The Ambush "part two"

Finally, I found something that I liked, and pushed the sketch a little further.

I took a big canvas ( 80cm by 100cm ), and projected a pencil drawing of that rough onto it.

The Ambush "part two"

I started by placing elements and playing around with the composition in photoshop.

The whole thing took probably half a second.

No I'm kidding, it took 2 seconds.

"The Ambush" part two

This watercolor entitled " A Maori ambush" was painted in the nineteen century by a colorful character named Gustavus Von Tempsky.

Even though these people were his enemies, we can see the respect he had for the Maori rebels.

For quite a while I've been thinking of doing my own version of that event, by imagining what happens after the scene depicted there.

"The Ambush, part two"

Tutorial 2

As the image became more detailed, the creature looked like it was too close to the characters. I added those trees in front of it, and got rid of its leg.

And still I was struggling with the lady...till the end!

Tutorial 1

I should have taken an earlier image than this first one. It would have shone a badly painted green canvas. As you can see I moved the characters a lot. The hardest one was the woman.

Giant Gorilla!

I wanted to paint something serious, you know like a sunflower or a beautiful sunset. But then I thought naaaa...Maybe I'll just paint a giant gorilla and a guy with a Tommy gun instead. Ah, and there's his girlfriend going : " Mon dieu un gorille géant!!! ( she is French you see)".

So there it is. It's done in acrylic, on a roughly 50cm x 60cm canvas. I've only worked on it in the evenings, to relax after a 10 hours doing digital paintings for Weta workshop.

Please look at the tutorial next so you'll know how to avoid doing this kind of thing.

The Famous "Moustache dinosaure"

Nobody knows exactly why the creature had a moustache. 

Scientists are still debating this very important issue.

 One thing's for sure: he was very successful with the ladies. 

Ink, watercolor and gouache on paper