Ongoing work in progress

[byroncallas]

It just gets better and better.

[drawing4art]

Great stuff, still making me smile

[justjean]

Love looking into see your wonderful imagination at work

[Caesar]

Glad to see where it all start from! I guess You first do the raw sketch by pencil and then You ink a finished drawing on a layer above, but did You find special pencil and ink settings or You change them continuosly as appropriate?
I hope You would forgive my curiosity, should it at any extent ask to disclose some secret tricks, but I think we all admire Your comics stripes and I guess a tutorial and tips from You, in any form, would be a best-seller in this Forum, just as your Rusty Knight stories ...

[kenmo]

Delightful work indeed....

[Arjen Vriezekolk]

Glad to see where it all start from! I guess You first do the raw sketch by pencil and then You ink a finished drawing on a layer above, but did You find special pencil and ink settings or You change them continuosly as appropriate?
I hope You would forgive my curiosity, should it at any extent ask to disclose some secret tricks, but I think we all admire Your comics stripes and I guess a tutorial and tips from You, in any form, would be a best-seller in this Forum, just as your Rusty Knight stories ...

Dear Caesar,

There is absolutely no question of revealing hidden secrets when it comes to an explanation of my way of work for I'm really an old skool illustrator.
For years since there was the ability to work digitaly I've been trying to get the hang of working with a digital pen and tablet.....never got to the results I could be happy with....And still NOT..

Yes...I do make a sketch first, but I work in the traditional way, on paper!
After i make a sketch - And sometimes that is just a thumbnail wich I blow up on the copiermachine - I trace the image onto the inking paper on a light table. I used to do that with a non repro-blue pencil but in the last year i switched to just a 2B pencil.
tried a variety of inking pens,fineliners and inking pens (the ones that stain ALL of your clothes and paper and sometimes even the dog...) But I did finally return to Ink and a brush...So the same way al the american superhero comics are being inked....
After which I scan the image at 300 dpi,safe it as an PSD file and import it in Artrage.....
From there on it's the usual way of creating layers of color and textures...

What I do realize is that during all my experimentations I managed somehow to create a kind of style that is as the way everyone has it's own handwriting...
I do feel that (although I scanned the internet) I can't compare my style of work with no one....except the work of tome and Janry and i can't even walk in their shadow!
I did learn an awfull lot (and still do!!) from our friend Nick...just by looking at his superb work in progress illustrations,his friendly explanations and just study and (when there's no one looking) trying to reproduce some of his techniques.

And always fail :-)

The only thing that keeps me improving is by using a Hanvon drawing tablet....working with a computer mouse isn't never going to work! Can't even draw a circle with a mouse!
Tablets are cheap enough these days and they really do make the difference in working digitally!
And for working then in Artrage gives you the "real" media feeling!

So....
Hope i did'nt dissapoint you with the lack of digital skills I'm laying out to you....But I personaly found out that a lot of buttons and settings do'nt make an artist... A drawing does all the work in my case...Artrage only the effects,colors and textures.....

Once i was working on a christmas card for a client....A lot of heavy machinery and 500+ little figures drawn at 50X70 cm.....When i got back upstairs in my little studio I found my daughter..which was 4 years old with a big fat red crayon coloring my inked piece of work.... "I'm helping you daddy with the coloring......."....

I whish Artrage was around 17 years ago :-)

Hope my explanation was usefull to you Caesar, never a problem to answer to you all!

Regards,

Arjen

[Caesar]

Dear Arjen, I thank You very much for Your extreme kindness leading You to provide me with a long and most interesting explanation, tso I really found it.
Because of my age, almost 54, and my drawing passion since eve,r I'm very much in the same situation and have a quite similar attitude (with far less discipline). The only, fundamental difference, Your talent apart, is probably that not being a professional illustrator or artist like You, I never went through the process of selecting the ultimate, best fitting tools, support, style etc., thus never set up an absolute reliability of my outputs quality.
I also perfectly understand and realized that all of us has his own "drawing calligraphy", even if I don't always draw according to my best one for each genre, this far, just because I should practice much more continuosly also make sometimes little copy exercises, boring or not, to refresh and get out from my mental imagination limits and learn (or remind) a little more.
I can easily confess that I'm too in awe in front of Nick Harris. I kept stating with him that his works, although showing all the skills, the accuracy, the know-how, an extreme care for the process, a quality standard etc. which are typically granted by British and American illustrator, are the works of a real artist, because they breathe with his outstandingly intelligent, smart, good-tempered, lyrical, imaginative character.
Finally, I appreciated very much the tender story of Your little daughter wishing to help You. You certainly raised an early passion in her which may or may not follow Your one, but will certainly help her finding activities and jobs she would carry out with pleasure. After all, whatever we do, whichever the required skills, passion is the salt of life and we have to love what we do to feel good.

[Arjen Vriezekolk]

Thank you Caesar...
Glad you liked my explanation and I do agree with what you say!

As in an attempt to draw away the winter: here are two more Rusty Knight drawings.....Same chapter.
Hope you like them.

Arjen

[grayflo]

Arjen, I am fascinated by your description of the process you use. May I ask something further? When you bring your line art into Artrage, is it transparent? I ask because my friend and I are planning illustrated teaching aids for kids.
So far I have tried importing a black lined transparent png, and using that as the top layer, so as to keep the lines clean. Colouring is then done on lower layers. That seems to work, but I wondered what you did with your scanned files when you brought them into Artrage. Do you have any tips? Your line art and finished colour looks stunning!

[Alexandra]

Great talent. I've enjoyed viewing your wonderful thread.