Speed paint #42

Tuesday's Sketch-ercise [done on Tuesday]... Having less & less time to prepare myself for these now after I get home from work so probably will be little to no colour on the next few posts; at least till I have time to go back on them... Meet Stefano... Restaurant owner & rare wine collector... He's a self indulgent tripe an idiot.

-M-

Speed paint #40

Hey folks! Another week's worth done. Here's this evening's Sketch-ercise... Mrs Betty O'Neal. Wife of Reece, mother to Kayleigh & Jimmy...

CHARACTER PROFILE:
Betty is the dream wife of any red-blooded American man in the fifties [& any man now I imagine]. She cooks, cleans, looks after her husband & kids, bakes cookies & always has a pie cooling on the kitchen window ledge; and if that wasn't enough, she even holds down a part-time job of her own as a switchboad operator... Betty is perfect!

Like her husband Reece, she too is unaware of Viktor's hidden intentions, although her acute female intuition occasionally picks up on some of the signs... More and more she begins to feel slightly uncomfortable around him, especially when Reece is out of the house. She once caught Viktor staring at her with an almost sentient look in his eyes... On another occasion, whilst was placing some groceries into the fridge, as she closed the door, Viktor was stood right there behind it. Startled, she gave a deep gasp of shock, dropping the grocery bag which still contained a few items... Viktor after a few seconds staring at her slowly picked them up, placing the damaged items in the trash before then continuing with other duties. Betty later that day told Reece of the incident but only as a passing comment; not enough to flag up as being more than "oh... well, must be my imagination".

Betty still occasionally feels Viktor's eerie gaze on her.

REFERENCE IMAGES:

***All work featured here, illustrated or written [unless otherwise stated] is under the copyright & ownership of 
Maxwell. A. Oginni. All rights resereved 2011***

-M-

Speed paint #38

Wednesday's Sketch-ercise... Jimmy's younger sister Kayleigh O'Neal.

CHARACTER PROFILE:
Kayleigh is quite possibly the purest little 5yr old you'll ever meet. She's very innocent & incredibly trusting. Naive in nature & very curious, she trusts everything & everyone; which results in her practically having no fear of any sort... A well behaved child, but Kayleigh has never actually spoken a word since her birth "a very late bloomer doctors say", but a short stare into her deep green eyes would suggest otherwise. She has a lot of quirks I imagine... it's always a struggle to allow her mother to cut her hair, so often has it dragging behind her picking up dirt & various objects which end up there as storage; she preferes walking barefooted & drinks milk like it's water... Get's on well enough with people but like her brother Jimmy, a little detached from her peers.

Kayleigh is completely trusting of VIKTOR & can often be found digging for worms in the back garden with him. In fact, the day Jimmy's skepticism of the ADL [Viktor] was confirmed, it was in that very same situation... Kayleigh was in the back garden digging plant holes with the ADL, with their backs facing the house; Jimmy was cautiously watching through the kitchen window, when all of a sudden Viktor's head slowly turned 180º to face him, pausing for a moment then slowly giving a fiendish smirk as the rest of his body simultaneously continued tending the flowers & placing them into the holes... almost as though suggesting the impending fate awaiting them all.


REFERENCE IMAGES:

Awwwwww...

***All work featured here, illustrated or written [unless otherwise stated] is under the copyright & ownership of 
Maxwell. A. Oginni. All rights resereved 2011***

-M-

Speed paint #37

Today's Sketch-ercise... Jimmy O'Neal.

CHARACTER PROFILE:
Jimmy is an above average 10yr old kid with an above average over-active imagination [for a boy his age]. He's a well behaved child with lots to say. He has an unquenchable thirst/ interest in conspiracies, urban myths & legends. An intelligent child, Jimmy reads newspapers more than his dad does & collects articles on UFO's & Space travel; in fact, many a mornings as his dad sits down by the breakfast table to read the morning paper, he often opens it to find little rectangular patches torn out... A little detached from his peers due to his interests, Jimmy is sometimes teased at school [but it's nothing he cant handle]. Well informed of the current political situation in the US regarding fear & protection against the communism movement... although to Jimmy, the word "communist" simply means "the bad guys who want our house". As a result Jimmy is incredibly protective of his family.

