Almost stepped on it...

Something's Glowing...

Red Door

Red has trouble with her internet...

Bubble

This one just came out of my head...

Uplift Universe Challenge....too late T.T

I came back to Germany one week ago. The vacation was amazing even if I became terribly sick the last two days. ^^
I was very busy the last week...! Anyways unfortunately I didn't find time to finish my Uplift Universe Alien Relation Challenge on CGSociety. Here are some of my concept sketches I did for the challenge.
The goal was to show the relationship between aliens and Humans.

Valley

Easter Eggs

Sorry for the lag of updates....
I bought a Macbook and I was very busy setting up my new toy ^^
Happy easter everybody! Hope to do more frequent updates again.

Storch

Dice

Balanco

He's trying to walk without touching the ground...

Leaf Collector

Cook

Speed Thumbs

Did some speed thumbs tonight. Took me about 2 hours to complete.
It's always a good practice!

They Come At Night

Catch me if you can...

Inhabitant

You Better Run

Today's painting.
yeah....wanted to do a self portrait ^^

Ree it's time for war rabbits!!!

Falling Leaf

4 faces progress...

I painted 4 faces simultaneously. A fellow artist did a bunch of those, I had to give it a try. Approx. 1h and hell a lot of fun!

A Girl

little doodle...

Gorilla

Wohoo! The Gorilla Artfare Blog is online!

Bunny Lair

Orchestra

First painting with Cintiq 12WX

I just couldn't resist when I saw the new wacom Cintiq 12WX. The board was delivered today...and wow!!! I already fell in love with this piece. The size is just perfect and the painting feel is awesome. I tried the older cintiq models a couple of times but I never had a chance to get used to them. After doodling around about an hour it actually felt like drawing on paper...what a fantastic tool!

So here is my first painting on my brand-new 12WX ^^v

Happy New Year!

uh....

A lot is happening right now...the Deadline for the film I'm working on comes close and the whole team is working overtime. There is so much work left that I don't even know how we gonna make it (°_° ;) but it always works out somehow..right?

Sorry for the lag of updates...I'll be back with more after X'mas ^^. Tomorrow I'll fly over to Ludwigsburg to go to the Premiere of the short film 'Descendants' I've worked on the past year. I'm really excited and maybe I'll find some time to paint on my DS too. ^^
I'll be back on Sunday.

Today I recieved an e-mail that my painting 'CU-02 in Love' was awarded with the CGTalk Choice Award. Now that's cool \(^_^)/. The judging for the Challenge still takes a couple of weeks I guess...

meanwhile a DS doodle...



hmm what else...
I updated my blog links. Just added my fellow artist Heiko Hentschel. Go check out his amazing characters and drawings!

Enough of the bla bla ^^;
Need to pack my things for tomorrow. Lubu here I come!

Strange Beavior Challenge

That's it! The strange behavior challenge on cgsociety is over. It was an awesome challenge with many outstanding artists. I'm really curious about the judging.
The challege started on June 25 2007 and ended on November 15 2007. It was kind of hard to create this painting besides work. But fortunately I could finish my entry in time. I guess I worked about 3 weeks fulltime on this painting. The detailing took most of the time.

The title for my entry is 'CU-02 in Love'. It's about a cooking robot, who forgets about his work because of a beautiful white cat he fells in love with.
You can read the full story below.

I want to thank everybody who supported me during the challenge. m(_ _)m

So this is it! 'CU-02 in Love'

Beanie

DS Painting with 'COLORS'

I recently found a link to an awesome tool for the Nintendo DS. Jens Andersson is the hero who coded this great painting tool 'COLORS'.

With 'COLORS' you can paint whenever and wherever you want.
Surprisingly, the DS touchscreen is even pressure sensitive so you have full control over the opacity of your brush.
Here are my first paint attempts with the DS.




Check out the amazing colors gallery. There are some incredible DS painters out there. You can even playback the painting process of each ds painting (not only on your ds but even online!!). Just click on the playback button at the bottom of each image page.
My fellow artist Sparth is getting nuts with his DS! Take a look at his awesome ds sketches...

