Sketchbook Completed: Independent Study Is Go!

It's true. I've FINALLY got second block classes set up! Independent study is happening! This means I can drop a class Fall semester and still graduate. Won't that be nice? I'm hoping to take some of these sketches to a finished state and build them in ZBrush. If I came out of summer 2016 with 4 or 5 (or 3 or 2 or 1, let's be honest) finished characters that would be aces. Moving on!

Today is Thursday? A week from now my figure drawing class will be over! I've done some nice drawings and will scan those in to show you. I'm posting today because I finished a sketchbook, the last in my 3 pack. My new one has 100 pages compared to the Moleskine's 60 and is significantly bigger (9x12 inches vs 7.5x10). This larger size is what I typically use, but I'm concerned that after having filled 3 smaller ones I'll have a tough time finishing in a month. I had forgotten how massive 9x12 is!

These sketches are the last of the Moleskine. 

In this first one we have the punching guy. Punching is a theme in my work, I think. It's great! I want to work on him a bit more, but we'll see. I seem to have a hard time finishing pieces...

Recently, I was going through some older stuff I had uploaded to this blog (circa 2013). It's terrible! I'm shocked by what I thought was viable upload material. So much of what's on here from that time is basically scribbles. It's nice to see that I've improved, especially when it can be difficult to feel that improvement in my regular day-to-day. 

Back to work!

Sketchbook Dregs

We've almost got the summer's second block scheduling woes squared away, which I thought would be nice, but it's turned out to be the least of my worries.

The figure drawing class has been a frightening nightmare. We had an assignment due this week and I spent 8-10 hours struggling to complete it on time. Because of this I had no choice but to get behind on sketchbook. I spent most of my day yesterday and a few hours this morning catching up! It's nice to finally be where I should, but I'm concerned the next assignment will throw a wrench into things again. 

Here's the last of the sketchbook I was talking about last time. This new sketchbook is off to a rough start, which I'm actually okay with because I had a really nice couple weeks. I'll get it back.

When I get a spare second I work on UV's for the 3D guy. It's super slow going since my time is all being funneled into figure drawing, but hopefully now I'm caught up I can spend a little more time getting through this and getting to the fun part (texture painting).

It's Me Again (SMALL UPDATE)

Well, I figured out my class schedule... Kinda. I'll be doing independent study with a couple teachers during the second block to meet the credit requirements since the blessed 3D portfolio class didn't carry. Even if it had carried I couldn't take it anyway because figure drawing is at the same time. Scheduling woes, scheduling woes.

Today is just a sketchbook dump, since I'll be finishing my sketchbook today. There's only a few pages left, I'll have taken exactly a month to finish it! I haven't worked on my 3D guy for days and days. I'm almost done UV mapping, but Perry's figure drawing class has been a nightmare. I should be working on stuff for his class right this moment, but I needed to do a quick blog post. I aim to have the 3D character UV mapped by the next time I post. I need to find a sliver of time to take care of the rest of that.

Also, all this stuff is drawn only in pen. That's weird.

The explosion in this came from a Google search. I used reference! But only on something as inconsequential as an explosion.

Okay, I need to do my homework now. Bye.

Slowly.

Hello! I'm starting summer school tomorrow! I think. I need 19 credits to graduate this December and I've ever so carefully built a schedule that meets that demand. Unfortunately, one of these essential classes didn't carry, so I'm 3 credits short. The art department isn't offering anything I can take, the much anticipated Zbrush/portfolio building class has a time conflict with figure drawing, and I appear to be locked out from digital media's upper division. I'm going in tomorrow to knock heads together and make them fix it. I'll be quite put out if I have to stay an extra semester to take a single class. Oh me oh my.

I was talking to my friend Samuel and he suggested I post what I had so far from my current 3D project. It should look familiar to those who saw what I posted last time...

This is a 1 hour study from a girl I found on Mel Milton's Pinterest page.

Sketchbook has felt weak to me the last couple weeks, but here's some scribbles I didn't loathe:

Hoping to have the rest of my seams drawn up and uv's mapped on the 3D guy next time I post. It would be ideal to have textures in, too, but I'm not gonna get too greedy!

