School Starts on Monday? (SUMMER '15 #15)

Sorry... It seems like everything I need to do has been jammed into the last few days. Paying for school, fixing the car, whatever, etc. I've been struggling with some 3D stuff (that infernal sword!!!) and just drawing and doing digital studies and whatever.

I booted up Dota 2 for the first time to see what it was like, as I want to make assets for it. I also watched some footage from The International. Umm. What else? 

Yeah, I don't know. I'm going to start modeling a character tomorrow or something. I just want to blah.

Blah.

Oh yeah. Due to some cool stuff happening we were able to get me a smartphone again (I haven't had a smartphone since late 2012!) so I jumped on the Instagram bandwagon. You can follow me here: @zachheckert.

I've just been posting lots of bus doodles there.

Well, not lots. 

You're still my first love, blog friends. And we also got that missing follower back! Back up to 30!

Sickly! (SUMMER '15 #12)

Hey! For those who don't live here and look at every post a million times (everyone who's not me, in other words) I've done a lot of posts lately. You should scroll down and have a look!

Well, I followed through! I kinda sorta finished a thingy. Or at least brought it to a more finished state. Observe (cloak pattern by Kaitlin):

A girl from reference I found somewhere. The internet. This was hard! I spent probably two hours on her mouth and eyes. I don't want to talk about it! Time to move on!

Couple things- All these studies I've been doing of people's faces have nasty, sickly quality to them. I know I should be putting warms in the cools or cools in the warms or using complementary colors and junk but still the mystery evades me. I'm working on it!

And the other thing is that I lost a precious, precious follower! What a fiend they were! I went from 30 to 29. I don't know how the Google+ followers factor into this. Thanks for stopping by, though. Okaybye

Practice V. 2.0 (SUMMER '15 #11)

Hello! Let me just preface this by saying that for once in my life I'm keeping my word to you guys: I'm actually taking a sketch and working on it. It's the guy with the big sword from my last post. Hee hee! I'm not going to show you what I have yet, but I'm tinkering with it between studies. 3D? I'm still working on my classes. This week I've learned more hard surface modeling stuff. I was blown away when I found out I could paint curve brushes to specific aspects of geometry, such as borders and polygroups. I took the sword to a near-finished level of completion but failed to keep the lowest subdivision level, spending hours worth of effort to try and finish the darn thing. A plus is that I've learned more about 3D workflow and what not to do. Also more about generating maps and stuff. So I'm learning a ton, I just don't have tons to show (yet). Here's some stuff from the last couple days I didn't despise:

Up first: Some girl. I found her by Googling "Female head reference."

Next, a Rocketman. He reminds me of this guy from this post back in 2013. Man, I was terrible(r) back then!

Then a random face.

I'll be back, have a nice Friday!

I Thought of Something Funny

I don't remember what it was!

Here's some pictures from this week.

In my figure class we just started doing draped models and I'm learning so many cool things.

Oh, I just remembered the funny thing I was going to tell you. It's not really funny, but it's something. Last Sunday I was complaining about how I wanted to update my tags. I did figure out a way, but I haven't really done much about it yet [I.e. you are a lazy fiend! - Ed]. I made a couple changes but it will take a while to reconfigure everything the way I want it to be.

I just remembered the real funny thing I was going to tell you. On Wednesday I went with my work buddies Eden, Cord and Nui to a comic jam hosted by Jess Smart Smiley. He had this crazy idea to have everybody make comics with branching storylines. So we folded paper in such a way to allow the other artists to add on to our ideas. It was hilarious. I'm posting my favorite path from my story here (right click and open link in new window for a better look):

Some figure studies I didn't hate from this week:

Then, for that same class, we had to draw 100 hands. I picked some faves, cuz there were some truly rotten hands and junk. Reminds me of this post. I also used the same tool from Pixelovely to handle that. Hand-le that. Ha.

Then some other junk. A merchant guy.

This next one? I'm posting it because in between waiting for paintings to dry in Richard's class, he walked by and said he loved the sketches I was doing. Now that's a heckuva compliment! So you get this guy, diving gracefully through the air as he peppers his foes with bullets.

Finally, this week one of my favorite bands announced a new album/tour. Great news and congratulations to Between the Buried and Me!

I'm a Thief (and I'm Slightly Sorry)

Oops! 

Last night UVU's Illustration Club met to discuss portfolio stuff to apply for the BFA program. It was whatever. Anyway, the club has been doing a new activity where members draw on printer paper with the eventual goal of compiling all the drawings into a sketchbook we can sell. I never really participate since I have to run to class soon after club starts, but last night, with maybe 5 minutes left before I had to bail I looked in front of me and saw a blank paper and a chunk of 2mm red pencil lead and thought, "What the heck, I'll throw something together" and this is what I scribbled out:

I thought it was way cool! But I realized that I couldn't give up this sketch without scanning it to show you all, so I looked around guiltily and stuck it into my backpack. Zoom!

