Tapwing

Canadian Digital illustrator/concept-artist of scifi and fantasy worlds. the 'planet series', and lot of fan art.

[georgebennettart]

I'm open for creature/weapon commissions! 🐉

These can range from Werewolves to dragons, or swords to magical items.

I've got 2-3 slots open. And I've got some examples below for you!

If you're interested, you can DM me, or email me at: [email protected]

[tapwing]

[tapwing]

Sooooo stuff like this is NSFW? (That and some of my creature/character drawings apparently. Things roaring, ooo how inappropriate)This is why you don’t leave a bot in charge of reporting content. All I can say is thank goodness this is not my main site for uploads. Till the bot gets shown the door I’ll stick to DA 🙄 https://www.deviantart.com/tapwing

Tapwing on DeviantArt

 

[tapwing]

Sketch commission drawn in Procreate

[tapwing]

Part of a portal themed mini-series I like to take on. (For a personal project)

Painted in Procreate

[tapwing]

Little study drawn in Procreate

[tapwing]

Inktober entries #1 poisonous and #2 tranquil

[oweeeeendennis]

Hi! Even though Infinity Train is only a short pilot I am obsessed! That being said I was inspired to try and develop concepts for shows/stories but I have no idea how I should start. Did you just start writing a script as you went along? Was there a format that you followed that helped you organize your ideas into what became Infinity Train? I am completely overwhelmed

Thanks!

When I start writing something, I tend to have a lot of junk floating around my head too.

Generally I don’t think there’s any one specific place to start. There’s a lot of disparate things I might be thinking about. So like for example I might be thinking “man, I wish I could see a movie where someone jumps out of the top floor of a building” and at the same time “man, I wish I could see a story about someone who is mad at capitalism and wants to stick it to corporations” or “man, I wish I could see a movie about a giraffe person.” Start to write down these different things you’re interested in and see if there are any common themes.

As you give it time and these various, seemingly unconnected ideas sit with you, maybe you start to realize that the length of a giraffe’s neck can symbolize rising up the corporate ladder. Your main character should be someone who would be most adversely affected by the world you’ve built, so ok, maybe your main character is a neckless giraffe. Now you have a rough idea of what your world is and what your main character is: a world of giraffes where everyone is trying to get higher up the corporate ladder, using their long necks to reach higher up in the building they’re in to get into higher positions of power, but one giraffe (named Dylan) can’t because he has no neck.

There you go. There’s a concept. Now what? Well, if you look at story structure, you’ll find that many stories start with characters in a state of normalcy before the inciting incident. This sets up who the characters are and what they’re looking for out of life. Often the characters really want something out of their life, then it is upended somehow or an opportunity comes along that they can’t pass up. Here’s what a basic story structure looks like:

You likely already have seen this, because most of us were taught about this in junior high, but I’ll run through it again as a quick refresher:

INTRODUCTION/ESTABLISH ROUTINE: Show who the characters are, what the world is, what we need to know about everything before the story starts.

INCITING INCIDENT: The event that sets off the story.

RISING ACTION: All the trying and failing and relationship building that we need for the rest of the story to feel like it matters.

CRISIS: The moment when all the trying hasn’t worked and our character gets to their lowest point.

REALIZATION: Realization and Crisis are usually counted as the same thing in story structure, but I split them up for easier digestion. This is when the character learns something from being in this lowest point that helps them achieve their goal.

CLIMAX: This is when the character puts their realization into practice.

FALLING ACTION: All the stuff after the realization put into practice works.

RESOLUTION: The new normal is established.

———

So lets see if we can set up a story with a couple of the random ideas we had up there:

INTRODUCTION/ESTABLISH ROUTINE: The short necked giraffe (Dylan) is going about his normal life working at a mattress company. He goes in, he does his work, but he wants so badly to be a long necked giraffe so he can move higher up in the company. All he has to show for anything he’s done is a pen that says “thank you for your years of service”.

INCITING INCIDENT: When an announcement comes over the speaker that there’s a new positions opening up at the top of the company, Dylan gets super excited, so he tries to get the help of his friends.

RISING ACTION: They help him to get further, but it’s still not enough. He grows greedier and greedier, trying to make his neck longer so he can get to the top of the building, but it’s not working, so he eventually starts using and manipulating his friends. He makes them stand on the ground and he climbs on top of them to get higher, crushing them beneath his weight.