Have a nice week. 

Oh, I haven't mentioned my goals for this summer yet. 

...Because I don't have any yet!

550 Views!? What's the Point?

You guys, everyone hates my portfolio site! At the time of this writing there have only been 550 views. Nauseating! I need to draw/add pictures of sexy ladies or something, yes? No, I only draw deformed men, semi-cute monsters, and truckloads of killin' tools. But I just need cool portfolio stuff to draw in the masses, which is something I'm working on. I actually have 2 things I'd consider portfolio-y in this post. And then there's those coupla weapons from the last few posts. What else, what else. Oh, I'm still waiting for the Summer class to appear online, that should generate some portfolio. After that I'll set up Artstation and get back to Instagram and Twitter. I just feel obligated to manage that stuff and respond and communicate! I respond to EVERY comment on this blog, and I'd have to do the same elsewhere! That's a lot of strain added to my feeble grey matter. I'm sorry, I'm rambling. I have to go to the bathroom. Also- I'm not sure I mentioned this last time, but I did add a link to the portfolio site on the right hand side, under my profile picture (mobile device users- I'm not sure where you can find that if you can't see it. I'll look into it).

Here's a guy I added some polish to. I'm finally pursuing my lifelong goal to finish something I started. You can see how this began life in this sketch.

This next brute is from last time. Remember this? I painted him all up and gave him scary teeth. The better to eat you with, my dear.

Then I've got some sketches from my new sketchbook. I was happy about the guy in the upper right because Kaitlin said he looked good. Also, a guy with a ridiculous beard.

#soblessed is a ridiculous and obnoxious hashtag and I don't know why it's here. Also, there's a vampire alien. You can tell from his shiny medal. All vampires worth their salt wear a medallion.

I threw together that guy with the horn from the last image in Blender and painted him up real quick. I got cranky because I couldn't hide my hideous geometry with a nice texture. This was more practice/prep for my next thing than anything else. It's not quite as stylized, which I don't like, but hopefully I'll be able to get closer to my initial sketch next time. I don't know that I'll get around to that 3D guy I've been talking about for the last few posts. I have something else I like more that I want to start on. If I'm going to be dumping time into a model, it will be that one. I'm hoping to have that modeled by the next post.

Then some pen sketches.

I have a final tomorrow and then I'm free.

Free to begin working super duper hard on portfolio stuff.

Interlude: Realization

Here's the last of my current sketchbook, going to start a new one today. Hoping to also draft out a prop and start modeling a character. Maybe I'm an idiot for never realizing this, but it's not just painting that can benefit from working large to small, general to detailed. I think this approach works well when modeling in 3D, too. I've been looking at past posts searching for a character I want to model and invariably there's a complication that would make it difficult to build. I think I'm getting stressed by the micro level before really looking at and approaching the macro. All complicated shapes started life as basic primitives and there's no need to bite off more than you can chew! So while I still intend to finish the character I started a couple posts ago (I started re-UV-mapping it yesterday, actually) I want to start another one (probably the "SLEEVE" guy from the first picture here) and a non-swordy prop.

Two posts from me in a week? I'm hoping I can continue to do this! Also, these images are pretty large. Is anybody having issues with that?

MORE

Today is March 8th. I'm wondering when I'll actually get around to finishing this post.

Hmm.

March 20th, 2016.

I finished a sketchbook over the weekend and decided to post what I have. I'm trying to paint a  character in Blender but it's been an insane week. I got him all UV'd, I just have to finish the dang thing. But since I'm starting a new sketchbook I thought I'd post the completed character (FOR REALS) with my next collection of sketch pages. I will not post again until that point!

Also, Blender just updated from 2.76 to 2.77 and reset all my preferences. I don't like that.

Major Change: Complete! Also, Why the Slant?

Hi! This post is so long in coming because I got wrapped up in making a sword:

 I just snapped a screenshot because I deleted the camera and didn't have time how to figure out how to light it and render it properly. Modeled in Blender, 512 diffuse, painted in Photoshop. I don't know the rest of the information (polycount, etc). I don't even know where to look to find it, but I guess it could be solved with a quick Googling. Maybe next prop. Probably more bladed weapons until I'm more familiar with Blender.