Jimmy is the only one in the family who categorically distrusts VIKTOR... He is the only one who know's Viktor's true sinister nature, therefor the main story conflict is built between the two of them. Jimmy believes that the manufacturing & distribution of the ADL's [Artificial Domestic Labourers] was a modern day trojan horse from the "bad guys", & that all model ADL's have an activation date to wage war, destroy the innocent & defile every bit of good the American way of life stands for...


He believes Viktor activated first... "it's only a matter of time before the others follow..."

REFERENCE IMAGES:

***All work featured here, illustrated or written [unless otherwise stated] is under the copyright & ownership of 
Maxwell. A. Oginni. All rights resereved 2011***

-M-

Speed paint #36

This evening's Sketch-ercise... This week's theme? Horror- Sci-Fi [chosen by the masses]. Introducing... VIKTOR

CHARACTER PROFILE:
Viktor [self-named] is an android owned by the O'Neal family... one in a series of ADL [Artificial Domestic Labourer] models designed by genius rocket scientist Wernher Von Braun & his team of engineers as non-gender, command driven domestic helpers. However, Viktor is... different... Unbeknownst to most, due to some sort of dubious "operator error" during his construction, he is a psychopath! Deceptive & extremely crafty, he has managed to charm his way into the hearts of most of the family members [especially Reece- the father] except Jimmy who knows his dark truth... Viktor secretly plots to kill all members of the O'Neal family.

At the end of a day, once powered down, Viktor is kept/ stays in a small broom cupbord under the stairs, hardly big enough to fit two people & crammed with cleaning products, tools, rags etc. Jimmy once ventured in there only to find the cupbord actually had a hidden extension Viktor had secretly made over a period of time, which on a gradual decline led you downwards, ducking under pipes & live wires shooting sparks and finally into a dimly lit den... It was there Jimmy discovered Viktor's sinister nature & intent towards his family. The entire den was plastered with various scraps of paper detailing the various comings & goings of each family member; from Reece's work schedule, the times he reads his paper, the meals Betty would cook during the week, the time it took to prepare them, to Kayleigh's favourite foods, her personality traits & even nap times... there was even a few post-it notes on Jimmy; everything from his known allergies to the few friends he had.

Viktor suspected Jimmy knew, so always kept a close eye on him. At the same time, he also knew how much of a part of the family he had been accepted as & often played on that fact, taunting Jimmy knowing no one would believe him if he told.

I described him as an 'Android Hannibal Lecter' during my Sketch-ercise session with the guys... excluding the cannibalism.

REFERENCE IMAGES:

There was an ambiguity in this illustration of a character Chaplin played that struck a chord with me regarding a dysfunctional/ possibly homicidal robot.



















***All work featured here, illustrated or written [unless otherwise stated] is under the copyright & ownership of 
Maxwell. A. Oginni. All rights resereved 2011***

-M-

Speed paint #35

Today's Sketchercise... I've now come o the realisation I have ZERO skill in the art of conversing whilst drawing... too much yapping/ not enough focus; I know that now. Although, somehow she did actually turn out a lot better than I'd hoped...  Probably flesh her out later in the week... [hold onto your wallets, she's a tricksy one].

-M-

Speed paint #34

Thursday's Sketch-ercise... *thud thud*.... *clink*.... *tsssssssssss*

-M-

Speed paint #33

Wednesday's Sketch-ercise... [worked up a little more after my session].

-M-

Speed paint #32

Today's Sketch-ercise... So this week's theme is a continuation on character exploration, but with the sub-theme "story behind the character"... In this exercise, the task is to generate character concepts for a fictitious animated series. The genre must be a Western & only one character per session... Focusing on the characters background, personality, who he/she is & how they relate to the other cast members; I think this is a great exercise in developing more substance, authenticity & dynamism in your designs...

There was a quote I once heard off either Greg Manchess or George Prat... [I forget] where he stressed, "every stoke you make with a pencil or paintbrush has to mean something, every line has to tell a story"... I totally believe this & try to keep it in mind whenever designing... As I'm developing a character I try to ask myself questions like, "why does he stoop like that? How did he get that lazy left eye? Are his hands this jacked up because he's an auto-mechanic?" & so on... I say "I try to keep this in mind" but honestly I still feel I could push this a lot more.

At the end of the week we'll compile all the characters together, giving a loose synopsis of the series & a short breakdown of the characters/ names etc... by the looks of it, mine'll end up being more of an 18th century 'rogues gallery' haha. Well, here's today's piece folks.

