[Art] The Bronze Forest - from conception to the completion of inking.

[moonvoice]

A series of work in progress shots.

This is still incomplete, but as I finished the inking today, I can now show you a series of WIP shots from conception to finishing.

This illustration, the most complex I've ever done, is a trade with an editor for significant editing on my novel Every Day Awake. Knowing that I could never afford to get the book professionally edited, and that she could not afford an illustration of this calibre, we traded. I don't usually trade, but I was willing to make an exception in this case.

From this:





To this:



















































Stay tuned for another post showing detail shots of the completed inked illustration.

Comments

Wow!

[ysabetwordsmith]

Huzzah for barter! I've traded professional editing for various things, including art, but I haven't had an opportunity for this scale. I'm glad you-two found each other.

[surpassingly]

You're a very inspiring artist. Thank you for sharing these images with us.

[callistra]

Wow that is just stunning.

[elialshadowpine]

Wow! I didn't actually realize you were doing it as a barter. Man. I think she lucked. (Though I haven't seen what she's done for you, obviously.)

As an aside, if you ever need a pair of eyes for anything, feel free to poke me. You have my e-mail, I think. If you don't, it's my username here @gmail. Short work isn't difficult to set time aside for, longer work would take some doing. I don't know how many folk you have available for crit/beta, so... just offering. :)

[tangledaxon]

This is just so breathtaking!!

[jensurvivor]

I wish I could draw like you. You inspire me to practice.

[silverjackal]

It's really interesting to see the progression all in a series like this. How did you conceptualize it originally? As a whole, or as pieces that you then merged together?

[moonvoice]

I didn't draft it (I don't draft anything, except for sometimes the Wandsuna illustrations), but I knew in my head how I wanted it to look. I knew I wanted the two moreton bay figs framing the image, with ferns in the foreground, and the sense that you're moving deeper into the image, and then off to the left (which will come through during colouring, and light sources).

Nothing much changed actually from the original conception. I did go through with Katt and we looked at about 40 different forest pictures so I could get an idea of what sort of things she liked. It's probably a bit more complex than I thought it would be, in terms of the background and how complex that is.

That said, I found it easier to do an illustration this size in 'pieces,' first the bottom two left corners, and then the two trees (the 'frame'), and then the mid-ground, and finally the background. It just wasn't possible to do this in my normal method of sketching the whole thing out first, and then inking it all out, it was just too intricate - and that much graphite pencil can destroy the quality of the illustration board (which is why my sketches are actually so light and 'brief', because while comprehensive sketches look nice, all that graphite - which repels water - can cause real problems during the colouring process if it's too heavy and gets embedded in the board; the little things that influence how I work! The same is true of pastels. If you overwork the pastel paper, you lose the grain, and then the final highlight colours look dull - so your sketches directly onto the pastel paper have to be as brief and as light as possible, with little to no reworking).

The one thing I did drop from the illustration entirely was a lopsided signpost, with dull writing on it. It was originally going to be near the wallabies. But I felt it was too angular and messed with the shape / feel of the lines too much, and ditched it.

/ramble.

[moonvoice]

*blush* Thank you so much. That's such a kind thing to say. I hope you do! I love it when people pick up artwork again, or even for the first time, it's exciting. :)

[moonvoice]

Thank you! :D

[moonvoice]

Yeah, total trade. She's a professional editor though, and a member of the Australian Society of Editors (or something), and I know I'm getting a different level of editing. I will definitely keep you in mind for beta-ing though; that's a lovely thing to offer. Thank you!

[moonvoice]

Thank you! :)

[moonvoice]

*blush* Thank you so much.

Re: Wow!

[moonvoice]

I'm glad we did too - though we were already friends, so it was lucky. She went to university to become an editor, and I went to become a media analyst / writer (and ended up an artist). The book she's currently got I think stands a real chance at getting published, so I want to give it the best chance possible. :)

Re: Wow!

[ysabetwordsmith]

If the fiction is anything like the illustration, it must be marvelous.

Editing *laugh* -- for me it was all patchwork and on-the-job training. There weren't any classes on it at the university I attended.

Re: Wow!

[moonvoice]

Our university is one of the few in the world that offered an Editing major, which is pretty awesome. :)

[silverjackal]

I think I like your forest better for the lack of any human link. :D

It's interesting that you didn't draft it out first to really get an idea about proportion/scale. I understand why you wouldn't do it on the piece itself, but I would have expected something of this magnitude to take some rough work to get it all to fall into place. You obviously have considerable ability to visualize, and to remember those images. (Which is not really a surprise, but still remarkable.)

[moonvoice]

I enjoy juggling compositional elements around in my head; it's one of my favourite parts of the process. So I kind of 'drafted' it a few times mentally, shifting trees and ferns and so on, but I didn't put it on paper. I always found the drafting process really stultifies my ability to work - we had to do it all the time in highschool, and in my first semester of visual art at university, and I never got the hang of it.

That said, the process on this was so slow, that I could mentally keep shifting things in my head as it went along. And the 10 foot rule (step back 10 feet - or 6 feet in a smaller room and survey the picture from a distance) meant I could keep perspective.

But yeah, I've always been less of a typical artist in that respect. I sometimes wonder if drafting would improve my artwork if I could ever get the hang of it, but I just don't enjoy hindering the mental composition shuffling by locking things onto the page - since I can do it so much quicker in my head. I always kind of likened it to having all the pieces of a large puzzle - the tree piece, the animal piece, and picking them up and moving them around. Likewise, I can do different colour schemes in my head - like Photoshop's hue change. It's just... more fun. :)