So yeah, in the end I did change my major on Tuesday. I'll be getting a bachelor's in science with an emphasis in arts and visual communications and an associate's in associated sciences. I think. It's a huge mouthful and I'm still unclear. I'll graduate this Fall, but I'm being cautiously optimistic until it's over and done with. I was planning a pretty grueling Summer of training but I guess I have to take classes now. Hopefully, they too will gruel me.

Here's some recent sketchbook stuff. 

I've noticed I seem to be slanting the same angle every time. I think I have some excellent bad habits that enable me to lock angles into the same spot every time. I need to break this. Everything is slanting the same direction. And in this first sketch, one of the bald guys and the bottom-left person-monster appear to even have the same collar on their coat. Freaky!

This is a character turnaround  I hope to model in 3D sometime down the line. It's kind of stupid, based on a doodle I did in my notebook during a call at work.

Special Anniversary Post: 3rd Year - Portfolio Site Is Live!

Whoa, it's hard to think that this blog has been part of my life for 3 years now. It's gone through several changes in that time, most notably the amount of posts per day/week/month. I can only hope the slightly different approach to posting has led to an increase in quality overall. Since I haven't posted in awhile, I'll treat this as a normal blog post and then proceed with the standard yearly review. 

First and foremost, I have to tell you the secret I've been whispering about for the last few posts. I decided to stop stalling and launch my portfolio site. I've been working on this for several months and will be switching the current images for more appropriate finished compositions as they happen, but I think it's time to stop messing around and let it go live! Click here to visit zachheckert.com.

Some of these are older pieces that will be getting some attention since I've learned some things since they were started. Those will be swapped out as they're improved upon. I have other works in progress that I'm trying to finish up. I've had kind of a rough start on doing artwork this year, despite my new year's resolutions. There should also be an increase in 3D work soon, too. I'll still post here, but I'll try to collect the best stuff I have over there.

I'm too lazy to go back and see if I talked about it last post, but my aunt and uncle gave me a card to Utrecht for Christmas. I bought some fancy Polychromos pencils (y'know, I'm thinking I talked about this last post after all, but just humor me) and a Moleskine notebook. They make some good drawings, but a downside I've found is that since it's not spiral-bound, it's difficult to scan stuff. I draw all over the page and am constantly getting into the spine, making that part horrible to scan. I really like the materials it's made of, but it's a bit too soon to tell if it will fall apart before I finish it like the cheap ones I normally draw on. Here's a handful of stuff from the first half or so.

This first one? There's a guy with that big gun that says C-42. I'm modeling that in 3D at the moment!
And the guy on the bottom with luscious hair is wayyyy stupid. What was I thinking and shame on me.

What the heck, this guy's stupid arm. It's even labeled "My stupid arm." What was I thinking and shame on me. Also, the guy on the furthest right only got into this image because I liked his hand.

My anatomy is disastrous. I've basically not been working from reference at all. It shows! The guy on the bottom left (who was also posted to Instagram) has noodle arms, and the guy above him has the opposite of noodle arms (big meaty meat arms). I don't know how it works. What was I thinking?! Shame on me!

I have no current issues with this one, except for the space scooter is facing to the right which I find irksome for some reason. I may become upset by these characters later.

That does it for recent stuff. Here's the year in review, with stats from last year in parentheses:

Total posts: 556 (510)

Total page views: 32,510 (24295)

Total comments: 1414 (1225)

Total followers: 30 (30) [Like last year, there's some weird numbers involved here. Google+ says I have 63 followers, but I don't think those people see or follow regularly.]

Total coolness improvement: 0%

JANUARY

I picked this because the faces looked good. They mostly even resembled the reference I was using, which I felt was a big step forward. Nice!

FEBRUARY

This one was competing against a sketchier sketch of the standard monster fare typically found on the blog. I picked this for diversity, to show that I'm capable of doing something more naturalistic. I also felt it showed growth over other faces I've attempted in the past.

