Kind of, I never really stuck with it enough to really get the hang of it. I have an Apple Pencil that won't hold a charge (ancient one, if I ever get a new iPad I might toy with getting something compatible and try again). I do remember having my old one connected to my iPad through some second screen software (can't remember what it's called) and using that for a while).
I also remember way way back in the day using a mouse to colour my art and that was... so much work, I never liked doing it because it felt like I had to do the art over and over, masking out spaces and all that and I think I would still have to do that if I went digital, to an extent. I feel very run-and-gun with my art, I don't want to say rushing it but I don't like to spend hours on a thing (another reason I'd never gotten into modeling, the other one being that I could never figure out the basics).
I feel like I do need to learn to paint and so on, actually give all these designs colour and life. I do like using the markers and so on, even if it does kind of limit what colour schemes I can do.
What's kind of hilarious to me is that I keep thinking of my paper as being bigger when the screens are the same size and can zoom in and out... maybe it's the intimacy level, the paper is close to me, the laptop screen is further away.
I will say, one thing I've noticed with digital artists is how often they'll erase and resize their stuff as they're working, and while my art isn't perfect, I do like the challenge of having to get things more or less right the first time, or embracing the mistakes and letting them roll into something new. For example, that older picture of Eager Young Space Cadet, her eyes are slightly not right. Digitally I would have fixed that, but having to look at it makes me more aware of it the next time I draw.
I also like the immediacy of paper, if it's right, it's right, if it's wrong, it's wrong.
Okay, I'm going to bump this up now that the page has finally turned over.
New sketches. Well, new to you, these have been sitting in my sketchbook for ages.
A blown-glass style spaceship. Maybe a sister ship to the giant glass greenhouse I designed for Eden's people ages ago.
Tried to mix a yacht and a bullet train together for this one.
Trying to sketch out a character for an Eager Young Space Cadet. Not quite sure what her uniform style will be, hence the bare shoulders (there are like 3 t-shirt variants as well.
Actually drawn her before, but it's way back on the last page, so...
See, I figure the triangle shoulders would be for officers, not cadets, so... she's cute in it but it doesn't quite feel right.
It's funny that for the same reasons you like the pen/paper combo, I like my digital setup, I feel very free to experiment, and "Just go with it." When I work with "real" media I'm more concerned about not wasting the resources and such. (I do have piles of sketches and writings that will probably never see the light of day though) , and sadly I have lost drawings along the way in moves and such.... I do think that if we work in the media that we are comfortable with we either get complacent and boring, or we feel free to just be us, and run with it... I really enjoy your work and love the marker stuff I have seen here.
I don't mind at all! She turned out great (wow, I didn't think I did THAT many lines... that's another thing, when I do digital colour I feel the need to add more detail and make it more realistic). Kinda had this highlighter glow to it as well, which feels a bit analog too in a good way. I will say, the shoulders are right on, was imagining a whole different fabric being used for them (and the matching triangles on the sleeves. I guess it's extra padding for when they have to wear backpacks/seatbelts? And for beneath the wrists when you're typing, now that I think about it.
Yeah, I'm not sure what the colour of her uniform would be, I keep fluctuating between a certain grey (which might be too bland) and a particular shade of purple (the one I used for the seat in the courier pod), with the piping usually being Trek colours b/c I can't think of anything else atm. I feel like she'd be blue.
The idea of the uniform, or at least the jacket (I never figured out anything for the trousers) is comfort, you're wearing this all day, it should be comfortable, it's fitted, it's got a nice lining... the issue is that it's still a little too Trek so I need to give it more flavour without making it too complex.
Some of my old colours from back when I was doing that.
Female pirate characters for a scrapped idea called 'Sea Dogs." I used to have such a clean line, but such poor bodies.
My first attempt to paint over a pencilled sketch.
Me trying to colour with markers.
These all have to be like... geez, 15 years old at least. So probably worth another crack at it.
So I think that in future, if I wanted to do colour, I would have to design the drawing for it from the start, rather than just colour lineart. My style has always been sort of simplified (someone called it "simplified realism" or something like that ages ago, I can't recall the exact term off the top of my head), and I think I've leaned more into the "less is more" mentality, and I feel like I'd have to approach the colour with the same mentality. The alternative is to try to add all this detail through colour to simple lineart and have the two clash with each other.
