Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Beware the WEREBEAR!!


What a bear might look like if bitten by a werewolf.

This started as a style sample for a client but I pushed it that little bit further to make it into a finished piece. The original idea wasn't a Werebear just a very evil, angry bear but the title just rolls off the tongue better.

First a pencil drawing was made and then scanned and coloured in Photoshop. Then in Painter I used an coarse oily blender to 'paint' over the pencils. A bunch of spatter and brushlike textures were made with ink on paper then scanned into Photoshop and overlayed onto the piece to give it more interest.

HERE is some detail at actual size.

Also here is a visual breakdown of it's creation. From pencils, Photoshop, Painter then texture overlays and final tweaking.



EDIT 14th Dec 2007- My Werebear art and many other of my pieces are available to buy as quality prints, posters and canvases over at my REDBUBBLE store. Here are the direct links to the Werebear prints-

Beware the Werebear Prints
Werebear Prints (face closeup crop)

28 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Really nice as usaul Chris. Has a sort of traditional painted Bill Sienkiewic look which is bad a$$...as his stuff is out of this world and very hard to replicate. Very nice piece. Would make a sweet shirt like the oppostite of those airbrushed Canadian tourist type shirts.

3:13 PM  
Blogger J. Nowland said...

Hey Chris.... mmmm Spatter.... Deadly job man... this is crazy.... good job... again.... PEACE!
J

PS: HA HA.... "Canadian tourist type shirts"... awesome....

3:18 PM  
Blogger Faboun'e said...

That's a mad Work ! Congratulations ! I would see how you're doing all of that in real or video. I like this.

6:33 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Chris you are a bona fide bloody genius Mate - I'm in awe ......................... Oh and BTW I hate you ...:0)
Terry

8:24 PM  
Blogger Patrick Strogulski said...

Great, what a beast.

8:48 PM  
Blogger SRH said...

That is one angry bear. The detail closeup really gives some visceral reaction. This is really well done. I am getting a bit disturbed by the amount of individual styles you seem to possess. Disturbed and greatly envious.

10:27 PM  
Blogger SEILER said...

Dang! Wow! Holy CRAP!

11:16 PM  
Blogger heri said...

your work will give me nightmares for the rest of my life!

i love it!

-heri

2:34 AM  
Blogger Overvision said...

Sweet, Chris.
Extremely emotional!
What version of Painter are you using nowadays?
I've got the latest, but it's so flakey that I find myself holding on to the previous version.

O

9:53 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chris, Did you forget to take Mac for a walk again? Love Ingrid

3:06 PM  
Blogger MBKKR said...

That's one mean looking bear...
looks like he escaped from hell.
Great job.

3:39 PM  
Blogger Overvision said...

Was that an all-nighter?

O

7:07 PM  
Blogger Chris Wahl said...

Thanks everyone!

Rob Sharp- Hey Rob. I remember you and your brother from the Disney days. Fantastic work you guys are producing on your website.

And thanks for the comment. I definitely had Sienkewicz's style in mind when I drew this.

faboun'e- Thanks. Hopefully the four picture timeline (which I added after most of these comments were made) gives you a bit of insight.

tel- I'll put your hatred down to our whole east coast/west coast rivalry. Go Sydney!! ;)

overvision- Painter 8 was used for this. After using Painter Classic for so long, it's still overwhelming by the amount of tools to choose from in version 8. I imagine 10 wouldn't be any simpler.

...and no, not an all-nighter. About 2hours work at night, then another hour or so the next morning.

Ingrid- hehe. Now that you mention it, this does look alot like our dog (except Mac's the biggest wuss around)

But if he starts looking at me like that, I'm gonna be running not walking.

12:45 AM  
Blogger Mike Thompson said...

Thanks for sharing the process. Very nice work!

3:51 AM  
Blogger SRH said...

Looking at your process piece, I find it interesting that you go from a pretty tight style and loosen it up with each step. I would have thought ut would have started with a more gestural sketch and then more detail added.

I also like the addition of more red negative space at the top of the image and the exageration of the bear's back. Those 2 minor pushes really take the bear from being a menacing bear to being a force-of-evil-nature intent-on-eating-people bear

2:52 PM  
Blogger Piotr said...

scary but so great!! really nice work as usual chris

7:21 AM  
Blogger Nelson Santos said...

Awsome work Chris!

7:29 PM  
Blogger Chris Wahl said...

Always nice to get new comments. Thanks guys!

srh- I find it very hard to work from gestural sketches. I really like to have all the problems worked out in the preliminary stage. It gives me the confidence to keep going.

I'm a bit impatient and nervous in that respect. If I can't see immediate evidence that a pic is working out, I find it hard to follow it through to the end.

8:10 PM  
Blogger Arkonbey said...

Sweet.

What I'm reminded of is the Demon Bear from the good years of The New Mutants.

9:43 PM  
Blogger Chris Wahl said...

arkonbey- Very observant. I didn't use direct reference, but I definitely had memories of those issues in the back of my mind when I did this piece. Especially the way Sienkewicz did the hair standing up on the back of the neck.

10:09 PM  
Blogger katzenjammer studios said...

phenomenal stuff. your pencil/paint blending technique is very interesting. I think your workflow is great (keeps you drawin) and your final pieces look amazing. keep up the good work.

9:49 PM  
Blogger Chris Wahl said...

Thanks for the kind words, Katzenjammer.

7:29 PM  
Blogger g1toons said...

wow pretty vicious

7:25 AM  
Blogger Brandon said...

Thanks for the mini tutorial. It's always cool to see how you make it happen. I'll have to try this process out.

2:05 PM  
Blogger Chris Wahl said...

Thanks guys!

8:09 PM  
Blogger Brian Churilla said...

slick. thanks for showing the process.

12:57 AM  
Blogger Chris Wahl said...

Thanks Brian.

6:18 PM  
Blogger Andrew Glazebrook said...

I do love this pic !! Loads of neat updates here too !!

2:47 AM  

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All artwork © Chris Wahl 2019 unless otherwise stated. All characters are copyright to their respective owners