Archangel speed(kinda) painting

While I was waiting for some large files to move from my hard drive to my portable I did this picture in Photoshop of my favourite comic character as a kid Archangel!


This was one of the first comics I got, X- Factor issue 44. I think it was in a showbag


Archangel just looked so dam cool, those razor wings and that funky costume. The whole issue was amazing as well. The opening page is Cyclops about to be crushed by a giant robotic foot! The princess also bribes a guard with a whole heap of drugs so she can steal a baby. Seriously for the first X-whatever comic to read this one was a winner. I was done for after that.

I've been taking oil painting classes recently with Roseline and it has been quite interesting. I've been trying to apply certain photoshop painting techniques that I learnt to real painting (although ctrl z doesnt work). I really like using oils with how the colours mix and blend to the texture of the paint. I'm still very much the amateur but it's a great class and everyone is really nice and supportive.

If you haven't seen my blog in a while you'll notice that I've given it something of a makeover. It's a lot more brown and earthy... I dont know why. It is just what I felt like I guess. You'll also see there are tabs up there now with links to a page with my showreel and a page with a few of my storyboards. I'll update that a bit more when I have time, for now though there's a board for Porcelain and an animatic for Existence.

I've been using Twitter a lot and I post a heap of scribble doodles on there. You can see what I've drawn over on the left in the twitpic widget or just click on this link http://twitpic.com/photos/timmerks You can see the wip of my oil painting plus the crazy pictures I draw for Roseline aka @scratchrabbit

I know there's a reluctance to have a twitter account but once you get one and you start finding all the artists you like tweets (as they are called in the twitter business) of what projects they are working on, the little scribbles they do on napkins, links to cool videos and all other kinds of cool things it's super inspiring.

Also everything links in together quite seamlessly (blogs, youtube, facebook etc). So it's not about using all these different programs but using the right program for the right job and having them all linked in together.

So yeah get a twitter account

Astroboy Week

I declare this week Astroboy week!


I will endeavour to add a new drawing of my childhood hero Astroboy to my blog every day this week.

Friday 25th February 2011

Well Astroboy week comes to a close. It's been a great inspiring week for drawing but also a sad week as an animal friend of Roseline and me 'Little B' flew away. So This last picture is dedicated to him. The funniest animal I have ever met.


Roseline has been doing a whole heap of blog posts that include videos and pictures that you must see. you can find them here: Little B "the funny Honeyeater"

A special big thanks to everyone who has drawn an Astroboy this week. It has been super inspiring and I love seeing everyones different take on Astroboy.

Woah! A couple of last minutes pictures turned up.

Astro - Bailey 2 by Richard Bailey


Astro - Patsarun by Air Patsarun


Astro - Grant by Steve Grant


I got this one a little late but I can't pass up having another butt gun illustration. haha

I've made a little thankyou animation for everyone that contributed to week




Well now I must go back to learning 3d and looking for work >:( (wish every week was Astroboy week hmmf!)

Thursday 24nd February 2011


and of course the best thing about this week, more Astroboy pictures by my friends

Astro - Anderson by Jamie Anderson


Astro - Buckley by Andrew Buckley


One more day left for Astroboy week, so the last day to send pictures to me. Thanks everyone who has sent pictures. You guys are the best!

Wednesday 23nd February 2011


Well Astroboy week is going great as there's even more pictures done by my friends

Astro - McKebery by Marcus Mckebery


Astro - Bailey by Richard Bailey


Astro - Burton 2: The Return Of Aaron Burton


Astro - Grimshaw by Ben Grimshaw


Lots of Astroboy love!

Tuesday 22nd February 2011


There's also some extra Astroboys for today thanks to my friends

Astro - Burton by Aaron Burton


"I'm too scared to draw his face... I can't draw anime! Will run for the hills before I draw his face off model!!!"

Astro - Clegg by Christien Clegg


haha I'm sure Astro had days like this

Astro - Davies by Aaron Davies


"It's my rendition of that inevitable moment in each episode when Astro would state "I'm running
out of energy." The personification of every battery operated childrens toy"

Astro - Stevens by Richard Stevens


(You're not getting the full effect of this image. Click the pic or Richards name and see Astro fly)

Astro boy week is going pretty great!

Monday 21st February 2011

Working out the kinks

Ok I made the video of this animation (under this post) loop so you can see it better.

The purpose of my blog is to capture my art growth so I try not to hide my lousy stuff. This runcycle wasn't a winner and has quite a few problems with it.

Here are the key frames and my analysis of them.




I think I could add in an extra drawing here to sell the antic. It's a weird move, as usually when you start running you begin by falling forward and let your legs catch up. I wanted the start in this to be like a slingshot


this is my favourite frame


This is the first loop frame.


