Concept Art Exercise: How to Paint Lifelike Monsters

Digital Painting Tutorial: Painting Monsters
Concept Art Genre: Sci-Fi Creatures
Subject: How to Paint Lifelike Monsters

Monsters are awesome - but why? What makes one monster design cool and another kind of meh...

Humans are hard-wired to recognize certain things about creatures and animals - is this thing a threat? Can it eat me? Should I run from it? As concept artists, we can learn how to use those built-in human reactions to design creatures that really get our viewer's attention.

In this 15 minute video I challenge you to practice blending realism with your artistic technique—to create a compelling monster. So grab your stylus and let's paint your world.

Key Take-Aways: How to create a lifelike monster by playing with Anatomy, Form and Skin to produce character, personality and energy.

→ Evoking Real Animals
→ Value and Anatomy
→ Color and Skin Tones

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Digital Painting Challenge: 5 Monsters in 5 Weeks ✍🏻
Improve your ability to draw realistic and compelling creatures, as you challenge yourself to paint 5 monsters in 5 weeks with Hardy Fowler.

HOW TO JOIN THE CHALLENGE:
→ The weekly challenge will be posted every Wednesday at 11am (CT)
→ You have one week to finish the monster of the week
→ Post your painting to your gram and tag @hardy_digitalpaintingstudio

We’ll be hand selecting 5 artists (one each week) for an invitation only feedback & mentorship session with Hardy Fowler or enrollment in the DPS PRO or CORE course of your choice!

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PAINT YOUR WORLD
Hardy Fowler is a professional Digital Painter with work seen in productions for Disney, Games Workshop and Neon District among many others.

Hardy's online academy, Digital Painting Studio, teaches the master-level skills, process and mindset he's learned from decades of experience as a professional digital artist.

CONNECT

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#conceptart #digitalpainting #characterdesign #howtodraw #howtopaint #paintingskin #drawingmonsters #creaturedesign #monsterart #creatureart

[HazedShaman]

That monster big or small would be terrifying to ever come across. I really love the idea of it being a creature that could lunge its head at its victim. I also really love the design choice to do the geometric patterns to the scaley skin, superb video as per usual Hardy!

[sannteh]

You're an amazing person, thanks for sharing all of this worthy knowledge with us ❤

[rezonantsarachnids]

Of all your paintings i've seen, this one sticks out as my favourite. thank you immeasurably for the passion and tips you put into videos like this, i can say they have been truly helpful to me and no doubt countless other viewers

[mayudrake]

Wow, seeing your carveout method combined with the value first technique and how great this works together - I'll definitely give it a try! Great video and great challenge, can't wait to start! 😄

[xuanxh]

I'm glad I found your channel. I've watched a few of your videos and so far I absolutely love watching your process. It seems so simple, to the point and straightforward, yet so difficult to properly execute without master skills and experience. I'm probably going to struggle a lot, but I am going to give this process a try!

[RaptorsVevo]

This was genuinely so interesting to see. I've been wanting to figure out how to render realistic creatures in my art for some time, and never taken the plunge, but this seems so intuitive and fun to do. I may not take part in the challenge itself, but this has for sure inspired me to at least give the methods a try. Excellent video, looking forwards to seeing more method and technique breakdowns!

[Gnarledwolf]

I'm fascinated by your technique of painting in the muscles then coating those with a layer of skin. That helps so much to see!

[alexsien]

Wow, this art is amazing! as a lover of art and biology myself, I find this video very informative and inspiring. I really love the rendering and can't believe this channel isn't more popular.

[leandroxavier]

Yeah... The carveout is not only good for mechanic parts... Organics turn out perfect! Excellent and masterful as always, Hardy. Thank you for sharing.

[ITS_JNPL]

I really like this so much. I just started doing digital art. I want to be able to express what's inside my head when i draw.

[galactica]

hey hardy! your rendering of the muscles on the creature is so good! how did you master anatomy? are there any resources I could look for?

[nudgeA]

yea, this is frikkin tactical and the best video i watched from you, and totally inline with what i have been trying sofar, so i keep this on loop for a while;) tnx man, awesome ;), cyborgmonsters here we come:)

[AbhishekKumar-hqdi]

I loved your last week video on fast character design. It was very easy and fast but value painting is hard and it takes a lot of time.
Also when should we do value painting and when we should do the fast designing technique like your last video??
Should we always do value painting when designing creatures??

[TheodoreKalamov]

Hey Hardy! Would you apply this technique to more mechanical, hard surface objects as well? I think it's very helpful, but I'm not sure how well it translates to inorganic matter?

[bonster]

your shading is so good that it started to look like a 3d textureless render with the orange.

[voacity]

I was wondering why this is the first I’m seeing of this! Posted 11 hours ago! Sick!

[natashaglogy]

Hey I just discovered your channel!
This is really interesting and useful. Never drew monsters or creatures before, I might give it a try

[RequiesAeternaGaming]

So, what is the point of the orange layer? What purpose does it serve for your process?

[corvidaeae]

First thought when I saw that thumbnail was vraal. Glad that made me click, this was a really cool video.

[rathodmukendra]

Super cool technique for designing and rendering...I love this technique and I am going to give a try.
Q- how to do the same for creature with hair and fur?