Sketchy

Wow, I have not used a pencil in a really long time.

Bad day & Better Day

Here's something a bit more revealing. It's a sketch I probably will never finish.

Some days, nothing seems work out. It speaks a lot about talent vs effort, and what happens if one approaches a painting sort of mindlessly with the expectation that things will go well without putting in any effort. At least for me this is true - even if talent exists (something I don't particularly believe in) it's better not to rely on it.

In between, I took a break and thought harder about the bad result all night. I worked over it the next day and the result was much better despite not using any reference. Just more careful thought and effort.

Photoshop Brushes, Palette Knives & Tool Presets

I get a number of requests for Photoshop pallete knives, so I thought I would put up a bunch of brushes and tool presets for the smudge tool and mixer brush. Grab them (made in CS5) here:

- Brushes
- Tool presets

Here's a bunch of examples of them in use:

Main rendering brushes

Sketching brushes

Pallete knives and textured brushes

Mixer Brush tool presets

Smudge tool presets