The feeling that we’ll never be “good enough” isn’t something to remove, my dear grey-faced pudding-pop, it’s the cold, hard, and universal truth that pushes us forward whether we’re amateurs or masters of our crafts. 

If I feel I’m good enough at any point in my life, I’ll be both a massive disappointment to the tiny angel-winged/shoulder-mounted version of me, and have effectively cheated myself of exploring my own human capacity. Like many problems that people face, how you use the struggle will determine its effect on you. It’s shockingly easy to let the abstract fear of never amounting to anything cripple you into a sobbing, fetal-position-assuming, ball of angst and pouting, but (though more difficult) turning that fear on its head and using it as the glorious fire under your ass to keep moving… well it keeps you alive and willing to attempt to make that life worthwhile. 

I get embarrassingly giddy when I see artists 40-50 years older than myself and their work has evolved exponentially over the course of their lives, continues to do so, and that even near the end, they feel their work still won’t be good enough after their dying breath. You can see that as a morbid and depressing thought, sure, OR you can see it as a delightful and life-affirming reminder that most people are never happy with who they are and what they’re capable of — but we get to spend our lifetime improving our skills and subsequently — ourselves. 

Blood Brother Poster - Illustration by Sam Spratt

I illustrated the poster for the winner of Best Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival. It’s a gorgeous and refreshingly self-aware film that I’m happy to be a part of in some small way. It will be making its way around, but I believe the next upcoming screening will be at Sundance London — so you should see these plastered around if you’re in the area. 

That largely depends on how well you understand the program you plan on drawing with. The technique, fundamentals, and general rules of drawing and painting can be tweaked then applied to any medium — digital isn’t an exception — the biggest shift is simply in learning how to use the toolset and do so efficiently.

When I mostly painted in oils, I knew the confines and necessities of the toolset — I knew going into a painting that I needed my paints nearby and I would group them together with similar colored tubes in their own bags. I would mix key color scales ahead of time on a glass palette so that I wouldn’t need to constantly be making new ones mid-painting. I would buy generally either a linen canvas and head to the wood shop to build stretchers to put it on or just use a wooden panel as my surface. I’d need it on easel which would need to be angled to the right so that my painting arm wasn’t obscuring the model, photo, or still-life I was looking at. I’d need turpenoid/turpentine, linseed oil, and walnut oil for mixing and changing the consistency of the paint, have my brushes arranged with different bristle types and sizes for different paints as well as certain brushes for lighter colors and certain for darker. I learned how much pressure to apply to get a smooth or scumbled/dry look, how to glaze color, how to hold a brush for the most control without smudging wet paint, how long to wait in between layers, how to use both dry and wet layers for different purposes and textures, and a million other tiny factors that make up everything that is “oil painting”.

When I started to move to Photoshop, some of those things were simplified and synthesized like color mixing, paint drying, and brush cleaning, some were just slightly tweaked like the transition of thinners and thickeners to opacity and blending modes, and others were completely unfamiliar like an infinite range of sliders and depth maps replacing my familiar sable and bristle brushes (though over time you can learn how to use brush settings to bring that organic and at times unpredictable nature of real brushes back into a synthetic environment) — but what helped me transition most was simply learning the tools and nuances that make digital painting its own thing. Hotkeys, selections, layers, workspaces, and so on are best grasped as soon as possible so that you can simply practice painting — not constantly be forced to learn a new way to do something as you go along. Not learning the confines of your medium puts up obstacles, moments of pause, hesitation, frustration, and reasons to get distracted. I find this especially key of the digital medium for me, because the thing I like most about it over other means of painting is that I can just sit down and start making shit.

I don’t have to prepare ahead of time, making sure I have the necessary supplies, that my brushes are clean, my paints are sorted, my colors are mixed, my canvas is stretched… these are all things that delay getting that first brushstroke down — and though many people like digital for many reasons, I just get excited about making things and this lets me START doing so quicker. Even when I spend over a hundred hours on a digital illustration, being able to jump right into the first second of it gives me momentum and the motivation to start and subsequently finish a good deal of things. Drawing and painting traditionally combined with learning the fundamentals of Photoshop early on (even before I knew it could be used for drawing) made picking up a Wacom pen click incredibly fast. Though in the 6 years I’ve been digitally painting I still learn new things all of the time, especially ways I can manipulate the tools of the software to cater to aspects of oil painting I miss, it’s those fundamental first steps of learning the confines of the toolbox that digital artists of every level still use.

It’s also important to mention that like traditional mediums, digital can be as little as one step of a mixed-media process –- learn the tools that apply to its purpose for you. I know artists who only use it to bring out highlights of an otherwise all-oil piece for print, others who only use it to overlay color, others still who do their linework in pencil and then paint value and color digitally, obviously many who use digital from scratch, and some who even use digital initially, print, and draw/paint on top of their lines. Digital art does not replace or make older mediums obsolete, it’s simply a newer one with strengths and drawbacks like the rest of them. As new-fangled as it may seem to purists, I can assure you that painting with pixels is shockingly similar to doing so with pigment.

My portrait of the Virgin should be done by tomorrow, here’s a snippet. Also, on Tuesday I’ll get to reveal the poster I painted for the Sundance Film Festival Best Documentary-winning movie, Blood Brother, which I’m fairly excited about.

A little bit of hand sketchin’

SAM SPRATT’S SIGNED TOMB RAIDER DEV EDITION PRINT GIVEAWAY!

In short: Likes and Reblogs of this image are each entries to win it. Giveaway ends in 1 week. Ships worldwide. You can also enter on Facebook.

In slightly less short: I have a couple 18”x24” prints of the poster I made commissioned by Crystal Dynamics and I’d like to give one away. Only myself and the developers of the game itself have this gold foiled “Dev Team Edition” but if you’re not a gambling person, the normal limited edition is on sale HERE

I might even have a few left over prints of some other works for runner-ups as well…

“Seer” - Illustration by Sam Spratt

(via fer1972)

I’ll be burrowing deep into my art cave on a particularly cool project for awhile so here’s some progress on a critter I’ve been making.

More progress…

Work in progress painting…

“The Dowager Countess’s New Clothes” - Illustration by Sam Spratt

Sometimes I finish something and I have no idea why I made it, but a small part of me knows that it was the right decision.

“Tomb Raider” - Illustration by Sam Spratt

Official illustrated poster commissioned by Crystal Dynamics and Square Enix to promote the upcoming game for global print, covers, and a special gold-foil variant just for the developers. There’ll be more info soon on when and where you can get your hands on the 18”x24” poster and I’ll have some fun behind the scenes pics on its creation in the near future.

Huge thanks to Alex Ruby, Joey L, and Caleb Adams.