Okay, here's another reason I like analog. I tried to open Photoshop and all of a sudden it didn't work. I think I might be able to fix the problem, but I don't want to upgrade it if I can avoid it b/c of the Pantone issue. i can use Pixelmator in the meantime, but still... app problems are inevitable. I'm not going subscription with tools, that feels insane to me.
Since we're talking colour, here's the last thing I did in colour that i can think of. Posted it on my insta (where I think there's a more rounded sense of my style), but I'll show it here just for context.
I was actually worried I'd screw this up, so I basically redrew it. I can't recall if I was intending it to be bold, but I wanted to use the colour to really emphasize how close/apart the characters are.
And since this is a sci-fi board, here's an older drawing (surprised how old it actually IS), for a shelved project.
Pinstriped gangster, wanted to turn the person into part of the suit, I like the idea of a simple pinstriped face. The question was how simple and how human did I want to make it. He's meant to be an unblinking mass, after all.
halfway through, I thought I'd replace the flower in his lapel with a Venus flytrap type bug, to make him even more dangerous. Then I thought "what if THAT'S the gangster and he's controlling the whole suit?"
Inspired by the "Meet Your Meat" bit in Restaurant At The End Of The Universe, I wanted to make him a little weirder and beefier (and less like a dude wearing a heavy suit lying down, though I failed at that part). I thought it would be fun to add a couple more animals together, was definitely seeing a bug and I thought the legs could be like a giant chicken leg each, though with finds instead of claws.
I love pig monsters, and actually these reprogrammed Pig Slavers I thought of ages ago feel like they fit with this other idea, people keep growing pig monsters. Some are eaten, others are programmed with basic instructions and sent out to do simple tasks.
I saw this in a dream, or maybe as I was slowing waking up.
A minimalist bridge design, reminiscent of the bridge design for the Eternal Midnight (remember my Eternal Midnight?) Also draws inspiration from the bridges of Japanese spaceships like Yamato and the ones in Gundam. Was also trying to expand that screen-wrap cockpit design from last year into something for a bigger crew. Sort of like a planetarium. I think I forgot a few details, and I would like to mess around with that center area a bit more, make it more of a hub of activity.
I might totally rethink this into something maybe a little less... obvious? I dunno. I feel like I just expanded out from the video cockpit, and if I went a different direction I might have something more interesting and less headache-inducing to the operators.
And this is from a week or so ago? Maybe longer, I dunno.
Playing with some tokusatsu helmet designs. I keep doing interesting-to-me variations on Shadow Moon (especially because of that great cutoff he has in his helmet, makes it easy to play around with) and I'm trying to expand into the "what don't we see?" areas and riff.
I wanted to turn the bug-top of his head and transform it into something. I was thinking of the transparent brain helmet that Hakaider has.
I mean, I hope you can all tell with my previous creatures that I love how the Henson Creature Shop is able to bring character and humanity to their designs. Even as a kid, my fave scene in the first Ninja Turtles movie was when they're sitting around and telling jokes because that's what made them real.
Like the previous design, the green would be a video wall for the pilot rather than a window, with a hads-up display to give the pilot any vital information. The ship has no windows, instead you get a continuous line of video throughout the ship giving you an external view (or any view you might like).
The pink is a shorthand from that bridge design from last week, but in this case I want it to be analog switches, I just didn't want to draw them (it's like 2am here).
Since the idea of sitting and being surrounded by a giant screen evokes being in a movie theater, the steps (and railing) felt like natural fits. The railing visually separates the cockpit, and It also gives another actor something to lean on.
I wasn't sure what I wanted to do for the walls just yet, I didn't want to do the ripple tiles, I wanted a more mechanical look but not super-detailed. And while I didn't intend for it, the "fusebox" (an excuse to have lit switches somewhere) wound up looking like a laptop fan so I could see that kind of design mentality continuing. Feels like a natural fit, now that I think about it.
