Soliums Depot

[Solium]

Ok, I am just starting to draw again. So I am at the monkey see monkey do stage.

First I have some sketches I did of Banjo, from a Banjo The Woodpile Cat coloring book.

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Fan%20Art/BanjoFanArtSketchesWeb01.jpg

Second I drew Daphne from Dragons Lair. This is based off of a screen cap. The line art was drawn by hand then scanned into the computer and colored in Photoshop.

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Fan%20Art/Daphne-Color-Web-01.jpg

[amandahamster]

Wow, you're a great artist!

The only thing I would point out is that Daphne's finger looks broken. You can probably fix that easily enough.

I really like the lighter outline on Daphne, might have to try that myself.

[Solium]

Thank you for your comments and suggestions. :)
I have some difficulty with the fine details. Such as eyes (iris and pupil) and finger nails. Heck, I torment over hands in general.

I think I am a fairly good "copy" artist. I can copy anything. But I need to improve my drawings skills so I can draw my own stuff.

For the Daphne pic, I tried to simulate the old fashion inked lines on a traditional animation cel.

[samuelvictorjones]

Ah you finally posted some stuff publically - excellent :)

You already know I love these man. You should post some of your older original works too - I think you are under selling yourself. Your original stuff is really nice :cool: I'm looking forward to seeing you progress & learn from Don, you're already starting at a very high level.

[akkushisu]

Amazing work, Solium! You've got some very clean lines in your Daphne picture. The colored lineart really helps to soften the whole feel of the picture, too. Hoping to see more from you! :D

[arif]

Very Nice Solium.....Great to see some of your stuff....post more..........

Regards,
Arif:laughing:

[Rodney]

You are off to a great start! (and it's fun to see you drawing the classic Don Bluth characters... Banjo is a favorite of mine!)

Outside of the finger that has been mentioned I think you've done a wonderful job with Daphne too!

Keep it up. :)

[joedorsey]

Keep drawing! Your work is looking great.

[Solium]

Thanks everyone for looking and commenting on my work. :)
I will be drawing some more Don Bluth characters, along with other "famous" characters. I also hope to do some life drawings. Sam thinks I should post a short storyboard I did years ago. So I guess I can put that up as well.

[samuelvictorjones]

You totally should they're really very cool! & the colour drawing of the mice/rats too :cool: People hear love mice & rats what with American Tail & Nimh :laughing:

[Solium]

I am more than happy to grant Sam's request ;) So here's the storyboard I created.

First off let me say, neither a story or character designs were finalized. This was simply a practice in storyboarding. This was also done a long time ago. I would say late 80's. (The 2005 mark was the first time I put it online) Finally the first page is horribly drawn. I didn't get into a groove until the second page of boards.


http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page01.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page02.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page03.jpg

[Solium]

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page04.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page05.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page06.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page07.jpg

[Solium]

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page08.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page09.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page10.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page11.jpg

[Solium]

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page12.jpg

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/storyboard/little_explorers_page13.jpg

[akkushisu]

Holy cow, Solium! That's some seriously impressive storyboarding! Sam's right, you should've shared this with us sooner. :D Extremely detailed and well thought out, my friend! If you haven't worked on this in a while, you should consider picking up on it again. It looks amazing so far!

[andrew sharp]

Very good work Solium like your compositions:D

[Solium]

Thanks! It was fun to do. I always try to find the most "dramatic" views.
Oh, I just noticed I missed a page. It is corrected now. I added the page with a pelican. ;)

Edit: I just noticed I put the NIMH amulet in frame nine!

[amandahamster]

Wow, you definitely have some storyboarding skills. Might give me some ideas on how to make my own better. The characters are incredibly detailed! Amazing work!

[samuelvictorjones]

Chris, I'm SO glad you posted these. They are fantastic. The fact you did them 20 years ago simply make them more impressive.

I know its a closed chapter & you don't really awnt to develop them further or use them, but just posting them here will inspire others, as well as show what you can do.

Funnily enough, in a round about way, since showing me these last week they've set off a chain of events for me.

I was inspired by them to start thinking about storyboarding my next "full" animation after the Jake one is finished, I wanted to do a short, with a proper story, multiple scenes & settings. I envisioned first a simple 3-5 minute short, then a 15-20 minute one, then a 30-45 minute one, then perhaps joining them together as a "package" film.

