[Malachi Maloney]

"Teas"

Hey all, back with another slice of cheese cake for ya.
This piece took a little longer than I had expected because I came down with the flu right in the middle of it. Oh well, life goes on.
Anyway, my fiancee Amy is the model in this piece. Which brings me to another topic, I wasn't going to post the photo reference for this piece simply because it's a half naked photo of my fiancee and I'm just not comfortable with showing that to the world. (Even if she is. ) But, now I'm not going to for other reasons as well..... After receiving some advice from numerous other friends/artists recently, I'm deciding not to show the photos of my models anymore. For many reasons really, the main reason being that I want the focus of my posts to be my paintings and not the photos or any combination of the two. Wether it be a nice comments like "WOW! She's a beautiful model!" or "I wish I had models like that in my figure drawing classes." or even the crude yet flattering "I'd do her.". With bad comments like being accused from anything to tracing to not being original enough in my work.
I personally feel that the model and the photo shoot are just more tools/steps that are used along the way to creating the finished product...........The painting.
So yes, I did use photo reference. Yes, I did take the photo myself. No, I'm not going to post photo reference any more with any painting for any reason. I hope if the upsets anyone that they get over it very soon.
Now back to the focus.
I went with a simple background again, in order to focus on the subject. She's making a kind of "kooky" face in this piece. I only got 2 shots of her in this pose, one was blurry and the other one is shot right when she was in the middle of changing her facial expression. So, her lips were pursed together in a weird way. I tried to "tweak" it a little, but I didn't want to change her face too much. Non the less, I think it came out well.
Another first with this piece, this was the first time I painted leather. Well, other than belts and boots, things like that. She was wearing a lamb skin coat in the photo, so it was kind of shiny in some places and really mat in others. It was a good learning experience and I'm really happy with how it turned out.
Still trying to perfect my skin tones.
Painted 100% free hand in Photoshop 6 on a 9x12 inch Wacom Intuos tablet.

On with the show............
"Teas"


Detail

Full resolution detail

Let me know what you think.

Take it easy,
Malachi

[palladia mors]

so clean....
it would help to put some variations to the skin tones. now it's just pink --> looks somehow flat. (like a photo taken w. flash)

[dARCKLOWN]

exellent as usual

[SporQ]

great work. it seems like there should be a little more shadow where the coat overlaps the skin, and maybe some under the chin. but on the whole, i think this is a really excellent piece.

[jabber]

i myself really like the skin tones on this. very porcelin like. the coat came out very well, however it seems there is a strong light source located at her mid section, which isnt being reflected strong enough on the coat i think.

this reminds me of stuff done by olivia, but her stuff is a bit more fantasy based, but the process is similar i think.

[m703-324]

take one more photo of her with better light setup... :P
and this time take picture with boots visible

[m703-324]

and who are you kidding the background is obviously not 100% free hand in ps.

don't write so much if huge amount of your text is bullsh*t

[Steven Stahlberg]

Excellent!
Hm, big deal about the background not being free hand, who cares... the body and face is the hard part anyway.

But I think the background could be much darker, might be even cooler. Black at the edges of the image, just a highlight outlining her waist, like...

[Quasar]

hey man you do good work!!

[eVilAsmo]

Nice tight work.. The skin tones dont bother me, the shading did at first, untill I located the light source (at least I think I have).

As someone else mentioned, it's somewhere around her mid section, if this is the case, it'd make sense for her shadow to be more prominant on the wall behind, and maybe visible on all sides? dunno.. it just seems a lil wrong and lacking depth..

m703-324: Regarding the
background not being freehand.. he didn't claim it was. He said he chose a simple one so as not to distract.

[Nathan Marciniak]

I never quite understood the point of recreating a photograph so that after all the artist's hours of labor in Photoshop the final result looks 98% like a photograph. I mean, you can clearly see "through" the art and see that this is obviously a photo. The frontal flash lighting and all. I mean, it's great technique and everything, but what's the point? Sorry folks.

[Malachi Maloney]

Thanks for the comments all.

palladia mors~ Maybe adjust your monitor? Don't know, but there's a lot more colors than pink in there. Yes, the photo was taken with a flash camera. I'm still learning how to operate my camera and I've been wanting to turn the flash off my cam, but I didn't know how. Fortunately I had the sense to READ THE INSTRUCTION MANUAL today. (I can be so hard headed some times. =/ )
Anyway, I found out that my camera has 6 different flash settings, one of them being no flash at all. So now maybe I can get some better shots. I've been setting up lighting in my photos, but the flash just robs it all and leaves them with that flat look. Oh well....
Thanks for the comments.

dARCKLOWN~ Thanks.

