ILD 130 Color Pencil Study

I am now taking ILD130 - illustration taught by professor Dan Henderson.  I am learning that in my journey to become a better illustrator is starting to shift focus from tight line are to color. It was a frustrating migration at first. I have to thank David Moyer's for him pushing me to learn and explore hue, tone, tint and shade using watercolor. At the end of painting for illustration the proverbial creative light bulb turned on in my creative mind. Painting and Flatting are two different things.  

Let me break some things down here... 

• Flatting - which most comic artist do, is the rudimentary filling in if negative white space of an image with hue. This works well in the graphic medium. Depth, texture and life can be done through flatting but the art is forever depended on tight and talented keyline, wireframes, or inks  
• Painting - which most fine artist do, is the precise creation of an image using hue. Line art is a base, guide or a guide for the final piece. Thought the line art is a piece of art in itself.  Depth, texture, temperature, power and emotion are brought to life through this process. 

I started noticing this when I started to color my line art for other projects digitally. I noticed that the color layers (flats, shadows, highlights, and effects) gave a realistic view and image when the inks layer was removed. I saw that my art was looking more like a fine art painting instead of a comic art piece. Hence I was starting the basics of painting vs flatting.  

I noticed that shapes were objects in space. The color was the reflection of light from that shape. The shape was 3D and color neutral but the lighting determines the color (hue). I also learned another serious lesson... there is no line art for serious fine classical or pulp art painting. (OUCH! BECAUSE I LOVE LINE ART... VIVA PATRICK NAGEL!)  

So after the initial lecture we got our first assignment. Creation of a color study using colored pencils. I have used colored pencil as a kid. And it was pretty much glorified crayon smudging and flatting. But now I am going back into utilizing what I learned in color theory to make this medium work. I spent about $80 at Hobby Lobby on Prisma Color pencils, blenders, etc...  I also picked up a stack of books for reference and hints, as well as watching a few decent Youtube Videos, here is the link to the YouTube vids I am watching as reference . 

Maffett's Colored Pencil List