Hey everybody! Spent some time at my parent's house this christmas. Took a few days off and proceeded to do absolutely nothing for a few days. Felt pretty good to just sit and relax for awhile. Things are going good now, I'm pretty excited the rest of the winter will be pretty decent work wise. No real money problems or anything so its just a matter of producing cool work :D! I'm pumped to possibly get in some time for personal work(which I haven't done in months :(). Bought myself an Intuos 4 Large tablet, I'll let you know if its worth the money or not D:. Waiting for Chelsea to get back from her christmas break so we can have our own christmas here :D.
So yea, expect some more activity on here in the coming months! I'll try my best to make time for myself. Got a bit of catching up to do though with a couple commissions. At least theres no more giant looming deadline...
Hey everybody! Just wanted to let my Crimson Daggers know that I'll be out til the 27th!
Looking forward to taking a little break from work, I'll continue to study though :). Here are some studies I've been doing lately. Not very exciting but I'm waiting for my work to get released :O.
Hey everybody! Just wanted to update so as not to dissapear forever into the depths of the internet... Finished up my first set of Magic: The Gathering cards last night :D! I'm pretty excited to get em in the mail whenever that happens. Been a dream of mine for a long long long loooonngggg time. Pretty much ever since around... I was 9 or 10? Anyway, pretty pumped! Now all I got left are 6 magazine illustrations, 3 of which due on the 22nd.
Other than that I've been hosting the Crimson Daggers stream steadily everyday for more than a month now! I can feel the improvement from everyone! Its working out far better than I ever expected. So if you're ever looking to study with somebody you can join me everyday @9am EST!
Before I get back to work though... I have a favor! My friend Hannes(algenpfleger) has entered the Dreams contest on deviant art. He's worked so hard(pages and pages of studies daily D:) and has been doing fantastic work! So in order to vote...
Click on the image below and please favorite to add your VOTE!
Thanks and I really hope he wins! He really deserves it!
Concept art is fighting with itself D:. I've been saddened by that place since Manley started asking for money... Don't know what to do... but!
I'm getting an awesome new mic in the mail and I'm gonna start pushing the Crimson Daggers stream around to hopefully help bring some hope back! Free learning experience and we're all gonna move forward and achieve our goals. Its really been amazing to see the turnout and I know everybody is gonna do great. Cannot wait to get this running full steam ahead!
Hope you've been keeping up with the Crimson Dagger's progress! Lots of new art everyday :). If you're a member of Concept Art feel free to drop some support on em :D.
I'm really excited today because I'm ahead of deadline on all of my work. Could possibly send it all in today but I'll hold onto it in case I see something I could improve... But its cool to have most everything done ahead of time. Having too much fun working for Wizards! Hoping I can get some more magic work soon although I'm not sure how often they ask for work. I'm hoping my Daggers are all working their hardest because once you do start to achieve your goals you'll see how worth it it is to really push yourself everyday. So if you're a Dagger and readin this then just know that I have total faith in all of you! I see crazy progress and I know if you stick with it you'll get to wherever it is you're headed. No need to worry about anything, as long as you follow what you love 100%... Success and money follows. But if you go around chasing money then you'll most likely never get it. Just work hard for yourself. Also remember to post anything helpful you may find(reference/technique/study habits/ etc) on the sketchbook for everybody else to check out. Keep in mind you can get everything outta life by helping others get what they want. If you're always dedicated, working hard, and always helping/being helped then how can we not succeed? This is the fastest way to the top!
With that, heres some crappy studies I've done lately haha.
All of these are 1-2 hours with the exception of the Repin study which is on hour 6 now :).
Also, keep in mind that I'm showing these even though I think these are all terrible haha. I just want to show that it doesn't matter. You gotta know that we all fail...if we never failed we would never know how to improve. Making mistakes is just a natural part of learning, you'll never(unless you're a superhero) do anything perfect the first time. Everything is just a matter of practice. Some people are naturally inclined to certain aspects of whatever it is you're learning but that doesn't mean they're any better than you. Just keep at it and you'll see through trial and error that you have just as much potential.
