Our articles about the LA-based pop band “Lights Over Paris” have attracted a lot of attention. Read the articles below to see why.
Experimenting with a Tablet
A few months ago, Dr. Novachord and I each scored sweet deals on 6×11 Wacom Intuos3 Tablets.
We bought them while in Vegas for $150 a piece… about half the cost. However until now I hadn’t really had a chance to play around with it. I’ve had the desire to get back into drawing but also wanted to take a stab at matte paintings which I thought would complement my photography.
But first, I wanted to get some practice. Thus I decided to do a photo-realistic portrait based on an image I took. It’s taken me around 15 hours to complete. So without further ado, I present… The Chuck.
Here’s a comparison with the original photo.
And here are some snapshots of the WIP. However, I didn’t save versions and didn’t plan on showing the workflow till it was already near completion. But you get the idea…
Please feel free to comment on Dr. Chuckles’ face. I’m sure he’ll like that. And if you have any cool Photoshop brush presets you’d like to share, I’d love to find some new ones.
Comments
Dr. Lazy-eyez
Jesus H macy!
That is fucking amazing man.
How do you get the fine details? Did you use all pressure sensitive brushes? Goddamn. MASTAPIECE!
Sir Chucks-a-lot
Chuckie Smalz
The CHUCK!
How the hell did you get the finite details in the facial hair and eyebrows? Was there any photo masking involved? or is this all wacom!?!? Goddamn man.
I am blown away.. BLOWN AWAY!!!!
THIS IS DR. SALVATRON
LOSING HIS MIND
HIS SANITY
HIS BRAIN
*TRANSMISSION END*
Also, nice photo of the wacom…
is your’s actually gold?!? or did you just make it gold?!?
Nice touch
NICE TOUCH
IAEK YAEN
*TSNARMISOISN CLOETPME*
CHUCK JUSTICE! Man, at first glance I thought you just went over the photo with some brushes and shit. But that is incredible. I heard Chuck just ordered a print and is getting it framed
Bloody hell that’s cool! Very, very nicely done.
I’ll get one made for Mother’s Day
Jesus, that’s amazing!
…and damn the both of you for scoring cheap wacom tablets. I’m still rockin’ my 6×9 intuos2 that Dr. Novachord swung me a few years back. Still works wonders though.
Thanks for all the comments. Yeah I made a pressure sensitive brush that correlated to the diameter. It was pretty basic. I just kept toggling the size, hardness, and opacity of that brush for most of it. One trick I found is to use a wet brush. That allows for better blending of colors. For the hair, I just used a hard brush with a small minimum diameter. Then I just drew tons and tons of strokes (the hero hairs) and added different colors to get texture and depth too… and with Chuck, he’s got the greys kickin so that helped. Then I just filled in color behind those hero hairs.
Oh and the tablet is the same color as yours, Salvatron… it just looks kinda gold cuz of the color temperature and lighting.
Whoa… I’ve been looking at those wacom tab… and was wondering if it was worth getting one but this project let me know right away. Good work man Chuck looks amazing