Hello my Jungle friends,

And so it is, my daily sketching turned into preparing for upcoming "lecture" although its still couple weeks ago but since this is my first time in front of a crowd I need to prep so most of my morning time is going into that. By the way if someone is interested I will be doing the talk at Chesterfield Colleges Digital Careers Week on 8th of March. 

On the other hand when I have time I'm working on this bad boy :D

Still ways to go and probably I'll remove some stuff to make composition better ( although I was never a fan of center vanishing point but hey practice ) at this point practice sketch has become a full on painting again :D

for you who are interested here are some shots of the process

Basic process of deleting and adding. I did have an idea in the beginning sort of a stronghold in between these abandoned containers, maybe a small city, but I think its not going to fly for this composition in the end so I'll change it to smth else, or not :D

As for my small IP as I said I finished the space shot on Friday, but had some friends over so haven't posted it yet, but you blog readers will be the first to lay your eyes on my planet code-named Laika :D

Maybe it need bit of sharpening or contrast but I'l look in to it before I post it.

As always all crits are welcome ;]

Over and out.

And here he is again ;]

After a brutal mortal combat with my pc I think I am finally back on the track with my works. These past days were hard as most of the time all I saw on my screen was this view

Apparently my PC was running out of memory or smth when I tried to model my planet shot and even after managing to close some applications the windows would not wake up, most of the time my screens would just shutdown but everything was working in the background ;] FUN! 

Even that was happening I managed to get so much request for over-paints that I barely managed them so sorry if someone got less attention or maybe not all the help they asked me for. That being said I though  need to manage a little bit the paint-over situation. So I decided I will do week over-paint 'event' so to speak. I ask you not to send me anything until you see over-paint week event on this Blog ;] should be something like Day X - Over-paint week event :D sorry about this but I really would like to help all of you but there just no time for that ;/ but you can keep sending me stuff if you want some crits or just tips ;]

Anyway today got bit back on the daily sketching, I think after all this mixerupper my ideas are shit need to get back on the idea horse so to speak. My take for the day

Yyyeeeehaaaaa Giddy up :D tried to stay in that abandoned theme that I started with the Cowboy guys but yeah ended with Blah...as always crits are welcomed.

On the other hand still continuing with my never ending so it seems image of super simplicity. here are more render that I managed to do through out these days

If someone wondering I wen to World Mashine and generated a terrain that after I exported in to maps and used them in Octane render. I think it turned out like a good practice, sort of like those daily sketches. I would say I enjoyed the process and probably will use it again real soon for this project. If someone is curious about the maps they are super simple and took me probably 30 min to do maybe 1h here they are

I have to promise my self that I will be done with this image tomorrow :D this taking way too long for no reason at all ( well almost ).

So tune in next time for updates on ma struggles :D

Over and out.

Well hello folks,

Wow today was a crazy day. So much happening I barely had a time to do anything. Got featured on Kotaku and that just amazing never though I be there. Also finally have a permission to post Battefront 2 stuff so tried to prepare them for posting and them I found out about the Lithuania concept art group so spent some time talking with people. Sorry that I have been away and not posting anything yet. Just one of those days when you deal with unexpected stuff. In any case I though I share were I am with my image. 

I was experimenting a lot today with 3D rendering, just different thing to try to achieve a look I wonted, and by asking some people around they basically told me with my PC right it will take me a very very long time to render an image that I want so I tried to find a similar but faster way to do it.

I think this is going to be enough to edit it later in Photoshop. If anyone is wondering I will render 3 separate renders, with atmosphere off and another with clouds and atmosphere off. 

Well kids there ya go you want fancy renders get a fancy PC :D if not let see how this will turn out :D

Come to think of it its a pretty easy image and seems like I am taking forever with it :D

Over and out. 

Hello my fellow readers,

So I started a quick sketch yesterday. I changed the theme from military to abandoned, guys was dreaming of The Last of Us :D yeah that game left an impression that's for sure. I mean those first 30min or so, just... f**k it was good. So if anyone hasn't played it yet DO IT, JUST DO IT. Anyway as I was saying I did a quick sketch and was about to jump to my personal project but...

After sort of finishing it I thought to my self this is going somewhere I want to go :D and I decided that I should just keep my energy that I had then and push this piece further more. I wanted to keep the mood and overall feeling the same, there were just some composition and environment changes I felt could do with some work. Little did I know that it will take me ages to get the composition I kinda like :D I thinks it always the hardest thing, even if you do a series of sketches you keep on developing the composition and design of the shot until the last moment, it is something that personally me never settle on. Anyways some time later here is what I ended up with, still small things here and there I would like to change but I spend more time on it as it is :D

As usual crits and comments are welcome.

I am definitely going back to my planet shot now so hopefully have some updates tomorrow. Thank for tuning in and as always 

Over and out.

Halloo,

How is everyone. Good good glad to hear all of you are ok :D

Jokes aside so after last post I asked if anyone would like a paint over of their work and one person contacted me. He is planing to start his concept art studies and just asked about his painting. Actually I was surprised as this one was pretty good compared to what I usually get so good job. After removing all the clutter the image was nicely done. So here it is before and after.

