Veteran Explorer

This one was real simple, but allowed me to flex my art muscles in a direction I hadn't in a while. The piece is a new illustration for an existing card, "Veteran Explorer." This new art is specific to Magic's Battlebond setting and the fine folks at Wizards had everything pretty well figured out before the assignment got to me.

I was asked to depict a map maker sitting in the top of a tree above the clouds. The map maker, though human, was to be dressed similarly to how the elves in the plain of Kylem (where Battlebond is set) dress and he was to be looking toward the viewer and the uncharted lands beyond. The city of Valor's Reach should be seen piercing the clouds in the background.

Given to me for reference were images of Valor's Reach and examples of Kylem elven dress. All that was left was to process all the stuff, find a way to depict what they needed from me and draw it up. Simple right? Well, in this instance, it kind of was. I knew exactly what kind of picture I wanted to make as soon as I read the description. The art order describes and adventure picture and when it comes to adventure pictures, there's one name that rings above any other in my mind: N. C. Wyeth. So, I pulled out some N. C. Wyeth art books, opened them to choice paintings that helped inform this piece, and went to town on a sketch, trying to absorb as much of the work around me and find a way to inject it into the picture I was making.

Here's how that came out:

©Wizards of the Coast

If memory serves, there was a request that I reduce the scale of the other trees indicated in the background, right. Aside from that I was good to go to paint.

I used to print out all of my reference images before starting a painting. These images would be taped up around my working surface and were constantly present. But honestly, I found the practice to be pretty wasteful in the amount of paper and ink I was blowing through to create things that were destined for the recycling bin. Plus, its been a long time since I had a printer that I didn't have to fight with every time I turned it on. Nowadays, I print reference very rarely and even then it's only what I absolutely need. The rest of my photos are kept open on iPad or laptop screens surrounding the painting. Less waste, less fuss, and it gets the job done.

That's nice and all, but what kind of reference did I collect for this image? Well, there are the aforementioned images of the city in the clouds and the elven dress, as well as some other images that I kept looking back to from the style guide that really informed the overall mood of the world. To these image I added images of clouds and skies and trees. I also included images specifically of trees sticking up above the clouds. Additionally, I pulled out a leather case I have to help inform the map bag hanging from the tree. Essentially, if I'm unsure about any aspect of a piece, I typically collect reference for it. I'm looking to make sure that the final result is believable—maybe not completely accurate, mind you, just believable.

And then there's the reference my wife and I take.

Usually reference taking works like tike this: my wife takes the photos using my sketch for comparison and I pose for the photos. This is often true even when I am depicting a woman. The reason is that it just always goes faster that way. Sure, I'll take some back up photos of her in the same pose, but I tend to get a bit closer to the pose I want than she does. Of course sometimes I photograph people other than my wife or myself, but that isn't always feasible with deadlines and scheduling. As a result, Amy and I have take a lot of photos of one another in basements or spare rooms over the years. Digital photography has made that a lot easier, cheaper, and a lot less embarrassing. I do not miss the days of picking up my roll of reference photos from the very bemused developer.

Below is the image I mostly used in this case. There were about twenty-five more, but I picked the one that most closely matched my sketch and used it above the others.

Behold the unfinished demolition of our murder basement in all its box-filled glory!

Some folks cobble all their reference together into one, single image via Photoshop. I find that that takes time away from the easel and I'd rather spend the time there than in front of the computer. That's just personal preference, mind you, but it's worked (mostly) for me so far.

Anyway, after all the reference was in hand, I went to paint. Here are a couple photos showing it at two different stages (with absolutely no indication of how I got from point A to point B):

Yeah, a lot happened between those two but I can fill in some blanks. Generally, at the start of every piece I like to find some part of the image to sink my teeth into. Sometimes that's the figure, sometimes that's an element in the background. It depends on the piece and my mood. Here I dug right into the figure. I brought it up to a certain level of finish and then began to branch out from there. I established where the tree would be, using darker browns than it would inevitably be so that I could just go ahead and paint the background right over the branches and still see where they needed to be. Then I went and had a ridiculously fun time painting the background. Seriously. Those clouds were a blast. Eventually, I got back to the tree and the figure and started to tighten those things up. The second photo probably represents what the piece looked like on the Monday before the piece was due (which would have been just a few days later on Friday). There's still a bunch of details left unfinished on the figure and indeed the leaves of the main tree are still incomplete. Missing also are the beams of light shooting out from the city.