I was sorting through some boxes in the attic, when I came accross some old paperwork of my mother's, from 1976 - 1987 (I was born in '82) that had since been disguarded & she'd sent to me incase I wanted any of it. My mother is a pretty successful writer of short stories, poems & songs & had some tv & radio success in the 80s.

The paperwork reminded me somewhat of your storyboards, in the sense that the paper was yellowed, lots of sections were cut out & stuck into pages as you did with your pictures & words, & it was all typed on an old style typewriter. Looking through I found 2 short musicals that she wrote for young children. Through-out the 70s & 80s these were performed in many schools around the UK for 4-8 year olds. Something about the vague memory of these combined with the association in my mind with your storyboards made something "click" in my head.

The first was a quick story of a Teddy Bear left behind after the human family moved away, who is then befriended by a mouse & eventually a new family who moves in, via 4 songs. The second is a longer story via 7 songs. It tells the a moral story of Matilda, similar to the "boy who cried wolf". Funnily enough, after considerring last week adapting the "Cautionary Tales" by Hillaire Belloc, & asking Don about them, it turns out that my mother did exactly that with this musical, which I'd entirely forgotten. It has a Disneyfied happy ending, & more reason is given as to why Matilda is motivated to lie, but then realises it is wrong.

I'm very excited at the prospect of turning these plays by my mother into fully realised animated cartoons, & the lengths actually fit perfectly with what I was planning to do for a 5 & 20 minute cartoon. With inspiration from your storyboards, I've now started my own. My mother is very pleased that her old work may be turned into something that can be enjoyed by future generations.

I'm sorry if it sounds off topic, but these chains of evets were triggerred by my enthusiasm for these storyboards & how they inspired me! :)

[Solium]

Ha, ha! Yes I was around when they had typewriters. Does that make me ancient?:laughing:

It would be an honor if some of my work inspiration others. Certainly others inspire me. I see some of the illustrators on here and know how much I need to improve.

Your Mothers stories sound interesting and I look forward to what you come up with!

[jeremyhopkins]

Not too bad and I enjoy your clear staging. Good for you for hanging on to your drawings for so long. You probably learned a lot by keeping a record of your work!

[samuelvictorjones]

Ha, ha! Yes I was around when they had typewriters. Does that make me ancient?:laughing:

Not at all, I'm 28 & learned to write on a typewriter. My mother was a professional writer & used one. I remember it being a momentous occasiona when she switched to an electric wordprocessor so she could send things for print on floppy disc (She got fed up of spelling & punctuation mistakes added by people re-typing her work for magazine publication!) That still printed in the small manner as a type writer however, with hammers hitting an ink ribbon. It wasn't til 93 when when got an "inkjet" printer that could print anything you threw at it, rather than fixed fonts & character sizes.


It would be an honor if some of my work inspiration others. Certainly others inspire me. I see some of the illustrators on here and know how much I need to improve. Your Mothers stories sound interesting and I look forward to what you come up with!
Thank you. Well, I now have a full script for the teddy bear story. I've fleshed it out with more characters & a Christmas theme, & written poems for a narator. (In mind head I was imagining Don reading them in the way he did for the Cyber Garage - I love his voice telling a story).

[story editted out as, on reflection, it was long winded & too personal to be in someone else's thread! sorry about the hijack ;) However I'd like to thank Solium for sparking the chain of events that started meon this new project! :) ]

[Solium]

Sweet story Sam. I look forward to seeing and hearing more about your project. I remember the electric typewriters too. They were really cool in their days. They had a built in dictionary and could do spell check. I don't remember a ribbon or hammer. I think it just "printed" what you typed. At least the model we had.

[Solium]

Here's my little update for today. I will be switching between cartooning and figure drawing so I can improve my skills over all.

Of course what we have here are feet studies. My source of reference was from a book titled simply enough, "The Art Of Drawing" by Willy Pogany. I absolutely love this book. Wonderful illustrator. While mainly a figure book, the artist displays some uncanny talent for "fantasy" and "Renaissance" imagery.

Art-Drawing-Willy-Pogany (http://www.amazon.com/Art-Drawing-Willy-Pogany/dp/1568330596)

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Figure%20Drawing/feet_study_01_web.jpg

[frankenart]

i really dig those storyboards alot,nice work.

[Solium]

i really dig those storyboards alot,nice work.

Thank you!