This is a really great tool. It's fun to paint without layers and undo function. It really makes you focus on the colors and compositions. More DS speedies to come...( ^-^)/

Glowing Leaves

The Owl

I finished my entry for the "Strange Behavior Challenge" on CGSociety earlier this week. I'll post the result as soon as the challenge is over.

Sijun Tiles

I recently participated in the sijun tiles game over at sijun forums. The official theme of this Sijun Tiles Game was "what may come..."

My Tile

The Rules of the Game (by Awetopsy):
1) There will be 25 tiles altogether. Each tile will be 320x240 pixels. This way when we sew it all together it will equal out to 1600x1200 wallpaper size which can be resized easily.

2) Tiles must be created based on the theme "What may come..."

3) Please keep the tiles content clean (no nudity/swearing/inappropriate imagery/defamation etc.)

4) Tiles will be sent out in the general order of who signs up in the thread unless specially requested otherwise.

5) After I receive the first tiles back I will send the next four with 15 pixel borders of the previously completed tiles. Your job will then be to blend your tile in with the border you are sent. Please be careful not to change any part of the 15 pixel border you receive as that is part of somebody else's tile.

6) I will host the entire project on my web server for everyone to see. Each tile will be posted in its original state. However I reserve the right to make minor adjustments to any tiles that don't quite line up with the edges of the tiles on its borders. But the main content of your tiles will be unaltered.

7) Each participant will have 48 hours, from the time they receive the tile, to complete it and send it back to me. If more time is needed you must let me know before the time runs out or your tile will be assigned to somebody else.

And now it's done!
The participants were (each row from left to right):

Destinatus :: seth1 :: the_insider :: Critical Pete :: Faeklone
Max :: bobthedinosaur :: Daryl :: Nag :: Tinush
Vahn :: ExonGep :: Samsonreaper :: Andro :: Mitsui (me)
3Nasty :: NeFF :: Hideyoshi :: ironwolf :: med
Nag :: J.edt :: Octavian :: fruity_loops :: Notic


It was a really fun game with many cool ideas. I'm looking forward for the next tiles game.

Bunny Highschool

Strange Behavior Challenge is ending soon...and I'm almost finished with my entry. I guess I'll get it done by this weekend.

After work painting


It's getting cold in Germany....Winter comes.... T.T

Crash...

chase

A lil sketch for the sijun comic thread...


I started to work at Pictorion Magma as a Character Animator about a month ago...damn time is moving fast. It's a nice little studio. My collegues are super nice and the working environment is great.
The Film I'm working on is called 'Way To The Stars' and will come to the theaters in winter 2008. Stay tuned!

Oh! By the way....the new Heroes season started two weeks ago, yey! Every week is now a torture cause you have to wait for the next episode...
For those of you who watch Heroes, check this out it's hilarious!!

Costa del Sol

Glider

Birds

Waaa...sorry for the lag of updates. I started my new job two weeks ago and was kind of busy. I'm still working on my CGSociety Strange Behavior Challenge entry. It's about 85% done but there is still a lot of work left.

So here is yesterdays doodle...

Strange Pet

Finally 500 Speedpaints!!!

When I started speed painting in 2004 I decided to number them so that I always know how many paintings I've done.
I've just finished my 500th speed paint yay!

To infinity and beyond!

Holo Mouse

Day Out

Sorry for the lag of updates. I'm currently working on my 'Strange Behavior' entry and on my new animation demo reel.

Anyways here is a lil lunch time speedy...

CG Challenge: "Strange Behavior"

I decided to join the new CG Challenge on CGSociety. The topic is "Strange Behavior". Click here for my challenge thread.

