Piero Macgowan's blog

X-COM: Enemy Unknown - announced!

2012-01-05T11:13:00.000-08:00

XCOM: Enemy Unknown, the game I am/have been working on, has been announced! Check it out!

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2012/01/05/february-cover-revealed-xcom-enemy-unknown.aspx?SortOrder=desc#comments

Free shipping of my artwork to the U.S.! Limited time only.

2011-12-08T10:17:00.000-08:00

Artflakes has a special promotion going which is pretty sweet: free shipping for the whole US till December 14th 2011!!!

This is worth taking advantage of. You can check out my store at http://www.artflakes.com/en/shop/piero

Merry Christmas!

figure study

2011-09-18T13:57:00.000-07:00

It started as a quick sketch and sort of became a figure study. I probably would've done this in charcoal if I knew where it was going, but why change horses mid-stream? Not sure if I want to go on with it yet, but here it is so far.

Store

2011-09-05T17:47:00.000-07:00

I now have a store where you can find prints of some of my work. I will update it with more as I have it ready.

"Share One Planet" competition final piece.

2011-04-23T11:51:00.000-07:00

This is the finished piece. More details on the w.i.p. post below.

Making of "Share One Planet" competition piece.

2011-04-23T11:49:00.000-07:00

So last September I got an email inviting me to participate in "Share One Planet", a wildlife "digital artists" competition. I of course forgot about it eventually, since the deadline was April 20th, and I told myself I'd do it when I had more time. March comes and I realize I need to get moving on this.

There were about 100 species I had to choose from, and different categories to focus on. I chose the "Mother's love" category. For the animal, I started by choosing the Alaskan moose, but I then decided to see if both Siberian tigers and brown bears were in the list. They were, so I looked them up, and I found out they actually do meet in the wild every now and then - and tear each other up (tigers usually win the battle; they are designed to kill large mammals better that bears, who, even though they seem bulkier, are omnivores, and thus not used to battling other species of huge meat-eating predators very often).

My main focus was tension and narrative. There are still a couple of things I'll get to (you know how finishing a piece can go - there is always something left to adjust/correct/etc.) Here are the color thumbnails I started with, and subsequently the end result.

Quick color thumbnails helped me set the mood rapidly. I sketched out the lines quickly at first, then added swabs of color followed by sharper and more distinguishable shapes, which I did by using a combo of strokes, the lasso tool and custom brushes.

Focused on these two choices. While the left one has a lot of action, the one on the right seemed a more dynamic composition. It also narratively provided more questions than answers, which I thought was more interesting; It's not clear what's going to happen.

After some feedback I tried to give the tiger a bit more of a surprise appearance to the cub, like he was coming out from behind the rock. I did a quick warp and transform to see how that would look, but the idea didn't work as well as I wanted. The anatomy just wouldn't look right, so I eventually adjusted that back to how it was. Another important aspect was that I didn't feel the separation between the tiger and mother bear was obvious; I needed the tiger to look like he had not seen momma bear yet, and was going for the cub unaware of her approach. So I added some shrubbery and twigs to give the sense that the bear was partially hidden as he was coming. That helped to add a bit of a visual barrier, as well as to break up the snow and add some interest to the ground.

I wanted the eye to follow the tiger down to the cub, instead of going straight for the mother bear, so I included some

foliage at the top to help a bit. I also added the tree trunk on the foreground behind the rock to help the composition from escaping to the right. There was too much contrast and attention drawn to that area. Also, the mother in the previous thumbnail seemed too frantic. I wanted the tension in the piece to come from anticipation, and having her run full force wasn't selling the idea, so she is now approaching with sudden alarm; she probably had suspected something was wrong, but did not see the tiger until a moment ago.

