Less than 10 days ago, we posted our game Mekazoo on Steam's Greenlight. Upvote it if you haven't!

Anyways, I didn't scroll through all the comments on the Greenlight page, but one did caught my eye. User rybaby commented that "furry artists dont deserve yes votes". Well sir, you get what you want. Introducing my latest artwork and perhaps a new series of paintings:

Character Lore

General Wroofus is the chief commander of the 301st Infantry battalion of the Republic of Dogmanican.  Legendary for his expertise in handling numerous weapons on the battlefield with the flail being his signature, the mere act of mentioning his name strikes fear within the ranks of the Catopian military. Despite his fierce-looking demeanor, Wroofus is one of the few Dogmanican leaders who shows concern and care for his fellow soldiers. Because of that, he is widely respected in his home nation and an idol to many aspiring recruits.


With this character, I want to kickstart a series of more character-centric artwork. As we enter full crunch-mode with Mekazoo, I have less time to dedicate to personal work. I still hope to churn out personal stuff once a week or two, so doing something simpler will be less taxing for me.

Recently, I finished reading James Gurney's "Color and Light". Yes, I'm ashamed to have only finished such an important book now. But better late than never, right? Anyways, the book inspired me to pursue more academic learning on the subject of painting. I took it upon myself to start with some studies of master drawings. I post the ones I do on the Level Up! Facebook group, to force myself to continue that habit. Here are the ones I've posted so far:

These are all 45~60 minute sketches. I did not want to invest more time in it as I want to brush up my painting speed too. Some of the things I've learned from doing these studies so far:
- The fastest way to do hard edges is to just use a hard edged brush
- Despite being common knowledge, I realized I start detailing paintings way too soon into the process. Always build up the entire painting as a whole and start with the details on focal points of the painting.
- It is OK to leave stuff blurry and unfinished as long as it is not the focal point of the painting.

I tried to keep these learning points in mind when I created the General Wroofus painting. It did cut down a lot of time from my previous attempts at doing a character painting. I'll continue to work on the characters and the studies, so please look forward to it.

When the DeviantART Heroes of the Storm fanart contest was first announced, I knew I HAD to participate. Although I haven't tried the game, I am a huge fan of the Warcraft and Diablo universes. In the midst of conceptualizing and executing this painting, I was hit with a major personal tragedy. It gave me some time in between to really think about the painting.

As usual, I started with a grayscale thumbnail sketch. Initially I wanted to create a series of thumbnails, but I kinda like this one and I decided to stick with it.

Next, I blocked in the colors using Color/Multiply/Overlay blending modes. You'll notice that I added the laser for Diablo. I wanted more interaction between the characters and this was something that players of the game can relate to. I wish to create fan art that players of the game can understand and relate to.

I started adding in some details to the painting and started to see some major problems with it.

Like the sci fi painting I did before, I screened a white layer and sketched over the painting to tweak the pose of Diablo. The old pose was too static and lacked the force of the action he is making. You'll naturally tilt your head forward when you shoot laser out of your mouth. Trust me, I know.

Did a quick block in of colors to test the pose out. Oh! I also replaced Gazlowe for Illidan. Illidan has always been one of my favourite characters in the Warcraft universe (I'll say it's between him and Arthas) and that also introduces some greens to the painting too.

Detailing Diablo...

Next was Thrall. You'll notice that he looks shorter as compared to the sketch from before. I tried to mimic the official proportions, which resulted in a shorter character.

Next, I moved on to detail Illidan. One of the problems Illidan posted was that his weapon will block off Diablo and Thrall. I had to come out with some solution to still show all three elements (because Illidan's dual blades are so darn iconic) and still keep the composition clean.

In the end, I made the blades smaller. I'm not proud of this solution, but its the best I can come up with.

Final.