more photoshop tutorials

Just a quick note of some great tutorials that have been posted by classmates at Marks and Splashes - thanks to all for sharing!

Monster Cutie has posted links to 20 'mighty fine' tutorials, I have tried a couple and loved them all I highly recommend spending some time looking at these.
drawinghowtodraw.com has some great stuff on photoshop, illustrator, using a wacom tablet etc...
Digital Art Secrets has a great post on using traditional painting techniques in Photoshop

Character Design Exercise

One of my favorite character designers is Peter deSeve - how can you not!  Recently I took out a compilation of his character designs from the library, both me and my children looked through his sketches over and over.
I think that coming up with creative characters are so challenging. I suppose it comes with practice, but to really think outside of the box is even more of a challenge.On that note, today I came upon a post with an amazing idea to do exactly that - think outside the box and create unique characters.  Here is the exercise ! Thanks to Letters From Schwarzville for posting!...note not only is this a great exercise for illustrators, I think it would be a fun challenge for grade school kids. Heck, I'm going to save this for a fun rainy day activity from my children.

Art of the Masses

I have been a fan of Emily Grandin for a long time but had let way too many months go by before returning to check her work at Art of the Masses. She has done some amazing work this year, including a very cool advent calendar and a Sketchbook Project. Here she explains her process.

Marla Frazee

Tonight I discovered this interview with Marla Frazee where she talks about her journey to becoming an award-winning Illustrator. She has some other great video links on her website.

Patrice Barton

Patrice Barton is not only a great illustrator, but from some interviews of her that I have seen, she is so genuine, sweet and kind. Here's an article she wrote recently about her approach to illustrating a picture book vs. a chapter book.


In addition, here's a link to an interview she did with Mark Mitchell where she talks about her process as she created her new book Sweet Baby Moon.

Video clips on illustration

I happened upon a great video this week, an interview with Polly Dunbar with was both interesting an inspiring. She talks about her process and offers some advice for new illustrators.

One piece of advice was to draw all the time. She compared drawing like running, which I can related to, and said that as with running you have to draw all the time to get better. A week away on holiday and it takes a bit to get back to where you were in your drawing. And she certainly has taken that advice to heart herself, I was amazed by the stack of sketchbooks she had filled as she worked on her characters etc for her books.









And then of course, I can't get enough of Quentin Blake, so here's a little clip from him as well.

Marla Frazee

I am always astonished by how generous illustrators are sharing their knowledge and experience. Today I happened upon Marla Frazee's website and loved reading her 'Studio' section which addresses important topics for budding illustrators - tips, portfolio, thumbnails and characterization.

I have admired Marla's illustrations ever since I was introduced to "All The World". The world and characters she creates are amazing.

(Note: for fans of Marla Frazee, she will be the 4th Annual Children’s Festival of the Book at Bozeman Public Library in Bozeman, Montana Saturday, November 5, 2011)

Emily Gravett

I just can't get enough of Emily Gravett. I think she is such a wonderful illustrator - I love her work, I love her stories, I love her personal story. Recently I came across a couple of YouTube videos that for me were both inspirational and instructive - I really enjoy seeing how illustrators work.



and from the Rabbit Problem:



In the Rabbit Problem video Emily Gravett uses a cool Photoshop tool to extract her sketch, a tool I had never seen used before, so I did some Google searching and found a tutorial here.

IF- Climb

"Okay boys, no climbing in the grocery store please!!"

This will probably be my last post for a bit as new baby is arriving in just a few days. I wish I had had more time this week to work on this sketch. I like the idea, but it's obviously not finished, and I'm a little embarassed by the quality so will not be officially posting it on the IF website this week. It was a good learning experience though. This week I decided to try inking in Illustrator and once again relied on Dani for some guidance.

Coloring

Since I am very new to digital art processes, I have been very busy this weekend finding some tutorials on the subject. There are so many generous artist out there sharing their process, tips and tricks. Here's a great one by Rivkah that I am going to try to follow this week.