Today I'm posting an experimental piece. I guess all of my work is experimental but I wanted to attempt another extreme exaggeration. The first one I tried of ... well, I'd better not say, was a total failure. In this caricature, I used a source image that I've used a couple of times in the past. It's an interesting figure and the costume is cool so there are many directions I can take this guy. My goal here was to make the nose at least 50% of the total face. I didn't quite get there but it's close and I think I could have if I had pushed it far enough. I just got to a point where I felt like it was time to stop. I try to listen to my instincts in cases like this especially since I have no clue what I'm doing. I do like the line in the shape of his face and I tried to make that line very prominent and clean. That's one of the reasons for the drop shadow and the darkening of the background, to further define that line. Of course, the intent was not likeness in this case, strictly an experiment to see how far I could push a profile without it looking totally stupid. Absurd yes but hopefully not stupid. Anyhow, it was lots of fun and I really learned a lot from this piece and that's what it's all about. These exercises always help when the next commission comes along.
I'm going to be working more on my web site, RodneyPike.com in the coming days. I have to get a gallery page started there. I will be more selective as to what goes in as the site will hopefully be a professional representation of me and my work. I have some cool things in mind so make sure you bookmark the site. Also remember you can subscribe to the entire site or just the blog there if you like. For the time being, it is a mirror of this blog but that will change as time goes on. I also have plans for totally changing the landing page.
I'm getting more and more requests for tutorials and I wanted to remind everyone of the webinar I did a couple of months back for RetouchPRO Live. The webnar can be accessed here. There will be more of those in the near future as well.
Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day and be inspired!