The handlebars and the chair are still escaping me. Realistically the regular racer chair is the most likely, but I feel like a more interesting idea is possible. The handlebars I should probably reference some 80s scooters and concept cars. I want all the key functionality to be right there.
The Single Rider is going to pull a lot of inspiration from things like houseboats, RVs, skoolies, longboats, etc and so on so I think finding the right blank base is gonna be key, something quasi-futuristic but generic that ties it all together.
And like those, I think there will be more of a mix and match of components, so I'm trying to make something basic that those various elements can plug into. These ships get upgraded piece by piece rather than go into spacedock like in Star Trek.
Which puts me in a bit of a quandary, worldbuilding-wise, if these ships are interoperable. It's so the opposite of how things are now, so is it naive/idealistic to go this route, or am I falling into that trap of "people can't imagine the end of capitalism" mentality? To me, interoperable and modifiable everything is an ideal, and for spaceships seems like a necessity. And these ships aren't in the Iron Star universe (I guess this is the Retrodecoverse? I hadn't thought of a name) so different rules apply.
The thing about the RetroDecoVerse is what while it's heavily inspired by cassette futurism, Syd Mead, 80s electronics, Japanese culture, etc... I want to grow it from that seed, not be stuck in that era. That's the trap I'm trying to avoid.
Also, you would THINK the big bridge from last week would be on the ship that Eager Young Space Cadet serves on, right? Nope. She's in what I've shorthanded the 2600-verse, there are hints of what her ships look like (organic shapes, curves, sports cars in space) even though the uniform at the moment might feel too Retro-deco both in terms of design and just how comfy/utilitarian I want it to be. I suppose ideally the RDV and the 2600 would converge, but they haven't yet.
Some TNG doodles, since I was watching a reaction to Encounter At Farpoint.
Trying to figure out how to draw Q, his face is weirdly generic. Had the idea of trying to ross-pollinate him with the Time Lords.
Girl Wesley! Surprised by the face, she actually looks a bit like a girl I follow on instagram, totally unintentional. But I love short hair and I didn't think the eyes would be that dark but they so work.
I thought I would play with the infamous sweater, maybe making it shorter could give it a little more character. Originally the pants were baggy and reminded me of Ortegas' casual outfit in SNW. When I fixed the trousers (there's only one shot or two when you see them), I thought maybe it might be a good outfit for Eager Young Space Cadet... forgetting somehow that Wesley IS an Eager Young Space Cadet and I should vary my influences a little. I could also see a Doctor Who companion wearing something like this, so maybe I'll cross-pollinate it.
Was watching one of Ray Studios' "turn a phone into X" videos and since I had the idea of laptop parts for the Single Rider's walls, I figured I should sketch the layers of the phones for a bit of 2D kitbashing.
Quick pencil sketch of the Dominator, trying to figure out the basic shape/layout of it. Still based on the redesign of the Liberator, but I'm thinking I might let it sprout into its own thing. In the meantime, I also found reference for other microphones and I should look at other vintage studio equipment to keep the "microphone turned into a spaceship" vibe alive.
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I also remember way way back in the day using a mouse to colour my art and that was... so much work, I never liked doing it because it felt like I had to do the art over and over, masking out spaces and all that and I think I would still have to do that if I went digital, to an extent. I feel very run-and-gun with my art, I don't want to say rushing it but I don't like to spend hours on a thing (another reason I'd never gotten into modeling, the other one being that I could never figure out the basics).
I feel like I do need to learn to paint and so on, actually give all these designs colour and life. I do like using the markers and so on, even if it does kind of limit what colour schemes I can do.
What's kind of hilarious to me is that I keep thinking of my paper as being bigger when the screens are the same size and can zoom in and out... maybe it's the intimacy level, the paper is close to me, the laptop screen is further away.
I will say, one thing I've noticed with digital artists is how often they'll erase and resize their stuff as they're working, and while my art isn't perfect, I do like the challenge of having to get things more or less right the first time, or embracing the mistakes and letting them roll into something new. For example, that older picture of Eager Young Space Cadet, her eyes are slightly not right. Digitally I would have fixed that, but having to look at it makes me more aware of it the next time I draw.
