At 1/3/16 10:50 PM, fxscreamer wrote: I've been on vacation visiting the family, but here's my 2015 year in review. 2016 is about to get a LOT more busy with my art. Lots of stuff coming. :D

whoo!!! it's only going to get better, which is rad because its already great. its exciting to see my own progress in a year too.
Its exciting to think how good this is going to be in 5 years. like wow. can you imagine how good this is going to be in that time. you are balling right now.

keep up the good work pimp!

At 1/4/16 12:22 AM, Spac3case916 wrote:

At 1/3/16 10:50 PM, fxscreamer wrote: I've been on vacation visiting the family, but here's my 2015 year in review. 2016 is about to get a LOT more busy with my art. Lots of stuff coming. :D

whoo!!! it's only going to get better, which is rad because its already great. its exciting to see my own progress in a year too.
Its exciting to think how good this is going to be in 5 years. like wow. can you imagine how good this is going to be in that time. you are balling right now.

keep up the good work pimp!

Thanks! I always like to imagine where I could be a few years from now...of course as long as I keep this pace up! ACK!

Also....first sketches of the year. Kid versions of Arlo and Enzo (experiments anyway).

Roughing out another shot of Ohmsdale. Here we go again. :P

Working on a new concept for Satri Van Buren....now Satri Lockridge....retired business tycoon, and the president's mother. Also did I mention she's a total bitch? :D

More developments on her later.

As my 8th official landscape of the world I'm creating (Ion Valley), I present you the suburbs of Ohmsdale. This luxurious neighborhood is home to the main characters and has many wonderful features. Being only minutes from Hybolt City while still having access to beautiful parks and lakes for some peace and quite, who wouldn't want to raise a family here? in a world of airship culture, streets and roads as we know it are quite different than Earth. In Ion Valley, environmental planning is specifically designed for public transit and airship traffic. This leaves wonderful wide open walkways and ample more room for parks and properties. Sidewalks are now mainwalks! HA!

Contact your real estate agent today to look for fabulous properties in Ohmsdale. However, be prepared for some steep pricing.

Satri has definitely gone through some transformations over the months, but I must say this redesign is probably the most fitting. Considering this is based on my sister's real life cat (who yes is a total bitch), I believe I've captured the essence of her character. She's controlling, calculated, cynical, and just simply a....ahem...bitch.

Formerly the CEO of Lockridge Industries, she's now comfortably retired, yet she still wants her hands in day to day operations. Did I mention she's the President's mother? She's not only got her hands in business, but politics as well. Her son Winston thinks he's running the show, but she's more the puppet master than anything. However, there are things she even keeps from her own son, as her goals are quite different than his. One thing is for sure, don't get on her bad side or she'll make your life a living hell.

At 1/11/16 06:57 AM, fxscreamer wrote: As my 8th official landscape of the world I'm creating (Ion Valley), I present you the suburbs of Ohmsdale. This luxurious neighborhood is home to the main characters and has many wonderful features. Being only minutes from

Hey man, your improving! i feel like this is all there it just needs some slight changes.
what bothers me the most about this one is how much contrast there is, there is alot of pure white in your values.
Pure white only happens when you look straight into a light or when it reflects off a material. but your mountains in the back are all white. try to be more subtle with your value shift, put a layer filled with black turned on to saturtion mode ontop of your work and color pick to check it constantly. second is that your colors are rather boring, try live it up with diffrent hue's instead of just one plain color. best is to even give your shadows a diffrent hue then your lights to get a subtle contrast going on. Im thinking you might want to blut your shadows too as they go further away, especially for your tree and building. For composition i like how you made it a postcard but the top half of your painting doesnt have anyhting in it, why is it there? I moved it down a bit and added some foreground elements. Remember to allways have a foreground mid and background. also i toned down the saturation a bit they might actually still be too saturated.

At 1/16/16 08:01 AM, Flowers10 wrote:

At 1/11/16 06:57 AM, fxscreamer wrote: As my 8th official landscape of the world I'm creating (Ion Valley), I present you the suburbs of Ohmsdale. This luxurious neighborhood is home to the main characters and has many wonderful features. Being only minutes from

Hey man, your improving! i feel like this is all there it just needs some slight changes.
what bothers me the most about this one is how much contrast there is, there is alot of pure white in your values.
Pure white only happens when you look straight into a light or when it reflects off a material. but your mountains in the back are all white. try to be more subtle with your value shift, put a layer filled with black turned on to saturtion mode ontop of your work and color pick to check it constantly. second is that your colors are rather boring, try live it up with diffrent hue's instead of just one plain color. best is to even give your shadows a diffrent hue then your lights to get a subtle contrast going on. Im thinking you might want to blut your shadows too as they go further away, especially for your tree and building. For composition i like how you made it a postcard but the top half of your painting doesnt have anyhting in it, why is it there? I moved it down a bit and added some foreground elements. Remember to allways have a foreground mid and background. also i toned down the saturation a bit they might actually still be too saturated.

