Skin Texture and Adjustments of Hyper Realistic Figure Sculpture Part3

copyright  Art Di Lella 2012

copyright  Art Di Lella 2012

copyright  Art Di Lella 2012

copyright  Art Dilella 2012

Hi, I'm back with the second part of my post. This time it's the torso. The images illustrate the base textures that have been applied to the surface. It's a back and forth process that has constant checks on both the texture and the surface forms underneath.  I'm hoping to get the basics done on the torso sometime this week.
In the meantime, I've gone back to working on #6 LO,remember her? I'm very close to finishing this model and hope to unveil her soon.
I will be returning this week with some new updates to publish,so until then ,have a great week!

Skin Texture and Adjustments of Hyper Realistic Figure Sculpture Part 2

Image copyright          Art  Di Lella 2012

Hello, I'm back again with a two part post.
Over the past week,I've been working on this sculpture's skin texture and making further changes or adjustments to the modeling. So, I thought it was time to show new images of the progress thus far.

Today's entry focuses on the head. In earlier postings,I talked about the need to find the right skin texture for this sculpted figure. I've been spending time experimenting with different approaches,sometimes making the skin fairly smooth much like a modern adolescent or applying the texture more vigorously like an older adult human. I have deliberately avoided any texture that would look ape like because as I stated before both apes and humans have evolved so to apply ape skin textures to the surface of this sculpture would imply that apes have skin texture that  has changed little from the common ancestor.   That being said, it would not be reasonable in my opinion, to have modern human skin on this figure either so instead I've applied a somewhat exaggerated human texture to this figure. You will see in these photos that some areas such as the neck are not complete but has the basic texture laid down. It just requires a bit more detailing before it's finished.

Image copyright           Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright      Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright                Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright             Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright        Art  Di Lella 2012

I guess what really counts is believability. Does this work overall?  We'll see how things play out.

Anyway, I'll be back in a few days with the second part of this post which is about the torso.

Cheers.

Inspirational Casts

Skhul 5   Epoxy  Cast (Wenner Gren Foundation)                 Adult male cranium  90,000 BP

Over the past several years, I've been acquiring a small collection of casts mainly of prehistoric hominids. These casts are used not only for reference but also I find they help me generate some new ideas for sculpture. In a sense they are part of my art practice and I refer to them often.

Amud 1   Epoxy Cast  (Wenner Gren Foundation)         40,000 BP

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella  2012

Image copyright  Art Di Lella  2012

Reconstruction of Australopithecus Afarensis  by SOMSO            3.5000,000 BP

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella  2012

Image copyright   Art  Di Lella 2012

 The first shown is a early modern human from Mount Carmel in Israel,discovered back in the 1930's. The second is a Neandertal specimen from Wadi Amud  near Lake Tiberius,also found in Israel in 1961.  The final cast is a reconstruction of Australopithecus Afarensis. This individual is a composite of several fragments which were discovered in the1970's by Donald Johanson.

The main reason that I collected these castings is because I love the exotic shapes of the bones themselves and the potentially amazing faces that were once attached to them. They're certainly part of the inspiration for the current figure that I'm working on and I'm hoping to start another prehistoric character soon but that will have to wait until all the other projects are finished or close to it. We'll see how things go.
In the meantime, I'm working the skin texture of my Hyper Realistic Figure #1 and should have some new updates soon.
I wish all of you a great week Cheers.

Bronze Gallery Update Coming

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

I hope everyone is having a good week .
Today's post is about a bronze bust that I had completed in 2002. This piece was part of a series of head studies that I was involved in about 10 years ago. These studies were primarily about facial expressions and making the clay modeling more forceful. A few have survived from this period such as the one illustrated in this post.
The original inspiration for this series was Xavier Messerschimdt's work but as a friend mentioned to me Leonardo is definitely in there as well.
You'll notice also the artifacts of the casting process are left intact on the bronze. This is exactly what  a bronze sculpture looks like after the ceramic shell material is removed.  The sprues(which feed the casting), vents and the surface fire scale were retained as part of the finished piece.
This sculpture will be added to the Bronze Gallery soon.
I'll be back next week. Have a great weekend. Cheers.

Skin Texture and Adjustments Hyper Realistic Figure Homo Erectus

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

I'm back again with some detail shots of Lake Turkana Boy. I've been madly working on the texture,trying all sorts of methods.

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

Image copyright  Art  Di Lella 2012

I thought some detail shots might give a better visual explanation. The strategy so far has been to start from the head and work myself down the body although there has been some texture applied in other spots.
The last two images illustrate the initial application of texture but as I've mentioned before skin texture is done in stages with different textures on top of each other. At the same time,I'm making further changes to the modeling,taking out unwanted lumps and bumps which are inevitable with clay work.
I'll be back soon. I wish all you a great week. Take care.