Speedpainting: Tiki Drummer

I noticed that a lot of digital artists who blog, will often put up what they call speedpaintings. These are quick, very impressionistic paintings done in some digital program usually lasting no longer than 10 minutes. It seems like for the most part they tend to be landscapes, a subject that lends itself well to the quick bold strokes and stark contrast between light and dark. Being close to midnight and not wanting to search out a landscape photo, I'd thought I'd try painting the fellow who sits directly in front of me, on my desk.


Some of you may recognize him as one of the Tiki Drummers from Disneyland's Enchanted Tiki Room. The one I have is a replica created by the incredible Kevin Kidney a few years ago, and sold through DisneyShopping.com. Here's a photo of him in my nicely cluttered studio.

Lesson of the Day: It's fun to do stuff from your imagination, but when painting, there's nothing like having your subject in front of you in three dimensions.

I spent about 20 minutes on my painting. I didn't use any fancy brushes or anything (I haven't had time to figure out how to download special brushes) just the Photoshop defaults. But it was really fun to do. I'll have to remember this and do some more when I need some more variety for my blog.