Summer-update
Hello followers of StudioColrouphobia.net!
After a longer period of downtime I return with some private commissioned artwork.
The guest-blogposts are going to return after a summer-holdup, keep your eyes peeled!
The future has some interesting things happening for the Studio, which we cannot really speak of just yet but what it means is that private commissions will be a little fewer, look out for some more personal paintings in the future and a bit more focus on tutorials and guests then before.
All in all, we sincerely hope that you readers will benefit more from the changes then not.
In the meanwhile, here are three private commissions.
Salamander and Sister
Valrak – Imperial Fist
(Done for Valrak, over at the Vigilia Mortis forums - http://www.battle-brothers.net/home )
Kahuna – Chaplain of the Lantern Marines
The Lantern Marines are always fun to paint and this time I got to paint the Kahuna, the equivalent of a Chaplain, of the Lantern Marines.
Don’t forget to add us on twitter or Facebook (just click the images below)!
Until next time!
David
Guest blogger: Noah Bradley – On the Shoulders of Giants
On the Shoulders of Giants
You don’t become an artist on your own.
Even if you lock yourself in your room and teach yourself, you’re still not on your own. You’re learning from the legacy of all the masters that have gone before you. You’re pulling on artistic traditions stretching back hundreds and thousands of years.
My art is heavily dependant on the artists that I look up to. I look up to my heroes and pick apart everything they did. I try and reverse engineer their brushstrokes, their compositions, even the ideas behind their pieces. When my art is feeling stuck I look to them for direction.
Rembrandt gave me an appreciation for rich contrast and thickly textural brushstrokes. Sargent showed me what artistic bravado really looked like. Albert Bierstadt taught me the meaning of epic and George Inness taught me the power of subtlety. Thomas Moran showed me an American ideal and Mark Rothko showed me the feeling of nothingness. Frazetta reawakened an adolescent boy and John Berkey inspired with his beautifully abstract representational paintings. Pyle taught me composition. Hopper taught me silence.
I have been blessed with countless teachers–some alive, most dead.
~Noah
This blog-entry is part of a series of Guest-blogs on Studio Colrouphobia called To be Inspired and Driven where some of the greatest influences on art today are invited to tell about their inspirations, their thoughts on art and their musings on anything related to art.
Noah Bradley is an environment concept artist & illustrator. He’s young but has already worked for an international clientele and has been accepted into the industry’s most prestigious publications. Even if you haven’t heard of Noah, chances are you have seen work he has done for Wizards of the Coast, L5R or AEG.
He is part of Awesomehorse Studios which do a great job of paying it forward to anyone and everyone who want to improve their skills and careers when it comes to art.
Noah Bradley is also the creator of The Art of Freelancing, a video aid to freelancers in art.
We here at Studio Colrouphobia did a review of this instructional video not that long ago. The review is found here:
The Art of Freelancing – a review with ducks
To be Inspired and Driven
Hello there Studio Colrouphobia followers!
Today there aren’t going to be any pretty pictures in the blogpost, but I hope the text will bring something interesting to you anyway.
In an effort to give back (something I’m sure you have heard before from others) here at Studio Colrouphobia we looked at our past, present and future to see what has been important for us when it comes to art and working as artists.
Pretty fast I personally came to the conclusion that there are two things that have and continue to, play a major role for me when it comes to working with art.
Inspiration and Motivation.
When I was younger, I thrived on visuals. I was into movies, comics and games, just like most others. But what really got me into things, where the visual aspects.
When I imagined things, the more I could visualize things in my mind, the more vivid they would become and therefore they would inspire me to explore that imagination.
My first true introduction to Art, as means to work with, actually came from the Swedish version of D&D. The images and illustrations where probably not the best, but I remember the creatures they depicted very well (and they all look perfect in my head now!) and I also remember thinking:
“Wow, the guys doing this are my dad’s age. Nobody I know my dad’s age would do this unless they got paid for it. They get paid to draw!”
I had always drawn and sketched, just like most others, though I was hardly the one two scribble on walls and scream if no pen or paper was around. I just enjoyed sketching and put enough effort into it for people to notice.
At a certain age I just decided that this, doing Fantasy and Sci-fi art, for a living, was what I wanted to do.
From there on, things become a constant battle between being inspired and getting motivation, drive, to continue. Most people have a really hard time trying to become a freelancer at anything, regardless of what you do. The reasons are many- people not believing in you, lack of money to pursue that sort of career, lack of self-confidence and lack of believing in yourself (and no, those last two are not the same – one mean you do not believe you are good enough and the other that you do not believe you WILL be good enough).
So how do you solve this?
Well for one, you need to have support from your friends and family, something I know doesn’t always happend. I had luck enough to have my -then girlfriend, now- wife that has given me support throughout the past 10-12 years. That’s not always evident.
The other things you need are great sources of inspiration and causes for drive.
I had great sources for inspiration. Before the internet (yes, I’m old) there where things like “Heavy Metal“- with giants like Simon Bisley, Frank
Frazzetta and Jeffrey (Catherine) Jones. There where Roleplaying-games, with covers and interiors just giving my imagination so much to use- I was inspired by Brom, Paul Bonner, Paolo Parente and Wayne England. There where book-covers with fantastically painted images -people like Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell as
well as Luis Royo just made me feel extremely enthousiastic about improving and possibly one day be able to earn my living on art, if I could only get good enough.
Once on the Internet, I got so many more inspirators added to the list.
Traditional artists such as Donato Giancola, Dan Dos Santos and David Kassan blew me away from the moment I either discovered them or found out who those book covers where made by.
Digitalists like Andrew (Android) Jones – for his innovating techniques, Björn Hurri for his fantastic dedication and commitment, J.P. Targete for his traditionals-looking digitals, Melanie Delon for her fantastic characters, Noah Bradley for his fantastic environments, Brad Rigney for his general excellence and so many more…
They all inspired me and gave me a drive to continue, to try to become good enough to work as an llustrator for a living. I’m sure most of you have sources for inspiration and motivation. I would love to hear who they are, perhaps we share them, or I haven’t heard of them or seen their work. I am still looking for more inspirational and motivational artists to add to my list to keep me driven to learn and improve.
Well, back in the days, I had to really look for these sources of inspiration and talking here at the studio we agreed that we should try and give back some of that inspiration.
To do that, I have asked some of my art-heroes and sources for inspiration and drive to write one-time blogposts, right here on studiocolrouphobia.net.
A lot of them are busy with their work, but some have answered an will write to give you guys some inspiration. I do not know what they will write, as I didn’t want to restrict them, but the general theme for these will be ”To be inspired and driven”, and every blog-post made by a guest-blogger will be on the topic of Art.
We here at Studio Colrouphobia will post these as they come in. There is no a perfect schedule for when they will come in, but we will never post more then one a day, so if you have seen a guest-blogger post here, chanses are you wont see another update on that day.
We hope you will enjoy this little treat.
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Until Next time!
