A Neverending Process

​The artistic process can be very fun and very difficult at times. There is a lot of planning and preparation that goes into creating a single image. Hopefully, this post will provide some insight into the process I go through to create most of my illustrations.

I usually start by picking a topic and then thumbnailing ideas. For this project the subject was already provided, Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven," so the process was a bit faster and required less concepts.

I then go through all my thumbnails and pick some I'd like to pursue and explore more in depth. I usually only pick 2-4 to explore more, but that changes depending on the client or complexity of the project.

Value studies are usually next in the process, but sometimes i skip this step and jump straight into color. That decision is based on time constraints and project complexity.

From the explorations I choose the composition I want to explore and start gathering reference photos for lighting, rendering, color, etc.

Once I get the grayscale to a point where I like how everything is working together I start laying color down.

And then I render it like crazy! Finally, I get my final image.