Aurumek

New Lineart

Hi everone!
The new linework is done! Well, most times, there will be minor changes to it later down the line, but it's good to have it done, it is the most time-consuming task of it all. The red roofs will stand out nicely in all of that green, as well as the small mage. Let's see where this leads me - I am (as always) torn between making the clouds realistic vs. in comic style. We'll see in the end I guess.

The thing that is particularly nice about this though is that the concept i...

Something kind of different

Don't worry, I won't trail off and only draw starships from now on 😂

Just needed to scratch a permanent itch of mine to do some SciFi.

I'll return to the usual stuff soon, but this week my boss is on vacation and there is a lot to do in order to keep up the work. So it might be some days until I can get back to you - so we'll most likely see each other with the new lineart again. 

As my print sales started picking up a bit lately - I can't see the names of the custom...

New Sketch

Hi everyone! The small mage returns (if you can spot him)!
I don't particularly like drawing scenes in villages or close-ups of houses too much, but really like the sight of villages from afar, especially when they're kind of hidden or tucked away.

In terms of the lineart itself I'll probably use a combination of the more dried ink and the more gel-like one. This way I won't be always drawn between the two of them ^^

Have a nice week!

Best,
Simon

New Artwork "Horseshoe Island"

Hi everyone! Finished up this piece today - Horseshoe Island is located in the western islands of Argenta. Lots of amber can be found on these coasts, and its huge chalk cliffs are legendary.

As for the style, "letting loose" with the linework and not being all to precise with it is a LOT of fun - especially with the trees and ground!

Anyways, I hope you're having a cool day, it is getting really hot here in Switzerland. Talk to you soon with the next sketch - take care!

Inking done

Hi everyone! This style of inking feels much looser, and has more "dryness" to it, which is a lot of fun. There is a constant struggle between the more loose and the more clean linework for me, but in the end, both options seem to look nice. It mostly depends on the subject - if you draw more futuristic environments without a lot of vegetation, the traditional "ligne claire" style will do well.  But as soon as you imagine the grass in the foreground with these clean and stiff lines, they...

New Sketch

Hi everyone!
The last piece was meant to be simple, now the goal of this one will be to convey size. There will be small houses and fields in that opening, and the small house in the foreground is what will set the comparison so the viewer can "feel" how large the scene before them is - especially when it comes to the background. 

I'm currently thinking about making the foreground stay in shadow as well - the great thing about foregrounds in fantasy pieces like this one is that ...

New Artwork "Lighttower"

Hi everyone! This piece is focused on it's simplicity more than anything. I like the rather otherworldly look of the tower and the color of the grass - it creates a bit of a sense of wonder without being unrelatable.

Positioning the tower at the right place is harder than it looks, there has to be a pleasing distance to the canvas edge on bith sides. In ancient Greece, philosophers wondered what this ideal relation is that people find pleasing. Legend says that the gave people a stick a...

New Sketch and Lineart progress

Hi everyone! I'll try to keep this one simple, yet have the things itself be at a higher level of creative concept. This tower will be set in an almost endless sea of grass, and the lantern by the tower as well as the characters lantern will be matched in their look. If you look closely, you'll also already see the wisps floating around in the lineart piece, which has yet to be finished. This time, there will be no clouds in order to not distract from the simplicity of having just two element...

Cities of Araak

Hi everyone! This whole piece took about 10 hours of work, and the colors only took about 1.5 hours of the whole amount, which is always astonishing. As you can see, the colors changed quite a bit during the process, finally arriving at a warmer tone. The grey stones added a bit of character to the landscape, which would otherwise be too bland for my taste.

I'd like to web in more airships and technology in general into my worlds - being a mixture between technology and magic. For exam...

Lineart "Cities of Araak"

Hi everyone!
This ne will be in a way more dry environment than usually - there is something fascinating about just rocky planes and huge skies.

