June 4th 2012

I wanted to write a little on process today.

Often, when I'm doing an illustration job, the deadline is tight and I don't have a lot of time to work on preliminary drawings.  I'll do a quick sketch or two to get more an idea of the space I'm working with than anything, but they don't usually end up being very nice, polished drawings.

When I'm doing personal work, however, I like to spend a bit more time developing my ideas, so I'll do more finished preparatory drawings.

I'm planning to do something I haven't before; I'm doing a painting to go straight to print.  I've wanted to do another silkscreen print with Kid Icarus for a while now and needed an excuse.  When I'm planning to do a print, I usually take existing paintings that I'm especially happy with and have them printed.

Above is a sketch that I started a few days ago.  I wanted to do a detailed portrait of a running hare.  I was happy with the drawing, but felt like it may need a little more, so I took some tracing paper, (which I use a lot when working out the layout of a painting), and drew another hare; this time an arctic hare.  

I'm using a very similar posture for this rabbit, with very subtle changes so it doesn't look pasted in.

I noticed after taking a step back from the drawing that the right foot on the arctic hare looked too relaxed for it to appear to be running realistically.  So I went back and did a couple of variations on the foot and scanned them in-

- then cloned it in to place.  It may look not look obvious, but I think this change was just enough to make it look more true to life.

Well, the funny thing is, after all of this debate and redrawing I decided that the first drawing would work best.  I felt it had a bit more impact than the two hares.  I guess that's just part of the whole process!

I'll be sure and post the finished painting, and update when they've been printed!  (Also, a very happy 5th anniversary to Kid Icarus)!