Warrior vs. the Dragon Worm

Time for my yearly art blog post. Does anyone remember when blogging was a thing? I miss those days.

 

Thrudr - daughter of Thor

Did you know Sif and Thor had a daughter? Her name is Thrudr. I picture her as extremely strong and wielding a hammer like her dad, with an axe thrown in for good measure.

This is a work in progress, part of the Valkyria project:

Thrudr detail

Julycanthropy 2020 #01

I drew these on my live stream last night. You can watch me draw and talk about D&D and stuff on Twitch weeknights 9pm PST (Pacific Standard Time)

Saga of the Volsungs

King Volsung and his sons journey in three ships to visit Siggeir King of Gautland.

This was originally a pen & ink sketch drawn for Inktober. I was reading the Saga of the Volsungs at the time and was inspired by the stories and characters in it.
I recently got a new digital tablet, an XP-Pen and was playing around with doing digital pen & inks. I used this piece to experiment on and kind of like how it came out.

November - the Month of Drawing Ravens

So I filled my sketchbook up with drawings of ravens. Trying to really study them, understand their anatomy, their feather patterns, and how they moved. I don't do this kind of deep dive enough and am endeavoring to do more of this kind of study. Next up will be wolves in December. You can follow my art journey on Instagram: @thomas.denmark

Deviant Art

I've had a DeviantArt account since 2009, but haven't done much with it until recently. I've been using it lately as it has a lot of stock photography and some of it is useful in a pinch. Also you can find PhotoShop brushes and vector shapes and a variety of other handy art references. In addition it provides interesting data when you post art; you can see who has favorited the art and what else they've favorited to give you some insight into who likes what you're posting.

It has become a place where I post drawing experiments. Some experiments include these mixed-media drawings I've been doing for fun with pen & inks coloring them with watercolors, colored pencil, and finishing them digitally. Here are some examples.

http://thomden.deviantart.com/

Dejah Thoris

This was a little inking experiment. Trying to get a cleaner, more graphic effect.

Murderous Heads

Rough sketches for a long running project about murder most foul.

Badass...Liu Ji and Leonides

Badass...Justinian

Here is the illustration for Justinian from Badass.

Badass

I recently helped illustrate a funny little history book called "Badass", filled with vulgar language, but quite entertaining and educational. Written by the amazing Ben Thompson.

Here was the illo for Peter the Great, known for his hard drinking as well as his "badassness".

I illustrated this while at the height of my "ink splatter" brush fascination, so they were quite fun to do.

It's published by Harper Collins, so it should be available in most major retail book stores. It's also on Amazon.

As The Crow Flies

Sword and Planet

Been reading Edgar Rice Burrough's Mars books. I'm so inspired! And so excited that Andrew Stanton is directing the movie.

This one is real pen & ink, not one of my digital fakeries.

Barbarian, Fighter, Druid

So I did this sketch of a barbarian with my splattery custom brushes in photoshop.

Then I turned him into a fighter.

And finally, into a druid:

This is something I see a lot of concept artists do where they continually morph a character or pose into several different variations. Looking through my work I'm surprised I haven't done more of this. It's fun, and you can quickly generate a lot of drawings. I love photoshop.

Style vs. Stylized

I've been working on this little side project for a while and I reached a critical juncture. I love goth art style in works by Edward Gorey, some Tim Burton, and very few other things. I'm quite particular about it. I love Lenore for example, but not many other comic books in that genre.

This project has a morbid subject (murder), but it is also light hearted. In the way Edward Gorey is quite morbid, but his wit makes it so entertaining. Anyway, the juncture I am at is exactly how stylized am I going to make the art. This was my first pass (okay, more like 21st pass):


Well, my wife made some great observations, particularly about the general flavor of the project and suggested I push the crows to have a little more personality - to be a little less realistic. I agreed and took another pass. Then realized everything else had to be just as stylized - the trees, the character, so on. This was my second attempt:


I definitely like the crows better. I think the design is stronger. I can draw a better character then that and will have to just practice more to get them right. But I'm wondering if this is an improvement, or is it merely different?

Solemn

A quick digital sketch. I've really gotten into using splatter brushes lately.

Barbarian Raging

Peanut Brittle Tastes Good

Sees Candies makes my favorite peanut brittle. I was eating some while sketching this.

Travail

Some dudes on a long journey up. Who knows where they are going? I certainly don't.



Photoshop cs2, mostly done with that one default hard brush that changes size depending on pressure. Pretty much my favorite brush next to the basic round brush.

Wizard Duel

I love the wizard's duel scene in Disney's Sword and the Stone. This doesn't have anything to do with that.


Simulated pen & ink, in Photoshop cs2.