This challenge draws on one of the most popular artistic themes – unusual behaviors and relationships. Whether it’s a giant robot admiring a fluffy teddy or a sheep in wolf's clothing; a cow that thinks it’s a helicopter or a warrior going into battle dressed as a giant pink bunny – they all make you stop and think. They also stimulate discussion – what one person finds funny another thinks is demented. Unusual juxtapositions and humor allow us an unprecedented freedom of expression. They can also bring us closer as we laugh together and at ourselves.

The Challenge ends on October 29th 2007. For more information, check the Challenge Page.

Challenge Sponsors
BOXX Technologies, NVIDIA, Autodesk, Softimage, Pixologic, Luxology, e-on Software, Maxon, REALVIZ, Corel, Stash, Gnomon Workshop, MudBox, Ballistic Publishing.

This is gonna be fun!

On The Way Home...

ITS ART Magazine 10 - Interview

I was interviewed by the IT'S ART MAGAZINE issue 10.
Get your free copy of the magazine here.
Or choose the Hi-Res version for 4$ including multi media content.

There are many great interviews featured in this issue. Check it out! ;)


Interviews :
Justin Lassen, Benita Winckler, Goro Fujita, Tim Borgmann, Mike Corriero, Piero Macgowan, Pascal Blanché

Animation:
Blur Studio, Victor Navone, Mike Blum

Black Hat

Red Tree

Star Wars 30th Anniversary

I participated at the daily sketchgroup of CGSociety again.
It's Star Wars week.

Sith Lord

Imperial Royalty

Droid

The Rock

At World's End

I went to the theaters to watch Pirates of the Caribbean yesterday.
And I have to say, I was really impressed!
Great characters, wonderful costumes, stunning vfx, awesome overall design and
just a little complicated story, but it didn't matter at all! ^^
I was very well enternained. A must see!

Inspired by pirates...

Progress...

When you are working on your skills it's hard to tell how much you are getting better. The improving process is really smooth and you hardly realize that you are actually improving.
Sometimes you can feel those 'Level Ups'. In other words you can tell that you are able to do something what you haven't been able to do before. If you're a beginner you make a bunch of those Level Ups in a short amount of time. But if you reached a certain Level it takes more and more time to get to the next noticeable Level Up.
I guess everybody has experienced the situation that someone tells you that you improved so much and you are quiet surprised about it because you didn't realize it.

One thing I love to do to find out how I improved is to paint over old work of mine. It's interesting to see in which areas you improved most over the years.
I've done it a couple of times now. The painting below is the 2nd paintover of an old painting of mine.

Click here for the progress GIF.

April 2004 first time I painted this image (45min)
July 2004 first paintover (30min)
May 2007 another paintover (60min)

Yesterday's result...

Hell...it's about time!

a starcraft 2 speedy...

Bot Jump

The server at work is down and I can't go on animating right now.
Thought I spend some time painting again.

Bubble Aliens

Feeding Birds

Back from FMX! It was an awesome conference with many interesting Presentations!

Sub Bot

Happy Easter everybody!

Spaceship

Quick sketch during break...

Just Watching...

lil' doodle...

Hidden Nature Progress

I made a WIP gif animation.
As you see, I changed the lighting a few times.

"Hidden Nature"

I started painting this image in November last year. Since I was really busy at work, I hardly found time to go on painting.
Today I finally managed to finish the whole thing.
I'd like to do more of those detailed paintings if only they wouldn't take so much time and energy...I'm exhausted (*´ο`*)
Anyways it's done! Yey!

"A garden robot is taking care of his treasure in a hidden room..."

now I need some sleep...good night...

Friends

I was doing lipsync animation the whole day....needed a break ^^

Our New Home

Gasse

uf...sorry for the lag of posts. I wish I could do more paintings but I'm super busy at work. My buddy Stephan came to help us out at work a couple of weeks ago. But he'll leave next week...damn...anyways check out his artwork he is very talented!


Gonna watch Rocky Balboa tonight ^^
Have a nice weekend y'all!

Wheeler Part 2

Little doodle after work.
Sparth, here you go ^^ still thinking about the bunny comic strip

Happy New Year!