SporQ~ Thanks for the C&C.

jabber~ Thank you very much for the kind words. The reason the lighting is so bright in her mid section is because I aimed a halogen lamp at her while I took the shot. I was trying to create a spotlight effect.

m703-324~
****PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT****
Do you know a hater? A hater could be standing right next to you, right now. Or even posting worthless crap in your thread.
Let's check it out........

quote:

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and who are you kidding the background is obviously not 100% free hand in ps.
don't write so much if huge amount of your text is bullsh*t

---

Steven Stahlberg~ Thanks for the C&C Steven. Yes, the background wasn't exactly done "free hand". I just put down a few different tones of grey and cream with a large airbrush, then I ran a noise filter on it. After that I hit it with a slight gausian blur and adjusted the levels. But the background was really an after thought. The focus of this painting was Amy.
I'll take your advice on the BG and do some adjusting to it. I'll let you know what I come up with.
Thanks again.

Quasar~ Thanx.

eVilAsmo~ Thanks for comments and crits. I appreciate it.

Nathan Marciniak~ Hey bro, everyone's entitled to their own opinions. If you don't like the type of work I do, please pass on by.
Can't make everyone happy all the time. =/

Take it easy all,
Malachi

[J-D Leon]

good work..

one thing bothering me tho...
did u just paint everything u see in the picture??

aren't u going to make some change to make this picture perfect.
aren't u going to use any of your imaginations and put it into this pictre?

i personally are imagining her face to be a bit more smoother...

[Malachi Maloney]

Thanks for the C&C JD.
Of course some imagination was used here. Little things, like the ear rings, her bellyring, I adjusted her facial expression some, etc.
And after all, I set up the shot, took the picture and used my own model. So, some "imagination" was even used during the photo shoot.

Thanks again for the comments.

Malachi

[ December 15, 2001: Message edited by: Malachi Maloney ]

[c]

watch out for the white pupils. yes they are in the photo because of the flash, but who has white pupils? be careful about that kind of thing.

watch out for the lighting too. i know it's a painting but it still looks too much like a photograph, you know? even if you get better lighting and equipment, there can be a tendency to be held back by the source. just be careful.

[Fallen]

I sorta disagree with you there Malachai.

But I think the use of your imagination will grow with your work as it did for me. Whe I started doing pin-up I was trying to get as close to the photo realism as possible. Now I've loosened up and don't care so much, I would rather have fun and throw in a few things that weren;t there,different lighting altogether, or some funkier clothing than was in the ref pic, etc.

[ December 15, 2001: Message edited by: Fallen ]

[Malachi Maloney]

Ok, that's cool and all Fallen. You don't have to agree with me.
But, what do you think of the painting?

By the way, let's not pretend as if this is my only piece. As far as adding things to a piece from my imagination....May I refer you to my Asian Elegance piece. The background, lighting, props, EVERYTHING but the model came directly from my imagination it that piece. So don't tell me all I do is replicate photos.
The reason the background is so simple in the "Teas" piece, is because I wanted to focus on the subject. AMY. You should know where I'm coming from on this, all of your pieces have simple backgrounds in order to focus on the model. So what's wrong with me doing the same?

Malachi

[ December 15, 2001: Message edited by: Malachi Maloney ]

[palladia mors]

wohoa. I only stated my opinion, don't sniff peas up your nose about it.
it must be the flash thing that does the flatness I mentioned. It's not THAT "flat" though. still, some accurate shadows here and there (since somebody already gave a hint of the places / you'd probably know them already) would make the pic more dramatic, more immersing and exiting.
don't get it wrong, it's still a very well done piece!!!

[Fallen]

quote:

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Originally posted by Malachi Maloney:
Ok, that's cool and all Fallen. You don't have to agree with me.
But, what do you think of the painting?

By the way, let's not pretend as if this is my only piece. As far as adding things to a piece from my imagination....May I refer you to my Asian Elegance piece. The background, lighting, props, EVERYTHING but the model came directly from my imagination it that piece. So don't tell me all I do is replicate photos.
The reason the background is so simple in the "Teas" piece, is because I wanted to focus on the subject. AMY. You should know where I'm coming from on this, all of your pieces have simple backgrounds in order to focus on the model. So what's wrong with me doing the same?

Malachi

[ December 15, 2001: Message edited by: Malachi Maloney ]

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BReathe....

I wasn't attacking your painting, I think it looks great. I was merely saying that setting up the shoot shouldn't take the imagination, the finished product should. I would recommend not using your flash at all. Your best bet if you dont' have big photo lights and a backdrop is to shoot during the day with natural sunlight.

[Shaded]

Gettin a little excited there, arent we Malachi.

Just here to second Fallens statements about the piece. Props.

[Malachi Maloney]

I'm sorry if I came off as being defensive. I TOTALLY appreciate Fallen's opinions of my work, seeing as how he's the only other artist here who's work is so closely related to mine.
I've always liked Fallen's work and at times when I was first exploring this style (which I still am really) I've even found some of his works to be inspirational.
All I was doing was defending my art and stating my opinions on the matter. I have NO hard feelings towards Fallen, nor do I begrudge him his opinions. I was simply stating my own.

I hope ya'll understand.

Malachi