Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays to everyone! As i look back on this past year i see so much improvement in my art and that is really exciting. My thanks go out to all my friends and family who have supported me and helped me when times got rough. This past year i learned a new 3d program, i learned how to composite 3d into video footage, i worked for a gaming company doing illustrations, i went to San Diego Comicon, i reacquainted myself with my cousins and my new second cousins in California and i am in a relationship with someone i love. What a great year! I will be graduating next year around september with a Bachelors of Art in media arts and animation. I can't wait to see what the next year holds! Be ready, i know it will be exciting and i will be posting all here!

Another quick pinup sketch. I inked it during work last night. I usually like to make dark hair for pinups. i guess because its fun to ink and gives it that classic Betty Paige feel but my coworker suggested i leave it so i could make her blond or red headed instead when and if i ever color her. Hope ya like!

This is what i was doing instead of paying attention in physics class!
I'm in finals right now so i'm doing what feels like a million things. I'll be posting more soon!!

The Gate Keeper

In traveling to the underworld Magnus and his crew come across the Cerberus. Placed in the underworld to guard the gates from letting anyone IN or OUT. This creature does not breath fire but has nearly impenetrable armored scales. It is fast, agile and ferocious. How will Magnus defeat such a creature?

This creature design copyright © Matt Campbell 2008

Picturesque

Another one i'm working on. This one is still in the very early stage.

Here is a little bit more progress on the pirate painting. It doesn't look like much and it may be dark on your computer but most of the time was spent on the ship wood and the barrel under her foot.
I've got a few other paintings in the works as well.

A sketch or two

I should be going to bed as i have to get up early but i felt the need to do another quick sketch first.












Also, this is one of the projects i've been working on in Maya. There is still a long way to go on it but i'm hoping to have it completed and textured very soon.

Gunslinger Sketch

I little sketch i made after watching the Marko video from Massive Black. If you don't know who he is then go find out!!

Been Busy

Hey everyone. Sorry it's been so long since my last post. I'm getting into the final quarters of my animation degree and it's pretty intense. I'll post some of that work up here real soon. I have been able to squeeze in some illustrative work here and there but just not much.
I have been slowly working on this illustration of my friend Rachel. It's far from finished but i thought i'd show you the WIP. I also have one in progress of my friend Erica as well as my best friend Summer. Hopefully i'll have more time for illustrating soon.

Renaissance Festival

Rachel hand made this entire costume as well as two more that are just as awesome!










The master of thieves, aka Fingers












Privie Guards?











Just Sexy!











Also sexy apparently!











Captain Jack himself













Death is among us!!!


















More to come!!

Taking a break from homework...

...to post up some pics for you!! First for those of you that didn't catch them on myspace here are some pics from San Diego Comicon.



The Mad Hatter












Joker and Penguin






The Penny Arcade Guys









"Why so serious?"








The man himself





Okay i think i'm going to reduce the size of the ren fair pics because i just noticed how huge these are when you click on them.

Busy few weeks!

Sorry it has been so long since my last post. I've had a busy few weeks. I went to San Diego for Comicon with my good friend Joey. It was awesome and i shall post some pics soon. I also went to the renaissance festival in Larkspur,Co which was awesome as well. I should clarify that it was the last day and i have friends there who are die hards and pirates. We partied all night till we couldn't stand any more. I have lots of pics from that as well. I have to catch up on some school work and other projects first.

Zombie force GO!!

I've started on the undead group. I've made dozens of sketches here are a few. Be sure to click on it for a larger view. Oh this is so fun. IN this group there are zombie/undead warriors, those who worship and want to be an undead warrior, and lets not forget wizards and stuff. Oooh undead wizards, lol.


Also, i went to go see Hancock. It's a fun movie. Lots of cool special effects but as a hero movie not on par with say Ironman. Although i did catch something interesting in the credits that i had to research. It said the producers were Will Smith and a James Lassiter. Now my first thought was that maybe he was related to Jon Lassiter the CEO of Pixar but i found no such connection. What i did find is that this guy James and Will must be tight. Here's a list of movies that James has co-produced lately, Hancock, I am Legend, The Pursuit of Happiness, Hitch, I robot, Ali, Men in Black. Notice the theme here? Now i'm just curious. Is this guy in love with Will or did he just see a star that could ride to the top? I mean if you look at what he did before Will Smith its pretty unnoticed stuff. I don't really have any opinions. Who knows maybe they are best friends. I just found it interesting. That is all for now

This is the LAST of the Iron Legion series!
Now it's time to sketch Zombies and the like!!
I'm, so excited!!

Oh, and don't ask why he has buckles around his biceps, i just thought it looked cool.

They came in the night..

"It felt like an earthquake at first. Made of iron and stone it devastated everything in it's path."

Yeah i like how this one came out...alot! :)
This is called a Colossus
Forged from the dwarves and brought to life by the wizards, the colossus are nearly unstoppable.
You may remember the preliminary sketches from an earlier post.
I've got one more to post from this group then it's on to the UNDEAD!!! Sweet!

YARRRGH!!

I just finished this illustration for Nayantara. Had fun with this. I could have kept going for a long time adding little details but these are supposed to be kinda rough looking, more painterly and conceptual.

“It is when pirates count their booty that they become mere thieves.”

On a sad note. A great artist, Mr. Michael Turner passed away of cancer this weekend. I was a big fan of his work. He and another roll model of mine, J. Scott Campbell, both became known for their sexy, curvy woman in comics at about the same time. My love goes to his family and friends. They have it much harder now than he does.

Just finished this one. I had to spend some time studying horses. I haven't really drawn very many. I wanted a big horse like a clydesdale so i drew a few from a book i got from the library. Then i wanted a fierce striking pose that would work well in a vertical space so i came up with this design. I still need to work on not allowing myself to get too focused on details too early. All the detail os on the armor of the knight and yet he is only a small part of the whole picture. I do like the atmosphere.

