Digital Painting Process

It's been no secret that I've been wanting to improve my digital painting skills for some time now. I feel that my drawing is substantial enough to at least get some work as a professional animator & illustrator. But painting has always been daunting to me. Without the safety of the line I feel lost. I've always had this terrible habit of expecting my work to look perfect from beginning to end which of course, is discouraging and also the wrong way to look at it, especially with someone as impatient as me, it has been fatal to the completion of my past painting attempts. But I now know that you have to gradually mould and sculpt your painting from the general and rough, to the specific and refined.

Anyways here is a print I'm working on which WILL be successful! I'm going to push through!

I've seen Brave twice now, the second time I watched it was on Sky player in order to break down the story after reading 'Invisible Ink' by Brian McDonald. After having read that book, deciphering the tools and mechanisms of the story became unbelievably easy and almost too obvious. I saw all the workings and mechanics of the film, the setups, the dramatisation, the symbols, the underlying armature and how everything served an important part in leading up to the final climax and inherent message therein.

Subsequently I became inspired to draw 'Merida' the lead character. Here is the initial sketch which I began to colour in Photoshop.

As I began fleshing out the face I decided to take the plunge and paint this properly. Here is my current progress...

I can't even begin to tell you how annoying and difficult getting this far has been! That's the reason I'm here to be honest, to relieve some stress! Ha! Alas you can see that I have begun sculpting the form as well as adding a little rim lighting just so I know where I'm going. (really out of panic because I painted over the line work...) It's hard picking the right colours when painting. Knowing where to put the blues and greens in the skin tones, dealing with light, how that effects the hues of the shadows and cast shadows, something I find especially tricky to get right.

Well wish me luck! 

Liam.