Podcast coming soon!

I interviewed my life drawing friend Rob Cocks this week and need to edit the audio and get the post ready this weekend.

Busy busy! I’m officially a new decade older, had a great dinner with friends and will go out with my wife tonight for some French food.

I’m pretty much done with the Kids on Bikes job, but they had some last minute feedback I had to tackle today. Not much to show in terms of new art, I’ve been busy working on my wife’s actual play studio. I’m art directing the project and there has been a lot of back and forth with logo designs and getting character info from all the cast members. Can’t talk about the details, we shoot next month and it will be released at a later time, in the mean time I have to get the characters done and get and intro segment created. I’ll walk through the process of everything once it’s released.

Anyway, this is a short post this week, but I’ll have more art next week most likely!

Another week down!

I’ve been working on getting more interviews lined up for the podcast. Last weekend was pretty cool, I was at a photoshoot for my wife’s project and had fun helping and seeing all the great photos that came out of it. I am art directing the project currently and will be bust drawing for it next month on it.

In freelance: I’m almost done with the Kids of Bikes rpg work, I have two images left. It’s that last home stretch that can be tough to push through, I will have some time tonight to work on it, then try and finish this weekend.

There is a life drawing party this weekend and a sketch group meet up I’ll be doing. I don’t have much of anything to show this week as all my work can’t be released publicly until later.

My mentorship is going well, I see a lot of progress in the mentees, they are pushing themselves further than they would have on their own. You can check out the feedback videos on my Youtube Channel.

I saw this post by someone in the discords, they mentioned feeling like they had artist block and didn’t feel good enough to keep drawing, they felt like nothing they were creating was for them.

I think the main things I can advise any artists that are grinding to get better is to schedule the studies and make it regimented. Make practicing feel like a normal part of work, something you do for about an hour or two each day. I think it’s important to take away the feeling that each thing you create needs to be amazing. You have to get through the bad drawings and paintings to get to the good stuff. You might not be good with your first, second or even 100th painting, but creating the work will help you to level out the “base good” you might start drawing at a level 1 skill but by the time you are on your 100th drawing your average output will be at like level 30, but you won’t notice most likely because you are busy doing the 100th drawing. It takes looking back and stepping away to see how far you’ve come.

It also takes stepping away from drawing and art sometimes. You can’t always draw and paint all the time, the best artists in the world take time to go see other art, go walking in a park, go camping, or just go out to dinner and chat. If you have artist’s block I recommend making yourself do studies, and making yourself step away once the study is done and focusing on something else. Maybe try enjoying the thing that inspired you to do art in the first place. Go watch a movie, play a video game, read a comic. Just take the time to get away and not create for a little bit. What most likely will happen is that you will get inspired and your energy will spike and you’ll be able to get back into drawing again.

I enjoying running, cooking, and watching TV shows or movies after dinner with my partner. Once a week I go to life drawing and meet up with other regulars to have a drink afterwards, this little weekly ritual gets me out of the house, talking with new people, and practicing my craft all in the same event. Try getting away for the drawing desk and doing something new and different.

Hope some of this info helps, good hunting!

Sketch Night Launched!

Whoo, busy week. I am behind on my freelance schedule, but I plan to catch up this weekend. I spoke to Russell Jones this week and released my first podcast, you can find that here. I’ve been moving forward with freelance art directing. I’m currently working on a board game, a TTRPG, and my wife’s project that is multifaceted.

I’ve got some work to show, I do a daily comic that I don’t often mention, that can be found on my Instagram and Tiktok

I drew this Wolverine as a way to practice my inking in Clip Studio.

Wolverine

Finally I finished this book cover for a client of mine. I’m happy with the turn out but I want to push myself further with finish next time around. I needed to wrap this up to going into too much rendering wouldn’t have been good. I made myself do the majority of the work in Clip Studio, then I finished in Photoshop, but I did a final touch up pass in Clip Studio which made me want to do the next piece entirely in Clip.

Book Cover

Busy weekend of freelancing ahead for me, I’ll be interviewing more people in the coming weeks and producing more podcasts. Keep an eye out!

Another Friday, another blog!

I reset my alert so that I remember to post each Friday. Week has been eventful, we have friend’s in town from LA, Ify and his fiancée Emily. I illustrated Ify’s character from his Push the Roll episode a few months ago.

