Better still.
 The black is blacker..some textures...and I stole someones face.

The Flaming Nun,... in ink..and in colour...partly.

Much better.

I hope to do some retro letratone style shading on this...soon...

Nun done,...hey that rhymes.

Design for charactr #4; Nuns with Guns (actually it's a flame thrower).

'This is Sister Emmanuel of the Sacred Fire; cleansing the world of its ills with Holy Fire.

Sister Emmanuel was always caught playing with matches during her formative years, so the Convent sisters thought it best to find a way of using this fascination to their advantage.'

I  tried her with trousers for a while, but that wasn't quite right.

Still trying to get my entry for charactr #4; Nuns with Guns, ready. Pencil design is going well but the legs are a bit off at the moment.

 I have less than 24 hours to get it finished and a very busy day tomorrow. Its going to be close...again.

The final nuns are starting to come in to the forum; http://www.charactr.co.uk/final-voting-thread-for-charactr-3-t105.html. Some good ones already.

I set the new task on Friday. This one is 'Tattooed Spider Woman'. That means I could get anything from a shadowy, smouldering femme fatale from the days of film noir, to a mutated spider-human cross-breed. Should be some interesting submissions.

I made the sheet below to give some inspiration, and to show that there are many ways that this one could go.

Nuns with Guns

These are my silhouettes for charactr #3: Nuns with Guns. This task started over the Easter break but the input has been slow so far. Everyone is very busy right now.

 #1 is a really old Nun carrying a stack of decomissioned weapons that were found hidden in a ditch.

 #2 is armed with a flame thrower...and why not.

#3 is a foul cliche that will probably get more votes so I will have to us it as the final design.

charaqctr #2 Emaciated Jungle Explorer

 

This is my charactr.co.uk entry for the second brief; 'Emaciated Jungle Explorer'; a Conquistador running for his life through a South American forest.  I am much happier with the final image than before, though I did not get the last hand drawn layer  done...

These are the three initial silhouettes; #1 is, as you can see below, based on Amy Winehouse [one of the first images that comes up when you search 'emaciated', god help her], #2 comes from an actual jungle explorer and #3 is based on a prisoner from a WWII Japanese camp.

As it happened Amy won, which was nice. It was clearly the most dynamic image. Next stage, lots of reference. Small selection here...

I thought I would make him look like he had gone a tad native at some point. The image below is a concept for the Nazca Warriors from Indiana Jones IV. From these I got the grass/reeds tied to parts of his body and the tattoos.

 

This is the pencil sketch scanned in. I put it into Photo Shop, copied the level and hit 'multiply'.

I was now able to draw under it and basically colour it in.

Pretty much done; I selected the outside of the figure and used it to make a silhouette, made a new level and filled in the silhouette, Then I put that behind the figure and skewed, knocked the opacity down, it till it made a good shadow. Added lens flare...

Cut it out and found a descent jungle background.

At this point I had planned to ink in the pencil sketch with a brush to give it some descent mark making skills, scan it and overlay that onto the digi-paint. But time ran out, maybe next time.

Seriously though, I will try that technique on this design soon, to see how it looks.

charactr #1 Shamanic Urban Nomad

This is my first design for the 'charactr' forum; http://www.charactr.co.uk/

I created 'charactr' mainly as a way to force myself to draw regularly, to a deadline. OK...i missed the first deadline by an hour or two, but it was the first one I ran.

These are the three silhouettes that I submitted for the first stage. Th guy with the antlers won, though I was kind of routing for the TV head bloke with the shopping trolley.

Always had a lot of the Slough Feg; Horned God from Slaine [2000AD] in this idea. The original Slough Feg was inspired by a cave drawing from France of a shaman with antlers on, so that is what I looked at for this',

 

Next stage; I Photoshopped a quick guide for the final drawing. Yes I know the model is a girl, but the pose works. Hips and shoulders at nice angles [death to symmetry]. Loving the antlers.

A3 pencil rough on trace with a rubbish right arm. Left arm not much better,...

Final design. Pencil, pen and smudges on trace paper, blu-tacked to a book and photographed. No scanner available. Very happy with this one.

The bio to the character refers to drawing graffiti using moss blended with buttermilk to make living graffiti. No idea where I first heard of that but I really must try it one day.

http://www.charactr.co.uk/final-images-for-charactr-1-t29.html

charactr #2; Emaciated Jungle Explorer is now underway. Back to the drawing board...

No rest for the wicked!

More Robots WIP

More robots, all in various stages of drawing and inking.