Thursday, February 01, 2007

Flame War



This is something I did for the French publisher, Gallerie Daniel Maghen. They have done some stunningly beautiful high quality books. The dragon book this art is for will have the work of many illustrators. I've seen some of the art and it is all first class. If you think of dragons as a thoroughly explored subject, this book will change your mind.

At the bottom you'll see the sketch they chose for me to paint. I asked them if the wanted the dragon more malevolent. The art director said yes. The painting at the top is the result. Please don't tell me you like the sketch more than the painting -- it always hurts me when someone says that especially when it's true. At some point I'll come back to this basic idea and explore it further.



Tomorrow, if I have the time, I'm going to talk about how I do my pencil drawings. I expect you'll find it pretty boring. The approach is pretty straightforward. A bigger future project will be about painting tricks -- little things that can make a big difference. This will be highly theoretical and tediously tiresome. So you see, there's a lot to look forward to.

9 Comments:

Blogger MManzieri said...

Pretty boring? Tediously tiresome? I don't think so. We look forward to all your wonderful posts!

The Digital Arts Studio
Maurizio Manzieri, artblogging from Italy

4:32 PM  
Blogger Mark Reep said...

Wow. The jpeg loaded from top to bottom, the dragon came into view first, and I thought, mmn, nice dragon- Then its scale became apparent, and... Whoof. As scary, and as strong a dragon image as I've seen. Great work!

10:43 AM  
Blogger tlchang said...

I'd love to read your tiresome techniquey posts! (I actually quite enjoy those sorts of things. Twisted?) Don't hestitate to ramble on!

4:43 AM  
Blogger Tom Kidd said...

Well Tara, I've done it but you would likely have seen it already. It's a first try. I wonder if I'm running out of things to say though.

It's nice to hear all the comments from the many different places and people. I like this slow developing of new friends. Sometimes I meet a whole bunch of people at once and then I never get a chance to know them.

7:21 PM  
Blogger Leslie Sealey said...

Your work is so inspiring! I am starting to do a lot more paintings from imagination, and I really enjoy all your sketches. I think your dragon painting is even better than the sketch-that fire is hot!

10:01 AM  
Blogger Konstantin Pogorelov said...

This sky is PERFECT ! MOst people would make everything red. I love it it works so incredibly well with the last rays of the sun hitting the top half of the wings showing scale...

10:03 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Amazingly inspirational art. Keep up the good work!

11:18 PM  
Blogger Tom Kidd said...

It's nice to get comments on older posts. I'd forgotten this. Thanks to Anonymous. Also, thanks to all the people who commented here I somehow forgot to thank.

2:23 PM  
Anonymous Canada Viagra said...

I just loved what you drew... it's all about my passion: paintings and sketches in black and white. I think you are an artist but you will be even better at the future.

11:11 AM  

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