Artemisia

TAD offers scholarships for Women in Art!

2010-02-16T03:40:00.000-08:00

Hey all! I just noticed this while browsing ConceptArt.Org this morning before work. I've been following the first few scholarships handed out to their partner school, The Art Department, and now Jason Manley has announced that two full rides and two half ride scholarships have been set aside exclusively for female applicants!

You can view the post here here and apply to TAD by going here and clicking on Apply Now. All female applicants are eligible for the scholarships.

I'm not planning on going back to school full time (at least not for a while!) but I think it's a great move on TAD's part to support female artists in the industry.

In other news, the deadline for submissions to Exposé 8 is coming up. February 22nd - that's less than a week away! (Side note - crap, I really need to finish my submission...) Here's the link - good luck!

Article Round Up!

2009-09-28T13:50:00.000-07:00

Drive-by post! This week we've gathered up a few links to various articles and cool stuff we've seen recently. We'll probably do this again from time to time for stuff that we like that, for whatever reason, doesn't make it onto our Twitter (like when Louisa finds something awesome during the day only to realise she's managed to wipe her Twitterfox settings at work and can't remember the password to the account, for example).

Twisted Princesses: A Darker Take on Disney

We're used to seeing the Disney heroines as glittering, gracious, smiling beauties. Well, some of them may be smiling in this macabre art series, but in a way that is likely to give you nightmares.

Why Strong Female Characters Are Bad For Women

The title is misleading - take Strong Female Characters with a heavy dose of irony and then have a look at this interesting read on how mainstream movie writers still aren't quite grasping the concept of creating a compelling female role model.

Can Marvel-Disney Help Close the Comic Book Gender Gap?

A look at what the Disney buyout of Marvel might mean for marketing comics to women.

Fangirl Invasion, Part One: The Changing Face (and Sex) of Fandom
Fangirl Invasion, Part Two: Hollywood Takes Notice
Fangirl Invasion, Part Three: The War of the Sexes Hits Geekdom

Ok, the use of terms like Invasion! and War! tends to annoy me because it seems to imply that women are forcing themselves in and taking over where they don't belong. I am slightly tired of news articles declaring that Twilight is the new Moses, parting the seas of testosterone and bravely leading thousands of young girls to the Holy Land of Geekdom. Because gee, it's not like girls existed in fandom BEFORE Twilight, right? On the other hand, hey, at least they're finally making it to the party and I do have to (grudgingly) admit that Twilight is bringing more young girls to conventions, the fantasy genre, and helping them to realise that BOOKS ARE AWESOME.

Epic Worlds Without Women?
The Epic Fantasy and Female Characters, Part Two
Fantasy and Female Characters, Part Three

Another three part article series in which fantasy authors Kate Elliot and Ken Scholes discuss female characters in fantasy and how they handle them in their own work.

Two mentions of Disney is kinda of like a theme, right? So I'm going to round this post off with a Princess painting meme that's going round that I think is pretty adorable.

Princess Coloring Book by *Artsammich on deviant ART

The challenge? Take a Disney princess colouring book page and colour it in the style of a Masters painting. Ryan Wood kicked off this idea here with his portrait of Belle in the style of an Ingres painting, and Sam Neilson took up the gauntlet with the beautiful painting of Jasmine above. I have a soft spot for the heroines of Disney - they were some of my earliest childhood idols and anytime before I hit my teens you could guarantee that my favourite film was whatever the latest Disney film was. (Well, except for Snow White. No taking candy from strangers, you vapid dummy!) So I was thrilled that a few more of the awesome artists on my watchlist picked up the idea and ran with it. Here are a few more for your viewing pleasure!

Aurora by Katie DeSousa

Cinderella by Lois van Baarle

Belle by Adelenta

If anyone has seen (or done!) any more of these, let me know in the comments? I'm kind of addicted - I may even have to do one myself.

Featured Artist: Liiga Smilshkalne

2009-09-14T08:10:00.000-07:00

Artist Profile

Name: Liiga Smilshkalne
Job Title: Freelance Digital Painter
Client List: Northeast Games, LightCon Inc. Butterfly Fan the Inferno, and oodles of private commissioners.
Education: Bachelors Degree in Economics and Business. Currently studying for 2nd Bachelors in Politics. No art related education.
Years Experience: 7+ years
Favorite Medium: Digital
Specialties: Fantasy, somewhat realistic figure painting, whenever possible with a surreal or macabre twist.
Accepting Private Commissions? Schedule varies, please inquire.

