Featured Artist

5 min read

Deviation Actions

ConceptWorld's avatar
Published:
4.3K Views
Featured Artist

Hey Concepteez,

:iconvladgheneli: is the current featured artist of this group and we thought it'd be a great idea to ask Vlad to give us an insight into his process.
Vlad also shared with us his latest piece and talks us through his inspirations and how this piece came about.  
We really hope you take something away from this feature and work hard on your skills to be featured here one day.

Please introduce yourself to the group?
My name is Vlad Gheneli and I'm a 25 year old concept artist based in Bucharest, Romania.

Your area of interest?
I am focusing on sci-fi and fantasy environments, sometimes vehicles too.

Your background?
I've been drawing since forever, but I got really serious about this a couple of years ago, when I bought a graphic tablet and decided to go digital. I've studied hard, followed a lot of artists, Daniel Dociu being the one that inspires me the most. Right now I'm pretty satisfied with how my paintings turn up, so I want to focus more on my concept ideas.

Present occupation?
I'm currently working at a small company in Bucharest and we're focusing on short animations, small games and comic books. Not exactly the path I'm looking for, but I've learned a lot in here, I'm drawing every day and we have a wonderful team.

Red kingdom
Featured Artist

I usually start a painting with a general idea in my mind. This time I was assigned to paint a castle with the surroundings in its kingdom, that has a fantasy feel, fairytale alike but still with a medieval mood. Also, given the name Red Kingdom, I had to use as much red as possible, but without reaching lava rivers and an ashland look. Also needed to be on higher grounds. I figured it would be cool to actually have a long road to the castle, maybe even something happening on the way there - some traps or maybe some golems rising.
  
I use a perspective grid almost all the time, I often like using a 3 point perspective, it's much more dramatic. If things get complicated I use Google SketchUp to render a quick perspective, but I usually like building the perspective myself.

I used my Wacom Intuos 4 medium tablet I have at work, Photoshop CS5 and it took about 14-16 hours I guess.

Featured Artist

Where do you find your inspiration?

I get my inspiration from all sort of shapes and objects that I see around in nature, but the ideas usually just hit me without warning and when I put them on canvas more ideas come up and the result is often different, but most of the times better than the initial idea. I like to improvise a lot. I'm not the type that has everything settled even before starting to paint.

Achieving depth in your pieces
The depth is achieved by working with values. The best way to practice is working in grayscale mode, using only grays. Your composition should contain values ranging from pure white, to pure black, where the pure black is used for elements that are very close or even in line with the camera, and pure white (which should not be overused) is present where the strongest light source is and, of course, where the farthest elements are.
Another way of achieving depth is by painting similar objects and, as you place them further in the background, they go smaller. This way, the human eye can understand that they're the same elements, but one of them is smaller so it has to be further away.
If you want to master depth I can recommend Feng Zhu, he has some nice tutorials and he is obsessed with depth www.youtube.com/user/FZDSCHOOL

Vlad's favourites pieces:

Sky Fortress by vladgheneli Returning home by vladgheneli Tech Aircraft by vladgheneli

If you prefer Vlad's style of work, be sure to visit his gallery here vladgheneli.deviantart.com/

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Vlad for taking the time to write this article and working with us in inspiring the community.

Keep up the hard work everyone,

:icongdsworld:
© 2012 - 2024 ConceptWorld
Comments4
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
Maripon's avatar
A great artist who always is an inspiration for me when it comes to composition, colors and lighting!