First of all, this is in no way a tutorial on "how to paint" (I don't feel qualified to show others how things should be done). But, since people have asked if I've considered doing a "tutorial" on 2d as well as 3d, I thought I could just type a few easily written words about how I worked out one of my latest pictures. I didn't go very deep in explaining it though, -so what you see here is just the steps where I naturally felt like saving the image through the process of making it.

step 1
It all started from a really cool thread in the sijun forums, where people made some mech-tech robot of their taste and every picture had some kind of "story" attached to them. Anyway, I didn't have any inspiration to do a robot-mech-picture in the first place. But, suddenly over a phonecall I just got this clear idea in my head and started to paint in photoshop while talking. So, I started straight in photoshop without any paper-linedrawing. First I just did a gradient of the sky colors...kind of how I was picturing the angle and colors to look.

step 2
On top of this gradient I really quickly sketched up some lines and colors, to get a clear shape of the robot I had in my head. A kind of strange design, I know :) For some reason I was imagining this robot to be huge, with long legs that was walking over everything in it's way. I guess without knowing, I kind of wanted a similar feeling on the robot as that machine from the movie "Wild wild west" and the AT-AT's" from Star Wars. I sketched the robot in a kind of frog perpective to give the feeling of it being huge, that was my intention all the way from the beginning. Also, since it's daylight and the sun is supposed to be rather high up on the sky, I think that helps the "looking-straight-up" effect, and I also like the way it "blends" the viewers vision of the robot. I guess I had worked about 15 min on the picture when it had reached this level.

step 3
This is were I started to refine the sketch and add details. Also, I knew i wanted it to be an army of people and mechs beneith his legs. But, I just sketched it really quickly to get the element in, but didn't bother to work on them until the end of the process. Probably I felt that the robot was in the focus and that the army is there just to give the feeling of size and to kind of get some "action/story" into the picture. The detailing on the robot went rather automatic. It's always fun to add those smaller knick-knacks to technical things :) (just being aware that it don't disturbs the overall mitif) Also, I did small changes on the main shapes from the original sketch, f.ex I put the legs in a different position that I think was more natural if the robot was walking, and I think it helped the composition. But, I guess that's more superficial stuff that I felt for some strange reason and don't make sense to others, hehe.

step 4
Well, after I was done refining the robot, I started painting the army. I wanted it to look like the people were desparate and that a lot of things was going on. I guess I didn't bother to do much with the details, but I felt the closest body gestures and all the shooting and explosions gave the feeling I wanted. After cleaning things up to the certaing stage that I was happy with, I just played around with adding and removing small things, like brushing on some clouds and such, and refining minor things here and there. It's always nice to put a picture away for a day or two or just sit and nitpick to see if you can come up with some more ideas or change things that can help the picture to get better. But, to be honest, I did this image rather quickly, and I never did put any heavier thoughs on how I could make things better or not. Though I like trying to get as good result as I'm capable of at the certain moment, I also like to start fresh and make something new without sitting too long bugging around with one thing if it's not something required from someone that pays me money for it. ....it's just one of those small pleasures I get from doing non-job work, "I can stop when I want and I can keep it as rough as I want" :) I guess I also feel that I learn more by doing new things as often as possible instead of sitting days and weeks with the same thing.

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