 |
| Final painting |
I described drawing process for this piece in an earlier post. Basically I watched Kamen Rider Black RX on TV growing up and wanted to draw Robo Rider because I remembered how cool he was. After drawing the pencil art though, an idea struck me for a Bio Rider piece and I drew that too. Despite getting caught up in the excitement of drawing this new idea, I did get myself to finish painting this piece.
When starting, my main inspiration was a piece by Jake Parker titled "Sentinel of the Fifth Sun". The idea was painted background with comic-style figure in the foreground. However, my goal this year is to create images that evoke emotional reaction. I had to aim for something more striking. What was it about Kamen Rider and other Japanese tokusatsu shows in the 80s that I found striking?
The image I started with was one shot in Jiban opening. I can find only a low res image of the shot, shown below; my memory was even more blurry. I remembered the contrast was more dramatic. Main ideas I wanted to capture were (1) dark background, (2) overall low key image, and (3) strong rim lights.
 |
| The shot in Jiban opening |
After some searching and head scratching, I gathered the following reference board. (The image of Janperson head was a surprise find. It looks good and is high res.)
 |
| References for painting |
It was time to start painting. The opening steps were as expected: adding base color, lighting... and not liking the result.
 |
| Opening steps. Lineart; base colors; lighting; glow. |
I was struggling at this point. I followed my plan but I did not like how it looked. Still, I started painting the rim lights, making the fill light white color (instead of red) and it started to look the way I wanted.
 |
| Rim light added |
To make Robo Rider stand out, I added rim light to the head as well, effectively giving him a white outline. Next, I darken RX head in the background to improve the contrast.
 |
| Making Robo Rider stand out from the background |
Finally, I painted RX eyes, adding dark core shadows. I soften the outer edges around RX to give the illusion of depth of field. I painted in colors using a sparse brush; but the result does not look good. I probably should have used the smudge brush...
 |
| Working on RX in the background |
At this point, the painting was mostly done. Only small details on Robo Rider remained: highlights on the eyes and belt gear details. (While working on this painting, I realized how different Robo Rider belt was compared to other forms. I wonder if the designer was different.)
|
| Final painting |
I hope you enjoyed this process post. Next I will paint "Piltover's Finest" while continue drawing "Bio Rider".