[samuelvictorjones]

Sweet story Sam. I look forward to seeing and hearing more about your project.
Thanks. I've finalised ascript & recorded a temporary audio track for it, its exactly 10 minutes long. I shall be using this to slowly create a storyboard & piece together a static animatic with the audio. Once sections are complete I'll uploadthem for people to see :)


I remember the electric typewriters too. They were really cool in their days. They had a built in dictionary and could do spell check. I don't remember a ribbon or hammer. I think it just "printed" what you typed. At least the model we had.
Yes thats right, but ours definitely had a daisywheel hammer system, like the old printers for early pet machines. I think yours must have been slightly newer or more expensive to have a "proper" printer built in :D

I like your feet drawings, very realistic. I particularly like your use of varied pressure pencil lines & your shading techniques. There's some very difficult angles & poses there, I think you mnailed it. I feel the 3 diiemensional ness of them, like seeing the implied curve of the sole even when not drawn. very cool.

[akkushisu]

Hey, Chris!

I noticed that you asked Don about how to improve your lineart in the last seminar. Don didn't have too much to say on the matter, but, since I work with inking so often, figured that I could provide you with some tips.

Now, keep in mind that I'm basing all of this on your Daphne picture since it's the only image you have up that's inked. One thing I noticed right away is that your lines generally have the same weight throughout. They stay more or less at one thickness. To add a bit of depth to your linework, try fading the lines as they end, like where one just stops and doesn't connect with another.

Another thing I do is use thinner lines for fine details and thicker lines to establish shapes or parts of the character. Eyelashes, whiskers, folds in cloth, wrinkles, and places where a lot of intricate detail is used should all be done with thinner lines.

If these are techniques that you already employ or don't want to try out, please disregard my post. You've got some wonderful art here and I'm very eager to see more. When you do some more inked work, I'd love to check it out! :D

[lavallelee]

feet and hands are so hard for me, you really got it figured out!

great job

[Solium]

Hey, Chris!

I noticed that you asked Don about how to improve your lineart in the last seminar. Don didn't have too much to say on the matter, but, since I work with inking so often, figured that I could provide you with some tips.
:D

Thank you for the suggestions. :) I have a bad habit of trying to emulate the small thin lines used in animation. But I guess that's not the right approach for an illustration. (Even if its based off of an animated character)

Good idea about using a thinner line, or pen tip for the face details.

For this particular drawing, (Of Daphne) its actually a pencil drawing scanned into the computer and colored. So it was not inked. What I have a slight problem with is keeping the pencil line consistent on long arcs.


@lavallelee: You should see my hands. They are terrible! My hands look like deformed claws. It will be a major priority for me to improve not only basic anatomy but hands in particular.

[lavallelee]

ya i hear ya, when Don draws hands, he does it so easily

i hope one day I can be that good :D

[Solium]

Small update for the week. I am designing my version of Santa Clause.
Not the best sketches because my thought process was on the "design" of the character and not on the line art.

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Santa/santa_concept_01b_web.jpg

Edit: Updated sketch.

[ashek]

Wao......Soliums you are great . I like your drawing & storyboard design.More share your work.....Wait for see.

[akkushisu]

Hey, Chris. Excellent work on Santa Claus! Don't sweat the quality of your sketchwork, it looks amazing! Can't wait to see more! :D

[Solium]

Ashek and Seth-2. Thank you for looking and your encouraging words. I truly appreciate them. I'm going to do a little more line art on the Santa sketches and repost. ;-)

[andrew sharp]

Fun looking character Solium really like the stretched out torso:D

[Solium]

Thanks Andrew. I'm glad you like the torso. :) I should add, my character is supposed to be very regal and a little bit wizard like. So the elongated torso and high chest was deliberate.

[Solium]

Life drawing class day. I couldn't get Selena to pose for me in person so I used a photograph. :laughing:

I almost finished it. It was more a study so it was drawn on standard copy paper. If I drew it bigger I could have gotten a bit more delicate with the skin tone shading.

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Portraits/Portrait_Selena_Gomez_01web.jpg

[akkushisu]

Beautiful work, Chris! The shading and level of detail you put into this are simply breathtaking! Nice work. :D

[amandahamster]

That is an awesome sketch. It looks photo-realistic. Super-impressive work. :eek:

[andrew sharp]

Great portrait work That hair rocks:)

[arif]

Agreed!!.very nice Solium ......Thanks for the posting....:D

Regards,
Arif:)

[Solium]

@Seth and Amanda: Thank you very much. Its the first portrait Ive done in 12 years. So it was an exciting project to take on. I was personally curious if I could pull it off.

