Coolvibe: digital art to inspire you

Bobby Chiu

There is a great collection of digital art on this site. I especially love the first pic by Bobby Chiu of cute beasties on a branch!

Imagine FX new issue out now

The latest Imagine FX mag has some good stuff this month.There's an article on how to make up a good portfolio, some interesting workshops including 'paint smarter, not harder' and another of their series of development sheets for game concept art.

An article titled' Photoshop vs Painter' takes on this endless argument, which I think is a futile one since they are both useful for different purposes. Anyway the contest ends in a draw here which makes sense. It is worth reading this article though if you are not familiar with one or either of the big P's, as they use 10 good examples to show how and when to choose Photoshop over Painter or vice versa.

New hub page

I have written a new article on Hubpages called 3 Essential things to do if you want to learn to draw well

Hobbit paintings by Justin Gerard

Justin Gerard is an illustrator I had not heard of before I came across his blog where he has some fantastic paintings illustrating the Hobbit. He works on paper with watercolours and then continues the pieces digitally. I think he manages to get the best of both techniques this way when you see the great results.
He has posted the process of the Battle of the Five armies and explains why this scene is so exciting to paint. If you are a Tolkien fan like me you must see these paintings and even if you're not they're still stunning.
There is also an interview on the excellent Tor Sf and fantasy site.

Right or left brain quiz for artists

This quiz made me chuckle as the some of the questions seem a bit obvious, but I tried to answer honestly and got a score of 70 % in favor of being right brained. This was surprising as I thought it would be the opposite, so maybe it's quite a clever quiz after all.
Have a go and leave me a comment with your score, I would like to know what sort of brains read this blog!

Aviary online applications : vectors

the Aviary online graphics suite have just released a new vector app called Raven. You can read about it on their blog. If you have no idea what I'm talking about read my previous post about Aviary here.

Create a Cute Vector Monster from a Pencil Sketch

Blog.spoon grahics has a quite detailed tutorial on creating a character from scratch using vectors. It's well explained even for those who haven't much experience drawing with vectors. When you've made a monster you can then learn how to create a scene to put it in. They use Adobe Illustrator for this one. I aslo quite like to use Flash to draw with, but if you have a tight budget and prefer free software you can also use Inkscape

2D Artist online magazine

2D Artist is a downloadable PDF Magazine on concept art, digital and matte-painting. It is full of articles on techniques, tutorials, interviews, galleries and a lot more. You can download a 'lite' version for free or pay for the full one which is $4.50 or €3.24. This is pretty good value. I wish there was a print version, although it would probably be very expensive, and I suppose you could always print out the bits you really like.

Artzmania: Free e-zine n° 9

There was an issue of the free e zine Artzmania in July that passed me by, but happily you can still download all the back issues here. These zines are packed with interesting images, issue 9 has 478 pages.

Color vision and Art

Color vision and Art is a site about color theory and the way we see and respond to color. It is fun to read and concise without being simplistic. There are also interactive examples so you can experiment with certain effects for yourself. I wondered who wrote all this and then found a credits page with art historians and neuro biologists. It's well worth a visit.
This site led me to another interesting one called Causes of Color. this goes into detail about why things are a certain color. Some of this involves a lot of physics which gets a bit complicated (well for me, anyway) but it's still fascinating.

My Drawing day favorites on Flickr

June 7 was Drawing Day. These are my favorite entries from the Flickr site. My effort is the monkeystack at the bottom! Click on the images to go to the artist's Flickr galleries.

Moira Hahn

I love the paintings of Moira Hahn, particularly her series from 2006-2007 which seem to combine many of my favorite things. They are watercolors that resemble Japanse prints with fantastic animal characters, cats, tigers ,fish , owls and many others. The colors are glowing and very beautiful. This one is called 'Food Fight'.

Drawing day 2008

On june 7 it's Drawing Day.
Drawing Day is a worldwide drawing event encouraging everyone to drop everything and draw for the sake of art. The internet is an open canvas. Help create 1 million drawings online this day and boost online art communities.
I shall join in and post something on Flickr. If you intend to draw something leave me a comment and I'll post links to my favorite Drawing Day art on this blog.

Kim Cogan

Kim Cogan paints beautiful cityscapes of his native San Francisco and New York City.
What I like about these images is the way some parts are sharp and others blurry which is often the way you really see a busy street or buildings. When you look at a scene with so much detail you can't take it all in so most of what you see is out of focus and only parts will be clearly detailed.
The various types of light are also very well done, the contrast of neons and bright windows against the glowing night skies of a city.
Kim also has some good photos on his blog. He also has a website.

Patchblox art links

Patchblox is a mosaic of art links. You can add your own links if you have a little avatar or banner. It's fun because it changes every day, so you never know what you will find. It's sent quite a lot of traffic my way so far, so I would recommend putting your link up.
See if you can find mine:

Photoshop painting tutorials

There are some very good painting tutorials on CG Arena. They are meant for Photoshop but the basics can be applied and combined with other graphics software programs. The 2D gallery on this site is very impressive as well.

Become a better artist

Imagine Fx is a monthly magazine about creating fantasy art. Even if you're not into fantasy it's full of good advice for painters and illustrators. On the Imagine FX site you can consult some of their articles and tutorials, they call them 'workshops', and you can download them for free here. I liked this article called 'become a better artist'with 40 tips from various artists, some of them are really useful. And if you're wondering : is this a not so thinly disguised advert? Well, no it isn't! I really do like this mag and buy it, although I think the price is a bit steep.

Ken Wong

I love this guy's work, his website is well worth a visit. His work is really inventive and original, be sure not to miss the Illustration and Character design sections.

Photoshop Hubpages tutorial

I have made a new Hubpage with a basic coloring tutorial for Photoshop Elements.

Artzmania: Free e-zine

Artzmania is a free e-zine you can download here. All the issues are packed with art and design, issue 7 has 490 pages! It is presented in a browser called Spotbit which has a handy magnifying tool so you can look closely at the details. It's a great source of inspiration, especially if you can't afford expensive art magazines.