An Artist

Art is dirty work and it's inevitable to get a little dirty when you're working but... How did so much end up on this strangely confident rooster's tail feathers. What was he doing? It is a pretty piece though.

Sad Eyes

While I don't feel any sorrow at the moment it is a great subject. In order to better capture it I used the close view and a dull color scheme. I feel the eye shape and shading work well in that direction.

Well Groomed

This piece features a more anthropomorphic characteristic in the subject's posture and design than most in the collection, while also featuring an animal-like method of grooming. This contrast helps to set this piece apart from the greater collection.

Dark Focus

The use of various grays and slight staggering in the outline gives an unfocused feeling to the majority of the image, with the exception of the red eyes. Combined with the dark background the image is slightly off-putting, which helps create the uncertain feeling of "evil" the artist was trying to convey.

Light and Dark

I always found it a bit odd that yellow is light and purple is dark. This is a long standing convention for associating colors. Obviously White and Black can be used instead of Yellow and Purple but if you want to have any depth using black and white the whole thing just becomes shades of gray. By using yellow and purple you can instead use shades of each and no matter how bright your purple or dark your yellow they can't be mixed up.

I mean you can have a bright and vibrant purple, though I guess then it becomes pink or magenta or some such. I do think of yellow as being bright but the color I think of as being really bright is green. Especially on computer screens.

Like Ink Through a Scribble

In this piece the artist chose to disregard their clean conventional style in favor of a more haphazard display. The incomplete and indistinct outline leaves a lot to the imagination, which is guided by the scrawled coloration. While the basic elements of the figure are all present they are not fully developed leaving a somewhat abstract space in the picture.

I always feel like this site is doing better when I draw with some different style.

Rough Spectre

A ghost shouldn't be clean cut, but it also shouldn't be so vague that it doesn't have a clear form. In this piece I tried to find a balance between rough form and clear image. The scrawling outline and lack of distinct colors leaves a shaky form, while the shapes leave a solid enough impression that the material is clear. By bringing together these distraught elements we present an interesting piece.

Knight

The earnest young fowl had no choice but to take the path of knighthood to win the noble pullet's love.

In this piece I chose to utilize several techniques to give the piece a solid feeling of quality. First in designing the knight's armor I opted to extend the visor to properly allow for the knight's beak. In addition, by adding in the lighter chain mail at the neck and on the wing under the pauldron I gave the character a less monotonous design. In addition shading the image with darker colors gives the image a feeling of depth. The castle, and other background elements, were drawn without the thick outlines I tend toward using to let the knight maintain a solid focus and not be drug into it. In addition the small handful of marks atop the castle give the faintest hint of the noble's existence as she looks out over him leaving on his journey. The journey itself is faintly alluded to by the path leading to the knight from the castle gates.

Interesting Outlook

This piece is an inquiry into the abstractness of the eyes that I have made so many times on this website. The eye in the center is nothing and anything. By surrounding it with other trappings it is defined. Looking at the beak on the left one can see it as an angry, or at least determined eye. Looking at the beak on the right it is obviously a sad or guilty eye. In this way the eye is given clear characteristics

Red Blue Purple

In this piece the contrast between the red and blue chickens is dulled by the backdrop. The purple background is used to compliment the red and blue chickens. Interestingly the piece is signed, avoiding the empty space that would have taken the corner.

Water Sprite

In an echo to the earlier blue periods this piece chose to take a thematic focus on water rather than simply work with the colors. This is brought into focus by the raindrop eye, and the flowing look of the outlines. The attempt at lighting effects was a bit lacking but develops a different look than usual. From the title, "Water Sprite"  we can assume the artist intended the chicken to be made of water.

Just Butcher

He believes in Justice but he isn't a hero
He Cuts them apart but he isn't monster
He is Just a Butcher.

In this piece the artist abandoned many of his refined techniques in favor of a return to simplicity. In some places the lack of attention to details shows through, such as around the headband.

Santa Hat

In order to differentiate this piece from the collection I chose to use a very limited palette, letting the reds of the comb and wattle match the felt. The same is true of the fur and feathers. In a shift I let the eye take an orange color shared by the beak. This limited palette lets the piece showcase the thin distinctions we make between the reality and the ideals of Christmas. Merry Christmas everyone.

Circles and Lines

This piece is going into a more formal construction of the stylized chicken I present on a regular basis. The design in made of simple shaped and lines along centers and interceptions but has not yet been smoothed into it's final form.

I was glancing at a figure drawing book because I saw it and figured why not, and it reminded me of the first time I saw actual directions to draw people by, with like dozens of circles and lines through them and I decided it was crazy. So I did.

Impression

This picture gives the impression of a chicken. It was made by creating the outline of a chicken, then adding heavy shading and, as a twist, removing the outline. That was my process here. This shadow of a chicken creates the impression which you accept because it is what you expect to see.

Kicks

The blind and deaf martial artist chicken has been in training for years. Without further guidance all he can do in continue to practice his kick in the darkness.

In this piece I attempted to work with some perspective to emphasize the kicking leg, but as often happens with such attempts I used enlargement, which makes it look like one giant leg. With no background or shading it was hard to create the illusion of depth in the 2D plane.

777

This piece uses the number 777 as a numerological motif, by taking seven as a sign of luck. It then proceeds to incorporate another sign of luck into itself by pulling in a four leaf clover design. The bright green color comes to emphasize the joint nature of luck the two symbols represent. Aside from that this is the artist's usual style with it's faults and flaws.

Castle

A dramatic adventure unfolds. He might be a chicken, but he knows that he has to face his fears and enter the castle of despair to save the ones he loves.

In this piece I chose to work with dark tones to create a feel of despair and let the heroic resolve stand out. In addition I created a distinct background and foreground, using thick and defined outlines on the foreground and letting the background stand stylistically apart with its lack of borders. The swirls of dark violet in the back lend the air an air of mystery

The right of the picture is cut off, so click it to see the whole thing.

Sunset 2

In this piece I chose to focus on generating a gradient like backdrop to emphasize the dark silhouette I had created. A sunset was the obvious choice for the nature of the gradient, as it often creates a natural shadowing. Moving from grey to red to orange to yellow in small but distinct steps.

Strokes

I'm sorry, having a computer that can do things well distracted me from all of my important business, running this website. Now in my continued playing with new paint I decided to use one of those fancier brushes to draw a blurry chicken.

The image captures the feelings of the artist and the complexities of depth that the piece reflects. The varying shades of the brush strokes reflect the various facets of the character. The lack of defined color on the left side, the chicken's head, shows the undefined state of the future, while the frayed tail feathers show that the past is something that can be left to the wayside. What really matters is the present.