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URL: http://www.loonygames.com/content/2.4/pop/
Vol.
2, Issue 4
December 2, 1999
Painting
on Polygons:
Conceptual Art
Part 2
by
Rick "Flatness"
Grossenbacher
irst
off, I’d like to thank those of you who sent in artwork and
questions for the new Critique and Q&A section that I’m
going to be starting in Painting On Polygons. And to everyone
else, keep sending in those questions!
In part
1 of this article I showed a few examples of conceptual art and
explained the major uses of concept art in the design of a video
game. In this part of the article I’d like to just into some
good basic rules and techniques to follow for drawing your pictures.
You may prefer a different style in your drawing, but the things
I’m going to be explaining are useful to just about anyone
because they train your eye. I really wanted to show a concept
drawing from the absolute start to finish but because of time
restraints this time around, I’m going to have to save that
for a future article.
Using
Line Quality
For starters,
let’s take a look at the dragon again that we saw in the
previous article.
Notice
the lines in the dragon that make up his basic shape. Art instructors
will often refer to this a “line quality.” It is basically
the variances in pressure that you put on the pencil as you draw
to make a line lighter or darker at appropriate parts of the drawing.
In the next picture I’ve labeled some sections of the drawing
in red for you to take a look at to exemplify this further.
Looking
clockwise around the picture, follow the numbers:
1. Notice
how much the darkness/thickness of the line changes from one area
to the next.
2. Again,
see how the line is lighter at the beak and then darkens around
toward the top of the snout.
3. In
this area, the same type of rule applies but not just to the outside
line. Look at the scaly area on the surface of the dragon’s
neck. The little specks inside are also lightened and darkened
to give a better sense of texture.
By using
big changes in lights to darks from pitch black to white, you
can really make the mood and feel of the drawing come out rather
than having the entire drawing stay within a certain set of gray
tones. To some of you this sort of thing may seem obvious, but
more often than not, beginning artists make the mistake not learning
it at all. Again, I need to stress that there are times when stylistically
your drawing doesn’t use line quality, but a vast majority
of traditional sketching does.
The purpose
of this section is for two reasons. First, artists can get exposure
of their work, and second they can get some non-bias feedback
from me. Today I’m going to do a critique on some pieces
sent in by Gamaiel Zavala (ceriumz@hotmail.com).
Gamaiel
sent in some very nice work. Keep in mind that Gamaiel has substantial
quality in his drawing and you don’t need to have professional
quality artwork to submit to this column. This critique section
is designed for every one of all levels.
The first
piece that we will take a look at is a portrait he did.
Notice
how nicely he used his lights and darks in the shading of this
drawing. This is a perfect example of using line quality successfully.
Much of the right side of the face is pure white which shows off
a nice use of realistic-looking lighting. This is a great example
of how every little bit of the face doesn’t need to be colored
in to show texture. Some can be just white. Conversely, some can
be just black (if there are heavy shadows or darkness in the particular
picture you are working on).
He has
nice proportions of the face set up. The eyes, nose, and mouth
look like they are just where they are suppose to be. The facial
expression is very natural looking (which can be very difficult
to pull off). Many times when drawing the human face, the expression
will look weird because the features aren’t placed properly.
In Gamaiel’s drawing here, he did it nicely.
This is
just one of his drawings, and you can see more of Gamaiel’s
work at: www.geocities.com/siliconvalley/way/8354/
That wraps
up this addition of Painting On Polygons. Keep sending in your
questions and graphics for the Critique and Q&A section, and
keep drawing too!
-
Rick "Flatness" Grossenbacher works on Gameboy Color
games for Vicarious Visions.
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