A CRISIS: He finally reaches his goal of getting to the top of the building, BUT, it turns out, at the top most floor of the building, it’s just a bunch lions eating the giraffe heads. All the other giraffes that got this tall are just super long, floating, neck stumps that the lions have eaten. The lions said there was a new opening to fill because they were feeling hungry again.

REALIZATION: Dylan realizes that he has spent all this time climbing on the backs of his friends to reach a lie fed to him by the lions at the top of the food chain (uber wealthy capitalists).

CLIMAX: Dylan, being a short necked giraffe, is able to use what he once thought was his disability to jump off at the top floor, run around the lions, then stabs the head lion in the throat with his “years of service” pen. As blood gushes out of his neck, the other lions pounce on him, unable to stop their bloodthirsty urges. Dylan jumps out the window, leaving all the lions at the top scrambling, confused, and devouring each other.

FALLING ACTION: Dylan lands on one of the very mattresses this mattress company makes.

RESOLUTION: He apologizes to his friends, and sagely decides that anarcho-communism is the best form of government.

THE END.

——

This story took me 20 minutes to write. I made it up as I went along, based purely on those three, unrelated ideas (which really were unrelated when I wrote them).

As an example of how the story changed while I wrote it, when I got to “how should Dylan kill the lions?” that was the first time I went back to the beginning of the story and rewrote the introduction. I added a “years of service” pen that would add some irony to the killing of the lions. Then, when he had to jump out the window, I was like “Wait what does he land on?” so I then went back to the introduction again and rewrote it to include the fact that it’s a mattress factory. Don’t be afraid to change things, nothing is precious.

Now obviously, this story could use a few rewrites, but the bare bones are there and you can kinda understand what happens and why. Start super super simple and then build out from there. Don’t get caught up in dialogue or describing worlds until you have the foundation. The main theme of the story and the actions that take place to show that theme will give you the proper foundation to build everything else your story needs. Once you have that, it will all feel like it somehow just falls into place.

Keep in mind that this is generally just what works for me, but I hope this can give you an idea of where to begin and how to move forward. 

[tapwing]

Now this is a really nice breakdown and probably a good way to avoid the detail trap when writing too.

[tapwing]

Hyperendocrine rex- the isle Drawn in Procreate

[tapwing]

:Hyperendocrin Dilophosaurus: Not being able to compete against some of the larger fauna of the isle, this Hyperendocrin is adapted to hunting down the small and agile within the confines of dense woods. specialized glands lining the edges of it’s mouth fire streams of glue-like strands in a netted spray, slowing if not holding small prey down completely. In a pinch it’ll grapple with larger species, attempting to use it’s weight and armour to knock down or fend off opponents. if you seek shelter in the woods, beware.

[tapwing]

So procreate has the video playback feature and lets you export them, would you ever consider posting some of your playback vids? Your work is really cool and I'm interested in seeing your process.

I have been thinking about what to do with those. I’d definitely like to start uploading more speedpaints. Not every speedpaint made for a good video so I need to do some organizing and set something up. In the meantime I do have a few choreographed speedpaints on my studio website.http://90studio.ca/art-wall/ I’ll make a post if I resurrect my YouTube channel or find another venue to post speedpaints.

[tapwing]

Have you done a Hypo Allo yet? Would you if you didnt?

I’m partial towards it. But I also don’t have any plans for one yet either.

[tapwing]

How are you able to make such great art so quickly? If I tried making stuff with the same quality as yours, then I’d spend whole months on it. You seem to have something new every few weeks.

Well it’s taken a lot of practice, research and developing little tricks to shave down the time these paintings take to make. I can safely say that the biggest time-suck is repainting or fixing something (i’ve had paintings that should have only taken 7 hours take 20+ because I didn’t know what I wanted to do with the lighting) . Building confidence and knowing what you want your subject to look like is a huge step in saving time when painting.

[tapwing]

Bye Jim Drawn in Procreate Inspired by ‘the isle’

[tapwing]

We’ve run into a little problem drawn in Procreate inspired by ‘the isle’

[tapwing]

Falling in love all over again with the smudg effects/brushes in Procreate.

[tapwing]

:Tetanurae matriarch: 3-6 To confirm foreign development the team located and recalled one of our active Matriarchs to compare how the ‘caged’ and ‘wild’ specimens develop. The cage Matriarch grew only slightly and remained physically unchanged. The wild specimen however, grew substantially and adapted common traits of theropoda. Losing it’s wings and developing denser structure along with a more muscular build that serve it in grappling or climbing. Some unknown growths spark concern, but nothing outside of the current margin of error. Further observation required.