Happy new Year everyone!
新年明けましておめでとうございます!
Frohes neues Jahr!
Próspero año nuevo!
Bonne année!

Merry X'mas

here it goes, this year's christmas painting ^^

Monday Sketchround

In today's sketchround David chose a reference photo and everyone had only
one minute to look at it. The task was to paint it from memory in 30min.
Was nice to see everyones interpretation.

Here is my contribution.


Oh and yesterday night I saw the movie Pay It Forward Directed by Mimi Leder. Can't believe I haven't seen it before.
It's a great movie.

Secret Pet

White Dress

Spider Bots

Girl in Black

Soldier

another quick sketch

more war bunnies...

Chillin' on a Bench

It's pretty warm at the moment here in Germany....about 16degrees.
Definetly not winter. Snow wound be great...

Apple

Mondays sketchround:
Paint an apple from life in 30min.

Rage

Did this for the daily sketchgroup on cgtalk.

Ball

Eggs Eggs Eggs

Today we had another sketchround with the students.

my 30minutes contribution...

Bounty Hunter

Forgive me Sparth ^^;
I'm studying new techniques...

Space Port

Inspired by Vyle.

Heli

Tanuki

Tried to paint as fast as possible. Took me around 15min.

Another Speedpaint Session

We had a sketch round again with the Filmakademie students. 30min traditional sketching and 30min digital speedpainting, everybody did great!
Here is my 30min contribution.

Speedpainting

This is a painting I did a while ago. I recorded the screen while painting. I couldn't make it to add an audio track, sorry for that... ^^
This tutorial video is also available on my website, some of you might now it already.

Actually I did a new painting video today...but when I was finished the video file was corrupt T.T
That's why I'm using this old tutorial. This painting below is the finished Painting. It took me 1h23min. Click on the link to see the clip. (Quicktime Player required)

Port


Most of the time when I'm doning speedpaintings I have absolutely no idea what I'm gonna paint. I just start with a backgroundcolor, then I start to block in some random shapes. Suddenly I see a character in one of my shapes and I start to add some rough paint strokes to play with the silhouette. But then again the character looks more like a tree or some kind of rock. So I just continue to paint and the image is always changing. This process is really fun.
Robin asked me for some tips and trick so here are some things you should keep in mind while painting.

1. Backgroundcolor
I rarely start with a white canvas. Cause white is the brightest color. If white is already your backgroundcolor, it's often times hard to handle the values in your painting. You can only go darker but you have no option to go into the highlight areas cause you already have the brightest color as your background. So a good thing is to start with a midtone. The color or value of your background is also dependent on your environment. So when I would like to paint something like a forrest by daylight I would tend to use a brounish or greenish midtone as a backgroundcolor. When I paint something dark and cool I start out with a dark blue or grey background.

2. Values
In the foreground you have usually the highest contrast. The darkest darks and the brightest brights. The farer things are away from your viewpoint the lower is the contrast. When you are in the stage where you block in your shapes, keep that in mind.
You will see in the tutorial that the rocks in the background have almost the same value as the sky and the color is only slightly different form each other.
Then again the foreground has a strong contrast with the dark rocks. They pop forward.
Here is an example I just did in 5min.


The decreasing contrast and the decreasing size of the objects gives you a sense of depth in the image. Using grayscales is a great way to study values.

3. Highlights
When you have no experience in using colors, you will notice that you tend to use white for the hightlights. But when you observe highlights you will see that they are rarely white. In sunlight for example the hightlights are very saturated. That doesn't mean that you aren't allowed to use white highlights, cause metalical objects often have bright white highlights. Just remember that dependent on the material and the lighting highlightcolors can vary a lot.
The woodbar below shows you what I mean. The highlight area is a saturated light brown.


4. Start Rough and Fast end Detailed and Slow
When you are painting it is important to keep it rough at the begining. Work on the whole painting all the time. Don't struggle with details.
In this example I did a painting using a reference photo in about 30min.