Damn that looks nice! Thanks for the tips and paintover! I'll admit it's not the first time I've been told about white light and using FULL white. I apparently let that get away from me. Color is something I'm still struggling with constantly, so I'm all ears. I need to get in the practice of starting with dark values and working light. I think I've been doing the opposite sometimes. Plus my color relationships are still shaky.

As far as the foreground, I actually did have a bush exactly where you had it, but then I omitted it. I did not however, have the tree. I think the tree works great in your example, but I remember thinking that I wanted a "big sky" open environment in view, especially with that tiny airship flying overhead. The sunset sky in itself was thought as part of the composition. However, I'll admit the tree could probably work even better with some adjustments. *smacks head*.

There's lots of little things I'm constantly seeing mistakes in, but that's why I keep chugging away at these landscapes. I have a couple more planned, so I'll try to use your tips in seeing what I can come up with. Thanks again! :D

On another note I made a map of Ion Valley. It's done in a style of a kids map you get from a gift shop. Plus it has some notes done from my characters....apparently they're fighting over the map...hehe. The 4000px version is better for more detail.

LINK: http://i.imgur.com/X7J1g4V.jpg

At 1/16/16 08:01 AM, Flowers10 wrote:

At 1/11/16 06:57 AM, fxscreamer wrote: As my 8th official landscape of the world I'm creating (Ion Valley), I present you the suburbs of Ohmsdale. This luxurious neighborhood is home to the main characters and has many wonderful features. Being only minutes from

Hey man, your improving! i feel like this is all there it just needs some slight changes.
what bothers me the most about this one is how much contrast there is, there is alot of pure white in your values.
Pure white only happens when you look straight into a light or when it reflects off a material. but your mountains in the back are all white. try to be more subtle with your value shift, put a layer filled with black turned on to saturtion mode ontop of your work and color pick to check it constantly. second is that your colors are rather boring, try live it up with diffrent hue's instead of just one plain color. best is to even give your shadows a diffrent hue then your lights to get a subtle contrast going on. Im thinking you might want to blut your shadows too as they go further away, especially for your tree and building. For composition i like how you made it a postcard but the top half of your painting doesnt have anyhting in it, why is it there? I moved it down a bit and added some foreground elements. Remember to allways have a foreground mid and background. also i toned down the saturation a bit they might actually still be too saturated.

I'm starting on my next landscape and am trying to lock in my composition and values. If there's anything you see wrong, I'm all ears. Always appreciate your input. :D

This is a shot of a walking path up in the mountains at sunrise as the clouds are dissipating. There's the foreground, midground with the forest and mountains below (and some lights from houses), then the background with a giant neighborhood, a couple lakes, more mountains and the city in the distance. I'm trying to show massive scale here.

At 1/18/16 05:12 PM, fxscreamer wrote: I'm starting on my next landscape and am trying to lock in my composition and values. If there's anything you see wrong, I'm all ears. Always appreciate your input. :D

your perspective seems all good, just make sure you use your dark values in the foreground, you have to be very carefull about these. i tend to only use pure black or pure white when i want to put attention to something.
putting a man in there would show scale aswel as repeating shapes, or things going in extreme perspective foreshortening realy fast. also alot of admosphere. most important are values tho, your air is all white again. You can practice painting within range of 10-90% of the full value range first and then try adding the darks and whites where you want them.

At 1/18/16 07:19 PM, Flowers10 wrote:

At 1/18/16 05:12 PM, fxscreamer wrote: I'm starting on my next landscape and am trying to lock in my composition and values. If there's anything you see wrong, I'm all ears. Always appreciate your input. :D

your perspective seems all good, just make sure you use your dark values in the foreground, you have to be very carefull about these. i tend to only use pure black or pure white when i want to put attention to something.
putting a man in there would show scale aswel as repeating shapes, or things going in extreme perspective foreshortening realy fast. also alot of admosphere. most important are values tho, your air is all white again. You can practice painting within range of 10-90% of the full value range first and then try adding the darks and whites where you want them.