Captain Jack Sparrow

I had to do one last painting for my painter class. This was painted using a frame from Curse of the Black Pearl as reference. The original had burning trees in the background that had been set on fire by Elizabeth. I didn't really want to paint that so i made a ship in the background instead. I painted it all in painter using artists oils with the exception of making a pattern overlay layer in photoshop for his bandanna.I spent about 8 hours all told on this. I see lots of stuff i could fix but i get bored and have to move on to the next thing. Please click on the image to enjoy the larger version.

Hope for the Nice Guy

Last year i did some illustrations for a book my friend Tad Spencer was writing. The book "hope for the nice guy" is now published and available to purchase at Amazon I just got my copy in the mail today. I forgot how funny the stories are and how fun it was to do the illustrations. I can't wait to read the whole book! Congrats Tad!



I found this old caricature i did of Tad almost two years ago out in LA. Haha still makes me laugh. Sorry Tad.

Another illustration for Nayantara Studios. This is supposed to be an elegant dwarf. Still exploring and trying new things. I'm not sure if they are all really working so i'd love some input.

I see dark people!

After viewing this painting on the monitors at the school i decided to make some brightness/contrast adjustments. When i viewed the below image at school i could not differentiate between his boot and the shadow below his boot. It just looked dark! I checked the monitors at school and almost every one i cold find had a brightness/contrast setting of around 50-60%. So i went home and checked mine. It was around 75% for each so i adjusted it to 50% for both brightness and contrast. (The factory default was 100% brightness 75% contrast so i actually turned it down from when i first turned it on)

I could still make out a pretty decent definition of color between the boot and the shadow of the boot so i sat back in my computer chair to contemplate. Just then i noticed the screen get darker. So, if i sit back in my chair, tilt my computer screen back a good inch and a half from verticle and have my brightness at 50/50 then i can achieve what it looked like on the screens at the school. Now, after discovering this i did come to the realization that i was viewing a wacom cintiq screen that sits back at a pretty steep angle.

Still though, my obsessiveness kicked in and i decided that there may someone still who can't see all the things i want them to see so i made adjustments to the file as well. I'd love to hear your input and i'd also like to know what your monitors are set at.

Spearman of DOOM!!

Woot!! I just finished this spearman for the game. I went to go see the new Indiana Jones movie and i think that's what inspired the dramatic lighting. It was difficult pulling off having the character back lit yet still be able to see details. Also, in all my years i have never used the lens flare. (ok i did use it in the Etherealm logo)I have always been told that it is a cheap trick. I used it here because i think it fits. Let me know your thoughts.I just sent it in to the boss so we'll see what he says.
In other news, i think all my neighbors are going crazy. Yesterday i saw my next door neighbor cutting his lawn with scissors and now as i look out the window i see a lady and her grandson doing the same thing across the street! WTF? Are gas prices THAT bad?

Speed painting with texture brushes!

Hey this is so neat! I saw this icon on my deviant art account and got inspired.
So i opened up photoshop and grabbed my dirt brush and started laying in a shape. An hour later i had this!! I love photoshop!

Wizard

Just finished up this Wizard for Nayantara Studios. My first attempt at painting any sort of magic. Again i could spend a lot of time working in the details but these need to remain quick. I spent about 6.5 hours on this one.
Enjoy!

Business Cards and ComiCon

Getting things ready for ComiCon! The tickets for both the plane and the convention have been purchased. I'm working on a give away portfolio which will be in comic book form. I'm working on the cover now. I also intend to send out an order for business cards within the week. This is the current design. The phone number is blurry on purpose. it won't be like that on the print. I'm not sure that everyone will approve of the nudity but I'd love to hear your input.

Also, i added a hit counter to the blog. I'm curious to see if i'm just posting this for myself or not, lol.

Concept Designs

I thought it might be interesting to show these concept sketches for a rather large character in the game. This giant is powered by steam, coal, and the magic of wizards!! It doesn't get much funner than that! I had so many ideas but i ended up going with a more humanoid design.Two of them were chosen which i will combine together into one finished painting. Can you guess which ones?

It's me!!

This is me!! I painted this in about 7hrs all together using Painter X oil brushes. I really do like that program but photoshop has some definite advantages when it comes to texturing and adjustments i think.

Another ones bites the dust!

I just finished up another painting for Nayantara Studios. I've been having a blast doing these. This one took about six and a half hours. Probably would have finished sooner if not for all the hair, haha.













I decided that i needed to fix some things on the scout. I mainly redid her left hand. The previous version was "a bit ogreish" to quote a friend. lol
Anyway i fixed that and adjusted the contrast to help her pop a bit more.

Leo Returns!

After a two year hiatus Leo has returned to Etherealm Creations! Leo has been vital in the past to keeping spirits high during production of projects. Within the first five days of being here he has already changed the infrastructure of the office. So good to have you back Leonidas!

Geez this week is flying by. There's a lot going on. I have an eight to ten page paper due next Tuesday on "Getting a job as a professional artist". I have about half of that right now in rough draft. I won an old Punisher comic titled, "The Punisher invades the Nam" while i was in English class.


For Nayantara Studios I've made over half a dozen sketches for a colossal character. This one here was the first one. I really like it as a whole but it's not right for what the game needs. The robot creature is too futuristic and nowhere near big enough.









I rendered a character with a spear who looks an awfully lot like my friends boyfriend, Jon. I started laying in the flat colors for the outrider. I hope to finish the outrider tomorrow as well as get a good start on a female wizard.












I did this light study Wednesday morning in about 30 min.