Here is the finished piece. I adjusted the scale of the three animals a bit to better fit the composition. Momma bear is a bit larger, and she now has her head down, which gives her a more menacing posture. Previously she did not have enough presence in the scene, especially since I wanted her to portray incoming danger. She is also not as dark; the contrast in the upper area of the piece was drawing too much attention, so I added a slight atmospheric perspective to tone it down a tad. The tiger's tail, body and front paw were shortened (they were too long). I also polished the fur on the tiger and the bears, and did what I call a "vignetting" pass on the piece, where I brighten and darken certain areas as well as adjust contrast here and there for emphasis. Special note: custom brushes are your best friends. I created about 8 just for this piece, which helped with all the different textures I needed, and saved me tons of time.

Closeup of momma bear.

Tiger closeup.

Cub closeup.

Got into EXPOSE 9!

2011-04-13T08:33:00.000-07:00

So this piece got into Exposé 9 this year. Wohoo!

Done

2011-01-26T08:08:00.000-08:00

So I think I'm done, at least for now. Things I did:
-Tweaked the location of the helmet and faded it a bit since it was attracting too much attention.
-Added some more foreground bushes to help the framing of the piece.
-Changed the position and posture of the farmost leg and foremost arm in the guy in the bottom. The way he was posed was dividing the composition a bit, so this created a bit more depth movement through the piece.
-Tightened up certain armor parts and added some highlights to both guys.
-Polished the moon's edge.
-Rendered the clouds some more.
-Added the feeling of marshes in the background - it was a bit too nondescript.

For now, I just have to wait and see what the Spectrum judges think in a couple of months. You never know if your artwork is what they are looking for or not. Here's hoping!
Cheers!

2011-01-24T20:25:00.000-08:00

Added the horse's armor, polished the image in general, and changed things here & there. Not much to say except that I'm working the up to the final stage. I am trying to keep the balance the image started with. As I polished the horseman, he started looking too overpowering, so armored the other guy up to restore a bit of the tension.

another update

2011-01-17T18:50:00.001-08:00

I changed the weird sword thing he was carrying for a mace. It just looked bad, broke the composition, and just didn't fit. Same with the rock that I tried to make look like a shield. It was getting lost in the piece and was gonna take too much effort with little payoff. To hell with it, and I also changed the helmet which didn't look like a helmet) to the foreground. Hopefully the whole thing reads better.

Evil Horseman update

2011-01-13T18:38:00.000-08:00

Here is an update to the piece. I obviously polished some of the armor a bit, and added the shield and helmet, both of which I am not sure about yet. I wanted the guy on the bottom to look defeated but yet still willing to fight, so I made him wipe the blood from his face with his hand (hopefully it reads that way). It's late so I will retire from this for now and look at it with fresh eyes later.

Spectrum, Maybe?

2011-01-09T11:12:00.001-08:00

Long-ass time since I've put anything here. This is a piece that I started as a sketch a whiiile back. Abandoned, I decided to see if I could rekindle my interest in it. I'm having some fun with it, so if I keep going maybe I can submit it in time for spectrum. Hopefully I'll be a good boy and post wips. So far:

New Blog address.

2011-01-04T13:39:00.000-08:00

I've ported my Blog to a new address: pieromacgowan.blogspot.com
I was not able to transfer links or followers, so I will find out how to do that hopefully soon.
I have also secured www.pieromacgowan.com which looks just like pieroartist.com.
Cheers,
-P

Wrapit!

2010-08-23T11:27:00.001-07:00

Andrew Kincaid's model based on my concept is used as a sample image for the Wrapit plugin for 3dmax!

http://www.matt-clark.co.uk/wrapit/pic.php?o=171

Andrew Kincaid's model from my concept!

