A Psychochronography in Blue (Part 6)

I think, by now, you probably know the drill.  On the chance that you're a newcomer to these here shores you can read the previous entries in this series by clicking here. You don't need to in order to follow along, but the option is there if you need it.

So, new cover for a new Phil Sandifer joint, this one being the 6th of the main series of TARDIS Eruditorum, 'The Unofficial Critical History of Doctor Who' (because Phil loaths a short subtitle).  To see Phil's post on the subject, click here.

By all rights, this should have been my personal favorite of the series to do, as it lands smack dab in the middle of an era I hold dear.  Oddly though that very fact made it less satisfying, as nothing I could do would ever live up to the memories of the ridiculous gaudy graphic excesses of the mid-80's (the prime example of the theme being the 6th Doctor's much maligned coat).  I did my best though, in line with Phil's preferences, and quite like the result.

The Bumper-Fun Summer Speedpaint Special

"You only posted once last month you lazy bugger."  I know, I know, I'm just not as committed to this blogging lark as I should be, but in my defence last month I messed up my back, had a vehicular breakdown, bought a new car, had two family visits, did (a lot of) things at work I can't divulge, saw a meteor shower, had a kid that couldn't sleep (this is not a new child, the old one is just now having issues), had my wedding anniversary, did five speedpaints, read three books, taught my son to play Chess, and made an omelette.  Given all that it's amazing I managed the (fairly wordy) post that I did.

Actually, it was six speedpaints I guess, but one of them was more like a speed sketch page (I did almost no actual sketching this last month - busy, see?), I'll show it anyway.

But in addition to that, since I didn't post about it last month it's actually eleven speedpaints I need to cover this month, plus a bonus guest one from my brother, for reasons we'll get to below.

A Musing 7: 10 Tips for Digital Beginners

I was asked yesterday if I had any tips for digital painting I could share.  The answer to that is "Yeah, I do, but it might not be much help to you." Which isn't terribly useful, but is potentially true.  My way of creating art isn't necessarily your way.  I can give helpful advice and tips, some of which may work for you, and others won't, depending on your style, chosen subject matter and so on.  Use what works for you, ditch the rest.

So the following are some tips for those just starting out at digital painting (as the person who asked my advice was). For more advanced things... well, see point 3 below.

There are no images in this post - I might rectify that at some point.

The Speed of Warm Molasses

I'm a little late getting to this speedpaint post.  The most sensible way to do them would probably be the first weekend of the following month so that what I did, and why, is fresher in my mind.  This is of course the last weekend of the following month, which is less ideal.  Still, at least I'm not falling into the next month as I started to do with my sketch posts a while ago, and look how that ended up (hint: months and months behind).

Still, last month was actually pretty good when it comes to speedpaints, with 6 to show, except it's actually sort of 14, for reasons.  I'll get into that below.  This month on the other hand I've done 4 so far to show next month.  I might get to doing another, but maybe not.  With the exception of the sketches though I think this brings me back up to date again (finally).  I may be forgetting something though, but if I am I've forgotten (obviously), so I have no idea what it is.  Okay, enough preamble, lets look at splotches of colour that look like things!

Pink Petals

Another way of catching up on the blog a bit is to just post more, so two in one day (if you missed the previous one due to my posting twice in a day being an unusual occurrence, it's this one here). Like the last one I'll be saying as little as possible in order to get it done in one go. This post's subject has been seen in a lesser way before, in the last speedpaint post. I said I'd get to the results soon; this is the post about it, so let's see the result.

Robots Under Lighting

Well, I certainly missed a couple of weeks there.  One of them was the July 4th weekend, so of course nothing happened that weekend except alcohol, grilled meat and small sparkly explosives (a winning combination!).  Last weekend... I have no clue - obviously last weekend occurred, but I could not with any certainty tell you what occurrences happened during it.  Possibly I did some art, I'm really not sure.

So, anyway, hopefully today I'll get some catching up done.  I think this will be done by just saying less stuff - most of what follows is basically stuff you've read before about other pieces anyway, so this one will focus on things that were slightly different.

Even More Board: The Hunters

As predicted, nothing got done last week. We had friends over for the weekend, and a BBQ on Saturday with lots of friends over. A lot of fun, but exhausting (so many kids!). This weekend was a little more relaxed, so new post, even if I should have written it yesterday (I actually did write it yesterday, but Blogger had an issue so I couldn't post). Today's subjects are actually from a while ago. Fortunately my wife is building a TARDIS, so that allows us to head back to the end of April for a recap*. Told you I was a bit behind. So behind in fact that this post will cover three things at once, though they're all related. This post ties in with the previous one regarding "The Most Dangerous Game", which you can recap on by clicking the title of it. That I just wrote. Back there.

All up to date? Good, let's go look at the "new" stuff.

Speedy Like Sunday Morning

Speed wise, last month was a good month.  Eight paints in a month!  Now, to be fair, some of them are rather rough, but that's generally the case even when I just do the one a week, and it was also a 'long' month with an extra weekend, but still, I'm pleased - and you know how rare that is.

This month my intent, blogwise, is to post about two of the three pieces I haven't written about yet, and post another three months worth of old sketches (which should bring me up to this year).  Oh, and this post of course!  We'll see if I can manage a post every weekend then; next week is already looking iffy in that regard.

For now though, on with the speed.

All New Year Old Sketching: July to September '14

Despite having quite a lot to post about, I do seem to have fallen behind on the actual posting bit.  This means that for the first time in a while I have quite a few pieces that need posting about, rather than just a handful of speedpaints.  I'm not going to be doing much catching up today though, instead I'll be doing some catch up a little on the other posts I've fallen behind on - the monthly sketch update.

From here on things will be done a little differently.  Usually I scan the sketchbook pages, and then cut out things of note for the month and compose them into a new image.  This has two disadvantages though.  Firstly, it takes bloody ages, and I don't think there's really enough feedback to warrant all the work I put into it (this time sink aspect is the main reason I've fallen behind so badly).  Secondly, it means that consciously or not I end up cutting out a lot of the stuff that's crap.  This gives a false impression of my current progress (actually, my progress about 11 months ago because I'm so far behind).

5 years at speed! 2010 - 2015

As promised this post will be a brief recap of the Speedpaints I've been doing over the past 5 years.   Some confusion has occasionally come up because of my use of the term speedpaint though, so before we review let's first define.

A speedpaint is a painting, usually digital, whereby the piece is created in a limited amount of time. It's a painting, done at speed. Simple.  Sometimes the time is decided upon before starting, sometimes there's a general maximum time beyond which it's not considered a speed painting, sometimes it's just the frame of mind the piece is created in.  Sometimes these are termed as Studies (and I do so myself in some places to reduce confusion), except a study can actually take a really long time, yet remain a study.

What they aren't, in my useage at least, are timelapses.  This is where someone records themselves painting and then they play that back at an accelerated rate. So you can see someone painting something that took 20 hours in a mere 5 minutes (or whatever).  Sometimes those are timelapses of speedpaints, and I've done a handful of those myself.  I think it's because of this that the timelapses have also become popularly known as Speedpaints (seeing someone paint, at speed),  but that's not what I mean by it.

OK, so now that's sorted out, lets go look at some, small ones, briefly.