Night Crawler Moodboard

Here is a moodboard of reference images for possible compositions for creating my own digital painting of Night Crawler. For this brief I will use the brushes and techniques learnt from Darken's tutorial.

Rough quick sketches of compositional ideas

I created this on top of the silhouette I created. I  have a further developed piece of this, working more into the tone, shade and composition as well as tidying up the outline. I have also worked more into the face.

I decided to create Night Crawler in a different composition, flying backwards jump which looks more interesting than him just crouching. I thought this would work out better for a magazine cover compared to my first attempt

I then added the main base colours onto my drawing. 

I decided to place Night Crawler in a foggy misty background using the brushes from Darken's tutorial. 

Here's the final image of my drawing of Night Crawler.  I am pleased with the progress I have made from my first attempt the colouring, shading and composition looks much better.

Copy of Darken's work

Heres are the steps I took, showing my progress in creating a transcript of the artists work. I followed his video tutorial and looked at his photoshop file to try and create an accurate copy of Darken's work/technique.

Heres what I got to so far.

I have created a smoky effect using the artist's brush by blending in different hues of grey together. I like this brush and may use this further in my digital paintings.

As I was following the video tutorial, I also followed some of his mistakes to learn some useful tips. In this step the soldier does not have a neck so the next step was to use the lasso tool and play around with the perspective using distort and warp which was useful.

Here I have moved the head up so that I could have enough space for the neck.

I also kept flipping my canvas horizontally like the artist to see whether the perspective and shading looked right. In this step I realised that I did not have enough canvas space to draw the arm. So I extended it using the crop tool and filled in the smoky background again blending it in. To avoid solid lines being visible.

I then started blocking out colour and adding detail to the arm.

Here I started working on the arm detail.

I then flipped the piece to see whether the perspective of the arm looked okay.

Started adding colour to the piece using overlays and playing around with adjustment layers and colour balance.

I then started adding the dark areas in the background to make the soldier stand out more appearing from the darkness.  

Heres's what I got to so far. I am quite proud of this piece as  I have learnt some very useful techniques how to create a cool smoky effect, I also enjoyed playing around with his brushes. He also uses adjustment layers and colour balance to decide on his overall look and colour of the piece which was also useful. To improve I could work on the body more making him look more muscular like the original. If I have time I will try and develop this further with the extra detail and textures he has applied in his final painting.

Below is Darken's original work that I have created a transcript of above. 

Darken's work

Copy of Bobby Chio's work

Picture below is an section of Bobby Chio's piece in which I have chose to create a copy of.

Artists work 

Here are the steps I have taken to create a transcript of Bobby Chio's work using his techniques.

I began creating a greyscale drawing first like the artist. Outlining a rough shape of the creature's body.

I then added more hues to the drawing. 

I then changed the flow, size and opacity of the brush to add detail for the fur. To make it blend in well. 

Then added overlays and played around with adjustment levels to get the lighting accurately I could like the artist's piece. 

Now I need to add the leaves textures and detail and work on the character. 

Started adding vegetation to the branches searched on internet for reference images and used the clone tool to blend the textures together.

Then began adding detail to the vegetation and adding fur using 1px size brush.

Adding more detail to the fur.

Working on the small creature adding tone.

Adding more tone.  I realised the face did not look quite right so I made changes to it when I started adding colour on top.

Final stage started adding colour to the creature and fur texture. Overall from following this tutorial I have learnt alot of useful techniques which I could incorporate further in my work.  I am pleased with the final result of this piece. However if I had more time I would have created a more defined piece.

Copy of Bobby Chio's work

 Here's are steps I followed of Bobby Chio's work. (First 20 mins of video tutorial)

Heres a quick sketch I made following the video tutorial.

I then began adding the light and dark areas using the standard brush and setting the flow to 10%

Starting outlining the character and composition. 

Here started adding light and dark tones. 

Started working more into the foreground and background. Adding the tree branches. 

Started adding detail and colour to the piece. To create this quick sketch, I followed the video tutorial in which the artist only uses a standard round brush for his sketching phase. From following the tutorial I  have learnt about how to apply semi-opaque paint by changing the flow of the brush. I also like how the artist creating a new small window of his work to see his details and tone forming in his painting. I also like how the artist starts from creating a greyscale drawing and then developing it in colour.

2D tutorial

Sorry my computer has gone in for repair so I couldn't get much done. However I did watch the video tutorial and looked at the PSD files. Will catch up with this brief soon, when I get my laptop back.