What did the pro's use?
pielemuis
Join Date: 2002-01-25 Member: 72Members, NS1 Playtester
Join Date: 2002-01-25 Member: 72Members, NS1 Playtester
C i have some interest in drawing and i may have some talent, though i haven't practiced in a while, but i just wanted 2 know what the artist used for their concept art. What paper, pencils, etc. I would appreciate an answer so i can rush to a shop and get me some.BTW i know it's not cause you ahve he tools that you can draw but hey can be of much help, like the little puppet that i use for my manga drawings, you now with the proportions of the human body neatly indicated.
Comments
One thing that should be stressed is that traditional art skills apply directly to digital art skills. Ie, any time you spend with a paper and pencil will directly help your artistic ability in general, and that's what's really needed to create great digital art. The software skills are needed too, but not without a solid artistic base.
I'm sure Cory and the other NS artists have lots more to say about this.
If you want a great place to learn about art, check out the fantastic Sijun forums (run by an artist at Valve in his free time):
<a href="http://www.sijun.com" target='_blank'>http://www.sijun.com</a>
<!--EDIT|Flayra|Jan. 28 2002,15:42-->
I mean i can work easily more than an hour on a manga thats just one page big, and doesn't even have a background. Oh well i'm gonna start drawing again, maybe i'll post something, c how it goes.
Yup, the alien concept sketches were straight up photoshop with a wacom tablet. The hive concept I did awhile back was a combination of Photoshop and Painter.
As for the amount of time I spend on a picture it depends. For the alien concepts anywhere between a half hour to an hour, once I actually get going (with those guys there was a stage of just fussing with lines a bit to get a sense for what direction I was going to go in). For full color its more like a couple of hours for concept stuff. For a full blown painting with background and what not (like the one below, which is a small version of a painting I did for another game), it can take anywhere between 10 to 20 hours.
And that sijun can be a great site to both get feedback about work and to learn about other artists processes. Good luck!
I used to do a lot of pencil and ink character drawings (I even had an ad in the back of Dragon magazine for a while), and those would take me anywhere between 4 and 8 hours. Later I got into airbrushing, and a full color painting would take days or even weeks if there was a lot of mask work. I've only been doing digital graphics for about 5 years, and I still am much more of a <i>designer</i> than a <i>digital artist</i>, the difference being that I typically work in generated (3D) or pre-existing graphics/scans and manipulate them into the images I want. My hat is off to Cory for being able to apply his art directly in the digital medium <i>by hand</i>, something I have yet to do. I should really get a drawing tablet and experiment. That would be the one tool I would strongly recommend for anyone wanting to do the kind of things that we have seen (as far as concept art) from Cory. Trying to 'paint' with a mouse or trackball is just too damned hard. <!--emo&;)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=';)'><!--endemo-->
Valve employees should get NO free time until they release TF2 and/or HL2 because that's all that's really important and because I said!
<!--emo&;)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=';)'><!--endemo-->
Either way, can you really imagine that they <i>wouldn't</i> be doing HL2? <!--emo&:p--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':p'><!--endemo-->
Also, relating to the "in his free time," I notice that the gallery has not been updated since 2000, so he obviously hasn't had *too* much free time <!--emo&;)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=';)'><!--endemo-->
That's a very nice site, I'm checking out all sorts of stuff an practicing a bit myself. I've already got the tablet (first thing I did with it was color those silly concept sketches way back), 2 versions of Photoshop, and a version of "Corel Painter Classic" which is a program that tries its hardest to look real (and does a nice job too; Thats the program I used for watercoloring the concepts), so I'm all set, material-wise.
Wish me luck <!--emo&;)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=';)'><!--endemo-->
-Jacius
Anyway, it was a good deal, and Wacom tablets are very nice. The screen/tablet mix is incredibly expensive, but the Graphire 2 isn't too bad.
-Jacius
I've always been pretty doubtful about my artistic skills. Everything I do is pretty careless and I don't put a great deal of thought into what I do - the only time I ever do good stuff is if I don't even know what I'm doing, and let my unconcious guide the image to its end. Unfortunately, this rarely happens and so I'm not really very artistically active :/
I'd love to be able to draw something the way I picture it in my mind, but more often than not, it just becomes a 2nd rate image. I envy people who are able to draw stuff so great, and have things turn out the way they like. I suppose it's just a matter of lots of practice, but I never can find the energy to practice a lot, even though I'd love to.
Anyway...here's an *alternative* hera computer core, scanned in using a webcam so its quality isn't so great.
One of my biggest problems I feel is that I can't get perspective quite right, as you can probably tell from this pic.
Extreme crit welcome <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo--> Basically I just picked up a pencil and drew. I didn't pre-plan it or anything, I just drew...
I've always been pretty doubtful about my artistic skills. Everything I do is pretty careless and I don't put a great deal of thought into what I do - the only time I ever do good stuff is if I don't even know what I'm doing, and let my unconcious guide the image to its end. Unfortunately, this rarely happens and so I'm not really very artistically active :/
I'd love to be able to draw something the way I picture it in my mind, but more often than not, it just becomes a 2nd rate image. I envy people who are able to draw stuff so great, and have things turn out the way they like. I suppose it's just a matter of lots of practice, but I never can find the energy to practice a lot, even though I'd love to.
Anyway...here's an *alternative* hera computer core, scanned in using a webcam so its quality isn't so great.
One of my biggest problems I feel is that I can't get perspective quite right, as you can probably tell from this pic.
Extreme crit welcome <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo--> Basically I just picked up a pencil and drew. I didn't pre-plan it or anything, I just drew...<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Atleast you can draw that well...I drew a cool looking wolf-creature once..then after that, I couldn't draw it ever again..I can't draw worth crap..but I'm a good Writer and I'm good at improvising...Hence why I've been a Quest Master in a few Online, Text Based, and Pen and Paper games..I can't program at all either...but I can write...and I can review games down to the pixels! <!--emo&:p--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':p'><!--endemo--> Don't get me started on Devil May Cry's tiny little mistakes...heh heh heh, my friend was so disgusted with it after I finished stating the problems, that he didn't play it again.