Nendil's Procrastination Outlet

Two sketches at once! These two cards aren't strictly related (or even necessarily neighbors) in the usual tarot deck, but in this deck I feel like they're complementary opposites, so wanted to do them together.

( 07. The Chariot + 08. Strength (values sketch) )

Using a more concept art (read: painterly) style to develop these because they're more about the feeling of the scene than the lines of the subject... if that makes any sense to you guys. I may keep working in this method for future sketches, but it will most likely depend on the card.

I had a lot of trouble trying to nail down the sketch for this one. (Seriously you don't want to see the previous attempts.) Turns out that I needed to just zoom in and draw a face, instead of working the overall composition as a whole as is generally good practice. I suppose that's to be expected with an emotional-centric piece...

( 06. The Lovers (prelim sketch) )

I don't ship it, myself, buuuut I suppose this warrants the "rampant shipping" tag in of itself. :P

I had intended to hold off on Skyward Sword fanart until the game's out... but it was a futile effort. This will be completed later because I have some other things to work on first, but, you know. ( Had to get it out. )

(For those of you not in the loop but still care for some reason :P, see this and this for context.)

PERSPECTIVE: easy to look cool, hard to look right. How's this looking?

( 05. The Hierophant (values sketch) )

Gotta run now!

MAXIMUM SMUGNESS FULL SPEED AHEAD.

( 04. The Emperor (values sketch) )

I'm finding that my art efficiency is improving tremendously since I started setting aside a temp folder to collect "style guides", or art/pictures that inspire the feel I want for the current piece. Since I consider my painting process to be something like "correcting a series of mistakes until all the most offensive ones are gone," this really helps cut down on the time I spend fumbling around trying to find the "look" I want.

Hey y'all with different monitor settings. ::coughboggybcough:: ( Is this too dark for you, or is it okay? )

Also I'm starting to wonder if this is maybe looking a little not-particularly-Harry Potter-esque. Any issue there?

Painting for The Fool is already underway, but I went on ahead with the next two cards because I didn't want to lose the sketch energy I had going while I'm neck-deep in fiddly paint.

( 01. The Magician + 02. The High Priestess (values sketch) )

(And no, I'm not going to do the sketches for all the cards before I turn out a finished one!)

Photoshop was awesome for the sketch! But I had to do a lot of fighting with Painter to get the brush strokes looking right. I think I've got it sufficiently satisfactory now, though this is one painting that would've benefited from a real brush & paint. But that would introduce its own load of problems, so oh well!

( Here's how it's looking. )

I do still have one more artwork I intend to finish in the near future, but I figured it might be better to save it in case I need a break from painting tarot cards. So without further ado, here goes the first one!

( 00 - The Fool (values sketch) )

Now the question of whether to take it into Painter or SAI...

Twilight side done! This must have been the most cooperative painting I've done in ages. Maybe I should look into using this kind of brush more often.

( french fries. )

I'm hoping to finish the whole thing this weekend if I'm lucky, hopefully Ammy's side won't give me more trouble than I expect.