January Gestures

Kickstarted the year by practicing Gesture drawing to loosen up before work! There has definitely been an improvement in pose and proportions, but I still need to work on my speed. Here are the best of the past 3 weeks. 

Schoolism Assignment 1!

 Hi guys!

I've finally signed up for Schoolism! What a kickass education platform! I'm taking the Painting with Colour and Light course with Dice Tsutsumi and Robert Kondo! :) I hardly get the time to work on the assignments at a stretch with Totem, but here's no. 1 and no. 2.

Please note that the colours in the photo may be different because of my phone camera settings. These are live paintings, not done with the use of the reference photos. Critiques are welcome! 

Assignment1_1

Assignment1_1

This week, I have to study diffused lighting. I started with this challenging view of our office exterior in the monsoons - too many details! Took about an hour and a half for this one.

Assignment1_2

Assignment1_2

After the previous painting, I realized I should pick a simpler subject and focus on the 3 details they mentioned - Contact Shadow, Soft Shadows and Local Colour. Definitely helped.

Kill Bill Study Boards #1

13th June 2016

Study boards from Kill Bill Volume I - the first chapter. Learnt so much about cutting and anticipation in this scene! It's still not complete. I intend to go on a full film study board mission, as suggested by Emma Coats (Story artist). She has some incredibly challenging but useful story assignments on her blog - http://storyshots.tumblr.com/

Thanks to Tanveer Singh for the nomination! Better late than never no?

Prisoners Character Study

11th July '15
Did a quick character study on Hugh Jackman in Prisoners. I should def do this more often, there is a lot of learning involved. Hugh Jackman is such a great actor, and I absolutely love this film and the character he plays in it.

I am learning how to quickly capture a character in drawing, and I hope soon I can make a very readable character design off it.

Speedpaint Challenge W1D1

5th April 2015

Given myself a speed painting challenge for a week to get my understanding of colour and light stronger. Hope I keep this up. Consistency is the main thing!

30 min mark

60 min mark

original image

SP#02 - Storm

15th Jan 2012
It was SO SO hard to get the form and the colours of the clouds right. Daym, I don't know how those Vis Dev artists do it. After a bit of basic round brush strokes I had to use a textured brush to give it a bit of clarity. It looked a bit too incomplete and too abstract. 37 minutes just flew doing this one.
Was hoping to keep it under 30 minutes tho!

SP#01 Baby Owl

14th Jan 2015

Did a speedpainting after REALLY long! It's been forever! I hope I keep this up. This is SP#01 for NY 2015! This owl didn't end up looking like the reference, but I think my eye either saturates things or desaturates them. Either ways he still looks like a really cute fluffball! >_<

Mikki Ekko Study

20th Nov 2014

Haven't done a speedpainting in really long! Felt totally out of touch. :( Anywho, this is Mikki Ekko from the 'Stay' music video by Rihanna ft Mikki Ekko. I loved this frame, the balance, cam movt, lighting was just gorgeous. Crossed the clock by 30 minutes. :(!

Critiques greatly appreciated!!

Total time taken: 1 hour 30 mins

Puppy Speedpainting

14th April 2014

I am feeling increasingly depressed, waiting for my studio results. I just really hope I get in my dream studios! Meanwhile, I am combatting apathy. I got myself to do a speedpainting after FORever. Here's tonights. Hope this continues!
I really wish I'd finish on the 30 minute mark, but this took 60 minutes to be exact.

Seeing the thumbnail I just realise how wrong the colours are, and how squishy-squashy puppy's face looks. I took this because I loved the lighting and all the bounce light and the balance of cold n warm colors, but I tend to see colours brighter than they are. Hopefully I'll improve with time.

Day 34 - Speedpainting of my house corner

23rd Dec 2013

Another study. I clicked the snap today coz there was a lot happening there in terms of lighting. I tried the setting the values right first and then adding colors of the same value/tone. It kind of worked out but I didn't use the exact same values while converting to color. 

                B/W                                                  Colored                                       Original
 
Speedpainting under 60 mins
Points awarded: 100
Yay!!

Also here's a VERY helpful link on values and color studies from this VERY helpful blog called Muddy colors. I found it very useful and thought-provoking to how see things as artists. Shared by Alok the awesome.

Day 30 - Sherlock (BBC)

24th Aug 2013

Got tired of lazing around. I decided to channel my frustration into painting. Since I recently started watching the amazing BBC Sherlock, here it is!! Enjoy!

Learned a ton about lighting the face. :) Also tried a new brush!