That front arm moves a bit bad through this bit. The arms in this animation lack purpose I tried to have them sweep the air as an extra leg but it doesn't read


This frame feels weak


That front leg doesn't move back enough. This is a sticky frame on the animation





That front arm need to go back further.


This is the loop frame. You'll notice that the scarf is different. I want to treat the scarf as an effect to add after the main animation.

This animation was done as an experiment to do a run cycle with one foot always on the ground and I felt as though I learnt some things. I'm also getting use to both animating Dash and working in Toonboom. As far as a run cycle goes this isn't good enough but it is a good start and something to build on.

Dash Dashing animation run test



based off a quote from Miyazaki, I challenged myself to make a run cycle where there is always a foot on the ground. The idea/theory is it gives more weight to the run.

I think I need to sell the leg push on the ground more. Have a cleaner head movement and stylise that scarf a lot more.

I do like the antic though

IF: Sweater

Artificial Sweatener...


not a spelling mistake.

Crystallised sweat... tastey

Here's the original sketch.


here's the linework


The colouring was done in photoshop.

I quite like the character designs on this one. Oh I wont lie, I always mess up sweat and sweet.

Cat and Rabbit (A Tissue!): Sketches 01

Here's some sketches for a book Roseline and I are making based on an old script that Rose wrote.



I'm trying to refine the drawing style and make it more 3d. Give the characters more volume and make them more I guess huggable. I think Rabbit is working out but Cat feels a little too controlled and not like a person yet. Oh that sour looking cat is another character called Milky. Rose has already written about him here

You can read a webcomic about Cat and Rabbit that I made a few years ago (and quite fond of) here

This book titled "A Tissue" will be drawn and layed out mostly by me with Roseline cleaning up (my work is pretty messy), adding details and finishing it with watercolours. You can see some of Roseline's water colours on her blog here

Rose will be doing the book between jobs painting charactered portraits of peoples pets which is her business. you can read more about that here

IF: Reverse

Since my last 2 illustration friday drawings where not done in time (they exist under this post) I'm happy that this one was done relatively early


This was quite fun to draw. Pencil on paper with a quick photoshop colour. 'Lost in Space' wiggly arms crack me up.

IF: Surrendered

Well I surrendered to do this on time and I surrendered on colouring this picture a few times but eventually I got it done and here it is.


Here's the pencil work as well


A big reason I was late getting this done was I've been playing with this add-on for twitter Twiflip. Where you can make flipbook animations. It's quite fun as there is a limited amount of lines you can draw.

These are my animations (I've only made 2)
http://www.twiflip.net/timmerks

My friend Ben Grimshaw made a VERY nice water splash (here)

Oh and check out this guys work (here)

Mannnnn that guy is good.

Oh in other news (for those who dont read my twitter) I've started learning oil painting. My grandfather was pretty good with oils (I'll try and find a picture he did). I've never really spent much time with paints but it is something I've always been talking about wanting to learn. Rose wants me to learn REAL painting so I can stop with all this digital crap! Haha I dont get good feedback from her about these pictures.

IF: Dust

Update!

Here's the finished picture. I'm still having problems matching my cintiq to my other monitor (or the cintiq to everyone elses monitor) so this picture might seem a little lighter than intended.



Sometimes when I'm colouring I like to select a layer of colour and move the hue and saturation and try a different approach rather than my first choice from my colour pallet. The big robot was quite orange to begin with.

Those cords in his arm is stuff I really like doing and I love those colours. I'm a big fan of the animated film Akira and I really love the colour pallet they used. Rich purples, greens, reds, really bold and pulpy. Akira  also gave me the love for drawing cities. My perfect job would be drawing cities all day (I may have said this all ready but I'm fishing for a job to draw cities). Oh that texture over the city worked super well! That was a mistake too haha!

I did mean to blend that photo sky a bit more but those clouds look fake like cotton balls and I thought that looked fun so I left it alone.

BAM! Illustration complete!

(old post)

I've have to pull out of getting this done by today. It is wayyy too hot and a warm cintiq is not effin helping.

 


There's more colours done than this but I figured I'll just have the urn coloured in. The urn contains the last human remains.

I'll finish this picture when I stop sweating

Scribbly scribble

Here's some more scribbles. This first one I did yesterday but I delayed posting it since I posted the illustration Friday illustration instead.


I really like the old man in that drawing and that bird at the top. This was drawn at work and on the train going home.

This next one was drawn today. I've been wanting to draw some pirates for awhile so this was fun.