@ Andrew: The hair was a "put expletive here" to do! It took some time to figure out how to "style" the rendering of the hair.

@ Arif: Thank you for looking. :)

[NateHorsfall]

I've been buried under other work for the past few weeks, so sorry I never got in here to check out your stuff.

First off, welcome! Secondly.. Excellent stuff, though the storyboards were especially impressive. Theres not much more I can say besides whats already been said by everyone else.. so, thanks for sharing, and keep up the good work :)

[samuelvictorjones]

Oh wow! :eek:

I've been rather busy for a while but have been meaning to post that I really like your design for Santa Claus & it fits the synopsis you mentionned perfectly. Its drawn really well & looks like a "proper" cartoon, I can visualise it moving.

But then I came here & saw Selena staring back at me!

Man you already know I'm kinda in love with miss Gomez, so I've studied her for many an hour, & that is 100% spot on. If I squint it could be a photo with a filter added through Photoshop :laughing: Absolutely breath-taking. (Both Selena, and the picture! :laughing:)

[Solium]

@ NateHorsfall- Thanks for checking in and taking a look. Once I get a "new" project started I will try my hand at some story boarding again.

@ Samuel- Your always very kind and generous with your comments. Stop it or I'm gonna get a big head. :laughing: Seriously, thanks for your comments. Its good to know people recognize the portrait as Selena since recognition is the most important factor.

Regarding Santa. This was just one design idea based on what I was going to do. His design may change as my ideas change...

[Solium]

Today's update. Designing a little girl elf. I know the legs are almost symmetrical. My bad. :o

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Santa/elf_girl_01web.jpg

[andrew sharp]

Good work Solium Fun design work:)

[akkushisu]

Ooh! Very cute elf character, Chris! I like her face especially. Very nice work! Oh, and don't sweat the legs looking almost mirrored. I think you did a great job at making them look different from each other. :)

[zanekohler]

Very cool drawing. Very nice line work as well!

[Solium]

Thanks everyone for looking and commenting. It lets me know if a drawing "succeeds" or not. ;)

This following "illo" was first shown in the seminar. I am ironing out my Santa design.

http://i906.photobucket.com/albums/ac270/cgt-graphics/Santa/santa_concept_02web.jpg

[akkushisu]

Hey, Chris!

You're on the right track with your Santa design here. LOTS of detail and personality showing! The part about his design that looks a bit odd to me is how thin his legs are compared to his top half. Like Don said on your Daphne picture, he just looks a bit top-heavy. If this was don intentionally, then please disregard my critique. :)

What I would do is make his legs kind of short and chunky and then make his belly just a tad bigger to round him out. It'd almost make him look dwarven in a way, but I think it'd work for Santa. Again, this is purely suggestion. Everything else looks wonderful! Keep up the good work, my friend!

...Hopefully I won't get a lump of coal for Christmas because of this. :D

[andrew sharp]

Good work Solium the second one is my favorite lots of secondary action on the belly especially against that belt :)

[Solium]

@ Seth- Its funny, once I saw the Daphne drawing line art I realized she didn't have enough "meat" on the bottom. Both Samuel and Don said the same thing. :laughing:

Regarding Santa, he is sort of top heavy on purpose. I am trying to stylize him more than perhaps I should. My inspiration are the character designs in El Cid. I couldn't find any good pictures, but heres a link that shows some.

Click Here (http://www.awn.com/articles/iel-cidi-spanish-myth-challenges-animated-features-usa/page/3%2C1)

The El Cid characters have small heads, huge upper bodies and small legs. While the robe is waving in the wind, Don did say, the robe in most cases should drape straight down, so I guess the legs will be hidden in most cases.

Oh, and no worries. I appreciate your comments and suggestions and you won't be getting coal in your stocking this year. :p

My original story concept had Santa as the center of the story, however that has completely changed. The story will center on the little girl elf and Santa will have one or two small cameo appearances in the story. Thus this Santa design may not be appropriate for his role in the story. Will see.

@ Andrew- Thank you for taking a look. I'm glad you like the second version better. I thought that one was an improvement as well.