Random Rendering

A couple nights ago I was trying to keep my mind creatively active for a little bit and came up with a quick sketch of this car. It's not a real car in that it's not drawn from any reference- it's completely made up. However, it does have some references to it- like a mid 30's roadster that I guess I was thinking about while drawing. The next morning I decided to put some color to it while I was drinkin' my coffee. Since I used markers and pencils, it went really fast. Its not as super nice or clean as some of the others, but it still has a cool look to it. Definitely on the rougher side, but thats part of the fun. Besides, I think doing these quick little practice drawings is totally worth it. Doing something like this with a 'no boundaries' attitude can bring out ideas that can't be used in a task with lots of parameters.

Prints are available!

1935 Ford Custom Rendering

A couple days I ago I was reading about some practicing techniques for doing renderings. One suggestion was to do smaller drawings so that the entire practice process would go faster, and less time would be spent on detail- basically an effort to work on just proportion and color. I found a good reference pic of a 35 Ford in a magazine and began drawing away. I didn't want to just re-draw the car I was looking at so I made some changes. The back end is stretched out a bit further then stock and the rear fenders are stretched to match. I added the ultra thin Cadillac style tail lights, but had them taper to a point at the bottoms so they'd emulate the tear drop style of the car. The back glass in the picture I drew from seemed too slim to me and was oval shaped, so I changed it to something a little more modern. Although the goal was not to spend too much time on detail, where I could I did. This drawing was the first time I used Steve Stanford's method of color blocking and airbrushed gradients. A lot of really tiny pieces of masking tape were used. The drawing is almost 10 inches across and a little bit of marker, airbrush ink, and acrylics were used. Photographing these drawings seems to be a bit of a challenge since each medium reflects light a little differently, but it turned out ok.

Ferrari Concept Car

Last weekend I broke out some new markers, pencils, and paper to make a fresh new rendering from scratch. This gave me the opportunity to practice some new technique with new materials. Years ago I did a bunch of Ferrari style concept cars since they are my favorite. I really wanted to try and render something red, so I thought this type of car would be a good start. I also wanted to try a view that I'm less comfortable with just for practice. Normally I'd draw a car with the front end on the left and work to the right- this time I did the opposite. The car itself is a mix of F360, F430, and F458 styling. I used a little bit of marker, chalk pastels, pencils, and acrylic paint for details. The only thing I didn't use that I normally would is an airbrush. This gave me the chance to practice some other mediums so that later I can use the airbrush more efficiently.

Custom Vw Beetle Rendering

Last night while we were watching a movie I decided to break out the new pencils and get something down on paper. Since I now own an old Vw Bug, I thought what better place to start. There are a good number of Bugs running around here each with their own little twist... but I've got a couple new ideas I wanted to demonstrate. Starting with cutting the roof down significantly while retaining that nice sloping shape that the Bugs have. After having driven around in one of these tiny things, I can safely imagine that if you cut the roof down enough on one of these Bugs, you'd need to move the front seats back a little bit- so the front doors need to be a little bit longer. I also removed the frame around the door and and side windows making it into a 'hard top' style. The fenders are modified to allow for over sized wheels and tires to fit once the car is lowered as well as having exaggerated body shape to them. The hood is cut down so that it sits back off the front of the car allowing the fenders and lights to appear to stick out a little past the hood. The hood is also at a more gradual slope to unify the low cut shape of the entire car. This car would take a million hours to make- however it only took the length of the movie to draw. And as unrealistic as it seems, who cares- That's what putting concepts down is all about!

New happenins

So I've technically been on vacation for 2 weeks now... with 1 week to go. But I'm getting restless and eager to keep myself both busy and entertained. I recently got a time lapse camera as a birthday present from sister Tammy, and I also recently decided that I wanted to put some time into drawing on paper while I have the chance. These 2 things are a perfect mix. My subject matter is a 1999 Ferrari 355... I didn't find a picture of it in the angle I wanted, but I found one that's close and used several other reference pictures to achieve the angle I wanted. I set up the camera and set it to 30 second intervals and worked in 2 stages- main body shape, then wheels. Ferrari's are quite curvaceous... so transposing the curves of the cars into lines can be tricky... especially if you're changing the perspective from your reference photo. Wheels, while more straight forward, still require good balance and perspective. I decided to turn the front wheel in a little bit (better pose/stance) as well as just making up the wheels (instead of going with the originals). It took a few tries to get them how I liked, but I got it to work. I also added a wet ground reflection to help make the pic more interesting. I've gone just about as far as I'm going to with pencil. A few more little refinements and it'll be ready for paint. Yes, I'm actually going to try to do the color/shading of this one with an airbrush.

More videos to come!

Thanks Tammy!