“Radio Flyer.” (c) 2013 Michael J. Barnes. www.lookingtodraw.com.
This is a new model based on the sketch I drew up and posted in a preview post. This model will be used in a future illustration I am working on.
So what we have here is a little red wagon enhanced with two supercharged jet rocket engines. This over-powered rocket wagon will send any kid flying through the skies, and through his or her imagination.
Let me know what you think.
Petal Power. (c) 2013 Michael J. Barnes.
I decided to try a different tack with this piece, hopefully to display a little diversity in my illustrative style. Petal Power shows a little girl giving a ride to her puppy and dolly through her neighborhood. And, yes, that is an octopus tugging at the end of his leash and snarling at the mailman (because its a well-known fact that octopi are the sworn enemy of mail carriers — at least it’s well known in my head).
The characters were created and rendered in Zbrush. The background (houses and such) we produced in Sketch-up with texturing and rendering done in Bryce. All elements were brought into Photoshop and Viola! (or voila) Petal Power.
I have decided to work up a couple more images based on this theme. I have four ideas in mind, with the next piece including a rocket-powered wagon.
Rusty Corridor Background. (c) 2013 Michael J. Barnes.
Completed updating the background for an illustration currently in progress. My plan here was to make the background a little eerie. Hopefully, it will give the impression that something might be amiss with this ship. In order to accomplish this, I painted in some volumetric lighting, and darkened and desaturated the walls. Let me know what you think.
Rusty Ship’s Corridor – (c) 2013 Michael J. Barnes
Working up a new illustration and this is the background for the image. I created this in Google SketchUp, then imported into Bryce for textures and rendering.
I really like using Bryce for rendering up background environments for a few reasons. First, for a quick build up of textures, Bryce has several preset textures. With this image, I employed many of Bryces “exposed metals” textures to give this background a “rustic” appearance. Second, Bryce has a great easy-to-use lighting system that allows me to create a great lighting environment. Next, I can render to very large, high resolution images. Finally, I like Bryce because I can render a panoramic image that I can import into Zbrush to use for HRDI lighting of my sculpts.
I am currently working up a full-body sculpt of my “Gaur” character. When completed he will be inserted into this background. More info to follow.
Gaur. (c) 2013 Michael J. Barnes.
Just completed this character concept illustration. He began as a test sculpt after learning some more new techniques. I then wrote up a character brief and “Gaur” here is the final result. The brief described an alien character, possibly of human ancestry. After centuries of cross-breeding with the indigenous species of an alien planet, the human features evolved into a distinct race. Finally, this character’s people embraced cybernetic implants to help improve the species. Think cross between a human, Klingon and Borg.
“The Little Princess & The Grump.” (c) 2013 Michael J. Barnes.
Digital Illustration.
This latest work was the image I was envisioning when I began the “Grumpy” project… A rampaging beast stopped in his tracks by a little girl holding up a teddy bear. I like to think I captured this image satisfactorily.