Manny Pacquiao vs. Ricky Hatton

Manny Pacquiao vs. Ricky Hatton, billed as The Battle of East and West, was a boxing match for The Ring light welterweight championship. The bout was held between Manny Pacquiao of General Santos, Philippines and Ricky Hatton from Manchester, United Kingdom.

The fight was held on 2 May 2009 at the MGM Grand Las Vegas at Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. Hatton was knocked down by Pacquiao twice during the first round, and again in the second round to lose by KO in the 2nd round. Pacquiao's win makes him one of only two (the other being Oscar De La Hoya) to win six world titles in six different weight divisions at that time (he won his seventh world title in seventh weight division on 14 November 2009 against Miguel Cotto). As of now Manny "Pac-Man) Pacquiao is the first and only eight-division world champion, in which he has won ten world titles, as well as the first to win the lineal championship in four different weight classes. According to Forbes, he was the 2nd highest paid athlete in the world as of 2015. The first highest paid is Floyd "Money" Mayweather who beat Pac-man in a unanimous decision in May of this year.

Below is a digital painting that  I completed recently, exploring a slightly different technique and style than my previous pieces.  Using Photoshop cs6 and Kyle's custom brushes, which you can purchase here.  Kyle has a lot of great brush sets that mimic all kinds of traditional media. Check them out and thanks for stopping by, enjoy!!! and stay inspired :)

Pin Up Art

This one took me a good part of the year to complete, on and off between client work.  At one point I almost gave up on it all together.  Glad I kept messing with it though.  I don't usually work things to this level of realism, but I felt this piece looked better this way than my usual loose painterly look.  I used Painter 2015 and Photoshop cs6, With Artist Mike Thompson's Corel painter Workspace and brushes. Thanks for checking it out, Enjoy !!!!

Steam Punk Spider Monkey

This one started out as a demo for a fellow artist at the tattoo shop I work at.  Inspiration came from movies such as Wild, Wild West and Men In Black, and my good friend Carlos Huante.  Below is the sketch followed by the  painting done in Corel Painter X3 and Photoshop CS6.  Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy !!!!

Jab Jab Whammo, now available at Amazon.com

So before I get into some shameless self promotion, I wanna take the time out to share some awesome tutorials by the very talented Anthony Jones. If your not familiar with his work, do yourself a favor and check it out here. I first heard of Anthony Jones through a 9-week Creature Design course that I signed up for over at the Schoolism site a few years ago. The course was awesome, I learned tons and have been following Anthony's work ever since. Anthony has put together a series of very affordable tutorials , and from the sounds of it he intends on adding a bunch more. I picked up Designing with confidence, Painting with confidence, Zbrush to Photoshop workflow, And Kitbashing your own Paintings. They are all awesome, so head on over there and pick them up. You won't be disappointed. You can check out the Videos Here. I forgot to mention he includes all the files, tools etc. that he uses. Now for some self love :) My art book Jab, Jab, Whammo is now available through the Amazon marketplace. You can check that out here. Good father's Day gift I must say, perfect for toilet reading :) So feel free to help spread the word about Anthony's tutorials and my book of course. Sharing is caring you know. You can preview a sample of the book below, and I also added a nifty little animated Gif of some progress shots of a painting of Italian Actress Gina Lollobrigida that I am working on. I'll be posting the finished piece soon, so be sure and check back. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!!

jab, jab, WHAMMO!!! by Rafael Rivera | Make Your Own Book

Some more studies

The art journey continues.  Here a few more painterly studies from photo references.  These were done in Corel Painter X3 using the oil brushes and Photoshop cs6 using various custom brushes that have canvas textures applied to them.  Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!!

Creature Creation

Here is a painting I did recently exploring the techniques of creature designer Carlos Huante. Carlos is a super talented designer whose work inspires me tremendously. He has been very cool to me as well, always offering great art advice or just taking the time to chat from time to time. He has worked on a variety of film and game projects throughout the years, If your not familiar with his work, you can check out his website Here. His books are available on The Design Studio Press site. And the DvD tutorials that I referenced for this exercise can be found on the Gnomon Workshop site available as a digital download, hard copy, or as part of a yearly subscription Here. He also has a fantastic self published art book called Blind Spot that can be purchased by following the links on his site. I have all his stuff and I highly recommend all of it. I look forward to any future work he has in the pipeline. So here it is, i'll post more of these as I finish them. The sketch was done with Col-erase prismacolor pencil and the painting in Corel painter X3 and Photoshop cs6. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!

