Software Used: Corel Painter IX
Date Created: April 25th, 2006
Total Painting Time: About 4 hours
 

This is not a tutorial, per se, but instead a step-by-step animation showing the development of a conceptual painting for a landscape. Sometimes when I'm trying to come up with ideas for an environment, I'll sketch out a few quick thumbnails and then take the best one to a finished drawing. Sometimes I do what I did here, which is literally just scribble around with colours and shapes until something starts to work. This can be frustrating, but if the drawing is 'clicking' you'll find shapes you like pretty quickly.

You'll notice that I draw and redraw things very frequently until I like what I've put down. For the castle here, I started drawing more of a symbol of a castle, with an old stone turret just to get something down until I had a better idea of what I wanted it to really look like. As I go along, I draw sharper and sharper lines so the painting comes into focus only after I'm happy with the design and composition. Keeping the drawing 'mushy' in the beginning and middle also make it less of a mental struggle if I want to erase and redo something; it's harder to be attached to a big, blobby shape than a sharp, finished line.

Flash 7 or higher is required to view this animation.