Tag Archives: Graphics

Just another “I’m Back!” Post…

Just another “I’m Back!” Post…

November 24th, 2010

Good news for those who don't fear change!

We’ve all been there; the moment you return from upgrading or revamping your website. It’s a strange moment. All of the millions of people who had been visiting your site (Not quite that many people visit my site though; it’s more in the billions) are now confused as to why the site they loved so much and spent their entire lives visiting now has a completely different look and feel. So, for the sake of your loyal viewers, you try to justify what you have done and try to prove that things will be better, and show them how the site will be better off in the long run.

Obviously, that is where I now am. There were things I liked about my site the way it was before, but a change was needed. This way I feel comfortable posting stuff that pertains to all the dimensions of my life and not just the creative stuff. That being said, I don’t want to waste too much time with the “why”, so I’ll just address the big changes I’ve done.

  • New Logo and design: I tweaked the logo to be a better fit to me, and wanted a smaller and somewhat simpler yet still good looking (to me) design. I felt like the site was trying to be bigger than it really was before, so this new deal seems to fit me better.
  • New Structure: This is the biggest deal of them all; The gallery is no more. A lot of older stuff I posted there didn’t grow in favor to me as time went on, so I’d rather not just have a static page of old stuff I’d rather not have people see. However, for the older stuff that I am still proud of, I will be bringing them back in “Spotlight” features, where I can go more into detail on what the works were, and tell the story behind them instead of just saying “Oh hey, here’s an image for you to look at.”
  • Categories: Everything from now on will be split into six categories. Photos for (yes, you guessed it) photos, Graphics for any kind of illustrations/design/photo manipulations/3d models, Music for any kind of audio I create, Words for any written stuff I make up, Hockey for anything I want to post about in the hockey world, and then the final category, Brian, which will include site updates and anything else I feel like posting.

This is all just the beginning for the new era of my site, so come back often, as I hope to give you a reason to do so! I have quite a few backlogged items that I will be posting now that the site is live.

My First Ever Piece of Digital Art

My First Ever Piece of Digital Art

November 8th, 2009

My first digital art

It all started while I was searching for a picture of me when I was younger with my Big Wheel. I was asked if my Big Wheel had brakes, and I was pretty sure they didn’t but I looked for the picture just to make sure (You can view that picture here.) While searching, I found a notable image from 26th of June, 1991. In that photo featured my first piece of digital art.

I was in Kindergarten then, having been lucky enough to have a home computer at that time. The Apple II gs was responsible for many hours of games like Thexder, Police Quest, and also trying to answer the questions that allowed you to play Leisure Suit Larry with my brother. I think I created the art in Print Shop Deluxe or Paintworks Gold.

As you can see, it was the work of a genius, with my my appropriately styled glasses, very correctly sized shirt, and perfectly done clip-on tie. That genius is only amplified when you look at the printed work itself, which is a self portrait of me wearing the exact same clothing. Apparently I was a fast worker then as well!

While it may not be much, it’s still cool to look back eighteen years and see the first thing you ever created on a computer. Too bad I haven’t improved at all!

Anatomy of Lundqvist – All Alone

Anatomy of Lundqvist – All Alone

November 5th, 2009
Henrik Lundqvist - All Alone

How did I create this?

In another effort to show you, my billions and billions of fans, the way I go about creating works, I bring you the dissection of my creation “Henrik Lundqvist – All Alone”.

The main ingredients were a photograph that I took of Henrik Lundqvist that I took during warm-ups when the Rangers faced off against the Bruins on November 1st, and the background setting that I put him into.

This piece was an update to an image I created about two years ago, which also featured Henrik Lundqvist in a dark foggy setting (Check out the original). I wanted to make something that captured the feel of the original, but also improved upon it.

Now that we’re ready, lets get to the start of things!

First, I grabbed a suitable photo to work with, which features Henrik Lundqvist in his “crouched focus” pose, as he does before he takes shots in warm-ups.

Henrik Lundqvist – All Alone v2

Henrik Lundqvist – All Alone v2

November 2nd, 2009

Henrik Lundqvist - All Alone

Here is a wallpaper featuring New York Rangers goaltender Henrik Lundqvist. This was a recreation of an earlier work of mine, where I had Lundqvist under a spotlight in a dark foggy rink.

You can download it at multiple resolutions below:

Anatomy of a Photo Manipulation

Anatomy of a Photo Manipulation

October 30th, 2009
How did I create this?

How did I create this?

In this little look into how I approach and execute my work, I’m going to show how I created the photo manipulation you see to the side here.

First off, the goal. I wanted an image of me sporting the uniforms of the Gem City Aviators that I designed. There were three things in the real world holding me back. I am rarely photographed, especially while playing hockey, I needed something high res, and I had no physical version of the uniforms (no jersey, matching gloves, matching pants, and socks). So, I had to think about how I could manipulate an existing photo to be a photo of me. Most people would just slap their face on a player photo and edit the uniform to look like whatever they wanted, but I wanted it to match very closely to me by having the same equipment that I used in real life.

The first order of business would be finding a suitable photo to work with. I figured that the New York Islanders uniforms had a somewhat similar design scheme to the one I made for the Aviators, so I started looking for photos of Islanders players (don’t start fellow Ranger fans :p) that I thought had good poses for me to work with.