Charles Bronson

Charles Bronson (born Charles Dennis Buchinsky; November 3, 1921 – August 30, 2003) was a Lithuanian-American film and television actor. He starred in films such as Once Upon a Time in the West, The Magnificent Seven, The Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape, Rider on the Rain, The Mechanic, and the Death Wish series. He was often cast in the role of a police officer, gunfighter, or vigilante in revenge-oriented plot lines. Below is my caricature of him done in PS Cs6, followed by a quick sketch I did to warm up for the finished piece, A few screen grabs of progress shots, and the reference pics I used. Thanks for stopping by:) Enjoy!!!!

Willem Dafoe

Willem Dafoe (born July 22, 1955) is an American film, stage, and voice actor, and a member of the experimental theater company The Wooster Group. He has had roles in a wide range of films, including Platoon, Affliction, Off Limits, Streets of Fire, To Live and Die in L.A., Born on the Fourth of July, The English Patient, The Last Temptation of Christ, Mississippi Burning, Mr. Bean's Holiday, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, The Boondock Saints, Spider-Man (Green Goblin), and The Aviator, and voice roles in Fantastic Mr. Fox and Finding Nemo (Voice Of Gill), as well as The Voice and performance capture of Tars Tarkas in the film John Carter. Dafoe has been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor twice. The first was for his role in Platoon in 1986 and the second time for his performance in Shadow of the Vampire in 2000. I always enjoy watching this man perform on film. Below is my caricature of Willem Dafoe followed by a screen grab of a process shot along with the reference pics I used. I purposefully kept this piece nice and painterly, experimenting with the various Mixer Brushes in Photoshop cs6 along with some custom mixer brushes I created for myself. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!

Zbrush Ant Creature

An Antman that wears a slug on his head???, Why not. I did this after watching the awesome Bryan Wynia do a few demos in a CG Workshop that CG Society released recently. Started out as a sculpt in z-brush, Then taken into photoshop and duplicated several times to come up with some variations on the same theme. I picked the thumbnail I liked the most and went back into Zbrush to sculpt and Polypaint a final. From there it's back into photoshop to composite some of the renders, paint over and add some more textures. Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy!!!

Minotaur Concept

In Greek mythology, the Minotaur, was a creature with the head of a bull on the body of a man or, as described by Roman poet Ovid, "part man and part bull". He dwelt at the center of the Cretan Labyrinth, which was an elaborate maze-like construction designed by the architect Daedalus and his son Icarus, on the command of King Minos of Crete. The Minotaur was eventually killed by the Athenian hero Theseus. Here is a concept of the creature that I sculpted in z-brush and painted in Photoshop cs6. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!

Sci-Fi Paintings

Here are a couple of sci-fi environments that I have not shared yet. The first one is a play on Moses speaking to the burning bush atop the mountain of GOD in the book of Exodus in the Bible. The ships in the second piece were kitbashed together from a bunch of shapes in z-brush. it kind of looked like a steam punk style ship to me from a distance so I decided to put it in a scene. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!

