MoHog's Sketchbook - how to get to where I'm going

[MoHog]

Well here we are, I'm starting my sketchbook to really begin committing to concept art. Will be posting daily with sketches/ digi painting/ and any interesting project work i'm doing. I'm 18 and will be moving on to art uni next year to do a foundation course before moving on to an illustration degree. I draw a lot, and enjoy it massively but am aware i have a long way to go. Hopefully this sketchbook will help develop my work to a higher standard and amuse you, the viewer. Not much more to day then welcome to my imagination please comment and crit.

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[MoHog]

Ok I'm gonna start with some digi paintings from the past year...
The traditional starting exercises:

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[MoHog]

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Squirrel paint!!

[MoHog]

My earliest COW
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And my latest COW wip
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[MoHog]

Two of my best DSGs
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[MoHog]

My most recent doodle - painted in ps
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[MoHog]

Beginnings of a sketchy paint based on some 'halo' armor, artists at bungie thanks for the inspiration.
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[MoHog]

Been a hectic few days so no posts

but...

heres dynamic energy contest entry sketch
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plus a sneaky peak at the next stage in the works
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[Icedearth15876]

Great job so far, the monsters look great. Keep up the good work I look forward to seeing more from you.

[MoHog]

latest wip 4 the dynamic challenge

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[MoHog]

wipage

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its getting there

critiques etc. are always great

[Nrx]

Hey man, apart from needing to round out your anatomy i think you need to ajust the contrast levels on the wip so that areas of importance (face, weapons etc) stand out and read more easily ! looking forward to working with you in the mentor thread

[MoHog]

cheers Nrx. cool your from blighty too :)
lookin forward to it too

[MoHog]

http://i350.photobucket.com/albums/q429/LouAy/screen-capture.png

teen challenge selkie!!!!!!!

[tomjones]

Ha! Is that a seal jacket? Neat Idea! It works really well as a hood :)

[Dan Valkar]

i think u need to try more values in ur paintings, do some studies and check all the colours involved, that will help u a lot!...

cheers!

[jatherip]

hey there, you have some nice concepts! but e.g. in your halo-piece you should take care about perspective...i know, thats hard within round thinks, but...just keep practising!

[MoHog]

Jatherip: cheers for the advice + crit, do some studies soon, make sure to come back and judge em :)

Dan Valkar: will do, i do tend to try to get ahead of myself - hopefully fix this for the selkie piece

tomjones : yeah, you kno it he he. might make it meld into the skin to prevent it lookin like a dodgy fashion statement

cheers to all who comment you are the ones that will make me better

[surfandsnow]

Cool stuff, looks like everything's coming along pretty good. I noticed a few things though.

post #4 pic one(bright orange one) the cast or proximity shadow is very light and it dosent look like its on the ground, I'd try to darken up the shadow around the area that makes contact with the surface. (google ambient occlusion, radiosity, and or global illumination)

post #5 pic 1, not much perspective to it, but amazing rendering!
pic 2 it dosent look balanced like its about to topple over. Also the shading on the character dosent match the cast shadow on the floor. If I am looking at it right, it looks like you used a small brush to render so of the small regions, use as big a brush as possible and you can get cleaner quicker results.

as for selkie post #14, Its pretty good as a whole, but the neck has all kinds of problems. because of the hood especially the area in between the clavicle and the neck should be fairly darker regardless of the type of lighting, their are all sorts of crevices for light to go into and not come out. The neck should also go a lot further to the right, connecting with the right ear.

A few quick anatomy things, the windpipe goes from the top middle of the sternum up to just behind the jaw, and the sterno-cliedo mastiod muscle(spelled improperly) goes from the sternum/clavicle to a point on the skull just behind the ear. with the windpipe, mastiodial muscle, clavicle and sternum meeting all in one spot deep recessions can form and it is know as the "pit of the neck". The hand is a bit small and the perspective is wrong, your looking at it from above and its contouring to the hip so the hand is going to curve around(grab a cup and look down at your hand, its a similar set up just a much bigger cylinder(the waist) and some visual inversion of course).

The nose should protrude more and the mouth needs to curve with the face.

I suck at color, but I'd say to try to use saturated colors sparingly, and saturate the colors most where the light and shadow meet. I have to say that the line art looks pretty well done.

Keep at it.

[Kurt.Y]

the two on #5 really nicely done~ and the ninja slashing spawn piece are dynamic indeed, the balance is ok, but it looks like the one on the lefe side is trying to do too much damage to the right, you may focus on one weapon attacking with a nice gesture and let people feels like the other one is comming...
keep drawing!

[MoHog]

cheers for the comments everyone, will need to take a break to work on these :P

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a recent doodle (in front of tv)

[DK_sketch]

Nice Pencils man really like the latest one.
One thing you might wanna try is doing some color studies find something near you and start filling in those colors it will really help you're digital paintings
keep em coming

[stimulus]

Hi Mohog,

I really like your latest pencil and your pterosaur. You have varied line weight, nice rendered shadows.

For the Spawn digital piece, I think if you make the action poses more extreme, like the back more arched or Spawn leaning forward into his sword thrust, it will really improve it.

[MoHog]

another pencil sketch - messing about with some vampire ideas, might start a little character series to design sketch and paint
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[stimulus]

Hey Mohog, this is great stuff! Can't think of any crits! More please!