2010-05-21T10:44:00.000-07:00

So here it is! After some months of working on it on his spare time, my good friend and amazing artist Andrew Kincaid modeled my dungeon master character:

Latest Painting

2010-04-25T18:54:00.000-07:00

So this is a piece I have been working on Lately. It was done personally but also served as a an entry into a themed exhibition (or art event, rather - kind of an auction thing) organized by Innovate Baltimore and the Baltimore Love Project. The theme I was to interpret was "Innovate Love". I could explain my idea, but I often find the most interesting thing is to let people make up their own minds about what it means - some of my friends have come up with pretty cool stuff.
The piece is Oil on Canvas, 36" by 24". I did most of it with the palette knife; I wanted a very textural feel. It was a challenge, since I haven't painted in oils in a very long time (years). I started with a digital sketch to get a sense of the general color palette, composition, and concept. I highly recommend this if you want to get a quick preliminary idea. Doing this, though, did remind me that digital painting can teach you a lot about color, but nothing about mixing oil paint. In the end it was a pretty malleable process; I didn't want to stick to the sketch too closely so as to let the painting breathe, but I wanted to keep the general elements of the picture the same. I'll post the digital sketch as soon as I find it.
Cheers.

head anatomical sculpt

2010-03-31T10:41:00.000-07:00

Just a quick zbrush study of the head in three layers - bone, flesh and skin.

More sketchbook stuff.

2010-03-09T08:01:00.001-08:00

So here are a bunch of sketches from Dr. Sketchy's sessions and some studies. Finally got around to scanning this stuff.

A lot of them are quick 1 or 2 minute poses. Some others are 5 minutes. I think there might be a 10 somewhere too. I'm trying to approach these a bit differently as I go. Some are more movement oriented, some more abstract, and some more carefully measured. I don't like being dictated by just one way of observing - it's more fun that way.

Dojo

2010-02-01T15:07:00.001-08:00

So here is a little quick piece I started on my Nintendo DS, on a program called Colors, which is awesome. It's pretty much like a mega-reduced photoshop. Great for quick ideas or studies. Anyway, I took it onto full-fledged photoshop and finished it there. Once again I am focusing more on color than anything else. I find that I need to do this every now and then, for some reason. I do some tightly rendered piece, and then move back to a completely loose, quick one. For this piece in particular, I had very specific colors in mind from the very beginning. I wanted to use red and green as the main colors by using mostly purple and blue to give them more importance. Red and green tend to work the best for me as complementaries. Here are the wip's.

Awoken

2010-01-31T16:20:00.000-08:00

So here is another piece I did recently. I think of it as some sort of undead catacombs ruler. It started as a concept for a friend of mine that's modeler at Firaxis (where I work). I then realized the spectrum deadline was approaching, so I decided to finish it in time to submit it. What ensued was a crazy-ass couple of days where I didn't get enough sleep, seeing as how I also had to prepare for teaching a class that same deadline day. I may get back into it, I may not. Here are some wip's:

And Done. Added spirits coming out of his staff of souls, drapery in the background, and there you have it.

Resolved a staff idea, added an aged carpet, and put some splatter here and there to give it more of a sense of history. I wanted this place to feel like it's not been cared for much, since it's in a dungeon sort of environment.

I then focused on the background. I wanted it to have hard, sharp shapes to emphasize the character of this guy. I also tried to come up with a staff idea, but it sucked, since I wasn't sure if I wanted it to be a head on the end or not (stupid idea).

For the modeler's sake, I kept the robe on a layer and clarified the armor some.

I then moved onto fleshing out some of the main shapes I wanted, especially in his armor.

I wanted a "creepy ruler" sort of figure. A throne seemed like a fitting idea. God ol' red and green complementary palette.

Volcanic Range Hellguard

2009-10-15T16:27:00.000-07:00

I'm trying out making a magic the gathering-like illustration. I guess it went from a "Death" sort of creature to more of a "Fire" one... Scroll down for the earlier stages.
I was thinking this guy could be a sort of guardian in a volcanic mountain area. Maybe there are several of these dudes spread out over the land, standing watch for incoming enemies.
Not yet done with this one... I'll post the final image once it's finished.

w.i.p. 6 - I think I'm done. I added some flames to his weapon after someone pointed out it didn't look threatening enough. Hopefully it's not too distracting. I added some detail to the face and tweaked a couple of things here and there. I'll leave it be for now and maybe make adjustments down the road. Hope you like it!