Hey everybody! Just saw that Wizards of the Coast released a couple more of my illustrations. These two mark a change in my whole approach... Not that you can tell right off but now my work has started to really change(wont be able to release for a bit though). Been having a really awesome time working for WoTC and hope they keep me around for awhile :D.
These are both from Dragon Magazine #382 -
Hope my fellow Crimson Daggers are workin harder than ever! Always exciting to see all the awesome updates from everyone!
If you're in the area and don't want to pay for a personal trainer then check it out! My brother is a really nice guy and is always willing to help out and help motivate. He's trained a ton of dudes and has been working as a personal trainer for years doing work with Crossfit and other gyms. Hopefully you'll check it out, gotta keep your mind and body healthy as well as keeping your art runnin at a good level with studies!
He holds the classes every Tuesday and Thursday @ 6:30am and on Saturday's @ 11 am. Check it out if you're looking to get healthy :D. Just click here to get his contact info.
Or just email him here for more info - mrapoza@gmail.com
Anyways, looking forward to seeing where my brother takes this :).
Hello everyone! I've been having a lot of fun lately with my work. I always knew that if I just kept on pushing my name and studying I'd reach the goals I set... But now that I'm doing the jobs I want I'm having a hard time trying to figure out what to do. Whats the next step? I just know that I can keep on doing better work and possibly move onto book covers. Trying to figure if I want to try and get a game contract or maybe some movie work. I haven't decided what to pursue just yet. Hopefully I can just keep on studying and pushing and move onto better things naturally.
In the meantime though I've been running the Crimson Daggers stream everyday(with the exception of a couple sick days) and have been loving it! The amount of improvement I see in the people participating is amazing. I'm really proud of everyone who has really just changed the way they live to focus on their big dreams. Everyone can see it(those who keep up), we're all improving and how could we not. As long as we're all studying harder than everyone else then we'll get there no problem. You just have to keep at it and stay dedicated to yourself. Its not about impressing anyone or always coming out on top. Its all about failing and learning from failures. Thats not a downer thing to say either! If we're not constantly failing then we're not truly trying. "if you don't make mistakes, you're not working on hard enough problems. And thats big mistake", that qoute has a lot of truth to it. When you have a big goal like becoming a fantastic artist then you truly have to work at all kinds of problems. This isn't a two step program and its not a scam either. When we all just meet for an hour a day everyday studying together for free and for ourselves then we're all that much closer. I really just want to see everyone move forward and not lag behind. Its really important that you follow whatever the hell you wanna do.
So if you aspire to be a great artist then please join up. No fees or anything stupid like that. - Crimson Daggers Study Group!We meet everyday @ 9am EST!
But yea... I just want to say that I have nothing to gain from this except my own knowledge and skill expanding. This whole thing is setup strictly to help everyone for free. I hate how money becomes the motivation to help people, nobody owes you anything. I worked my ass off but I'm not gonna hide anything, you just have to give back as much as you can. You can get everything you want out of life by helping others get what they want. This is totally true and I've seen it first hand. Having somebody tell you that you really helped them is worth way more than knowing I'm making the most money possible for spending the least amount of time teaching.
Not to say that I'm the greatest teacher or anything but I'll probably get real good if I keep up with the daggers hahaha. I hope so anyways!
Anyways, the Crimson Daggers might be hard to keep up with for most people but you can rewatch any of the Streams below the window there or just spend an hour of your day studying and post your work on our Concept Art sketchbook
Btw- of course I know there are plenty of well taught fantastic online classes and whatever but for the most part its 'lets appeal and use our names to make the most money possible'. And I think thats terrible. If you really wanna get good then invest in taking an atelier course from somebody who really knows what they're doing.
So Anyways! heres my step by step Cosmic Sorcerer. I don't use this approach anymore, but I figure it may help some people.