Thanks! I'll certainly keep that in mind. I also DO plan to have 1 or 2 characters on the trail to help with the scale.

ALSO, I went back and played with the Ohmsdale pick from your example. This is my second attempt. I tried to kill a lot of the whites, added the foreground, shadows, etc.

I'm at 9 of 10 planned landscapes and I'm happy to present the second Ion Valley postcard! I really tried to improve my use of color values and light on this one. Hopefully it shows. Anyway, from these parts you can see Ohmsdale and Hybolt City far...FAR...in the distance. These two travelers are passing by Zap's Peak in the morning with one heck of a view along with the sun rising from the east. If you look closely below, you'll see one of the Voltrak trains speeding along in the dark valley. What's that.....a passing airship? Get ready to wave! :P

Love your work here

Fresh and nice use of detail really looking good.

~X~

At 1/22/16 05:22 PM, XwaynecoltX wrote: Love your work here

Fresh and nice use of detail really looking good.

~X~

Thank you very much! I'm always trying to improve with every piece. :D

Here's my last vintage pick for awhile. It's a recruiting poster for the Ion Valley Public Services! :D

Bigger 1920x1200 download at DA right now: http://fxscreamer.deviantart.com/art/Ion-Valley-Public-Services-586371895

In the midst of polishing up ALL my characters for the future website, I couldn't help but turn this one into a simple little piece. I like it too much. Here's Abram and Enzo flying a little airship together.

Titled "Quality Time"

I haven't seen these rednecks in awhile. Holy damn did I clean them up from their sketches. I can't believe how washed out and lifeless the old stuff was looking until I started this new production process.

No more pen tool in Photoshop. I'm using 100% natural free range organic gluten free pencil strokes in Mischief for now, and all coloring is Photoshop. If I find the right brushes, I might do a 100% Photoshop conversion and ditch Mischief. Not sure yet. I'm also taking the soft shade approach rather than harsh cell shade. At most, I do soft edges like Disney feature films had done it. I got tons of these to go...practice makes perfect!

Old Version: http://i.imgur.com/bTQShGO.jpg

Big version to see it up close: http://i.imgur.com/CbibWqg.jpg

Also wanted to post Winston's redo. Damn quite the cleanup!

Old Version: http://i.imgur.com/mbYhsZN.jpg

New Big Version: http://i.imgur.com/faZNBnX.jpg

Another favorite of mine as I'm doing all these cleanups....Theo and Nelly, based on my real pet cats hehe.

Post #501 and 41,000 views! WOOOOO! Thank you so much for all your support! :D

MY FIRST PROJECT UPDATE VIDEO!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OWG6QUlwTY

I've been quite busy lately between work and all this art stuff. Character restorations are done, and I've entered many days of logo design frustration and zillions of examples....BUT I THINK I'M 95% there. Here's what I got! The background is for aesthetics. It also looks nice on straight black.

Up next......landscape #10.

Logo on black

I'm in the beginning phases of my 10th landscape. Here's the sketch phase with rough values and color and rough placements for composition. I wanted to get a feel for the location and time of day...being late morning. I have a long...LONG way to go on this. This was about 3 hours.

Most likely the final version of the logo. I put chrome edging with an icy subtle gradient. I added some hint of yellow on the lightning bolt. Classy / vintage...yet modern, with referencing to clouds / airships / electricity.

Got all the linework done for my next landscape. Values and lighting are next. This is one motherload of a piece for me. :P

All done!

SPEED PAINT OF EDISON SQUARE :D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvdxapiq2mE

Getting ready for the website, I drew Arlo and Enzo looking at the map I made many weeks ago. :D

After many years, thousands of drawing hours, sleepless nights, and headaches...the Cashmere Sky website is finally LIVE! Thanks to everyone for all the support over the years. This is only the beginning! Now you can FINALLY see this project's idea in its entirety! :D

http://cashmeresky.com

At 3/15/16 04:56 PM, fxscreamer wrote: After many years, thousands of drawing hours, sleepless nights, and headaches...the Cashmere Sky website is finally LIVE!

CONGRATS! :D

At 3/16/16 08:53 AM, 123mine123 wrote:

At 3/15/16 04:56 PM, fxscreamer wrote: After many years, thousands of drawing hours, sleepless nights, and headaches...the Cashmere Sky website is finally LIVE!

CONGRATS! :D

Thanks brah. Now it's time to life study spatulas....the most important tool in the world. Grabbed this from the kitchen. This was about 1 hour. lol