Indiana Jones Caricature Tutorial

I have been asked by several people about my process on how I do a caricature, so I have decided to save some process shots of my caricature of Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) and his Dad (Sean Connery) from the movie Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade to help me explain how I approach a piece like this. This was done in Photoshop cs6 and Corel Painter 12. Now I still consider myself to be a student of art myself and am always looking to experiment and learn, but I will try my best to articulate how I do what I do, and I hope it is a help to someone out there. 1) Make Your Mark: The clear white page can be intimidating, but you need to strike all negativity from your mind at this point and start to make marks in a confident fashion. I start to draw my subjects and since this is a caricature I focus mainly on the shapes of heads and bodies of the reference pics and source material and keeping in mind how those shapes can help to exaggerate the subjects yet still convey clearly who and what they are. 2) Refining The Sketch: The initial sketch is done on auto pilot, meaning very loosely. As soon as I feel I start to get a likeness I lower the opacity of the initial sketch, make a layer above the sketch layer and start to refine the sketch and add details to the drawing. 3)Basic Shading: Once I feel comfortable with the sketch I decide to tone the canvas and start in on the shading. I do this by setting the sketch layer to multiply and creating a new layer underneath the sketch layer that I fill with a medium grey tone. i then use a soft airbrush to start shading the piece according to the reference material, adding darks and lights as I see fit. I work with a big brush and stay zoomed out concentrating on the big overall shapes and not the finer details at this point. It helps to squint the eyes at your source material to see where the shadow shapes and the light shapes belong. 4)light Pass: After the basic shading I decide to do a quick light pass in a similar fashion. Still zoomed out, still squinting the eyes, and still very loose. I also start to slowly pop the main subjects out from the background with lighter tones. 5)Tighten up the tonal values: Now I start to zoom in and pay more attention to details, still working in greyscale. up until now I worked pretty quickly, but now I start to slow down a bit and clean things up quite a bit. I also switch over from photoshop to painter to experiment with paper textures and different brushes. 6)Starting to lay down the color: I now go back to photoshop and create new layers set to overlay and color, to start blocking in the initial color adding more details as I see fit. 7)At this point I decide to add some subtle photo textures to enhance the piece. I also adjust the colors and the contrast to my liking. I have to take a great deal of artistic license at this point because my reference pic is not of very good quality. 8)The Devil is in the details: Now I take as long as I need moving things around, altering the colors and zooming in to detail the piece. This is the most tedious and long step of them all, refining and polishing till it is done. It can also be the most fun. I keep most of the detail on the faces and parts of the clothing, but the rest is left very sketch, because I want the eyes of the viewer to be drawn to the characters faces. 9) Done: For now i call it a wrap. I do some last minute details and give it the ole' John Hancock. Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have enjoyed this mini tutorial and much as i have have enjoyed working on it. If you have any questions feel free to ask me and I will do my best to answer them.

New Art E-Book

Jab, Jab, Whammo!!! The Art Of Rafael Rivera A.K.A. DARAF is now available as a downloadable e-book for less tthan ten bucks:) Go get some funky art goodness for your mobile devices. You can preview the book at this address: http://store.blurb.com/ebooks/367174-jab-jab-whammo This next piece was another experiment using the stamp tool mixed with various custom brushes in Photoshop cs6. Inspiration came from The Transformers and the works of artist Daniel Dociu. Thanks for stopping by.

The Twilight Saga

A few caricatures I finished today of the three main characters from the Twilight Saga, Kristen Stewart (Bella), Robert Pattinson (Edward) , and Taylor Lautner (Jacob). I wanted to keep this one nice and loose and painterly. I think I got the look I was after. Done in Corel painter 12 and Photoshop. Below is the painting followed by some process shots. If you want to see some more of this kind of work and other stuff I do, pick up a copy of my book, jab, jab, Whammo!!! the Art of Rafael Rivera. Thanks for stopping by

