This time it was my turn to pick, and I went for my favorites: Godzilla and Friends! Well, actually the theme I gave was Toho Kaiju 1954-1975, AKA the Showa Era, and I provided this handy dandy chart to choose from:
I think, as far as giant monsters go, the only one that didn't make the cut was the Giant Sea Serpent from King Kong Escapes, and that's only because I wanted to keep to this 36 character grid. It's basically just a white Manda, so no big loss. Anyhoo, the gang seemed to be pretty excited about this one, and many characters were chosen. The first batch of sketches went up today, and there are AMAZING pieces there! (even though looks like a couple strayed from the Showa Era a bit, still awesome) You can check them out here: http://sketchattack.tumblr.com/
As for mine, I chose MechaGodzilla. I fell in love with the big MG early on in my life, and to this day no G-Foe has ever been more badass. That said, I was super intimidated to draw this. 1. It's a lot of pressure to pick the topic and deliver the goods. 2. I've never been good at drawing this stable of characters. 3. I wanted to pay homage to my all time favorites and not suck!
My first SA (Sebulba) came together well after doodling the character in my sketch book for awhile. The Sherlock one had less prep, a few character drawings and a small thumbnail, and I was off and running. Easy Peasy. This one, ouch, the first week and a half of sketching went about as well as any of my Kaiju sketches have ever gone: badly. The last one, though, gave me a modicum of hope, but I only had this weekend left to execute something!
I started the drawing on Friday night, using gray card stock paper as my canvas (figured MechaG=Grey, right?) but could not get down a composition at all. Frustrated, I turned on some inspiration, the Best of Godzilla 54-75 Soundtrack, and went back to work. After a bit of dirty sketching, I got a comp I liked and a drawing I started to dig. Definitely better than my previous attempts. I think the music made me forget about trying to get the character right, and more just loosen up and be true to myself.
The next night, I went in and changed a few things, made two of his fingers shoot off, and added his eye-beams. I mean, seriously, MG is just a big weapon, I had to show this! But then while looking at ref for some details, I noticed a HUGE error, I gave MechaG five fingers in instead of four!!! Oof, that's a lot of erasing. After finally fixing, taking away one the shooting fingers, I exposed his left leg more and noticed the placement of it was waaay off. Blah. A solution would have to come tomorrow...
Last night, after a trip to Ikea and watching the end of the Giant game, I sat back down to (hopefully) finish up. First, the leg issue. After failing to set it right, I decided the sketch needed an extra element anyway, smoke and fire! Sometimes introducing a new idea into the mix super charges you, and this one did. Fire and smoke added, it was time to decide whether it was done as a sketch or if there would be more. After some conversing and coaching by my wife, I decided to work in some ink and color by hand. Stabilo colored pencils, FW Acrylic ink, some acrylic paint (can't recall the brand), and a Papermate black pen (!) made its way onto my drawing. It became a mixed media assault, and in the end (which came at some point thankfully, that last hour was a blur), I dug that I did it.
So, now that I've explained all that, maybe next time I'll take pics along the way, here's my latest Sketch Attack...MECHAGODZILLA!
Again, here's the link to the fantastic rest: http://sketchattack.tumblr.com/
I think, as far as giant monsters go, the only one that didn't make the cut was the Giant Sea Serpent from King Kong Escapes, and that's only because I wanted to keep to this 36 character grid. It's basically just a white Manda, so no big loss. Anyhoo, the gang seemed to be pretty excited about this one, and many characters were chosen. The first batch of sketches went up today, and there are AMAZING pieces there! (even though looks like a couple strayed from the Showa Era a bit, still awesome) You can check them out here: http://sketchattack.tumblr.com/
As for mine, I chose MechaGodzilla. I fell in love with the big MG early on in my life, and to this day no G-Foe has ever been more badass. That said, I was super intimidated to draw this. 1. It's a lot of pressure to pick the topic and deliver the goods. 2. I've never been good at drawing this stable of characters. 3. I wanted to pay homage to my all time favorites and not suck!
My first SA (Sebulba) came together well after doodling the character in my sketch book for awhile. The Sherlock one had less prep, a few character drawings and a small thumbnail, and I was off and running. Easy Peasy. This one, ouch, the first week and a half of sketching went about as well as any of my Kaiju sketches have ever gone: badly. The last one, though, gave me a modicum of hope, but I only had this weekend left to execute something!
I started the drawing on Friday night, using gray card stock paper as my canvas (figured MechaG=Grey, right?) but could not get down a composition at all. Frustrated, I turned on some inspiration, the Best of Godzilla 54-75 Soundtrack, and went back to work. After a bit of dirty sketching, I got a comp I liked and a drawing I started to dig. Definitely better than my previous attempts. I think the music made me forget about trying to get the character right, and more just loosen up and be true to myself.
The next night, I went in and changed a few things, made two of his fingers shoot off, and added his eye-beams. I mean, seriously, MG is just a big weapon, I had to show this! But then while looking at ref for some details, I noticed a HUGE error, I gave MechaG five fingers in instead of four!!! Oof, that's a lot of erasing. After finally fixing, taking away one the shooting fingers, I exposed his left leg more and noticed the placement of it was waaay off. Blah. A solution would have to come tomorrow...
Last night, after a trip to Ikea and watching the end of the Giant game, I sat back down to (hopefully) finish up. First, the leg issue. After failing to set it right, I decided the sketch needed an extra element anyway, smoke and fire! Sometimes introducing a new idea into the mix super charges you, and this one did. Fire and smoke added, it was time to decide whether it was done as a sketch or if there would be more. After some conversing and coaching by my wife, I decided to work in some ink and color by hand. Stabilo colored pencils, FW Acrylic ink, some acrylic paint (can't recall the brand), and a Papermate black pen (!) made its way onto my drawing. It became a mixed media assault, and in the end (which came at some point thankfully, that last hour was a blur), I dug that I did it.
So, now that I've explained all that, maybe next time I'll take pics along the way, here's my latest Sketch Attack...MECHAGODZILLA!
Again, here's the link to the fantastic rest: http://sketchattack.tumblr.com/
