Cutie Pie

Here is a drawing I created, inspired by one of my two brothers named Pierre, and it's dedicated to him. As an overly sensitive little boy, he used to cry a lot, but he was also quite active, often getting bruises at school from fighting like a little brawler and coming home with a black eye. I remember he would always injure himself while attempting stunts to entertain the other kids and bring them joy.

Here is the complete process of a short animated clip I created featuring Jerry Mouse fighting COVID-19. This project served as a course to primarily teach the use of Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator, as well as how to work in Adobe Animate and Adobe Premiere Pro. Throughout the process, I provided advice on the basics of 2D animation, referencing both of my all-time favorite books by Preston Blair and Richard Williams.

The objective of this illustration was to use the Link statue as a reference to create a completely new composition, following these steps: line art, shading, lighting, coloring, rendering, and special effects (FX). I have also cropped some close-up sections, so feel free to zoom in for more detail.

Long ago, one of my very first digital paintings was inspired by Aaron Blaise, an animator and artist, along with his engaging YouTube channel and course content on his website, creatureartteacher.com. I felt so inspired by him that I binge-watched all the videos he uploaded, discovering many commonalities between his artistic journey and mine, as well as his perspective. I learned great techniques from him. Here is a cute composition I created, primarily focusing on storytelling, colors, values, and, once again, fur. The only photobashed element in this painting is a photograph of the leaves from my hazelnut tree, taken in my home garden in Saint-Jeannet, which is visible in the background. I thought it was a nice and easy way to complete the illustration, while everything else was digitally hand-drawn.

The goal was to draw inspiration from the original Saint Seiya manga character from the Knights of the Zodiac anime, using its iconic gesture. The challenge was to change the lighting from the reference and create an entirely new composition from scratch that does not exist among the reference images available online. The focus here was primarily on studying composition, gesture, and values, while also enjoying the process of drawing a manga character I admired greatly in my youth. I created this drawing using Adobe Photoshop and completed the final rendering in Adobe After Effects. I have uploaded a timelapse of my entire drawing process here.

Here is a very simple cartoon character I designed for the drawing classes to gently introduce students to the art of character design and development. I generally start these courses with basic shapes to ensure that the material is comprehensible for everyone, including complete beginners. This course covers a variety of digital techniques and emphasizes organization in Adobe Photoshop. After gaining knowledge from this course, students can advance their skills and tackle more complex designs for their film school projects.

Here are some traditional portraits I painted using soft pastels. I generally enjoy exploring human gestures, eye and facial expressions, as well as values and colors to achieve an interesting rendering. Since childhood, I have observed my environment and the people around me extensively to build my visual memory over the years, and I have always felt the need to draw everything.

Here is a cartoon character design of a bat that I had in mind for a while. I wanted to use it for my art classes to teach the entire process of character creation as a gentle introduction to character design and development. I believe it is also a good way to cover some key points in Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator.

Here is a fan art painting of Warhammer 40,000, which you can see at the bottom of this page. My drawing is not a reproduction; I created it to study values, layout, perspective, dynamics, and camera view. The focus was to make the composition more dynamic while drawing the same character along with all his details and accessories from a different angle, using only values.

As an art teacher, here is one of the many digital drawing and painting courses I created to explain values and how to use colors on a simple shape. In this course, students will learn to render a proper apple under a chosen lighting atmosphere, such as a spring morning outdoors. I also provide valuable digital techniques in Adobe Photoshop to replicate traditional art in a digital medium. Once students have completed this painting following my guidance and demonstrations, I generally encourage them to attempt the exercise using different lighting atmospheres.