Nikita - A new project

So today's post is a bit of a retrospective one. For the past few months I've dipped in and out of a personal project, probably only spending 4 or 5 days on it so far. I thought of this project when I started watching the second season of the CW show Nikita. I have been watching this show since it premiered and although CW shows have a rep of being for teens/young women and essentially being fan service for them (yes I'm talking about The Vampire Diaries), Nikita is one of the few that really stands alone. This show has come at a time that I began showing far more interest in how movies and TV shows are made, from cinematography to screenwriting and it excels in many of these aspects of film. The screenwriting is great, with interesting plots and twists planned well ahead and executed precisely. The acting is great with a cast that compliments each other and from what I've seen from the little behind the scenes footage, seem to be genuinely nice and improve each other's performances. But more than this the thing that strikes you when watching Nikita is the look of it. The action sequences are directed as perfectly as the intense dialogue and the use of visual effects and other post-production is subtle and aesthetically pleasing. As you can see, I've become a bit of a fanboy and this is only helped by the face that the bluray release is one of the nicest looking TV blurays in my collection. Anyway, rather than going on about it, here's the trailer and I recommend you watch the pilot episode and you'll see for yourself. And for anyone wondering, I've seen La Femme Nikita and it's plenty different, it is more of a complete reimagining than a remake.

Well now I'll actually get to the project I was talking about. I decided that, as I'm looking to improve my drawing skills and really push past where I currently am I decided to draw the cast. They're all very different and I've noticed that they all have very different facial structures so it'll give me some good all-round practice. First of all I drew Shane West. He's Michael, the main love interest of the titular character. More than this he works for the Initiative, the origanisation Nikita worked for. He's apparently also known for being in ER but I've only ever seen him in a couple of movies when he was a kid along with an early episode of Buffy. This drawing is not one of my favourites as I was out of practice with my old tablet and I do plan on going over it again soon:

After this character, I'd gotten a new graphics tablet and it was so more responsive so I decided to draw my next character (and my Twitter followers will probably already have seen this), actress Lyndsy Fonseca. She plays the young assassin Alex in the show and is also well known for playing Katie in Kickass and Ted's daughter in How I Met Your Mother among other roles:

This, I feel, was a great success and it only pushed me to do more drawings. I have found a nice digital painting style finally and so I started my next one; Devon Sawa. He was actually a secondary character in the first and second seasons but is being moved up to the main cast in the new season, plus he's a great guy who's tweeted me regarding the drawing and says he likes it (:D). He plays Owen, another division agent and has just recently got back into acting after a great career as a child/young adult actor. He played the human (well living) version of Casper in the 1995 film and has had other roles in many films I watched growing up, one of which was the first Final Destination film where her played the main character, Alex. This drawing proved a real issue as the only good reference image I could find had him staring off into the distance and I (clearly) had some trouble changing his eyes to look more forward. Although it's a lot better than the original.

well, other than this there's not much else to update on this project. I've started my next drawing, Dillon Casey who plays Sean in the show. I started it a while ago but I keep jumping between projects. I do want to get it finished by the end of the newest season at least as it premieres very soon. As you can see it's only just started but I'll upload it when it's all done

Been a busy day so far, got up early to watch my new Bluray edition of The Hunger Games before work and was so surprised how in depth the special features were. If you, like me, are interested in just about every aspect of film it's a must purchase even if you're not particularly bothered by the film itself. The 8-part making of seems to be around half an hour per part which is really unusual; you're lucky to get an hour of special features if any these days. Everything from casting and production design to screenwriting and direction is explored, I really recommend getting it. I still haven't managed to watch it all so that'll be what I'll be doing once I've finished this blog post. Aside from telling you what I've been spending all my hard earned money on I've also been working on my drawing a little more today (although there was only a couple of people on the train today) and I've also had some exciting news on the job front. I haven't actually applied yet, I've just found out about a great position in the company I work for that'd be perfect. To prepare for this job, well graduate scheme, and make myself as employable as possible I've decided to learn web design as it is one of the many things the job could entail. I saw an offer on Groupon that I'll be going for, which is a group of 37 webmaster courses including everything from design to coding and at the reasonable price of £99. I figure if I pay for it then I'll force myself to get the most out of it rather than just looking for web tutorials that I can send to the bottom of the never-ending pile of bookmarks I currently have to work through. Aside from that I've got a few more drawings that I did recently that I've yet to upload here. As I'm off tomorrow I'll probably do a couple of posts to show my latest projects. First of all, Jon Snow from HBO's Game of Thrones. Been a couple of months since I drew this one but I saw it again today and surprisingly I'm still quite happy with it:

Next we have a quick sketch I did of Sarah Michelle Gellar pulling a face. Doesn't look too much like her but it was more to try some exaggerated facial expressions, and it didn't take long:

Another couple of drawings I did of some members of the public while I was sat in Costa coffee waiting for the train:

Strangers on a Train

So it's been a while.. But I'm just gonna ignore that and great straight back into the swing of things. First of all; I'm a graduate! I recently finished university and got a First Class Masters Degree in animation. This is great news obviously but I'm not under any allusions; this is the time that I really have to push myself. I have a way to go before I can go up against those people applying for the jobs I want and seeing as I've never had a gap in my education, I'm currently working part time at Sky TV and spending the rest of my time working on my portfolio; VFX, animation, drawing, modelling and anything I can to find what I'm best at. Lately though I've made huge improvements in my drawing skills. I tend to have these big jumps when I take a lot of time to practice. This has been helped by the fact that I've been commuting to work in Sheffield from my parents' house (where I'm staying until I get a job confirmed in London) and the train journeys give me a lot of free time away (mostly) from the internet. Rather than sitting there bored and listening to music I've decided to spend most of my time drawing the people around me. It's great. There aren't any life drawing classes that are easily accessible so it's my free replacement of that and honestly, since I started the regular practice I've become so much better. I think the fact that I've also been reading up on anatomy, especially facial structure has really helped and I'm not making up characters that look much more unique and distinct. I thought I'd show you guys some of my latest drawings and see what you think. I'm gonna try to update from now on each day after I've drawn them so I can keep a record of how my skills are improving.