w.i.p. 5 - Darkened the sky and worked on some of the guard's armor and body. I think I am almost there.

w.i.p. 4 - Enhanced the contrast in some areas, especially in the head, since it's a focal point. The brightness of the hand gripping his weapon was too distracting, so I covered it with armor. Kept polishing areas.

w.i.p. 3 - added a bit more color into the composition and vignetted it a bit so the eye would focus more on the figure and not wander off. He looked like he had no purpose, so I gave him some sort of weapon; that way he looks more like he's standing guard or something. I also built up the rocks.

w.i.p. 2 - The guy looked like he was tripping over, so I changed his pose. I also made him a "fire" guy instead of a "death" guy (or whatever). I flip the canvas periodically to see mistakes and have a fresh eye on the piece.

w.i.p. 1 - I started by quickly sketching a line composition and painting over it, keeping the basic colos in mind.

Dr. Sketchy's

2009-10-07T15:25:00.000-07:00

These are some drawings from a "Dr. Sketchy's" session. They bring in cabaret models that use all sorts of interesting attire. These are some of the more intelligible sketches.

Copies

2009-10-07T15:20:00.000-07:00

Some master copies from paintings and sculpture. The First one is Greuze. The others are from Italian and French sculpture.

Unruly Lines

2009-10-07T15:13:00.000-07:00

Here are more sketches. I often like to let the lines flow freely; it is quite liberating.

some sketches

2009-09-23T18:55:00.001-07:00

I was able to get hold of a scanner and so here are some sketches.

This one, well, don't ask.

This is a drawing from life of an alien bust a renowned Hollywood sculptor was making (can't remember his name!) at Illuxcon 2008

Again, don't ask.

Figure drawing from life. I find myself straying further away from the purely representational ways of drawing. It's just more interesting sometimes.

More will come soon.

Rain

2009-08-23T13:06:00.000-07:00

It was raining like crazy one day outside my office, so it inspired me to do a little color piece.

Island in the Sun

2009-08-23T12:04:00.000-07:00

A little speedpaint. I seem to be focusing on color a lot these days. I guess it's kind of mindless compared to other things... This one was inspired a bit by Ponyo, a great movie.

Soap box racing kid

2009-08-23T12:02:00.000-07:00

This is a character I did for a workshop demo that my friends Aaron Yamada, Kenji Bliss and myself ran. The concept was soap box racing. I was to do the bad kid, Aaron the good kid, and Kenji the bad kid's grandpa. I made this guy look so pathetic that it ended up being the other way around; the good kid looks like a douchebag, and this poor child is the one that looks like he needs to win... You should check out their pieces: Here's Aaron's, and Here's Kenji's.

DS Colors! sketches

2009-08-23T11:52:00.000-07:00

These were done in that Ninendo DS program Colors while in a van in the Arizona countryside. They're mostly for color study, since it's hard to focus on anything when traveling 80mph.

Random old stuff...

2009-08-23T10:42:00.001-07:00

Some old, old stuff I found in my computer. Why not?
(why am I doing this?)

The beginnings of a fashion illustration that never was.

Done for a friends' music video.

Fresh fish from life.

Some master copies.

Turner

Velazquez

Rembrandt

Vermeer step by step

BHG era (ooold....)

2009-08-23T10:15:00.000-07:00

I'm gonna jump the gun and post some of my Big Huge Games era stuff (mid-2007). It's not very good now that I look back at it, but heck, I'm trying to just finally post all this old stuff up here, for some odd reason.
Oh yeah, these images are all property of Big Huge Games, so mind the rights and all that.

These are for the project that used to be called Crucible (RIP)

2009-08-23T10:03:00.001-07:00

Some really old stuff... I mean like 2 years old. The landscape color studies were done while on the train from Baltimore to Philly. Self-portrait self-explanatory.

2009-06-20T20:56:00.000-07:00