I like Spiderman at the top with his spider senses tingling. Derrrr Spiderman, they're Pirates

IF: CHICKEN

Woo! Done just before the Friday


Originally I was going to draw a big dragon and a knight running away from it, but I've been quite busy this week so I just pulled a face in front of a mirror and drew a picture around it haha.

I'm actually pretty happy how this turned out. It was drawn traditional with felt pens and then coloured in photoshop.

and a few more scribbles

Here's a scribble I did at work today of Roseline, Little B and me going on adventures (although I seem to be sleeping through them).


The other day before we saw "Tangled" we had a bunch of time to kill, (we did have to stand in line for 40 minutes though).  After our Retro Betty burgers we did some scribbles in my sketchbook (those birds I posted yesterday) after those first few drawings I remembered the game going around twitter recently of drawing batman with your eyes closed (search #drawbatmanwithyoureyesclosed) so Rose and I did that. Because batman is quite boyish Rose changed it to draw Strawberry Short cake, I for the life of me could not remember what she looked like. A big hat, eyelashes and lips was all I remembered haha, when then tried Garfield. We laughed quite a lot doing this, I hope you can work out what is what haha


oh just so you know, Roseline's drawings are at the top.

Busy working but here's some scribbles

Rose and I just got back from seeing Tangled again. This is the first film in a long time (Ponyo was the last film) that I've felt the need to go back and watch again, especially in expensive 3d (I'm poor I really cant afford to do this too much). This is probably the best 3d character animation I've ever scene..eff that it's real acting, such beautiful, funny acting (I love that horse).

While we were waiting for the movie we drew some crazy birds. We drew something else that made us laugh but I'll let Rose put that together.


I've also been busy working this week doing after effects stuff. I thought I'd get a lot more drawings in but I've been working nearly every minute of the day. A few drawings snuck in my notes though


Well hopefully I can fit in another illustration friday (maybe tomorrow)but for now enjoy a bird eating a pie and a whale playing videogames

What is this Tim?

I really don't know, I mean who are these brats?


They don't look like they are up to any good. Also what is up with this 4wd, it's a pretty sick drawing for someone who hates drawing cars.


What am I up to? I should be doing 3d tutorials

IF: Deja-vu

Inspired by the Rabbit Town Animator, I decided to do one of these Illustration Friday challenges. The topic was Deja-vu, a tough theme to start on!!!


I figure it's all in the expression. The colours are all about the parallel dimension you travel to when you have that deja-vu feeling (I learnt this from anime haha). I also really like just the plain pencil work.


Ok I better go back to my 3d tutorials.

Some old animation from the year 2000

I was looking for some other embarrassing old work by me and I came across a folder titled "stupidassanimation" and that title is apt. Stupidity, violence and cheese.

This is my first go at embedding swf files into my blog. I think I'm succeeding. Sorry that this page wont work on your iPad... I doubt it will work in facebook either. This is good because it means less people will see my crap from 10 years ago. haha

(*updated* I switched the hosting to google sites, hopefully less white boxes)

(push the button)


(you need to right click these files and select play)






(despite it saying loading it may already be loaded, just right click and select play)






Here's one based on Doug TenNapel's "The Neverhood". He's drawing a pretty cool web comic at the moment you can read that here


and this is the most cringe worthy for me. It's sooo cheesy. This was a test for a world I was creating. I think I have a feature film for this world stored in one of my drawers. The whole world was inspired by Ted Mckeever, although my drawings are way too conservative. I really love Mckeevers work, I wish I had that brain to come up with the stuff he does. Ok enough delaying....



Well this is my punishment for not drawing anything new. haha

Swordsman

Had myself an easy Sunday. I watched some silly movie about some guy in a jail cell who had a tunnel or something that he was able to get in and out of the jail to do things like blow up all the lawyers cars... that might have been the twist, I dunno. Anyway I drew this while I was watching it and I just finished colouring it in photoshop


I tried colouring it just using greys then adding colours to the greys but it made it look all washed out so I spent ages messing with adjustment layers and all kinds of things. Doing this brought back memories of my film 'Existence'(click the link to watch) Maybe this guy is a Dark Mountain.

Here's the original sketch


Oh and here's the sketches for the last few pictures I've put up.



Man that movie I watched was dumb. Turns out jail dude worked for the government as a tactician that's why he was so "smart". The end moral was also a bit questionable. The main lawyer dude realises he is no good at his job even though he has all the evidence at the end to put this guy away, he chooses to put the bomb the jail dude made under the jail dudes bed. Jail dude blows himself up and lawyer dude walks away from the explosion in slow motion. Then lawyer dude finally makes time for his daughter and sees her recital, because lawyer dude was a jerk to his family.