I’ve been using Clip Studio a lot more professionally, the image above was one of the first images I made in it. I had heard a lot about Clip from artists over the years, I knew that lots of people that do manga/anime style art loved it, and a lot of people that do comics work use it. I started considering using it last summer after hearing the rave reviews for the last few years from Dave Rapoza’s art streams. He integrated it into his pipeline a few years ago and I was curious to try it. Ultimately I delayed really giving it a go because I don’t like following the art trends in the industry. Often times artist begin mimicking other artist’s techniques and their work turns into crappier versions of the artists that they copy. After all the wait I began to get sick of Adobe’s expense and AI garbage so I wanted to give Clip a chance and man was I dumb for not trying it sooner. It’s just as they say, it feels better drawing in Clip. Most of the best brushes and textures are all free in their asset library and the way the inking and pencil brushes behave is just different, they are more robust and the pressure curve is better in the way the brush size dynamically changes as you make lines. I still need to practice painting in the program, but for drawing I now prefer it over Procreate and Photoshop. I highly recommend trying it out.

Okay in other news, I’m planning to start a podcast. I know it’s all the rage with men of a certain age, but most of my favourite artist interview podcasts stopped and I’m seeing a gap in the industry now, and I think I’d like to try and fill it. I’ve reached out to 4 artists, 3 have gotten back to me and I plan to reach out to more. I need to begin scheduling the calls and get my recording setup figured out. Today one of my scheduled tasks is to begin scheduling all the different artists. I plan to record all three of the people I know I have first, and then begin releasing on a semi-weekly basis. I won’t post who the artists are yet, not until I lock down the interviews.

I forgot to post some images I made for Near Dark Studios last week. I made these illustrations months ago, ultimately they will be used for an actual play show, but the final style of the characters won’t reflect the look of the game they are from, which I’m art directing currently.

Note how the barbarian guy was redone in a slightly different style. This style reflects the look of the game we are designing currently.

Anyway, I’ll have more to post next week, ideally I’ll have a couple interviews done by then and I’ll have figured out how to post them up. Have a great weekend!

Long time no UPDATE!!!

Wow I really fell off the wagon. I got far too busy and didn’t dedicate enough time into stopping to blog. It’s August 4th and I turn 40 this month! This is the first time an age has felt different. When I was 18 I didn’t really think much of it, and 21 wasn’t important because I didn’t drink until 24. 30 Was marked by my move to LA and at the time turning 30 didn’t really feel as big as the move I made to a new city. Now 40 is here, this time a new country and this time I’m thinking about all the stuff I’ve made and what I plan to do going forward.

Last year really helped to push me professionally. I worked full time at my game studio and produced 2 board games and a few rpg book interiors.

Modiphius hired me for two large projects, I did all the illustrations except the box art, those were done by the original artist Paul Kidby.

After finishing these projects I told myself I’d take a break for the summer and begin working on a comic, something I’ve wanted to do for years. I’m just about ready to start layouts and paneling but more work came up and I decided to take on a new RPG project, this time an expansion for Kids on Bikes. I’m currently working on that this month and need to wrap it up by end of the month as September will be very busy.

I’ve been consistently working on stickers for Push the Roll with Ross Bryant, a podcast my wife is a cast member of.

I posted up some of the Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees work on my portfolio.

I’m sure I’m forgetting somethings. I have been art directing 3 separate projects, one board game, one RPG book, and the main project my wife has been putting together that I can’t say more about now, but will have work out later this fall.

Anyway, thanks for coming and reading! I’ll be more diligent about posting going forward. You can find several new videos on my Youtube page too, they are linked below.

Oops! Skipped a week!

Hello everyone, skipped a week, I was busy with freelance. One of my jobs sent me this new list of 15 illustrations I didn’t realize they needed ASAP so I’m busy getting those done and trying to hit goals with the other freelance gigs.

Here is the latest version of the Arcanist image:

I also made a little progress on the Near Dark Studios character, but I will have more to show on that project once I’m done with Arcanist and work for Hunters Entertainment

I’ve also been behind on my sketchbook tours and getting part 2 of my tutorial done. Sketchbook tours will start up again soon, and the tutorial is almost ready for me to finish recording part 2 of the audio, I had to write out what I wanted to cover first. once I record I just need to take a day to edit audio and video and get it online.