Here's how it eventually came out:

©Wizards of the Coast

The final painting is oil on hardboard and measures sixteen inches wide by twelve inches tall. It was art directed by Cynthia Sheppard.

If I had one complaint about the finish, it's that it falls short of the more atmospheric take indicated by the sketch. Part of that was due to the request by Wizards to shrink the background trees, part of that was just decision making done on the fly. I'm sure there was a bit of a difficulty on my part marrying the atmospherics with the puffy, well-defined clouds I settled on. Still, I like where it eventually landed. Why? Well, it mostly comes down to my influences and the rare chances to nod at them in any way. Sure, I am absolutely a product of my all of my influences and therefore every piece I do nods to them in some way, but it's rare that I get to lean on my art heroes so hard.

In this case, this is probably the closest I will ever get to painting an N. C. Wyeth-esque piece. Obviously it's lacking in a lot of ways in terms of structure and paint application (not to mention scale), but there's a lot of color choices and lighting choices that are absolutely aping his work (or attempting to). Most importantly, I was hoping to capture the spirit of his work. The feelings of adventure and discovery are woven throughout N. C. Wyeth's illustrations and I was really looking to capture those things in a similar way. In the end, I'm mostly just elated that I even got a chance to try to do any of that with a Magic assignment and I'm quite proud of the degree to which I've succeeded.

More Advice

On the heals of Randy Gallegos' very nontraditional but all around awesome bit of advice over at ArtOrder, as well as my own, more traditional chunk of wisdom from last week, I bring you a few additional spoonfuls of what some might deem common sense.  Nevertheless, I'm here to offer these tasty morsels up for your consideration.  Why?  Because we've reached the time of year where art students far and wide start sweating their futures.  With the days of their doing projects within a structured environment coming to a close, many of them begin shooting off emails and making phone calls to folks like myself, hoping to get some insight, advice or a paid internship.  While I can't do the third, I just might be able to help with the other two.

Now, some or all of what I might share herein may be old hat to those of you perusing the letters which, when assembled, form words.  But my own observations of some of the folks entering the field each year have indicated that there are certainly those who might benefit from some of what I'm about to get into.  And so, without further interruption, I shall.

Learn To Talk About Your Work
Learning to draw and paint is fine and good, but in addition to developing such fine and admirable skills, you might want to take some time out to figure out how to discuss your work articulately.  And no, I'm not talking about learning to write well for your blog and such (though that's not a bad idea, either).  I'm talking about actual, spoken words — you know, with inflection and everything!  When I was in school, I was expected to actually talk about what it is I did and to eventually get to the point where I could describe my work, style, genre and subject matter in one, concise sentence.  Nowadays, I'm guessing you'd need to be able to do that in 140 characters.  Still, it's not a bad idea to be able to chat about your process, to be able to speak about your choices and to intelligently defend them.  While such a thing as vocalization may seem obsolete now that the internet is here, like it or not there are still art directors out there who might actually want to meet you in person at some point, and if at all possible, it'd be nice if they can actually have a conversation with you.  Trust me, they seem to like that kind of thing.

Learn Humility
While learning to talk about yourself and your work, remember to keep it simple and humble.  Don't be that guy who thinks he's the second coming of the illustration god, Illustrut (I made that up, like it?).  We all know him.  He's the guy who adds pretentiousness where none is needed, the guy who inflates the importance of his work and profession.  Most illustrators I know avoid that guy, and most illustrators are the opposite of that guy — they're humble and don't buy into their own hype.  Personally, I find it difficult to take myself too seriously.  I paint zombies and dragons and such.  I churn out the odd clunker now and then that is more than enough to damage what little self-esteem I actually have.  I have loved only a handful of my own pieces, and one day hope to love another handful.  While I'm not saying you should aspire to be some self-flagellating illustration martyr, I think it's worth remembering that when Illustrut returns to us, he will likely embody someone who isn't you.

