff
Follow me for more behind the scenes looks at the creation of "I Thought It Would Be Zombies..." Your votes help support its production! Also look for limited edition digital artwork for sale on NFTShowroom.com