MARCH

I like the guy in the upper right. His face and hair are what earned this image the right to be shown here. The guy with 3 eyes is cool too, I guess. His body doesn't really make any sense, but if you don't look down that far you'll be a-okay.

APRIL

I think that the armore is the reason I chose this one. I like it. I also like the fish chainsaw sword.

MAY

I chose this one because it was sorta-kinda-finished, even though some stuff needs work. That's fine. It's actually on a pile of stuff I need to improve.

JUNE

This was another contested spot. I chose this because I really like the drawing. I feel like this character could go somewhere. His design is simple, but I'm into it!

JULY

This was the final for my figure drawing class last summer. I put this one in to show, once again, that I'm capable of doing something outside of monsters blowing each other into gibs.

AUGUST

This was a study from a film still. I like it because I only spent an hour and it was a definite improvement over the preceding study I did. I have fond memories of this one, even if it's not totally representative of the source material.

SEPTEMBER

This one turned out pretty cool in general (in my opinion), but I like the guy with the ridiculously long arm and the sword and beard. His body is kind of funky but I feel like the musculature is believable-ish. I felt it showed progress over other stuff.

OCTOBER

Some 3D. I like this mostly because of the arms, though perhaps not the hands. That might be the only reason I like it, actually. This one goes on the growing pile of  "Tune up and get it onto the portfolio site" stuff.

NOVEMBER

The hands on these characters were good. That's why this is here.

DECEMBER


This one was picked because I like that I did it in an afternoon. It gives me hope that I can get stuff finished quickly. I'm hoping it means that there will be more, despite the relatively slow pace of January.

So there you have it. Another year, another dollar(s). I won't lie, this has been kind of a frustrating month. I've felt a bit slumpy and have lacked motivation. I've got some plans for how to reverse this, though, so you should hopefully be seeing nice junk soon. Thanks for coming to my blog and looking at the stuff I draw. Even though I only know a couple of you, it's cool that you can all come and visit. Hopefully all this posting is helping you in some way, too.

 To improvement. 2016 will be a good'n.

See you next time.

Bizarre Friday Post (and News about Future Updates)

Hi! It's our first anniversary Sunday, so we'll be gone this weekend. I thought I'd get these things uploaded before we head out this afternoon.

Here's a work in progress guy based on a sketch I did. I was going to show the sketch to you, too, but it's pretty ugly.

A western bandit, a pig man, a guy with an armored arm, a guy with two pistols, and a robot guy about to do some gongfu (also, according to the definition in that link, gongfu is "...any study, learning, or practice that requires patience, energy, and time to complete..." meaning that I, as an artist, am a practitioner of gongfu).

Here we have a crazy guy with a sword, a spaceman, a small guy with a sword, and an evil demon creature. He's upset.

This last one I kept mainly for the hand in the bottom right hand corner. I think it turned out super spiffy!

Okay, on to the news.

When I first started this blog, I posted every day. Then, I realized I didn't have to post everything I did and only started posting the sketches I like. I've kinda stuck to that mindset for a while with various degrees of post frequency.

I had a chat with a friend yesterday and we chatted about art and stuff. During the course of our conversation I realized how much time I was spending preparing sketches to be uploaded. I'd say these took me like 3-4[?] hours to get all scanned, cut out, placed, and selected. Sometimes it takes longer. That's a lot of time to spend on a sketch! 

I think that to learn what I need to I need to start pushing pieces further, and so I'll be taking one sketch at a time and working with that, spending the time I'd previously have spent preparing sketches to take it to a finished state. I love updating the blog, but I'd like to have some really professional stuff to show.

So I'll be taking on one thing at a time and really nailing it before moving on to the next one. As I finish things, I'll upload and do a post. Once I have a larger body of (finished) work, I may go back to posting sketches like I've been doing for the last couple years. 

So there ya go! I'm off for the weekend. Hopefully I'll be posting again soon! Between the colored work in progress at the top of this post and the weird fish man from the last post, I have a couple things that should be getting finished.

Thanks for stopping by!