Contact Info
Website or Web Portfolio: http://liiga.deviantart.com
Email: smilshkalne@hotmail.com
Twitter: none
Online Art Communities: deviantArt, GFXArtist, Epilogue -- listed as "liiga" on all of them.
Prints: http://liiga.deviantart.com/store/

Artist Liiga Smilshkalne (pronouced "League-ah Smeelsh-kuhl-ne") is no stranger many of us who have been around the various online art communities over the last few years. Her captivating artwork tends to ensnare you like the delicately detailed webs she often paints. Her work has been featured in artbooks, such as Exotique, but recently she's seen a fair amount of exposure of a different sort.

Her painting, "Sunlight" (shown above) has become one of the more prominently displayed images advertising the online game Evony. The game has received criticism over it's blatant use of cleavage in it's advertising (among other things), which seems to be everywhere, thanks to Google ads. Liiga and I talked a bit about the Evony ads and what she thinks about them, below.

I think my first introduction to your work was the painting “Captured” over on Elfwood back in 2003. It seems like you’ve been around the digital art scene for as long as I’ve been, but it’s hard to dig up information on you. Tell us a little about how you got started as an artist? Where are you now, in the art industry?  

I first got my hands on an easel, paper and paints at the tender and impressionable age of 3 and never quite let it go since then. I started painting digitally around 16, not long after getting a computer. Since it only came with MSPaint, I was originally extremely impressed by the amazing pixelation skills that the artists behind the digital paintings online must have had. After looking into the subject a little more, I came across communities such as Elfwood and Epilogue and the various digital drawing/painting programs out there. Well and it kind of went from there - not having a scanner readily available certainly facilitated my interest in digital painting as well, but mostly I was attracted to the interesting technical aspects and being able to learn a lot from others over the internet. Then I promptly set out to post on various art communities, and eventually commissions started happening. Right now I am gleefully working on mostly private commissions as well as the occasional game related project. Since I am still quite busy with studies at this time, it's the kind of art related employment that I am currently perfectly happy with.   

Your work shows an unapologetic love for transparent things and incredibly tiny, delicate details. Who or what are your biggest inspirations, artistically?  

I wouldn't be able to name a few specific artists that I've been inspired by, it is instead a long list of changing impressions by many people of different styles, depending on what I am focusing on at the time. At the moment ones that stand out for me the most are Brom with the way he handles colors and values, Ursula Vernon and her awesome texture work and daring imagination, Dali for being, well, Dali, and Lindra Bergkvist with the way she handles skintones. 

Other than that, I am perpetually inspired by nature. I am lucky to live in a place with a giant meadow and small forests around, so there's plenty opportunities for observation. Having spent a good chunk of my childhood in the countryside that might be where the fascination with drawing tiny details stems from. Well and translucent stuff is just awfully fun to draw like that, 'cause lighting is one of the things that I find technically captivating.   

You do a lot of paintings that are for website designs—which is fairly unusual compared to how most website designs are typically put together. How is it different from just doing a regular painting or illustration? What kinds of things do you have to work around or keep in mind when working on website illustrations?  

The sites I have done design so far have been related to fantasy games, so that makes the perfect excuse to do the whole design in a painterly style - which is helpful since I know more about painting than web design. 

The main difference from a regular painting is, of course, that there will be content that is more important than the painted bits. Then there is also the whole technical side - how feasible it is to code, what will work with this or that browser, how large it should be, what happens when the content changes size etc. Since I'm not much of a coder, I usually work closely with whoever is doing that part at the very beginning while brainstorming over what kind of design to have and how it would work, and the end when the images have to be sliced and otherwise prepared for the final presentation. And in between that lies the actual painting, which is more or less as painting usually goes.   

A few months ago you licensed your painting “Sunlight” to the creators of the online game “Evony” for use in their ad campaign and game. The game’s advertising has received a lot of attention, and some criticism, for their overtly sexual messages. Perhaps complicating the situation, “Sunlight” is a self-portrait. Did they give you any idea, going in, that that was what they were shooting for? How do you feel about your image being viewed as a sexual marketing ploy?  

The whole Evony thing turned into a bit of surprise, because I didn't expect that they would be quite so aggressive and suggestive with their campaign as a whole. Of course it isn't entirely lost on me that the painting itself has a certain amount of sensuality to it - it is mostly the context of the whole thing that was somewhat surprising, and amusing.  