-M-

Speed paint #30

& finally here's Friday's Sketch-ercise... Fighter pilot doll... watch out, she's a feisty one!

-M-

Speed paint #29

Here's this evening's Sketch-ercise... [for Thursday]. One more tomorrow to cover today [Friday] & that's my set for the week. Moving onto a whole 'nother theme next week so stay tuned! should be interesting... Been a pretty busy week, & I for one am relieved it's over... Time to R-E-L-A-X; but before you do, check out the pieces Tee Jay, Chris & newest person to join in with my sketch sessions, Nathan produced this week... Have a good weekend guys!

-M-

Speed paint #28

Had a great session this evening with Tee, Chris & Bernie, & would like to welcome our newest member Nathan Martinez who joined us all the way from the US! Would you believe he's only been painting for 3 months but has more drive than many professional artists I know!? *gasps*... He's just started a fresh new blog to keep track of his progress; if you have a few mins, hop over to it & show some support. Great having you join us Nate ; )

Here's Wednesday Sketch-ercise [done today].

-M-

Speed paint #27... [the real one]

Seems Tuesday's mishap with my charger has put me a day in arrears; will have to catch up with this one day lag over the weekend. Here's my Sketch-ercise for Tuesday.

-M-

Speed paint #26

So I've just taken on a pretty intensive commission; one of those, "lots to do in very little time" gigs [a cool one though] which has now eaten into my morning Sketch-time... BOOO! So for the next month or so, I'll have to be doing these in the evening after I get home... Here's Today's Sketch-ercise.

-M-

Speed paint #25

Hi folks. Here's this morning's Sketch-ercise... Decided to go for a slightly "rounder" [but still masculine] male today, & add a little variation to the body types. I think what I'm going to start doing with these posts is to share the bio's, backgrounds & statistics of these characters... We do this during our sessions to get deeper into the characters; going as far as whether he drinks Martinis or is a Scotch Whisky kinda guy, where he works, is he hot-tempered or a pushover, & so on...

It's been great fun this week but moving onto le females again next; same character exploration exercise. As always folks, if you'd like to join me with my daily Sketch-ercise, feel free to add me on Skype as: Sketchlounge... Till then, have a great weekend!

-M-

Speed paint #24 [+ some tips]

So with these character studies, what I tend to do before I begin is to gather a few random reference images based on my week's theme [normally I do a quick google image search the night before]... from there I'll pick out a few interesting pieces [3 - 4] that somehow spark off my imagination towards defining a character... The images will range from portraits to full body, & in varied compositional situations. What I'm looking for at this stage are simply elements in each that my imagination connects with... rarely [if ever] will use a single image alone as ref- it's more a mental collage of several...

I've also learnt it's really best to stay loose & keep an open mind about the information you take in through refs; observe & then let your imagination work it's magic. More often than not, I find [when I'm doing it right] my finished design looks absolutely nothing like my refs; even to a point you could argue why th'heck I had them up I the first place... There does of course come a point where it's best to now remove them; for me it's normally once I've laid down a strong framework of gestural stokes... from there on I'm pretty much good to go!

Hope this little explanation was helpful to a few out there?
Here's today's Sketch-ercise...

Oh, Also I recommend picking up a copy of Mike Mattesi's "Force" -fantastic book!

-M-

Speed paint #23

This morning's Sketch-ercise!
So he's some sort of "Hip Cat" Beatnik... or at least a wannabe... Quite like the body-shape/ pose but hate his face... that didn't quite come out right. Fun designing him though. Here's Tee's piece ; )

-M-

Speed paint #22

This morning's Sketch-ercise... "uughh... I'm hit".

-M-

Speed paint #21

Afternoon guys. So here's this morning's Sketch-ercise. Going for full-body designs this week, thinking about shapes, form, posture & strong silhouetting; should be a fun week. Along with my pal Tee Jay, I was joined this morning by my other good friend Chris for a 1st session; here's his warm-up... btw, if you fancy joining in with me on these Sketch-ercises, add me via Skype as sketchlounge. I'm here pretty much every morning from 8am to 9am GMT; always nice to connect with fellow artists/ new people. Either way, I'd really encourage giving this a go as regular daily practice at a time that works for you. It's tough getting yourself to do anything in the morning, let alone draw, but it really is a great way to start the day!

This morning's Sketch-ercise...

-M-

Speed paint #10

Here's Tuesday's Sketch-ercise...

Click image to view in correct size

-M-