The biggest question right now is posed by the clouds. There is no question about wether or not they should be there, but the decision of drawing them like you see it right now or to paint them more realistically bothers me more than it probably should ^^ both options will have to be tested out.

Anyways, will talk to you soon with the ...

Sketching Around

Hi everyone, here are a few ideas that sprang into my mind while sketching around. The two lower ones are particularly interesting in my opinion, I think I'll pursue those. As I'd like them to be really rocky, I'm not sure with which one to start first.
In the sketch in the lower left there are tower cities in these plains, and in the lower right there are towers carved into stone. There is a lot to learn about drawing rocks, and I plan to improve with the next few pieces in that departmen...

New Artwork "Moonstone"

Hi everyone! 

Weirdly proud of this one, as it has been a long time since the last night scene. The lines on the stone added even more hints of a culture when colorized. It has been a challenge to keep the stars balanced and not go overboard with them, as they look so nice to me I had to restrain myself from doing more of them ^^

This rather chalky style for the lines works pretty well, it adds a roughness to everything that doesn't make it seem so "plastic-like". This should...

New Lineart Piece

Coming to you with yet another linework piece - this will be in the nighttime. The idea is to have the stone on the podium be filled with moonlight and to reflect it slightly. The struggle to find the right shape and size for it was a long one, but it fits now in my opinion and is positioned rightly. It was astonishing to see what the ornaments on the large stone did for the storytelling - it's unreal how much perceived information can be given about a culture with just a few lines more.

New Artwork "Guardian Stones"

Hi everyone!  The quirky, rather playful style feels great! This small mage is checking up on one of the several guardian stones which protect his village his village from wolves and bandits. The reflected light in the tree feels lovely to me - I hope you enjoy seeing a lighter illustration as well. 

Talk to you soon with the next sketch and lineart!

Best,
Simon

New Lineart

Hi, coming back with the linework of a next piece. The aim was to make it more quirky and playful, which is why the lines are rather thick, yet have that "dry pen" feeling about them. This piece is focused on simplicity - details should be added sparingly and only where needed, an example would be the stone pendant on the tree. This is also the reason why the small wizard is not overly designed with lots of elements but the stave, hat and bag.

Compositionally, the treeline of the backgr...

New Artwork "Stillness"

Hi everyone! This piece was quite the adventure. Starting with not being able to decide on the thickness of the linework to the clouds being changed until the very end to deciding to completely flip the canvas in the end of the process - but here we are.
The scene should feel like coming home, and for this reason I especially love the sheep. This is also probably the first dog that has ever appeared in one of my illustrations.
The clouds gave me a lot of problems, but I'm starting to ge...

New Sketch/Linework

"New Sketch" probably doesn't fit too well now - the clouds will be a trial, but I'll give them a shot and will try to make them painterly.

Coastal scenes just have something irresistible - the piece should feel like coming home. 

New Artwork "Sea Mage Tower"

Hi everyone! Next up, we have a tower of a few Sea Mages. Some of them actually prefer to live on ships, but these ones chose the comfort of having a nearby village.

The lineart style is definitely catching on again, the colors are still way too much fun though. There are a lot of artists who strictly work in black and white, but I just love the colorwork way too much to leave it colorless.

The challenge is mainly with how clean/quirky and how thick or thin the linework should be....

New Concept

Hi everyone!
This piece will have emphasis on the vastness of the world, and of course include a nice tower which will be the center of focus, although I love the little bridge and lantern towards the tower the most in this piece.

On the second page you'll see some sketches that were made before deciding on what piece to follow up on.

I'll be back as soon as possible to show the full piece.

Have a great week!

Simon

New Artwork "Ebenen"

Hi everyone, back with another piece. This one took me about 10 hours to complete, and reminded me that I really love things that stand in landscapes - like stones, towers, or like here, crystals (although I had to sneak in another tower in the background).

The comic look has the same nostalgic vibe to it like pixel art, it seems like artworks from a different time, and not even just in the past.

