Painting Drama

I forgot to mention that I got into a new online painting course: Painting Drama! It is taught by Chris Oatley, contemporary master illustrator, designer, inspirer of disney fame and very well regarded in the industry today. (Seriously, check the website. It's got archived years of free learning stuff, ranging from techniques, interviews, PDFs, brushes....)

I'm really enjoying these lessons, mainly because they do not verse about the usual technique tutorials and step-to-step method of teaching that one can generally find online. This course is pushing me to find the "why's" and "what-about's" of any given piece. I'm starting to see patterns in successful paintings that earlier I simply couldn't get through. Technique isn't anymore what I'm after; I do not want to reproduce reality anymore: now what I want is to tell stories in visual form. This is just the right course for it!

Here are the first two finished illustrations I've produced for the course.

The first one is Medusa in Repose. This was for an exercise in leading the eye through the composition. I sought to show a tired Medusa, one that isn't content with the role imposed on her by society. She's tired of all the killing. But as long as she's got a breath in her, she'll keep fighting for it.

Here are Mr Hoover vs. The Dusties. This is a play on the theme of "David vs Goliath" in which I wanted to express a difference of importance in the painting using size.

And that's it for now. I'll continue updating when more things come up.