Learn to Critique

Now, I'm sure that most of you reading this will roll their eyes over this one, but it's an essential skill.  Most schools out there expect you to participate in critiques of your fellow classmates' work.  But, if managed to got through school without acquiring this important skill, then I suggest you find a group of folks you can rely on and trust, and start doing it as soon as possible.  And I'm not suggesting this because I'm some twisted mashochist who wants to shower in the tears of those being critiqued.  Critiquing the work of others trains your eye, so that when you turn it toward your own work it is more effective.  And while you might be looking forward to the end of such public critiques come graduation, I sincerely hope you don't abandon the practice altogether.  Fourteen years after graduating from college, I still regularly show sketches and finished work to several guys who I know will cut right to the heart of any visible weakness in a piece.  Work I've stared at to the point of bleariness can instantly be tidied with fresh eyes once I've lost all objectivity, and such an asset is invaluable.

Learn To Take a Critique

Think you only need to be able to give a good critique?  Think again.  If you can't take as good as you give, you have to figure out how to develop a thicker skin.  While it can be extremely difficult to have someone rip your favorite piece to shreds, you have to find a way to look at those comments objectively.  If you're getting defensive when on the receiving end of a critique, it just might be possible that in your heart of hearts you know there's some truth to what's being said to you.  I know that that is certainly the case whenever the urge to become defensive wells up within me during critique.  And, believe it or not, learning to take criticism helps make you better at giving it.  This, in turn, makes you better at receiving critiques, and so on.  Look, I know it's tough to have someone point out the flaws in a piece you've labored over and poured a bit of your soul into, but believe it or not, there's an excellent chance that whoever is trying to drive that stake through your heart is doing it to make you a tougher vampire.

Learn When Not to Self-Promote
There are some excellent resources out there on self-promotion.  I'm not going to link any, because I fail at research, but I know they're out there because people have told me about them, and I believe everything everyone tells me.  What I'm getting at is that it's a deeper topic than this post can accommodate and I think it's sometimes more valuable to touch on what not to do.  The gist is, there's a time and a place for everything.  Learn when to self-promote, and when to just plant the seed of self-promotion — the I'll-catch-up-with-you-tomorrow-and-we-can-talk-about-it, kind of thing.  This is a tough tightrope to walk, and it's something I think you have to learn through experience, but my rule of thumb is that if it feels natural to the occasion to whip out my portfolio or start handing out my business cards, then fine.  If it's going to result in any kind of awkwardness, I'll try and find a way to plant a seed.  If that still feels awkward, I leave it for another day and carry on.  There are definitely those who feel that's too passive and that you should be a touch pushier, but it's just not in me.  Figuring out what feels comfortable to you can take a while, but it's a necessary thing.  Just remember that there are times when you need to skip the used car salesman routine, and if you're asking yourself whether or not this is one of those times, it probably is.

Learn To Be Careful Of What You Shoot At

There's a lot of art out there I don't like.  There are some of my fellow artists who annoy me to no end, and I likely do the same to them.  And I've worked under some nightmare scenarios with companies I'd never work with again.  Despite all this, I try not to talk much about any of them.  At least not publicly.  Sure, I believe everyone is entitled to their opinion and are free to express it, but I try and avoid yammering on about many of my professional opinions when out amongst my peers, and especially on the internet.  Why?  Well, just as you can be fired from a job for writing the wrong thing on Facebook, you can lose a client doing the same.  As far as I'm concerned, the internet is akin to a soapbox and megaphone, only your voice carries much further online.  It's best to assume that anything said about anyone will eventually get back to them.  So, I avoid saying anything I wouldn't otherwise say publicly to a person's face.  Sure I might gripe and commiserate behind the scenes with a few people I hold as confidants (an important thing to have), but like it or not ripping another artist or their work, or complaining publicly about a client can come back to haunt you.  You never know who their friends are and how vengeful they can be.  This business is hard enough, try not to make it harder.

Learn To Feed Your Head
While I can't say this is a common thing, I can't exactly say it's uncommon, either.  I've heard tell tale of artists cloistering themselves in order to keep influences away.  They want to keep their work pure.  While I understand the mentality, I also think it's pretty flawed.  Becoming a hermit limits you to what's in your own head.  But if you take as much in as possible, you have a whole world to explore and more fodder than you could ever consume in a lifetime.  I suggest taking it all in.  Roll everything around in your mind a while, try each thing on and see what fits.  It is all going to be churned through that lovely, unique brain of yours, so you'll always be present in what comes out.  Your brain will filter every tidbit you cram in there, your hand will drive every stroke.  And weaving all those disparate, corrupting influences together will be your own sensibilities, your own will.  Feed your head, feed your heart.  It's what the beast needs to grow, and if the beast doesn't get what it needs it will whither and die.

