Character story for MAY ISOLATION

[franksandovalart]

Name:
No.26 before adopted
Renamed "Zed" British for the letter Z
"Z" the twenty-sixth letter of the alphabet

Born Location:
Liberia's Monkey Island

Primary Mission:
To test out the latest space technology and find out if Mars is suitable for human life

Parents:
  - Father:
Alpha Chimpanzee
Died at the laboratory
 
  - Mother:
Was one of many chimps used for experiments in a lab, later abandoned to die on an island called "Liberia's monkey island"
she received an injection of an unknown chemical while being pregnant with Zed
She died a month after giving birth, to an unknown illness

Background:
Zed became an orphan at a very young age left to defend for himself, the lac of food and absence of his mother helped develop high intellectual skills rare for the primate species
Life in Monkey Island was very harsh, lacking both potable water and good food sources, chimps that lived there rely solely on human caregivers to bring food to the island

chaotic surroundings and bullied by bigger chimps, life for a small orphan chimp was not easy
longing for isolation and a place to be free to explore other horizons, Zed began to explore the island to find a way out, developing tools to catch fish to eat and shelter to hide from bullies.

Zed special qualities did not go unnoticed a Neuroscientist named Robert, observing the Chimps saw Zed using one of his tools to catch a fish, Robert grew very fond of Zen and adopted him

One day Robert went to work, to meet one of his good friends who was undergoing a candidacy training program at the Johnson Space Center in Houston,
taking Zed with him, Robert didn't go anywhere without Zed

Zed showed a lot of interest in all the training equipment, Robert was very good friends with the head of the training program who grew fond of Zed
allowing Zed to participate in the candidacy training program apart of the human candidates just for fun, astonish by Zed training results, what started as fun and games
Zed stats were outperforming allot of the human candidates.

The Head of the training program showed his supervisors the results of Zed performance, baffled, decided to examine Zed further

Zed exceeded expectations

Thrilled by the possibility to save billions of dollars, the administrator of the space program decided to send Zed to trailblaze a secret mission to find out if Mars is suitable for human life.

Illustration:
Zed realizing his dream of complete Isolation, memories of tragic past long gone, Happily recording his exploration on the Red Planet!

[franksandovalart]

@gavpartridge thank you very much
God wiling i will post screen shots of some of the process, since i didnt record the painting

But i do have some earlier screen shots

[franksandovalart]

@gavpartridge yes
God willing, ill be making tutorials in the near future.

[Jeremy Ross]

Hi @franksandovalart, great storytelling! I’m ready to read the full comic! You’re illustrations are incredible!

[franksandovalart]

@Jeremy-Ross
Thank you Jeremy!

[Pamela Fraley]

@franksandovalart this is beautiful!!

[franksandovalart]

@Pamela-Fraley
Thank you Pamela

[franksandovalart]

@gavpartridge

since I didn't record the process, I put together this Gif with some screenshots of the Character, to try and explain how I rendered this illustration.

• Paint darker local colors as if the lights were off on the scene
  ' Paint as if it was an overcast day, using form and Ambient Occlusion

• AO/ Ambient Occlusion / contact shadow
  ' Areas where there's less light-hitting, these areas would be darker

• Shadow on character
  ' Adjustment layer, Hue/Saturation check on colorize
  ' Used a Multiply layer with a cool saturated color
  ' Used a mask alpha to paint on

• Add light source / directional light
  ' Here is where you add the true local color on the lighted side
  ' I like to use an adjustment layer for this
  ' Hue/Saturation check on colorize, on an Overlay layer, here you add the color of the main light source, example the sun, I would use a bright orange-yellow color
  ' Used a mask alpha to paint on

• Add sky fill color
  ' This is the light on the shadow side, usually the skylight, or any other light source that is not the main direct light. in this case, I use a rich blue color, you could also use magenta depending on the art style or time of day.
  ' Used a mask alpha to paint on

• Bounce light
  ' This is the warmer more saturated color on the shadow side
  ' I like to use the adjustment layers to have more control, selecting a warm color, orange/reds, in Hue/Saturation check on colorize, increase the saturation and then darken until u get the desired color, the cool thing about using this method is that u can adjust and see the changes live on your illustration.
  ' Used a mask alpha to paint on

• Lights on the space backpack
  ' Painted the saturated colors of the lights and then added another layer under with a blur brush using Overlay

• Levels Adjustment to increase the brightness

• Added finished details, Paint over

• Finished the illustration by painting atmosphere
  ' I used a reddish-brown color using the airbrush
  ' Overlay and Lighten layers to give it a bit of an Instagram effect.

Hope this was helpful

God bless you!

Thank you!

[franksandovalart]

This post is deleted!

[franksandovalart]

@gavpartridge no problem, in Photoshop there are many ways of doing one thing

[franksandovalart]

Hi everyone!

Exploration ideas that I played around with on the illustration, I decided to go with (E).

History of the main idea for the illustration:
I wanted the illustration to be a positive Isolation

Did some research about all the animals that were used on early space projects, sadly most of the animals died, until Ham the chimp,
''the first hominid launched into space. On January 31, 1961, Ham flew on the Mercury-Redstone 2 mission, part of the U.S. space program's Project Mercury''
according to Wikipedia

Wanted to make a character that people could associate with and also be believable

Like Ham the space chimp was the first Chimp that flew to outer space and came back before humans, Zed was the first chimp on Mars before humans.

I picked Mars because the red planet has been one of human beans fantasy for many years, and also because it takes seven months to get there, imaging been that far away from civilization and getting any type of help.

anyways, Just wanted to share some of my workflow with all of you, this illustration was a lot of work, but very fun to make.

Be safe out there
and my God bless you!

[franksandovalart]

@gavpartridge
If you are still interested i now have video tutorials explaining my process for Procreate, the methods use also apply for Photoshop.

Thank you!

You can find it here:
https://franksandovalart.com/store