Girl Viewing the clouds

Girl Viewing the clouds, a photo by Philip Hunt on Flickr.

Here's a concept sketch of a story idea I have in the back of my mind.
A young girl fantasises about escaping her daily routine and controlling the weather.

We landed on an alien landscape

We landed on an alien landscape, a photo by Philip Hunt on Flickr.

An experiment with rendering using Kerkythea, a piece of software that helps with making 3D models look better. Kerkythea essentially describes light falling on your 3D model and the resultant luminescence and scattering of light.

The Caterpillar Adventure ebook

You can find my free ebook at Smashwords. I wrote the book and illustrated the cover.
Find the book here Smashwords free ebook; The Caterpillar Adventure

The Caterpillar Adventure at Smashwords now for free!

Smashwords is an excellent publishing platform for your written material. It's easy to publish and there are no "up front" fees to pay to get your work distributed. You can charge for your work and the potential to earn an income from your well written book is there.
If you are self publishing and don't have the requisite design skills for a cover, get in touch and commission me.
With good promotion of your book you have the potential to reach millions of readers. The first place to start is with an arresting cover.

Box-Bods Worm In The Clouds

Box-Bods Worm In The Clouds, a photo by Philip Hunt on Flickr.

This is an illustration made with inkscape. To draw the piece I used a Wacom graphics tablet. Before realising the picture I did a little doodle with pencil, scanned it in to the computer and drew over this. I hope you like it?

Water Lights

Water Lights, a photo by Turnislefthome on Flickr.

A nice sample of an atmospheric 3D render. Check out more of Turnislefthome's work on Flickr.

Making Money Online; Part Two

Set your expectations at the right level to avoid becoming demotivated with your efforts at making money on-line.

Make Money From Your Illustrations

Have you created some cool images and have a passion to make more? Not only that, but you're getting better with each new composition?

Well, consider making money from your passion. The internet offers a number of opportunities for the budding entrepreneurial artist. Here are a few I know of.

Getting the most from your digital art work.

If your drawing takes a digital form, it is important to get your work seen. Indeed it can be instrumental in your development as an artist, whether you are amateur or professional.

Join an image sharing network such as Flickr: It's always helpful to get others to look at your work. As artists, when we know our drawings will be seen, it will make you be that little bit sharper and objective.

Ask other artists what they think you should work on: We all need mentor-ship in our lives and talking to others with more experience in a subject can give us new challenges, ideas and direction. An image sharing network will facilitate these connections.

Here are some networks I would recommend:

Flickr http://www.flickr.com/

DeviantArt http://www.deviantart.com/

Behance http://www.behance.net/

concept Art http://www.conceptart.org/?

Next post, how can you make money from your illustrations?

Free Design Software

We all know about Adobe Photoshop, Adobe illustrator and The Adobe Creative Suite. The suite is a creative industry standard and commands big bucks for a licence. If you have the money and nothing else will do then I advise you to go straight to the adobe site http://www.adobe.com/ for the proprietary software.

However, for those who want something different, on a modest budget yet still require quality software, read on. There are more options on the internet for designers than just Adobe.

Digital Drawing - What is it?

Digital drawing is lots of fun, not least because with the right piece of software loaded onto your computer, you have an endless canvas and materials. Digital drawing & illustration are very flexible and it's sometimes difficult to know when your picture is finished. The only limits are your imagination and your computer's processing power.

What do I mean by digital drawing?

Broadly speaking, pushing pixels around on your computer using a piece of image editing software can be classified as digital drawing. If you have ever done more than optimise the colours in a photo, you may have been drawing digitally. At least to my mind, the digital realm broadens what drawing can be.

Drawing, designing and image manipulation, before the computer, were separate disciplines but once you start to use a computer these separate disciplines quickly implode. For example: I can draw on a piece of paper with a pencil. I can then take a photo of that picture with my digital camera and import it into my computer. I can then use my computer and the software on it to change the image, add colour, draw & paint with simulated materials and add text if I so wish. I can even collage elements of other drawings and photos onto this image.

The big challenge, when making images digitally, is to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve. It is easy to get lost in the endless choices that are presented to you by today’s software and gadgets.

I usually decide if it's a technique I want to try or achieve a composition that communicates an idea (i.e. illustration). It's then easier to measure when to stop and if I learnt the specific technique or if I achieved a suitable composition.

So there, that's my view on digital drawing.

Next post I will guide you around some of the free design software I know about.