If you are talented both in illustrating and storytelling, you might want to consider a career as a comic book artist. Depending on your passion or interest, you may also specialize in specific genres such as superhero comics, manga, alternative or esoteric, actions and adventures, adult, horror, humor, science fiction, and children’s comics. On average, a comic book freelance illustrator could earn between US$100 and US$300 per page. Illustrators who are regular employees of comic book companies may earn lower or higher depending on the company. Small companies pay less while well-known companies like Marvel pay more. Elite illustrators could earn as much as $US1,000 per page. You may either do regular series or create your own graphic novel.

Publishing companies typically give advance payments per comic book project that has specified deadline that may range from a few weeks to several months. On average, mainstream comic books are published once a month and each comic book might be...

Whether you like it or not, deciding on going to an art school or not is primarily an economic decision. In terms of economics, there are several opportunity costs of going to art school. These does not only refer to financial aspect buy also about time and efforts that you will spend in pursuing an art course or art degree. It could mean years of studying and spending several thousands of dollars on tuition fees and other school-related expenses. The initial factors that you should consider when contemplating on a decision whether or not you are going to pursue an art education are the following:

1.) The school – You have three general options, namely, a stand-alone art school, a trade-type art school, a community college. Stand-alone art schools are a dime in a dozen and some are informal schools but there are many that have government recognitions. Some are well-known and have produced several successful artists in various fields. The main advantage of going to a stand-alone art sc...

Photorealism is often interchanged with hyperrealism and superrealism but it is a distinct artisitic genre and style of its own. It is actually the conceptual ancestor of both hyperrealism and superrealism. As an art form, it is fundamentally based on using high resolution photographs as basis for creating art works. The photographic images are rendered as paintings or drawings as realistically as possible or combined with other details to express certain ideas or concepts. One common method of creating such photorealistic arts is to project photographic images on canvass and use airbrush to replicate the images. Details are painstakingly rendered into another media in the process.

As an art style and genre, photorealism was developed into a collective movement of experimental artists during the 1970s. It came about during the same period and background as other art movements such as conceptual art, pop art and minimalism. As the name implies, it has strong emphasis on visual realism ...

Artistic skills can be partly measured by the technical aspects of mimicking the light and shadow details of actual subjects and objects. It involves manipulating the visual perception to achieve realistic and sometimes photographic results. The level of skills of an artist can also be assessed based on his or her ability to create impressive artworks using very limited materials.

For instance, using only graphite pencil as drawing material for creating photorealistic artworks is something that is almost magical. The painstaking details and subtle transitions between light and dark, shadows and illumination are very difficult to achieve by simply using graphite pencils. Aside from the fact that only shades and contrasts can be achieved using a pencil, there are subtleties and intensities that cannot be captured by black and white images. This is the main reason why blurred black and white images are often used in publications and on TV when depicting bloody or gruesome crime scenes.

Some say that art imitates life but what if art becomes too lifelike that it is visually very difficult to distinguish from a photograph of the real thing? Well, we are now talking about hyperrealism. It is a genre in visual arts – painting and sculpture – that is primarily focused on creating artworks that are very realistic. These artworks oftentimes resemble high-resolution photographs in the case of paintings and drawings or they resemble actual objects, people and animals in the case of sculptures. Hyperrealism developed from photorealism, which is simply the mimicry of photographs using paint and other media. Hyperrealism is an advancement of photorealism.

Hyperrealism is part of an independent art style and art movement that started in the United States and Europe during the early part of the 1970s. It has evolved since then and many visuals artists built their careers as hyperrealist artists. Some of contemporary hyperrealist artists have large installation exhibits like the...

Mind over matter. Nature versus nurture. Genetics versus environment. Theory versus praxis. Dichotomies are endless despite being in a world of spectrums. One can simply ask “why not both?”

Even if each element plays a vital role, sometimes people tend to neglect one against the other. That being said, there are times that people only give weight to their actions. If it’s done pretty well, it’s good, one might say. For some, the end justifies the means. However, it is worth noting that one side of the coin always affects the other, the way our beliefs affect our actions. Say for an instance, if a person silently believes that gays are worth respecting, then it’s likely that he’d avoid being homophobic, though it is arguable that it isn’t a guarantee. That is the same when one wants to accomplish something. If one thinks that his certain effort will yield particular results, chances are those results will be visible afterward. This is where the power of mindset comes into the spotlight...

In the Facebook video with a caption “Judge Yourself By Your Own Graph NOT Others!” Ryan Kingslien laid out various points on how we have to judge ourselves in comparison to other artists.

He was inspired by his deceased father-in-law from whom he acquired his most important insight: “Don’t judge yourself by other people. Judge yourself by your own graph.”

With the said acumen, the speaker demonstrated how we typically compare ourselves to others, on how we think that they are far better on particular matters than us. Moreover, he used linear graphs to represent how we perceive ourselves improving as well as how we gauge the present achievement of some other subject.  Initially presenting two sets of linear graphs, the first one tackles how we jump from one point to another in terms of skills while the other one attempts to match our growth with that of someone else’s.

Given the said portrayals, the speaker reiterated how the aforementioned linear view of ourselves is inaccurate bec...

Complicated digital images, particularly the 3D images, are difficult to create by just using one software application. Animators and game graphic designers would use three or more applications to create realist images. It is not radically different from the traditional way of sculpting physical objects. Oftentimes one set of tools like chisel is not enough, which is particularly true for composite art pieces. A composite art piece might be created out of different materials such as wood, marble and metal. You will need a welding tool if you use metal as part of the art piece. Similarly, you will need photo editing applications and image renderers to create realistic objects in ZBrush.

As a 3D digital sculpting software application, ZBrush does not have all the tools necessary to create complex objects. If it were, then it would probably be slower and too bulky to handle. It would not only be awkward to use and difficult to master but it might not work very well. It would be akin t...

Learning does not stop, they say. It is a cognitive ability that is innate to us. Evolution verifies that better learning ability helps certain species to survive longer in this world. Furthermore, how would we maximize our learning abilities? Is it merely instinctive? Let us unveil the studied principles behind.

Edward Lee Thorndike, an American psychologist, outlined a definitive set of learning process which is not limited to our cognition. He devised a theory called “laws of learning.”

Thorndike’s Laws of Learning are as follow:

Law of Readiness or Law of Action Tendency
This pertains to the preparedness and mental attitude of a person. Readiness is described here as a way to be prepared prior certain actions. It considers the given capability of the learner and his willingness to learn. It is a common sense that a year-old infant is not prepared to learn complex calculus equations. More so, a typical adult not willing to learn how to do gambling games will not also likely learn ...

Have you ever tried creating a 3D character in ZBrush? Well, even if you are a newbie in graphic design or not very familiar with the advanced features of ZBrush, you can easily learn the step-by-step process from tutorial videos like this tutorial about sculpting a realistic eye as presented by Jay Hill.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj5uK6RSdUo

An eye is very basic if you want to create realistic characters that have emotions and personalities. Your character could either be human or a fantastic creature. It could be alien or monster. At any rate, incorporating a realistic eye into your character would make it more believable. The eye is the most recognizable feature of a face. When properly placed in a character’s face, it helps provide the means of expressing complex emotions like fear, anger, love, embarrassment and pity.

The eye is proverbially called as the window of the soul. It is called as such not only because it is the organ used for perceiving light and images but als...