On to the next piece, my brain is full of ideas and there is not enough time to plan ...

New Sketch "Ebenen"

Hi! So I'll continue doing lineart for now, returning to my roots so to speak.

The composition for this is a typical L-shape, with the eye traveling towards the horizon and making a stop at the lake (there will be some kind of small settlement there). The top surfaces of the rocks should mostly be aimed at the crystal as the focal point, of course with some variety though.

I hope you have a nice weekend ahead of you, talk to you soon!

Best,
Simon

2023-05-27 11:40:51 +0000 UTC View Post

New Artwork "Return"

Hi everyone, back with the ligne claire style!

It seems to me that I could learn a lot from doing all these different styles. This was actually painted on a rather small canvas, and I feel like it makes the lines more quirky in a way, a bit more chaotic and less smooth as with a large canvas and smoothed out sketches.

This feels a bit like returning home after a long path, as lineart was the thing that kickstarted my dormant art journey some years ago. It feels good to reconnect.<...

New Artwork "Spring Ritual"

Hi!
The new softpastels feel great, yet I'm not totally convinced now. This probably does not have to do with the medium itself though, but instead with the artist 😅 My brain seems to want to jump to anything that I'm currently not doing - this morning, I even caught myself thinking of doing comic art again.
In order to not just talk bad things, the concept of this piece makes me proud. The idea that spring and all things blossoming comes not naturally, but has to be encouraged feels...

New Sketch and new pastels

Hi everyone!

The iteration for this sketch took some time - it feels weird in the beginning to not be able to just drag and drop, delete, erase things until they fit. The great opportunity about this is that you have to think about the whole composition each time you draw it anew.
There will be made use of the famous "Chiaroscuro technique" with the character clothed in white before the dark background of the tree in shadow inorder to create a visual "pulling point", where the eye i...

New Artwork (Oilpastel)

Hi friends!

Working traditionally feels great! There is a certain kind of feeling to doing something with your own hands again and feeling it on the paper in reality, and not just seeing it on a screen.

The colors look really vibrant and yet, they still don't glimmer so much as it would disturb the painting. However, they are a bit too soft for my liking, being really oily.

I saw that there are regular pastels as well which tend to be more chalky and immediately ordered them...

New Sketch

There are two terms for this one apparently, as a non-native speaker I had to search for both of them. 

One is "barrow", but "cairn" just sounds way better!

The plan is to really get down to business with the colors, and have lots of white flowers in a cool shade on top of the grave.

Have a great week!

Simon

New Artwork "Village"

Finding the balance between broad and finer brushstrokes is a challenge, but the composition was a fun riddle to solve.

Hiding the houses behind other things just makes one wonder how that village looks, I'll use that technique more in the future, it works wonders in my opinion.

This time, the progress pics have been saved for you^^

Have a nice Sunday!

Simon

New Sketch

Hi everyone!

There is a technique commonly used by painters and even in Japanese gardens to hide anything interesting a bit behind other things in the foreground, and this is what I'll try to do this. 

As it was not really readable at all, here are some black and white tones to make it more digestible. 

Have a nice week!

Simon

New Artwork

Hello everyone!

The biggest advantage of being that fast is that I fail faster, and learn faster. It also means that more ideas get realized, which is an amazing feeling!

The biggest disadvantage is that these are created so fast I sometimes forget to record the process, and since all of it is done on one single layer, I can't even go back and show you. I'll try my best to be better in the future.

Anyways, hopefully, this painting feels a bit like coming home for you as wel...

New Sketch

Hi everyone!

The next piece will be a bit more daring perspective wise. It is a challenge having the horizon line so far up, as it can hinder the "breathing" of a piece if there is almost no sky.

The cottage will be the point of focus, having white chalk walls and being the lightest point in the painting.

Coloring this will be a challenge, as right now, I am thinking about making the sky rather grey. This means there won't be a big range of values, which makes it difficult t...