The final product

what you see here is the product of a very long struggle.

again, working for family or friends is the worst, and this is the product os working for my brothers DJ collective.

My brother, god love him, kept giving me directions such as “it just needs to be a little more different” and “make it feel a little older”

I am sure He knew exactly where he was going with this, but getting there was pure agony. In the end though I handed this in and he seemed somewhat happy with it.

to be honest, it doesn’t really live up to the standards I set for myself, but sometimes you just have to shut up and do what the client says.

working on this has reminded me why I am not a graphic designer, this kind of work is just not my cup of tea.

my Wacom broke

My Wacom Bamboo broke. this is truly a sad day.

This is a piece of equipment that has been with me for almost 3 years and it has been well used… I never thought it would end like this.

I plugged it into my computer to start drawing, but o such luck. That is why you get this chest today, it was all I was able to draw, just using my mouse.

 

figure drawing

If you have been following this blog for a while (which presumably is none of you) you will know that I have been doing these character studies off of http://artists.pixelovely.com/practice-tools/figure-drawing/ for a while now.

I especially did these allot last year, as I was learning anatomy, but ever since I got my Samsung galaxy note, I have been focusing a bit more on still lives. Still, I thought today it would be a great idea if I just went back for a second, just to see of I would still manage it.

Luckily, figure drawing comes back pretty quickly, kind of like riding a bike.

re-hatching

When you draw incessantly, as I do, progress can be hard to measure.

you want to be able to point to a piece and say that this was the turning point, but more often than not, you just can’t. Every piece you make looks in some way like the next and you end up kind of disappointed with your work.

That is why I think these “draw it again” meme’s (that I have made a few of myself) are so popular.

Only by recreating something that you were previously proud of, can you really showcase your progress. It is very satisfying to look at a piece and realize just how much better you have gotten.

This piece, was not quite that, but in a way it was.

Ever since I attended the Nordic game conference, I have been made aware of just how important it is to have a working prototype of your game.

Creating a concept for a game is great and all, but nothing beats play-ability.

a little over a year ago, I created a concept for a game centered around the grieving process of teenagers as my bachelor project ( follow this link to see it: https://sylvesterhansen.wordpress.com/portflio/a-game-of-grief/ ) and as I stare the prospect of creating my own original game,re-hatching this long forgotten concept would be a great place to start.

For one, I already have the art.

Now, this is not an announcement, that I will release a game, it’s more just a small progress report on a project that will likely never see the light of day.

What I realized, and what is gratifying, as I reopened this project, is just how much more skill I have required since I did this project. Things that were a struggle then, now come to me easily, such as the city scape you see above.

it is good to know, as I embark on this project, that I am in a better place than I was last. Even if the game never sees the light of day

betrayed by my own stupidity

my internet has betrayed me or rather I am an idiot who can’t keep my things straight.

 

I did actually draw something of some kind of consequence and uploaded it to dropbox… or wel, I thought I did.

 

What ever the reason is, the outcome is that I have to upload this piece of practice material i lue of an actual upload.

 

the back-up folder

 

back in 2011 I had another daily blog.

This particular blog was animation themed and really centered around getting me into the California institute of arts, which has a legendary animation department. you can see the blog here

This is a dream that I have abandoned, but the full year of blogging did teach me something about consistency and writing.

One of the neat tricks that I figures out early, was to have a back-up folder on my computer. this is a folder where you put any topic that you think might be fun to discuss or any extra drawing that you just have lying around. This means that on days when you are feeling particularly uninspired, you would always have a fallback to go to.

Sadly this is not something that I have employed for this new-years resolution, which is why you get another Disney style portrait. However I do plan to get one going soon, so stuff like this doesn’t happen again

Ipad drawing

I borrowed a friends Ipad to make this drawing today. I have been holding out, but I think it might be time that I get a tablet

 

twitter sketches

It occurred to me that I have not been that good at uploading recently.

If I’m honest, I really only upload if I think I have something worth uploading, and these days I mostly do 10 minute and 5 minute colour sketches in photoshop.

I thought that might get a bit repetitive to look at, but if you are interested in that kind of thing, I do a couple daily on my twitter at: https://twitter.com/cykelvester