1.5 hours speedpaint
PS CS5

My first 5x5

19th Oct 2012

Since I can't upload my confidential studio work, I am sharing this short video I made with you. I'm pretty happy with it!

This video was made for the 5x5 vignettes group, where you have to make a film with 5 hots, each of 5 seconds duration. This is my first film, and so, obviously, I wasn't thoughtful enough about choosing my shots, but I basically wanted to film night time ferry at panaji/betim, Goa.

I had more shots than I needed and so they all weren't of 5 seconds, so I had to cut some and wished some were longer. Also, I had MAJOR focus issues since I'm capturing video after really long! :-s Won't make those mistakes in the next one.

5x8 - rough cut of Panaji-betim ferry from Nikhita Prabhudesai on Vimeo.

This one is a 5x8, that's 8 shots of 5 seconds each. And here's the final edited submission.


5x5 - The Panaji - Betim Ferry from Nikhita Prabhudesai on Vimeo.

Enjoy, and let me know what you think! This is a great learning and confident boosting exercise for young film-makers.

Day 25 - The Hunger Games fanart

22nd August 2012

I don't know if this movie is underated or not, but I absolutely loved every second of it. I loved the story, the look, the feel, the concept, the costumes, and especially the characters, who are so well rounded! I have been browsing some beautiful fanart and I was wishing there were merchandise being sold here. People always tell me to grow up and out of fiction, but I never will. Landmark had a HUGE sale and I HAD to buy the books after watching the movies. I am so excited to start reading.

Anywho, this post is a speedpainting of Katniss Everdeen, moments before being sent into the arena when she's in the tube, looking back at Cinna. This one took about 40 minutes. I wish my face study would be stronger!

Another quicky gesture. I loved the post and the confidence in the expression.

Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor. ;)

Day 21 - Speedpainting #05 - Ring-tailed Lemurs

24th July 2012

Another day gone in planning of my movie. Thanks to my best bud Alok's constant push to do a speedpainting just minutes before 12 am, I managed to churn this out. Since my friend Ankita was watching while I painted this (I dunno how she had the patience for so long!), I comfortably finished it in 1 hour 25 minutes. Learned mainly about rim lighting and back lighting, although I need to do more of these studies!

Two ring tailed raccoons, coming right up!

Original photo

Speedpainting #05

Feedback and criticism is highly appreciated!

The big jhol that happened with this one is that a guy had copied the original photo, copyrited it, and put it up on google. That was the one I painted from. Then I see the original on deviantart, and it seems so that it is different in its lighting and color!! So after I was done with it I had to tweak its colors to match the original. Sad story. :( Anywho, learnt a lot.

Day 20 - Speedpainting #04 - Sunlit kitten

14th July 2012

I was beginning to get worried if I could keep up with this speed painting stuff. I missed two days of it thanks to my obnoxious laziness, but here's tonight's speed painting. 

I had a lot of fun doing this one. I really thought I could stick to the one hour deadline (30 mins seemed impossible), but I exceeded by 20 mins. :( Still need to know how to resist from adding details and keeping it basic. Figured out how bounce light works and how sunlight saturates color.
Enjoy!

I think this is the best one so far coz it very closely resembles the original. Criticism is most welcome. :)

 

The original photograph

Speedpainting #04

Day 19 - Speedpainting #03 - Emma Stone/Gwen Stacy

9th July 2012

This one was supposed to done in 30 mins, but I've royally exceeded the time limit, nullifying the whole purpose of a 'speed painting'! :( I'm happy with it, except her face. I tried my best to make her look as cute as she looks in my eyes, but her eyes needed to be lower. Her jaw was super hard. I took 30 mins just to make a rough sketch!! :( 

I loved Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy! I love her no matter what she plays!! She's my latest favorite actress. Here's the result of 2 hours of backache. Need to be much much quicker and just catch the masses. I guess this is a proper digital painting.

 

 Original photograph

 

Speedpainting #03

Day 18 - Speedpainting #02 - Morning Light

8th July 2012

Phew, I was hoping I'd finish today's speedpainting. I really wanna keep this up no matter what work comes in between!

Today I tried to find a good image to study morning light. the process of finding a photo took really long. :( Maybe I shouldn't be so picky - anyway, I am pretty happy with this. In ten minutes time I was so frustrated coz I'd just finished a few basic patches. :( This stuff is so hard. But I think I can come to terms with the mood of the painting, I think I nailed that. :) I learned a lot about hard light and soft light here. Also I got a reminder of how badly I suck at draweing drapery and cloth. :'( Will work on that as well.

 

 Origial photograph

My speedpainting

Criticism and feedback is highly appreciated!