I also like the immediacy of paper, if it's right, it's right, if it's wrong, it's wrong.
New sketches. Well, new to you, these have been sitting in my sketchbook for ages.
A blown-glass style spaceship. Maybe a sister ship to the giant glass greenhouse I designed for Eden's people ages ago.
Tried to mix a yacht and a bullet train together for this one.
Trying to sketch out a character for an Eager Young Space Cadet. Not quite sure what her uniform style will be, hence the bare shoulders (there are like 3 t-shirt variants as well.
Actually drawn her before, but it's way back on the last page, so...
See, I figure the triangle shoulders would be for officers, not cadets, so... she's cute in it but it doesn't quite feel right.
It's funny that for the same reasons you like the pen/paper combo, I like my digital setup, I feel very free to experiment, and "Just go with it." When I work with "real" media I'm more concerned about not wasting the resources and such. (I do have piles of sketches and writings that will probably never see the light of day though) , and sadly I have lost drawings along the way in moves and such.... I do think that if we work in the media that we are comfortable with we either get complacent and boring, or we feel free to just be us, and run with it... I really enjoy your work and love the marker stuff I have seen here.
Since I didn't know what you were thinking by way of colors, I just picked what I saw in my head...
Yeah, I'm not sure what the colour of her uniform would be, I keep fluctuating between a certain grey (which might be too bland) and a particular shade of purple (the one I used for the seat in the courier pod), with the piping usually being Trek colours b/c I can't think of anything else atm. I feel like she'd be blue.
The idea of the uniform, or at least the jacket (I never figured out anything for the trousers) is comfort, you're wearing this all day, it should be comfortable, it's fitted, it's got a nice lining... the issue is that it's still a little too Trek so I need to give it more flavour without making it too complex.
Female pirate characters for a scrapped idea called 'Sea Dogs." I used to have such a clean line, but such poor bodies.
My first attempt to paint over a pencilled sketch.
Me trying to colour with markers.
These all have to be like... geez, 15 years old at least. So probably worth another crack at it.
So I think that in future, if I wanted to do colour, I would have to design the drawing for it from the start, rather than just colour lineart. My style has always been sort of simplified (someone called it "simplified realism" or something like that ages ago, I can't recall the exact term off the top of my head), and I think I've leaned more into the "less is more" mentality, and I feel like I'd have to approach the colour with the same mentality. The alternative is to try to add all this detail through colour to simple lineart and have the two clash with each other.
Since we're talking colour, here's the last thing I did in colour that i can think of. Posted it on my insta (where I think there's a more rounded sense of my style), but I'll show it here just for context.
I was actually worried I'd screw this up, so I basically redrew it. I can't recall if I was intending it to be bold, but I wanted to use the colour to really emphasize how close/apart the characters are.
And since this is a sci-fi board, here's an older drawing (surprised how old it actually IS), for a shelved project.
Pinstriped gangster, wanted to turn the person into part of the suit, I like the idea of a simple pinstriped face. The question was how simple and how human did I want to make it. He's meant to be an unblinking mass, after all.
halfway through, I thought I'd replace the flower in his lapel with a Venus flytrap type bug, to make him even more dangerous. Then I thought "what if THAT'S the gangster and he's controlling the whole suit?"
Inspired by the "Meet Your Meat" bit in Restaurant At The End Of The Universe, I wanted to make him a little weirder and beefier (and less like a dude wearing a heavy suit lying down, though I failed at that part). I thought it would be fun to add a couple more animals together, was definitely seeing a bug and I thought the legs could be like a giant chicken leg each, though with finds instead of claws.
I love pig monsters, and actually these reprogrammed Pig Slavers I thought of ages ago feel like they fit with this other idea, people keep growing pig monsters. Some are eaten, others are programmed with basic instructions and sent out to do simple tasks.
I saw this in a dream, or maybe as I was slowing waking up.
A minimalist bridge design, reminiscent of the bridge design for the Eternal Midnight (remember my Eternal Midnight?) Also draws inspiration from the bridges of Japanese spaceships like Yamato and the ones in Gundam. Was also trying to expand that screen-wrap cockpit design from last year into something for a bigger crew. Sort of like a planetarium. I think I forgot a few details, and I would like to mess around with that center area a bit more, make it more of a hub of activity.