I have read some of the online discussions about Evony's advertising campaign, and I do agree that the whole progression of the ad contents from the somewhat more timid fantasy figures to what appears at a first glance to be a lingerie ad was less than subtle. On the other hand, the whole concern of objectification of the female body and sexuality seems blown a little out of proportion. I mean, compare to a painting or a photo that depicts a person with the focus on some kind of external quality they possess - be it beauty, ugliness, green skin or three noses. Certain objectification will be inevitably present, because that is the whole point. Now one may argue that when the focus is on sexuality that it gets a little underhanded by appealing to the carnal desires, which I partially agree with - mostly because in this case it has absolutely nothing to do with the product being marketed anyways. However, the extent of concern that some people have expressed regarding the whole thing seems to imply that the ad and the image in it depict something far more explicit and sinister than they really do - although the suggestiveness has been heavily played up with the context of the ad compared to the original, I don't find it offensive in any way. Instead, I'm taking it as a compliment and getting a good chuckle out of the whole commotion - and of course, I don't mind the free advertising that came with it.   

I noticed on your dA page that most of your recent commenters have been people who found the image after viewing it in the “Evony” ads. Have the ads increased your site traffic? Have there been any negative effects from the ad?  

The ads don't directly state who the author of the image is, so the increase in traffic isn't that large, but enough people managed to find it that the increase was noticeable. There haven't been any particularly negative effects other than having to write more e-mails and notes than ever before, confirming that the image was licenced in a legitimate way. But it really just shows that people care, so I wouldn't call that negative either way.    

While browsing through the comments on it, I found it interesting that so many of us (and I’m including myself in this) saw the ad and immediately assumed it might be stolen, then contacted you about it. I can’t decide if that’s a good thing because it means that more people are aware of the problems of art theft and are willing to support the artist; or a bad thing because it means artists in general have become that cynical. What’s your view on it?  

I believe it is a good thing. Image theft is hardly a recent phenomenon on the internet anyways - so a little bit of cynism in this regard and readiness to assume the worst and investigate is a million times better than collective apathy towards it.

   What’s with the penguins?  

This one gets asked every now and then. The penguins are a sort of romantic art exchange I do with someone special - other people give each other flowers, we give each other penguins. And we can share our penguins with the rest of the world, too, so hey - bonus!

   Do you have any advice for other women out there who might be interested in getting into fantasy art commercially?  

To not be afraid of drawing boobies? I do believe that it is more useful to think of oneself as an artist who happens to be a woman than a woman who happens to be an artist in this context, because one's artistic ability is the main variable here. Nevertheless, it is always beneficial to be able to identify which parts of one's perspective and approach to art are related specifically to gender, so that they can be used in a beneficial way. Oh and don't be shy to look at men for figure reference purposes - it shouldn't be just guys that get to look at girls like that.

Image Credits:
Above: "Sunlight" ©2007-2009 Liiga Smilshkalne
Below Left: "Rhea Dragonsblood" ©2008-2009 Liiga Smilshkalne
Below Middle: "Defiance" ©2009 Liiga Smilshkalne
Below Right: "Emerald Conundrum" ©2009 Liiga Smilshkalne

It's All About Who You Know

2009-09-07T14:34:00.000-07:00

Firstly, quick newsflash - Massive Black are having a Labour Day sale on streaming classes, DVDs and downloads! It ends Tuesday September 8th at 11am Pacific Time, so if there's something you've had your eye on, better snap it up quickly. Go here for more details.

-

It's not just about being able to do the job - it's about knowing the right people in the right place at the right time.

Anybody else been told that? I know I have. Almost every time we had a professional from the CG field in to speak to us at university, we found out they got the job through a friend of a friend, a colleague of a colleague (and occasionally through alcohol, but moving on...). It was often stressed on us just how important networking and connections would be in building our careers and getting us from job to job. Great! So how should we go about that?

*crickets chirp*

Hello?

At some point I think most of us are faced with the somewhat herculean prospect of going from an inexperienced nobody to somebody with a wealth of useful contacts and resources at their fingertips. At that point everyone is a stranger, you have no idea where the best places to start putting yourself out there even are, and you also happen to be in a profession known for shy and reclusive personalities. Which probably includes you. Excellent.

