A fallen angel gazes upward, stranded in a gothic, cyberpunk landscape. Hideous buildings reach upward like jagged teeth. Her mohawk, a half-hearted attempt at rebellion. She longs for escape, but even her wings can’t save her now.
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Buy “Crevice” as poster or print
Tags: gothic angel, fallen angel, digital art, angel art, fantasy art, surreal art, punk, cyberpunk, sci-fi, science fiction
Thank you for visiting Blackened Wing: Gothic Angel Art by Carter Bowles. Here is our newest poster: “Behind the Mask.” Something a little more playful. I hope the image and title speak for themselves.
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Buy “Behind the Mask” as poster or print
Tags: gothic angel, fallen angel, digital art, angel art, fantasy art, surreal art
Thanks for visiting Blackened Wing. We’re going to try something a little different today. I’ll take you behind the scenes of our most recent sketch: “Stripped.” To begin with, it was created in Photoshop CS3. The original canvas size was 7000 by 4600 pixels, perfect for large posters.
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I have come to realize it is much easier to start on a piece of art when you begin with something other than a blank slate. Never start on a white background. A solid color is fine, but in this case I used photo manipulation. I won’t go into the details, but a background like this is fairly easy to create. I simply layered several photos over top each other, tweaking the blending mode for each layer. I then played with the hue and saturation to tone down the colors and keep it uniform.
Not everybody needs to sketch out what they are planning, but for me it is absolutely vital. This is the most important part of my process and I use it on every work of art I create. Don’t be afraid to be very, very loose. The easiest way to make something look amateurish is to start out focusing on every little detail. At this stage you want to focus on proportions and perspective. Oddly, this is the second most difficult part for me. During this stage you are deciding the premise of everything to follow.
This is the most difficult part. I always begin with the eyes, then move on to the nose and mouth, the rest of the face, the neck and chest, arms, torso, abdomen, hips, and legs. I try to focus on the surfaces, rather than the outlines. Think about how light plays on those surfaces. I use a 9 pixel brush with pressure sensitivity turned on. I start out with black, then go over it with the highlights, tracing the contours as I do so.
I consider this stage the most relaxing. Some might consider it tedious. Regardless, this is the easy part. I simply blow up the image and fill in all the gaps to smooth everything out. This part was more difficult than it should have been this time around because I decided to flesh out the ribs and torso a bit more. Don’t be afraid to reference photos to help yourself along. Remember to trace your contours. Use curved lines as you shade, tracing the surface of your subject.
Not much to say here. Just went through and erased any sketchy lines along the outline.
I should have sketched in the wings during the first stage, but it’s never too late to go back through and plan the rest of your work.
For anything black, like the wings, I start out with a solid black background, then go through and do all the shading with highlights. If she had hair, as most of my characters have black hair, it would be done the same way. For anything like hair or feathers only one pass is necessary. If I were to go over it again, it would likely end up looking too smooth.
Nothing adds more depth to your work in less time than shadows. I just went through with a larger brush for this. Always think about your light source and where it intersects your subject.
And that’s all there is to it. I hope this was helpful.
Buy “Stripped” as poster or print
Tags: gothic angel, fallen angel, digital art, angel art, fantasy art, surreal art, tutorial
Welcome back to Blackened Wing. We have a new digital sketch available: “Stripped.”
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Buy “Stripped” as poster or print
Tags: gothic angel, fallen angel, digital art, angel art, fantasy art, surreal art
Welcome to Blackened Wing, your source for artistic depictions of fallen angels.
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Fallen:
Buy “Fallen” as poster or print
Defiance:
Buy “Defiance” as a poster or print
Hope:
Buy “Hope” as a poster or print
Tags: gothic angel, fallen angel, digital art, angel art, fantasy art, surreal art
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