I might totally rethink this into something maybe a little less... obvious? I dunno. I feel like I just expanded out from the video cockpit, and if I went a different direction I might have something more interesting and less headache-inducing to the operators.
And this is from a week or so ago? Maybe longer, I dunno.
Playing with some tokusatsu helmet designs. I keep doing interesting-to-me variations on Shadow Moon (especially because of that great cutoff he has in his helmet, makes it easy to play around with) and I'm trying to expand into the "what don't we see?" areas and riff.
I wanted to turn the bug-top of his head and transform it into something. I was thinking of the transparent brain helmet that Hakaider has.
Muppets + Donbrothers.
Here's how I was thinking the layout would be.
Like the previous design, the green would be a video wall for the pilot rather than a window, with a hads-up display to give the pilot any vital information. The ship has no windows, instead you get a continuous line of video throughout the ship giving you an external view (or any view you might like).
The pink is a shorthand from that bridge design from last week, but in this case I want it to be analog switches, I just didn't want to draw them (it's like 2am here).
Since the idea of sitting and being surrounded by a giant screen evokes being in a movie theater, the steps (and railing) felt like natural fits. The railing visually separates the cockpit, and It also gives another actor something to lean on.
I wasn't sure what I wanted to do for the walls just yet, I didn't want to do the ripple tiles, I wanted a more mechanical look but not super-detailed. And while I didn't intend for it, the "fusebox" (an excuse to have lit switches somewhere) wound up looking like a laptop fan so I could see that kind of design mentality continuing. Feels like a natural fit, now that I think about it.
The handlebars and the chair are still escaping me. Realistically the regular racer chair is the most likely, but I feel like a more interesting idea is possible. The handlebars I should probably reference some 80s scooters and concept cars. I want all the key functionality to be right there.
And like those, I think there will be more of a mix and match of components, so I'm trying to make something basic that those various elements can plug into. These ships get upgraded piece by piece rather than go into spacedock like in Star Trek.
Which puts me in a bit of a quandary, worldbuilding-wise, if these ships are interoperable. It's so the opposite of how things are now, so is it naive/idealistic to go this route, or am I falling into that trap of "people can't imagine the end of capitalism" mentality? To me, interoperable and modifiable everything is an ideal, and for spaceships seems like a necessity. And these ships aren't in the Iron Star universe (I guess this is the Retrodecoverse? I hadn't thought of a name) so different rules apply.
The thing about the RetroDecoVerse is what while it's heavily inspired by cassette futurism, Syd Mead, 80s electronics, Japanese culture, etc... I want to grow it from that seed, not be stuck in that era. That's the trap I'm trying to avoid.
Also, you would THINK the big bridge from last week would be on the ship that Eager Young Space Cadet serves on, right? Nope. She's in what I've shorthanded the 2600-verse, there are hints of what her ships look like (organic shapes, curves, sports cars in space) even though the uniform at the moment might feel too Retro-deco both in terms of design and just how comfy/utilitarian I want it to be. I suppose ideally the RDV and the 2600 would converge, but they haven't yet.
Trying to figure out how to draw Q, his face is weirdly generic. Had the idea of trying to ross-pollinate him with the Time Lords.
Girl Wesley! Surprised by the face, she actually looks a bit like a girl I follow on instagram, totally unintentional. But I love short hair and I didn't think the eyes would be that dark but they so work.
I thought I would play with the infamous sweater, maybe making it shorter could give it a little more character. Originally the pants were baggy and reminded me of Ortegas' casual outfit in SNW. When I fixed the trousers (there's only one shot or two when you see them), I thought maybe it might be a good outfit for Eager Young Space Cadet... forgetting somehow that Wesley IS an Eager Young Space Cadet and I should vary my influences a little. I could also see a Doctor Who companion wearing something like this, so maybe I'll cross-pollinate it.
Did about 3/4 of a page of sketches, wanted something that was like a solid wall. Doesn't move much because he doesn't need to.