Anguish
This is a tone painting of actor Toni Collette from a particularly emotional moment in the movie Hereditary. Her performance floored me in how honestly she portrayed a sense of soul-crushing anguish. It is a hard-edged movie, and asked everything of her. She delivered. If she had given even an ounce less, the movie would have fallen apart. Instead, it and The Witch were the birthplace of a new breed of horror movie.
I’m not really sure why I decided to do this one in monochrome. I’m still getting used to Artstudio Pro. Actions that are easy in Procreate often require some clumsy fumbling for me, but any such cost is worth it for more realistic paint blending model. In this pass, I found a brush that actually has a bristle-like texture. I’m pretty happy with the look I achieved.
I made no preliminary sketch. This was straight to block-out. Initially I was on a different, less interesting brush, but after some experimentation, I got to my current pick: “Digital bristle”.
I would like to get more flexibility with erasers in the tool. The Ahmed Aldoori approach to digital painting involves making a new layer for individual strokes, making them very large, then carving them back with an eraser of the same size/shape as the brush. It gives you nice feathering control along with the “brush economy” look that I prize. In Procreate, every brush has an eraser mode; it’s a simple toggle. In Artstudio Pro, erasers, pens, and brushes are all separate tools, and the erasers available are untextured and basic. As a result, I’ve been working in the digital equivalent of a “alla prima” style: doing everything on a single layer. It’s working, but I would like to get back to working on that brush economy approach.
Medium: Digital
App: Procreate
Tools: Paint