It can be doubly scary when the people you want to network with are the same people who blow you away with their talent and art wisdom on a regular basis and whose artwork and tutorials you have probably spent hours staring at, slack jawed in wonder. Kind of awkward, introducing yourself to someone about whom you know you have uttered the phrase, "I want to marry this person" and/or, "I want to steal their brain."

For the record, neither of these are a good opening line for an introduction. Just so you know.

As a much younger artist, my networking prowess consisted of typing "fantasy art" into Google and dropping in on sites like Epilogue and Elfwood by pure chance. My sense of isolation was increased by the fact that social media wasn't nearly as prevalent as it is now. The artists I really wanted to talk to seemed aloof and untouchable behind personal ~~fortresses~~ websites and apologetic notices that they received too many emails to be able to answer them all.

From that clumsy beginning I slowly built up my list of communities to frequent, the best places to display my portfolio, and friendships with other artists, and as slow a process as it was, all those people who told me that getting to know people was so crucial were absolutely right. Few artists evolve in a vaccuum. Surrounding yourself with creative, supportive, encouraging friends and mentors will help you grow as an artist and keep you sane in the process.

Things are much easier now. Online portfolios and interactive communities go hand in hand. Forums like CGTalk and ConceptArt.org along with Twitter, live painting websites and the mighty blogosphere make great artists much more accessible and approachable - you get to talk with them, hear their advice, watch them work, and best of all you get to do it without feeling like you're intruding on their privacy.

So without futher ado, I present to you a list of the blogs and Twitters of some truly talented and awesome women, who are incredibly friendly and helpful to boot. Enjoy!

Alice Duke
http://alicedraws.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/aliceduke

Anne Pogoda
http://sezazu.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/Azurelle_Art

Christine Griffin
http://quickreaver.wordpress.com/
http://twitter.com/quickreaver

Char Reed
http://charreed.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/charreed

Charlie Bowater
http://twitter.com/charliebowater

Constanza Ehrenhaus
http://faerywitch.wordpress.com/
http://twitter.com/faerywitch

Dani Jones
http://danidraws.com/blog/
http://twitter.com/DaniDraws

Diane Özdamar
http://dianeozdamar.over-blog.com/

Dona Vajgand
http://twitter.com/dnalysis

Ellen Million
http://twitter.com/ellenmillion

Elvire De Cock
http://kokoahouse.wordpress.com/ (French only)

Irene Gallo
http://igallo.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/IreneGallo

Jennifer L. Meyer
http://jmeyersketches.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/JenniferLMeyer

Jessica Douglas
http://twitter.com/Jessies

Julie Dillon
http://twitter.com/juliedillon

Katie de Sousa
http://katiedesousa.blogspot.com/

Lois van Baarle
http://sketchblog.loish.net/
http://twitter.com/loishh

Marta Dahlig
http://dahlig.blogspot.com/

Mélanie Delon
http://eskarinacircus.blogspot.com/

Melissa Hitchcock
http://twitter.com/melihitchcock

Meredith Dillman
http://meredithdillman.blogspot.com/
http://twitter.com/uminomamori

Michele-lee Phelan
http://twitter.com/dreamsofgaia

Nicole Cadet
http://nixjim13.livejournal.com/
http://twitter.com/nicolecadet

Nicole Cardiff
http://gryphart.livejournal.com/
http://twitter.com/ncardiff

Rebecca Morse (French & some English)
http://pinkmint-gallery.blogspot.com/

Sam Hogg
http://twitter.com/Zephyri

Selina Fenech
http://selinafenech.livejournal.com/
http://twitter.com/selinafenech

Stephanie Pui-Mun Law
http://shadowscapes-stephanielaw.blogspot.com/

Ursula Vernon
http://twitter.com/UrsulaV

And a bonus - live painting channels! Check out their pages for broadcast schedules and show descriptions.

Jana Schirmer (Livestream)

Charlie Bowater (Livestream)

Dona Vajgand (Livestream)

Dani Jones (Ustream)

Melissa Findley (Ustream)

Char Reed (Ustream)

And in case you didn't already know, you can also find Melissa and me at the following locations.

Melissa Findley
http://wickedeye.wordpress.com/
http://twitter.com/Mercuralis

Louisa Gallie
http://maverickmuse.wordpress.com/
http://twitter.com/PhurieDae

EDIT 08/09/09: Added a couple more names to the list! Do you have any suggestions? Let us know in the comments!