This person was kind enough to let me share this here, so I though I would give an overall tips for those who are starting out. That is just my opinion and please ignore it if you don't care ;]

1. First of all try to keep it simple, make one step at the time. As you can see in his attempt ( top image just in case ) he tried to add so much stuff for his first work, and I think its cool to be creative and want more. So I took his image and though what the main thing you want to show here. The initial image was about mountains, spaceships shooting and people standing. As Shaddy Safadi said one time: you cant have all, pick just one ( Not a direct quote but you get the idea ) So I made this image about the landscape the spaceship is just their for added interest but its not what I'm trying to show,

2. If you are photo-bashing don't forget about fundamentals:

• Look were the light is coming in the images
• Perspective
• Mach colour 
• Always look at reference, keep an eye for depth, scale, rock formation variation 
• Last but not the least, images you combine usually are different resolution/quality/shadow density so don't forget to match them as well

3. Don't overburden your images, keep space to breath especially in landscape shots, unless that is your goal to make a viewer to feel trapped/claustrophobic etc. So when you just starting out choose one thing, don't try to put everything ( actually that goes for more experienced artists as well, me included :D ) In short less is more :D

Hope you find this useful and if someone else want an over-paint send it my way kalinauskas.darius@gmail.com ( don't spam please )

As for my personal project it was going so well until MODO crashed.... WHYYY WHYYY I keep forget to press ctrl+s so all I got is this screenshot 

Basic introduction shot for the story, the shapes going to me under clouds, just barely visible form space and ill be revealed as we decent to the planet surface ;]  

Th-th-th-tha-tha-tha-that's all, folks!

Over and out.

Hello my fellow artist

Pro tip of the Day - if you have no ideas for a new image try bashing your old works and using different blending modes to see something new, it will at least move you from a art block if you having one ;]

Funny I actually don't consider my self an artist more of the designer but thats just how my brain works. So after a serious exam I had on Saturday my brains have rebuild them self's and I'm back on the sketching road. Man ou man sometimes even a random sketch kills you. I spent way too much time on this one :D anyway the goal of practising something more cinematic was complete. Mountains to go still.

Comments and crits are welcome as usual. 

As for my personal project I will confess because of that exam I haven't done anything but definitely will be working on it tomorrow so for you who are interested keep an eye for updates.

P.S So I was thinking maybe someone would want some paint-overs of their works? I would be happy to help a few if there is interest. Let me know we could arrange something.

Over and out

Hello,

Pro Tip of the day - if you have an art block first day I would suggest going one of two ways either do nothing that day just play some games, watch movie, cook etc, or mash random images or your previous works by using blending modes in Photoshop and see if something comes out, I find it a good way to start your engine so to speak ;]

In past few days been preparing to start new project sort of little series of images, so been gathering references and building 3D assets, also there a huge design piece to make that will make thing slower, as I don't want those 5min designs I've been doing on my sketches. Just to clear up on what I'm gonna do next are these sketches, there gona be 2 more I think

and just for progress purposes I though I share amount of reference I gathered for this project, I tried to find reference for all the images I am going to do so there would be no need to do it later, although knowing my self I will do it anyway but at least big part is already here.

As for the sketch of the day so to speak, man not super happy of how it came out, the composition is meh idea is cliche but the purpose is to learn or warm up so it did that ;] what do you think?

Thanks for looking!

Over and out.

Hello hello again, so today bit later post cuz was lazy during the lunch. 

So today I would like to start with Pro tip - stop watching movie trailers :D I started doing it two years ago and trust me my movie experience went from cool to absolutely stunning. As always there are pluses and minuses biggest downside for this is trailer in movie theatres - nothing a pair of noise cancelling headphones and closed eyes can't fix, or more retarded version when you close your ears with your fingers and hum something.

Ont the concept art note, tried a bit different approach with more photos to play around that resulted in longer "warm up" time but hey is all good and fun. Here what came out

Loving the grain, I guess gona be cheeze about it and put to all my work ups just to keep it different :D

As for the other image omg, I think I reach a state were trying 100 different things and can't decide if they are good or not, so though I will stop and gonna go ahead with this version in the end, crits are welcome!

That's all for today keep creating.

Over and out.

So yeah after my last post I realised it was Friday although I was sure its Wednesday. Time flies when you freelancing. 

Anyway went ahead and did some quick photo-bashing as mentioned before, it was quick but fun and actually thought me something.

I know too much grain right :D

On the other hand been working on my personal piece and looking at it today I'm not liking it anymore, but I guess we all have these moments :D that why working on one piece for too long is not good, thinking to take a break form it and come back later, but then I'm afraid it will never happen. So one more day and will see how it goes. Here is were I'm at if you are interested, any comments are welcome ;]

You know that feeling then something just not clicking, that what I'm having with this image and I don't know what it is.

See you tomorrow guys, as always if you have any questions shoot ;]

Over and out.

Hello my fellow artist. So as mentioned yesterday I was thinking about some theme for day to day stuff to practise.

 Looking at the piece I'm working now I became curious of what other unfinished work I have. Went through my old works folders and found bunch of images that were left behind so to speak, whenever it was due some project or me thinking my skills are not good to finish it now ( stupid as practise is the key ). So here they are, some of them date back to 2012 some of them are more recent

I was actually surprised that there aren't so many of them. Some of you can recognise sketches that I asked to help me out with and they never saw the light of day, time to change that. Obviously some are shit but others I think can be worked up or at least I can borrow the idea from them and make something similar/new.

Like with the image I showed you yesterday. I looked at my portfolio and I was like "I never made and image for my Big Buggy" so started to make some sketches for that and then combined the two and got something worth working on I thought. Added vehicles to my scene and rendered out a shot in Octane. Went for the sunset view instead because looking at military photography things looked great in that light ( well most things do ).

And after all of this search I realised "these approach will not work for quick warm ups in the morning" :D back to square one, so I'll take an easy route and will be doing some military photo-bashing, cuz its fun.

Over and out.