I was sitting in class and feeling really good and remembered it was because I had drawrn a cool drawnrwning. I opened my bag and removed the sketch and found that I hadn't just stolen my sketch, but I had also stolen Dylan's sketch, too! The blank piece of paper I had drawn on? It was blank on one side. Dylan's sketch was on the other side! Sorry, Dylan! I'll bring the paper back to school and return it to the Illustration Club. Ha!

Then some drawings from the last week I didn't totally hate:

(This model? I drew her head too small for her body. Blast!)

Quick Stuff

Just letting you know, I'm alive and thinking of you, you silly bloggers!

While I was out and about sketching yesterday or today, I saw all of these things.

...

ALL. Of them.

Stuff from today

Planning on adding a background to this when I get home from work tonight... My lack of environment/background is kind of an issue, I'd wager.

These were from my sketchbook today, I might try taking these further if I get some time. I have a bunch of stuff to try to finish before Fall semester starts again (Sharkman, Wizzard, Dome-i-cile, and one where I'm placing the Wizzard in an environment [that you haven't seen yet! Nyah, nyah nyah nyah!{There's no need to be such a clown, don't taunt our audience! - Ed.}]) and I don't want to overwhelm my feeble mind.

Post 328

James C Christensen came to school today and did a lecture. It was good. We talked about lots of artsy things. 

The guy on the far left has potential. He could be cool.

I like both of these characters a lot. And one is a girl, which doesn't seem to happen often around here.

I worked more on one of my homework assignments. I forgot to scan it, though, so I'll have it up tomorrow morn.

Here's what I've done so far today

I have to go work on two homework assignments right now, but I wanted to get in all this garbage first:

I drew this guy's face. It took a while.

Then I tried to mix it up a bit. I still used the same reference, but tried to modify it. It was hard to push it. It's not different enough, I think.

This girl's face

Thumbnails for another assignment. We're supposed to create a fantasy landscape. I went to pinterest and typed in "Tree" and got a cool picture of a tree. Then I tried to duplicate the sweeping movement.

Then this. I already posted it on Twitter, but if you don't follow you wouldn't have seen it and I kinda like it.

Now I have to go work on those two homework assignments. If all goes well I'll update later today.

Another attempt.

I try my hand again at Scarlett from February 13th:

And here's the original image:

Whoops!

I don't want to show you this, but honesty and artistic growth demand it!

The left and and the right eye look good on their own, but in the the picture as a whole, it's obvious I made an error! The eye on the left is too high. This is what happens when you start adding details too early. Fool!

I don't know where the reference I used came from. Probably a tumblr page again. I'll try to keep better track. If you can somehow recognize this woman and are the photographer and want credit, please tell me.

Then I drew a thing and some girl's shoe in my first class this morning. I like how the shoe turned out.

Mostly because it looks like a shoe, which is something hard for me.

Who is she?!

If any of you can identify this celebrity then you win the prize. This is for one of my classes. It's exceedingly hard! I'm stretching art muscles I didn't know I had. I'm not done with her yet, but here's how it's going so far:

I'd like her to maybe be slightly more identifiable before I call it quits here. Also, the hair next to left shoulder (her left) doesn't read as hair, but more like a growth on her neck. I'd like to fix that too.

Oh, artistic credit wise: I found the picture on a random tumblr, but I saved the picture to my desktop and don't know where it came from. Whoever took this, you're the best and I thank you for furthering my artistic understanding.

Model from Illustration Club and some stuff

I feel like I just randomly capitalize letters in my titles. Whatever.

We had a draped model come in for Illustration club tonight. The first two are 2 minute gestures and the next one was like half an hour or forty-five minutes or something. 

I almost fit all of her in here! And her legs are almost not too small for her body!

I finished my sketchbook.

Sorry I didn't post yesterday. I filled a few pages in my sketchbook but it was mostly poop. I've become kind of lazy lately. I started this sketchbook on like August 23rd or something. ALMOST 3 MONTHS! Then again, it had 150 pages and I'm sure some of my issues were psychological because 50 more pages is awfully daunting and stuff. I draw all the time but I need to push myself. I need to mix things up regularly or I stagnate quickly. Here's what I did today. I'll also upload a couple things from yesterday, but they're not so great and I'm not happy about how they turned out. I'm also tinkering with how I add tones to things. Sometimes it's hard to see. Yep. I just need to jump in, do hard things, and not be scared to fail horribly. Also, the blue pencil is invisible to Photoshoppe's eyeballs and is no good for making selections.

OFF THE OLD DRAWING BOARD [after my daily episode of FLCL!]

These next couple are from yesterday. Bleh.