[MoHog]

http://i350.photobucket.com/albums/q429/LouAy/human.gif

anatomy for latest part of the mentor thread i am in

[stimulus]

Lookin' good. His left thigh looks a little thicker than his right, but maybe that's just the angle? I like the way you rendered the neck and arms.

[MoHog]

http://i350.photobucket.com/albums/q429/LouAy/vampirepaint.jpg

ok, thought I'd post a process pic to show how I work - give a chance for insight + critiques to help develop a piece to a good final

please comment and advise, much appreciated

[MoHog]

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eyes glorious eyes

[Lakeland]

Hello :)
First of all, thanks for participating in Molten Core Workshop.
I generally tend to avoid announcing my opinions as beeing just a student myself, I can do more harm than good with these :)
However, I do admit I love your imagination, you got some great ideas there, when it comes to alien forms and all that.
My only advise which is good for everyone on any level - study anatomy.
Once you get around it, you ll find its even easier, to construct alien life forms.

that - or you can join the Molten Core for real and do hard ass boring exercises that will make your hand numb mwhahaha :P

[626elemental]

Wow, nice stuff. For your vampire painting, try some more color variation. Don't just shade purple with darker purple, pick color for light source, use complimentary color for shadow, and maybe even add little bits of extra color from reflected light. Then you can blend it all together with the base color.

Btw how do you turn links into cool words? Like the sketchbook links in your sig.

[MoHog]

cheers for the insight 626 will try it out asap, pm'd you about links

Thankee lakeland; have begun dusting off my anatomy skills, molten core for sure! Will be an awesome thread hope to have two numb hands by sunday

[DStraX]

Id like to see where that seel girl ends up :) cool alien aimal concepts to!

[MoHog]

he he, DStrax you devil - i'll see what I can do :P

[MoHog]

what makes a COW go faster?
whips!
(a drole play on words)

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[KarylGilbertson]

right on dude--- your designs are pretty crazy, I like 'em. I agree with the comments on colour variation, and also I think a lot of your colour palettes (like that robot guy from your avatar) seem to either be "super saturated" or "completely grayscale". Mix them up a bit. for instance, why couldn't that guy in the pic be a cool, bluish grey or something instead of straight gray? or think about what kind of atmosphere he might be in, and how the lighting would affect his colouration.

Also, work on your blending and your linework, your brushwork, while not bad, seems a bit "heavy-handed" and your work will really improve if you can refine it.

Cheers!

[stimulus]

Your eyes turned out great, MoHog. Only 90 more to go! hehe...

[E4sY]

really liked the original sketches. keep it coming.

[MoHog]

wiiip, I call it the Enerbarus (sounds impressively mythological)

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=692349&d=1244467169

[626elemental]

This most recent painting looks really good. Don't forget to put some orange light on his face.

[Sebastian Wagner]

as far as I can see you are having a good start! Just go for it and you`ll learn fast :) ( as if that was new to you riiiiight?:D )

[MoHog]

Thanks 626 + Noro, within 2 weeks I will official have finished all non-art education and be free!!

sketchy entry for Lakeland's molten core workshop

http://i350.photobucket.com/albums/q429/LouAy/moonbook.jpg

[stimulus]

Hey, beautiful work. This is a great idea. It's not clear how the dog is cleaning the moon exactly...how about having his tongue out to lick it clean?

[MoHog]

cheers matey. yee was worried about that, supposed to be wet from being in the bucket (see first frame)

[stimulus]

Oops, missed that completely!

[MoHog]

just got the trial of corel painter II, crazy stuff - must learn to use it before 30 days is up. Some great brushes

[MoHog]

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back to basics - think im getting there

[MoHog]

CHOW wip - sci-fi Horus
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[stimulus]

Nice start...awesome design on the headgear and the arms.

[MoHog]

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exercise for molten core - inspired me to do some more studies
coming soon

[papervampire]

hey, cool work... i love those orc things up top... whips... hahahahaha... haha ; ) keep it up! i look forward to seeing more studies.

[Jamie Romoser]

hey whats up MoHog
Cool sketchbook you have going here
Your improving with every post
Keep having fun drawing and painting -Omerta

[MoHog]

cheers papervampire (cool name :P), thanks for encouragement OmertA morale boosts are always good

[MoHog]

Idea Wip for the newborn activity in COW
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[stimulus]

Hey Mohog, that looks like a great entry. I really like your creature designs. Just an idea..how about showing the outline of the baby stretching the womb sac? Like it's getting ready to come out?

[Jamie Romoser]

MoHog! thanks for droping by my sketchbook
That creature design looks awsome man!
Keep it up -Omerta

[MoHog]

Glass paint for the mentoring thread I'm on
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[My57]

your pencil stuff is good, i like the aliens. But the painting needs improvement. They dont look very solid if you know what im saying, i find it hard to explain but more life studies like above or refs from photo's will help get a more solid painting style.

Maybe they're to blurry? hell if i know. Just practise and you'll get better at it.

[MoHog]

wooooah havnt posted in ages
few pieces I did to put on my recently started deviant account

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DSG
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I kno what you mean My57 - workin on it + lookin at a more bold style to incorporate my pencil more

[stimulus]

Hey, I haven't posted in awhile myself. You have a great imagination and I love the details like the one long claw on the rat dude.

[Mahran]

Great SB, the 2 headed monster iz very cool!!!