Reference Image



Speed Painting



So try to be fast and loose at the begining. It's harder than it sounds ^^

5. Painting from reference images
As I said in the post before, it helped me a lot painting from reference to understand values, colors and light. I think it is a pretty good way to learn how colors and light work together. An important thing when you paint from reference images is not to pick the colors with the eyedropper tool. Try to see the colors with your own eyes and pick the colors by yourself.
When you pick the colors always ask yourself why you decide to pick this certain color. 'why do you use this dark grey for the skintone in the shadow' or 'why do you use a saturated orange for the forest ground' etc.
Paint with a timelimit around 30min up to one hour. If the painting looks ugly even after an hour don't care about it, just save your work and try to be better next time. The more mistakes you do the more you learn out of them. Number your images so you can always look back and see your progress.

For example:
sp_0001_imagetitle
sp_0002_imagetitle
etc.

I did around 30 paintings from reference back in the days. And did some paintings of my own inbetween using the experience I gained through the reference images. And suddenly I could create moods without using reference images. That was an awesome moment ^^
As long as you practice you will get better and better. Just keep that in mind.

The points I mentionend above helped me improve my painting skills very quickly.
Hope it might help some people out there as well!

And here is the painting I did today. As I said, I did a screencaputre of this one but the capture file was corrupt so no video...sorry T.T


over and out ^^

Sketchbook Pages...and Speedpaint Workshop

sketching while playblasting my animations ^^
The flu is almost gone. I'm feeling kind of good but it's getting really cold lately...Yesterday I had to scratch off the ice from my car windows T.T

I'm still practicing guitar like crazy...my left hand hurts but I use it only for my keyboard shortcuts anyways, so it doesn't matter that much. ^^v



Last monday I did a little painting workshop here at the Filmakademie where I work.
Every monday there is a Sketch Round arranged by my buddy David Maas. This time he had the idea to do a digital speedpaint session using photo reference.
When I started painting digitally back in the days, it helped me a lot to paint from photo references to get a basic understanding of color, values and light.
So we thought it would be a nice exercise for the students to start of using reference images.

Before we started, I talked about some speedpainting techniques.
Everyone had a timelimit of 30minutes
The students did really great and I was really exited that so many people participated. We will continue to do those painting sessions.

This was my 30min painting.

Orange

Sunset

Wheeler

Uuh....I have the flu....
I felt terrible the last two days. It's hard to concentrate at work...
Everyone seems to be sick right now.

anyways here is today's painting.

Bunny Headquarters

This one's for you Ree ^^

Robot Store

Thnx everyone for the blog birthday wishes! m(_ _)m
I'm flattered!

And sorry for the lack of posts...but I'm really busy animating right now. Not too much time for painting. But I will try to keep up.
It's getting cold outside...winter comes.... T.T

Happy Birthday Chapter 56

My blog is exactly one year old now!

Happy Birthday ^^

And thnx everyone for the kind comments and support!

I Time Traveled....

Yesterday I met an old friend from primary school. I haven't seen her for 17 years. It was a very interesting get-together cause the last time we saw each other we were like 9 years old...I found her by coincidence through the internet and I found out that she got a job in Stuttgart close to where I live right now.


When we talked, I felt a bit as if I time traveled cause I didn't knew anything about her, what she did and where she went etc. for the last 17 years. And suddenly we were talking with one another as grownups...very strange....
We had a pretty long talk....around 7 hours but there was so much left we could talk about. 17 years is a really long time! ^^

It was a very nice experience and I had a great time!

Chochin

Idylle

Playing around with artrage...


After a wounderful summer it's raining all day long lately....hope we still have some warm days.

Bunny Invasion

Green Hills

today's doodle.
I tried to put a city on the left area. But I couldn't make it look good ^^;
So I stopped painting.

Delicious

I haven't been posting the last couple of days cause I was in my home town hamburg. I went with my father to a great Japanese restaurant on his birthday. Very delicious!
It was also nice to see my friends! I came back today after 6 hours driving...kind of tired but I did a little painting.

DogBot

Stormtrooper?

Fishing