jab, jab, WHAMMO!!! by Rafael Rivera | Make Your Own Book

Rihanna

From Wikipedia: Robyn Rihanna Fenty born February 20, 1988), known mononymously as Rihanna, is a Barbadian recording artist and actress. Born in Saint Michael, Barbados, Rihanna moved to the United States at age 16 to pursue a recording career under the guidance of record producer Evan Rogers. She subsequently signed a contract with Def Jam Recordings. In 2005, Rihanna released her debut studio album, Music of the Sun, which peaked in the top ten of the Billboard 200 chart and features the Billboard Hot 100 top five hit single "Pon de Replay". In less than a year, she released her second studio album, A Girl Like Me (2006), which peaked within the top-five in the United States, and produced her first Hot 100 number one single, "SOS". Rihanna's third studio album, Good Girl Gone Bad released in May 2007, spawned the international hit singles "Umbrella", "Don't Stop the Music", "Take a Bow" and "Disturbia", with an additional four singles being released. The album was nominated for nine Grammy Awards, winning Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Umbrella". Her fourth studio album Rated R (2009), produced the top-ten singles "Russian Roulette", "Hard" and "Rude Boy", with the latter achieving the number-one spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Loud (2010), Rihanna's fifth studio album, spawned the number-one hits "Only Girl (In the World)", "What's My Name?" and "S&M". Rihanna's sixth studio album, Talk That Talk (2011) served number-one hit "We Found Love" and top-five single "Where Have You Been". Rihanna's work has earned her numerous awards and accolades, including five American Music Awards, eighteen Billboard Music Awards, two BRIT Awards and five Grammy Awards. She has achieved a total of eleven number one singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, becoming the youngest solo artist to achieve the feat. Billboard named Rihanna the Digital Songs Artist of the 2000s decade, and ranked her as the seventeenth artist of the same decade. She is the highest-selling digital artist in US history, having sold 47,571,000 singles as of 2012. Furthermore, she has also shipped 7.3 million album units in the United States as of September 2011. Some of her singles have earned their place on the list of best-selling singles worldwide. Rihanna has sold more than 25 million albums and 60 million digital singles worldwide since the beginning of her career in 2005, which makes her one of the best selling artists of all time. In June 2011, Forbes reported that Rihanna had earned $29 million between May 2010 and May 2011. In 2012, American magazine Time named Rihanna one of the most influential people in the world. Rihanna was also ranked the fourth most powerful celebrity in 2012 with earnings of $53 million between May 2011 and May 2012, according to Forbes. Here is my caricature of Rihanna followed by the initial color block in and The quick pencil sketch. Done in photoshop cs6 and Corel Painter 12. You can see a screen grab of the original reference photo in my last post. Thank for checking it out. Enjoy!!!!

Kim Kardashian

From Wikipedia: Kimberly Noel "Kim" Kardashian (born October 21, 1980 is an American socialite, reality television star, model and occasional actress. She is known for starring in Keeping Up with the Kardashians, the E! reality series that she shares with her family, and its spin-offs including Kourtney and Kim Take New York. Here is my caricature of Kim followed by the photo I used for reference. I started this out in Photoshop cs6, and I wanted to get a painterly look, but stay away from from the usual custom textured brushes I made for myself in Photoshop, So I carried the painting over to Corel painter 12 and used several of the oil brushes and the Acrylic captured bristle brush to achieve this look. I wanted it to remain fairly loose, so I'm pretty happy with the outcome. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!

Kim Kardashian Work In Progress

Here is a screen grab of a kim Kardashian Caricature I am working on. I find it harder to caricature women, so I will probably do what I normally do when I find something difficult. I tackle it head on:) I will most likely try to do a pic with all three sisters. Here is where I am at so far with Kim. Done in Photoshop cs6. Thanks for stopping by, Enjoy!!!

The Creature from out of the Mist.

I fell asleep a few nights ago while watching Stephen king's The Mist directed by Frank Darabont. This guys been dying to get out of my head ever since. lol This one started out as a z-brush sketch done with dynamesh option turned on in z-brush 4r4, then painted in photoshop cs6. Towards the end of the piece I uploaded Anthony Jones tool presets (which you can get for free and watch a quick video demo at the schoolism site. http://schoolism.com/?share=r0qv2 The presets were cool to play around with. If you have CS6, copy and paste the link above and check 'em out. I have been enrolled in Anthony's creature design course for the last few weeks, and I must say it is so much fun, and I am learning tons. I highly recommend the course to anyone who wants to step up their creature designs. Plus Anthony is super talented, so your learning from someone who is very good at what they do. O.K., so here's my creature, Thanks for stopping by:)

Centaur

Messing around in z-brush 4r4 again. This time a centaur creature concept. I am starting to get a little bolder with my sculpts now, but not quite there yet. It serves it's purpose though, as I'm gonna carry the sculpt over to photoshop to come up with variations and textures, and renders. Below the face variations are the turn arounds and the process shots showing the z-sphere , z-sketch, and some early sculpting and shape exploration. Thanks for stopping by, ENJOY:)