Recently I've been testing the waters as far as working digitally goes. I still feel very new to it, but I feel like Photoshop can definitely enhance some of my comic works.

Now

Right now I've gone back to practicing portraits. However, my intentions with these portraits is to learn the female face well enough to simplify them into my comic style. I feel, for the most part, that I understand how to manipulate the male face to get the expression I want. When I don't know how the anatomy or facial expression should look, I can always reference myself. But I find it much harder to give the female superhero a more feminine look.

Whenever I'm stuck in a rut and don't know what to do, I turn to portraits for practice. I feel as though right now Megan Fox is a highly idolized female figure, so I've been trying to find out why. Even while trying to understand the female structure with portraiture I still try and experiment.

This was the first time I've tried charcoal and colored pencils on colored paper. And the other one is also one of the first 'realistic' portraits I've attempted using Oil paints. It's a lot of fun experimenting with materials you don't usually use.

Combining the Two

Of course, being influenced by comics and portraits, I love it when Hollywood decides to release a movie on these badass superheroes. Here's a piece that I created last summer, using a reference (obviously). This piece definitely takes the cake with 'the-most-hours-spent-on-a-project' award for me. I tried to pay attention to every single detail. With that said, I really like how this turned out, just every time I see it I'm reminded of the time spent on it.

Portraits

Much like comics, I also find myself returning to portraits time and again. I started doing celebrity portraits two years ago in hopes of finding what specific characteristics make a face recognizable. Although I prefer using charcoal, I often find myself trying alternate techniques and styles with my portraits. Sometimes I simplify images, and sometimes I pay too much attention to small details. It's fun trying out new things though - keeps me interested.

Comics

Comics have made a huge impact on my artwork. As far as drawing goes, I hit a wall when I was about 12, and comics got me rolling again when I was 16. I started off just by copying professional images, just trying to pick up anything I could about facial expressions and anatomy. My interest in comics hasn't changed since. There's something about proportions, anatomy, dark shadows, foreshortening, and perspective that comic artists understand that I find fascinating. Although I still feel far away from where I want to be, I do feel as though along the way I've learned quite a bit.