That's it!  I swear.  If you managed to get through all that, color me impressed.  And while this advice is free (except for all the time you've spent reading that you'll never get back), it may not necessarily be any good.  Which is what I'll be talking about next time.

Revisiting Reprints: Rampant Growth

Rampant Growth is among the more re-illustrated cards in all of Magic.  Sure, it's not alone in having been illustrated more than once — in fact many cards have alternate art and come in various promo versions — but there are usually just one or two other variants.  Rampant Growth has seen at least five iterations that I'm aware of, and mine isn't even the most recent.

Some might wonder whether there is any added pressure or a difference in approach when it comes to illustrating a card that has been illustrated before.  For me, the answer is no.  As I see it, the previous versions, loved or hated, already exist.  No one can take that away from the players.  I'm just adding another aesthetic option to the mix.  That's it.  Some will love what I've done, others will hate it, and there will be various reasons for both feelings.  As far as I'm concerned, there's room for both opinions, as well as every opinion in between.

So how did this piece come together?  Let's take a look at the sketch, shall we?

©Wizards of the Coast

 Again, simple pencil on typing paper.  It was approved as is and I went to paint.

©Wizards of the Coast

Once again it's an oil painting measuring 11" x 8" on a piece of Strathmore illustration board measuring 13" x 10".  It was painted in 2006 and didn't see the light of day until Tenth Edition, which was released in 2007.  It has subsequently been reprinted in the Magic 2010 and Magic 2012 core sets, as well as in Planechase and Duel of the Planeswalkers.

As I recall, in the art order, I was asked to do depict a wave of vegetation rolling over a barren landscape.  There are any number of ways that I could have depicted this, but I ended up choosing to rip someone else off.

Ahem. 

I mean, I went the route of creating an homage.  Now, I had a professor — I can't remember which one — who told me that if I was going to rip someone off, rip off the best.  So that's exactly what I did.  I referenced one of the most celebrated Japanese wood cut prints ever created.  I stole from Hokusai's Great Wave.

Now, why did I choose to do that?  Simple, I'd never done it before.  If ever there was an image that made sense to reference in this situation, it was clearly that one.  I can think of no other image of a wave that is so instantly recognizable, and I wanted my Rampant Growth to be less specific (as so many of the versions are) and more iconic.  In effect, I stole from one iconic image to create (hopefully) another.

There are probably a lot of folks who will say that this is horribly unimaginative, not to mention overdone.  I think both are fair points, but I also think there's something to be said for context.  First off, I can say that if there had been a reference to Hokusai within the game of Magic to that point, I was not aware of it (though in retrospect there are probably dozens of them in the Kamigawa expansion block, which I've never really looked through).  So, in my mind I was doing something new within the confines of the game's aesthetics.  Second, I borrowed Hokusai's composition only.  The concept came from Wizards and the translation and handling of the final image was all my own.  After all, I could not simply turn Hokusai's wave green, eliminate Mt. Fuji and the boats and hand it in.  It needed to feel like my own work and it needed to fit into the world of Magic.

Anyway, I ended up submitting this piece to the Society of Illustrators Annual Exhibition and it got in.  I don't normally like to brag about such things, but it was pretty cool to see the rare Magic piece up on the Society's walls, and if I recall correctly it wasn't the only piece referencing Hokusai in some capacity in the show that year.  Since this piece, I've worked other homages into other paintings, though far more subtly.  I've stolen a pose here or a palette there from many of my film, art, and illustration heroes — not all the time, but on the rare occasions where it fit organically within the assignment.  The practice usually makes for a fun piece and one from which I learn a great deal as I study closely what I'm attempting to homage.  Fun, too, is spotting the references in the work of others, as they do the same.

If I were to get the same art order today, five years later, it's pretty likely I'd go the same route I did back then.  The only difference, I think, is that I might paint it a bit bigger now.

From the Flat Files 3

Day three in my attempts to embarrass myself.  How am I doing so far?

For the life of me I cannot think of the assignment.  It's a weird little piece, to be sure.  It was done either at the end of my junior year or the beginning of my senior year at Pratt, which would be 1997.  It measures 11"x14" and is on illustration board.

