Program used for the art: Procreate for Ipad Pro
Program used for the video: NCH Video Editor (free version)
Art Style: KuwaiiManga
Music Credit: Incompetech.com
“Perspectives”
The process of art (sic illustrations, drawing, digital drawing, etc) is unique to every artist. Mom, gods love her, knew when I was very little that I was extremely creative, imaginative and had a talent for drawing, a talent for art. When I went into a program for document technology (office systems management) at JAC in Montreal instead of a technical art program she was extremely disappointed. Mom always asserted that I was “good, no great at art”.
The below video is a quick sketch I did for someone very special to me, my little totem animal. She had asked for a drawing from me just recently (this is not the one she asked for) but it inspired me one evening and this is what popped out. That’s my process, random inspirations from left field out of no where that sometimes make no sense to me but will eventually make sense at some point (that’s a mouthful).
In particular, I tend to read Boss Lady’s mind a lot. Have since we met oh so many moons ago. Sometimes I do find myself drawing randomly with no sense of the thing until she sees it and goes “you are in my head again, you are scary psychic”. That’s the “touch of strange” side of my process.
The more normal side:
I get a request, details are bounced back and forth between the requesting person and myself. Sometimes it’s for a book cover, usually it’s Boss Lady going we need a cover for this project please and thank you. Sometimes it’s an illustration for inside the book, where the author of the book gets to input too. Either way, here’s how it works from request to finished product.
The request is made, I chat with the person requesting – get a feel for what it is they may want, then I set to the work of mocking up the backbone of the drawing. Place holders, placement of various elements, possible coloring and coloring techniques that might be better with the piece than others. Then I bring it back to the person who asked for the art, they get to make a few changes and I make those changes. Once that is done, it goes to final touch ups and becomes the final product. The medium used depends – sometimes I hand draw, especially for illustrations. At other times I will use digital means.
The example below is digital, it’s done in Procreate for Ipad. It has this neat feature that records your drawing session which allowed me to show you what it looks like. I even show you how to correct a mistake you make while drawing digitally. I hope to bring you all more of these types of posts so that I can share with you what the process is like in a more personal way.