New deathline and other stuff

Hi everyone, it’s been a while since last post I properly wrote, so beware of long text and chances of boredom.

I’d like to start this post explaining my current situation, but for that, I need to get back to 3 months ago when I started working on a few designs for my portfolio, initially to compensate some lack of design before applying for studios as a concept artist. The thing is, when I started the job hunt early this year, those designs became my own project, my own world, IP, call it what you want, so after much thinking decided to focus on my project for a little bit more, first for myself, second to show it as experience once I apply to some studios I have in mind, and third because, well, maybe I make something else of it.

I have so many ideas for Space Lotus, but there’s just a few I’m working on before I show more stuff. I was trying to finish it as soon as possible but had to slow down a bit to keep a good quality in it.

In the meanwhile a did some other stuff you can see at the bottom of this post. And now I’m also working on a piece of fan art for Danny Luvisi’s LMS. The book will be reprinted later this year and I’m very happy that my artwork will be included in the book, it’s a honor for me, and a lot of my buddies will be in it too. As you know it’s very very rare that I paint fan art, but this is special because it’s for someone I know and admire. Similar to what happened with the contest Anthony Jones organized (you can see my entry below).

I’m also considering to paint a couple of illustrations and push them because all my mates working at Applibot make me so jelaous with the awesome stuff they do there.

All this plan can change if I receive a good offer of course.

Last year around this date, I wrote here a post called DEATHLINE (http://isrartistic.com/2012/02/19/deathline/) where I set for myself 3 goals for the 365 days after.

I don’t know if the 1st goal was a success or not, it’s sure I only kept the daily painting studies for 2-3 months livestreaming them but that doesn’t mean I didn’t study anything else after that because I think I did just in different ways, if not painting, drawing, learning fundamentals, reading…

I kinda failed in my second goal too, I didn’t get the job I wanted, but to be honest, I didn’t even try to apply for it because I kept practicing trying to get better, and that’s sure, in one year I have a whole new portfolio with much better quality work in it.

At least the 3rd goal, the exercise was a success, running for half an hour twice every week, (only missed 3 sessions and was in Singapore) worked extremely well, now I don’t feel as “dead” and staying a bit healthier helped me in my work.

So it’s about time to start a new deathline. I had several things in mind, as to add another day of exercise to my routine or learn a new language, but at the end this is what I came up with:

1. 1 hour of reading every day. It’s hard to explain, but I feel like I waste my time reading because I’m not drawing. I read, but only when it’s related to a design I’m working on, but I want to do it as daily basis, and include novels, because everything I read now is about culture, architecture, science etc, but I want to read more novels.

2. 2 hours of sketching or studies everyday. One of my mistakes with the way I took the studies last year was spending too much time on them, limiting my time for personal stuff. So I prefer this time to take it as quicker but smarter studies. Also, when I work on something and focus so much on it I barely sketch something unrelated to it, I want to change that to keep my creativity and variety fresh.

3. Again, I’m going to set as one of the goals keep working on improvement, to work as a concept artist as my first choice, and illustrator as second, and to never forget that I want to keep creating exciting worlds for me, and for other people.

Obviously if eventually I’m under very tight deadlines I will give priority to work but while working on personal points 1 and 2 were something I want to add to my routine.

That’s all for now, apologies if the text was too painful to read, hopefully it was interesting enough for some people.

And here are some paintings, sketches, designs from the last few weeks.