This piece was the at the beginning of the wave of work that I did when I finally had decided on oil paint as my chosen medium.  I'd done a bunch of work in high school in oils and enjoyed the medium quite a bit.  Then, I went off to college and during my freshman year continued to paint in oils.  However, in my sophomore year, I had a class called "Methods and Media," and my professors for the course were Rebecca Guay and George Pratt (in consecutive semesters).  In this class I was exposed to different techniques using various media.  We worked in acrylics, oils, collage, watercolor, and then mixed many of these media in various techniques.  For some reason, I latched onto the mixed media technique that I used to do the pieces in previous days' entries, and it's the technique I used on the vast majority of projects I did until a point in the second semester of my junior year.

As I recall it, I was assigned a self-portrait by Dave Passalacqua and as a change of pace I chose to do it in oil.  When it was finished, my friend, Jeremy, took a look at the piece and asked, "why don't you do all you're work in oil?  I mean...your work in oil always looks...well it's better."  (Jeremy has always had a way of getting to the point).  I took a long look at the body of work I'd done in mixed media, then looked at the few oil painted projects I'd done, as well as the oil figure paintings I'd done in my painting classes and realized that he was right.

So, I switched to oils.  Permanently.  The really strange thing, though, is that my oil illustrations were really thinly painted to begin with.  A lot of the drawing still showed through.  This is something I had not done before.  I mean, look at it — this one is really unpolished, and this piece and other work I produced like it constantly garnered comments like, "this is a cool piece, it's just a shame you don't know how to paint." 

If I could have, I would have argued with them.  But they were right.  Still, I never gave up.  I'm still illustrating and I'm still using oils, and I think my work is better for it.

From the Flat Files

These are my flat files.  Flat files are excellent at crushing fingers.  In fact, I think that they excel at doing that that anything else.  A distant second to crushing fingers, flat files are also good at storing art.  While unpacking, I came across a bunch of stuff and decided I'd go ahead and share some of it each day until the end of the year.  So, here goes...

This first piece is a self-portrait I did in August of 1996.  It is mixed media on illustration board and measures 9.25" x 12".  It was done in about two hours (which I think is pretty obvious).  It also comes with a story and a very important lesson.

I was 19, and was just about to begin my junior year at Pratt Institute and had a few spare hours to do something amid my various responsibilities as a new Resident Adviser in Leo J. Pantas Hall.  The dorm's freshman occupants had not yet moved in, so it was serene.  The halls were empty and the only sounds were the birds singing on the branches of the tree just outside my fourth floor window.  I felt inspired, so I grabbed a spare piece of board and painted this.

As I said, it was a pretty quick piece.  At the time, I worked in a sort of mixed media technique that relied heavily on acrylic paint and this piece is no different.  It's done in a far less methodical way than I usually worked, but contained many of the same ingredients: a pen and ink drawing with water soluble dye washes followed by some acrylic paint.  It was quick and dirty, and there was liberal use of a hair dryer.  I finished it, signed it, and set it aside.

Once classes had started, I took it to a professor of mine, George Pratt.  I was pretty happy with how it had turned out and was pretty hopeful that he would be, too.  I arrived at George's class early to find him playing chess with Richard Clark, a friend of his.  George took a look at the painting and immediately critiqued it.  Though I don't recall all he had to say about the piece, I think I can now guess at a lot of the things he pointed out.  He was his usual, constructive but brutally honest self and was nothing, if not thorough.  I took his criticisms in, thought about them, and thanked him for taking the time to look at my "piece of crap" painting.

George immediately jumped on me.  Why, he asked, was I being so hard on my work?  Why would I refer to this painting as a "piece of crap?"

Because it is, I replied.

While I don't remember his words exactly before this point, I remember his next ones verbatim.  "Man," he said, "don't ever refer to your work like that.  Ever.  If you keep calling your work crap, then eventually you'll believe it's crap.  And once that happens then crap is all it'll ever be."

There are a variety of reasons why I have kept certain pieces over the years, while allowing others to be lost, destroyed, given away, or thrown out.  This piece I keep because of George's words.  Words that have gotten me through some tough times.  This piece is a constant reminder to never give up on myself, and to believe in what I do — two things without which I would be nowhere.