Monday, November 29, 2010

The Victor

I debuted this painting at IlluXcon, and have finally gotten around to photographing it. I'll eventually have this painting professionally scanned, as this reproduction doesn't quite capture the contrast and color.

I'm proud of this one (the original painting, not so much the photo). It's certainly not perfect, but I feel it's going in the right direction. A higher resolution image is available on ryanpancoast.com.

Recently, I've been trying to limit my palette. This was a test of the "Zorn" palette: Ivory Black, Titanium White, Cadmium Red (Medium) and Yellow Ochre. Those four colors seem to fit my needs, and I can always add ultramarine or viridian if I need to. The project I'm currently working on calls for a strong blue light. So I started with some Scheveningen Blue, used a Venetian Red (instead of Cadmium), Yellow Ochre, Black and White. It's a Zorn-derived palette to suit the specific job.

You can read more about the Zorn palette on this great blog.

4 comments:

  1. Nice !
    I remember this one. Super job Ryan.

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  2. This looks great! I really like that red glow and the way figures fall off and emerge from the dune.

    As far as the reproduction goes, how much tweaking of your photos and scans do you do in Photoshop to try to match the original?

    Also, on a perhaps completely unrelated note, did this painting inspire your choice of Halloween costume?

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  3. Thanks!

    I usually have to take the photo and adjust the levels slightly. Sometimes, I have to take away some of the warmth of the photo. But I always try to match the painting as best I can (without making it look better than the original).

    And to answer the unrelated note: My props inform everything I do. I have colonial/pirate props, so my Halloween costume and paintings follow suit. Portfolio pieces usually go like that. I try to create stories based on the costumes I have available.

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