New projects!

I got some new work to show! First from Arcanist Tavern:

This is a banner image for a new event they are hosting, I have reference photos taken for it, going to start the clean line pass tonight.

Also got started on my Near Dark Studios work:

This character has this magic-tech he wears. I’m having a lot of fun designing this guy, I have 7 total to do.

Finally I did a quick dwarf sketch that I had posted the rough for last week:

I didn’t have time to make a new Sketchbook tour video this weekend but I’ll get back to it next weekend.

New Sketchbook Tour!

Okay so I’m getting busy with freelance and the current jobs I have can’t be shown publicly until they are wrapped so I only have my latest sketchbook tour to show off this week.

I have several paintings that I’m working on for one job, they needed to be re-finished so I’m updating them this week and next week. but soon I’ll be wrapped on this gig, ideally by end of April.

The other job is some regular work I do for an RPG company. That stuff will be out later in the year.

I have two jobs coming up that I will be able to stream so I’ll have more to post next week, character illustrations for Near Dark Studios, and more work for the Arcanist Gaming Tavern.

I also have more work with Sector M Games, the same people I did the Artificer’s Guide with, but that most likely won’t start up until late spring early summer.

I did do a sketch for Sixmorevodka’s design challenge, I’ll try and wrap up this character tonight after work. I try and take Fridays off from freelance so I have one evening to do what I’d like for fun.

New freelance incoming!

I am busy again with an older freelance job that was put on hold for about a month and a half. So I didn’t get as many new sketches done this week, but I’ll have more to show still.

For the Arcanist Tavern I finished Ashe, the second character I was designing for them.

Ashe, Vampire Spawn

I started the boss character for the concept design challenge I’ve been participating in this last month or so. I think I can finish these lizards this weekend if time allows.

I also sketched out Buck Sanchez from our Eclipse show that we did over the pandemic. You can find that show on YouTube below.

Buck Sanchez, engineer on the Destiny

Collin is going strong, I don’t often blog about him, but he is posted daily on TikTok and Instagram, he’s currently on an adventure in space.

Collin and Sally Falling onto a moon of Saturn

Oh I also have another Sketchbook Tour posted on Youtube, you can find that below!

Valentine's weekend

Got busy Friday with work, had to update some scenes in Unreal Engine and it took all day so I didn’t have time to post a blog entry. Friday night we went out to eat some delicious Korean food with friends and this weekend I had time to post up the first tutorial in my “How to Draw a Vampire” series. You can find that video on Gumroad, but the page is linked on my website navigation under Tutorials.

Along with the tutorial I shared the intro video on Youtube for free, that video is found here, but I’ll embed it below.

I got new work done this week, I updated Josephine’s DnD party line up with new entries and got progress made on my freelance with Arcanist Tavern. Those images are posted below, the lizards are part of a concept design challenge I’m doing with a discord group.

Almost Valentine's Day!

Okay, little late posting, I’m trying to keep the posts to Fridays as a nice summation of the week.

Lots going on, I did a few studies this week, both for legs and poses and some armor studies for my wife’s DnD character.

I also got this goblin done and Lucille, they’ll be posted in my portfolio gallery here on the site. I need to reorganize this site better, it’s kind of trying to be too many things at once.

I started the next character for the Arcanist Tavern This one is named Ashe:

I started recording a video series of sketchbook tours to catalog my old sketchbooks and found some cool old sketches I wanted to paint up and finish. You can find that “Memory Lane” video here. The sketches are now all work in progress.

I also forgot to post this sticker design for my brother’s clown character project:

Along with all that, this one comic I made blew up on TikTok this week. I initially made a Black history month version which is the exact same comic with the words changed. The idea was that we need to celebrate Black History Month now more than ever in the US because of this shit administration that is trying to white wash the country.

But in the UK it’s LGBT history month so I decided to make an alternative version for the UK that focused on that… and whoa, comments blew up! mainly from people not reading my caption that says “in the UK it’s LGBT History Month” But I got a lot of supporters and people in the comments discussing why people should be acknowledging the LGBT History and people arguing that there is too much LGBT focus, and other people that were just like, “whoa I didn't know that and I’m in the UK!” So it turned out well, I voiced my view and it seemed to educate people. Both Black and LGBT groups need to be recognized and supported and I’m glad my little silly comic could start some discussions online. As of this post the comic has 79K views which is the most I’ve ever received.

Progress for the last week of Jan.

I’m making head way on my project with Arcanist Gaming Tavern, just rendering the character out now, still have to do a second look and a cloak, then her back in line art.

I finished my Vampire full body for the tutorial, he will be put into an illustration for the next part of the tutorial series.

Finally, I finished my minion images for the concept design challenge and started the mid-tier bad guys:

Sketches and new project started!

This week has been eventful, I was on a freelance project that was put on hold, now all the work I finished on it will need to be redone! That can happen sometimes, the new style should be fun to draw though. I can’t go into details just yet.

I did start a new freelance gig designing some characters for a gaming tavern here in London, The Arcanist Gaming Tavern has a home brewed world that they run games in and they need some character designs for upcoming projects. Here are some of the images so far: They include the initial thumbnails and the rough sketches.

Also got some work done on the latest design challenge from Russell Jone’s Discord Challenge, plus I knocked out some studies and warm ups. I also made progress on the “How to Draw a Vampire” tutorial. I just need to record more voice over and throw some music onto the videos. Part 1 will be out in February. Part 2 is recorded and needs VO but it’s like 4.5 hours long so I need to write topics to discuss.

Weekly Sketch Post

Well I have my alert set to make a post here every week. I’ll at least update with some sketches.

A lot of my sketches are pretty rough, I don’t normally do finished pencil illustrations unless I’m making a gift for a friend.

You’ll see a lot of anthropomorphic characters in the coming weeks as I’m reimagining my old Redhawk character for a design challenge with my friend Russell Jones.

This weekend I’ll be recording voice over for my tutorial “How to draw a Vampire” and I completed a new sketch that I’ll eventually take into Procreate and finish for part 2 of the tutorial.

Finally, I’m chipping away at my goblin illustration, I’m trying to focus my work on him on stream before doing studies. I’m streaming each Tuesday night 7:30 PM GMT www.twitch.tv/mike086

That’s all for this week, I’ll have more to post next Friday!

Long time No Blog.

Well it’s been about 9 years since I posted on my blog.

A lot has happened since those last posts in 2016. I have been working at a game studio since moving to LA back in 2016. I landed a job at Turn Me Up Games a few months after moving to LA.

Josephine and I were in LA for about 9 years, we left last year in the summer and moved back to Austin for a few months before our big move to LONDON!

Yes, I’m living in London now and have been here since June. I’m still working at the same games studio in LA and started a daily comic that I post on Instagram each night. Collin and the Weirdos are a little collection of characters I’ve been drawing sine about 2012 or so. The website has new work online and I’m pushing to make a series of tutorials this year and release even more work to the site.

If you are reading this, hope you have been well, please expect more frequent updates to my website this year. I’ve schedule a weekly reminder to make an entry on here and share some WIP sketches and unfinished art.

Here are a couple Nosferatu sketches from last night.

-MCIII

Oh man I need to post more!

Just finished the first of a new portfolio I'll finishing up during the holidays! 

Here is a process of Absentia:

Streams!

I'm streaming on Twitch now! www.Twitch.tv/Mike086

Here is the image from tonight's stream!

Watch the video here: Painting Ghastly

Whoa! Long time no blog!

I'm going to be doing a series of Twitch stream about the basics of Photoshop painting. I'll go over interface and tools and highlight several processes for painting and illustrating. 

If you want to watch Part 1, check it out on my Youtube Channel, I'll be uploading the videos there after the streams: My Youtube Channel

www.Twitch.tv/Mike086   Follow me to be notified when I go live. 

If you are looking to download my brushes, you can find those here: MCIII Brushes

Drawlloween is upon us!

Drawlloween, the yearly monster-a-day drawing challenge is upon us. This year I will be focused on design and quality of my final image. Each monster should present a decent design and good rendering. 

Check out the calendar! You can visit the site here: http://www.drawlloween.blogspot.com/

Work in progress update

I've been so behind on updating this blog, here are a few work in progress images from this week. I've been using Zbrush more and more as my move to LA approaches. 

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