Clearing Up Some Misconceptions

2009-08-25T09:59:00.000-07:00

I’ve been thinking about some of our reader comments lately, both on the blog and on Twitter, and I thought I’d try to clarify our position on some of these things. It's hard to respond to some of these in less than 140 characters :)

Artemisia is about fantastic art, but that covers a wide range of topics. “Art” was something we left fairly broad, because we wanted the opportunity to talk about all kinds of art. Whether it’s the obvious sort like fantasy illustration, book covers, concept art; or things that involve art: like movies, video games, books, conventions, etc.

“Fantastic” is also something we left fairly broad. Both Louisa and I are genre artists. She specializes more in video games and conceptual art, where I lean more heavily toward illustration and graphic art—but we both share a love for sci-fi, fantasy, even sometimes horror, genre art. We work in what we loosely call “the Industry”, which if I had to define it would be something like: those who produce genre art for money.

“From a Female Perspective” is where things get a little sticky sometimes. Obviously both Louisa and I are female. We are not ALL females. Our views are not going to be shared by all women—but we do spend a great deal of time talking to other women who work in the industry, asking questions, gathering information, and trying to draw informed conclusions.

Gender equality is something that the world has struggled with for centuries. I’ll be the first to say that I don’t believe it’s possible. Men and women are never going to see eye to eye, primarily because society won’t let us. And that’s a GOOD thing. If we thought alike all the time, if everything were perfectly balanced, I think the world would be much less interesting. Stagnant, even.

That said, we also think that there’s such a thing as too much imbalance. Right now our industry is so male dominated, it’s like sitting an elephant and a house cat on opposite ends of a balancing board. Sci-fi, fantasy, horror are produced and marketed mostly by and for men. There is a subtle but clear line of thinking that seems to say that women are only interested in fantasy if there are pretty fairies, elves and unicorns, only interested in games that involve dressing up fake people in cool clothes, only going to read fantasy if there is a heavy dose of romance in it, too. While those statements may be true of some women, some of the time, they are not true of all women, all of the time, and they certainly aren’t true for us.

We believe that it’s important to even that up a little, and the only way to do that is to get people to THINK about it. To think about why certain choices are made, and to hopefully help people realize that it might be time to start thinking a little outside the box.

For example: A few days ago ImagineFX, the magazine, started a poll so readers could vote for their favorite cover out of their first 48 issues, in preparation for the release of their 50^th issue. Louisa and I have pointed it out before, and it became even more obvious once all those issues were laid out side by side on a single page. Of the 48 covers, three featured couples, two had monsters, one had a landscape, two featured masked male comic characters, and one had a single barbarian male (of the not exactly supermodel or body builder variety) staring out at the reader. The rest of those 39 issues? A single, usually scantily clad, sexualized female subject. Most of them were pin-ups; those that weren’t were of the pretty, soft, fairy tale sort of female.

We complained. ImagineFX didn’t bother to respond, but some of our readers did.

@charreed said: “I don't mind all the ladies on the cover of Imagine FX. I'm a lady and I like looking at fantastical woman :)

When it comes right down to it, neither do we, Char. I can appreciate female beauty, too. The problem that we see, however, is that the imbalance in the covers suggests that ImagineFX’s primary audience is male, and that any female readers are going to be interested in pretty fairy art. The assumption is that putting a male on the cover is somehow going to disinterest the male readers, or scare off the female readers.

@cetriya said: “I would think it more, its easier to design for females where you have to watch out not… make the males 'gay' looking”[sic]

Why do we assume that it’s okay for women to have to look at sexualized female characters with their tits and ass hanging out, posing tantalizingly… but it’s not okay for men to look at male characters posing somewhat more tastefully but just as objectified? Why do we assume that it’s HARD to draw a good-looking man without making him appear effeminate? I see guys draw tough, sexy male characters all the time. I see women do it, too.I never see those images on the cover of ImagineFX. Why not?

@charreed also said: “… unfortunately the audience is mostly dudes.... So convince more girls to buy the mag or get guys to like beef ;)”

Honestly? Of all the artists I know, the majority of the ones who subscribe to IFX on a regular basis are female. So we ARE buying the magazine. You might ask “why, when it’s so obviously marketed to men?” Because ImagineFX isn’t a gaming magazine, or one meant for guys to …er… enjoy in the privacy of their own bathrooms. ImagineFX, in theory, is for ARTISTS. It’s a trade magazine, with tips and tricks for artists—both male and female.

It might come as a surprise to many people to know that there are a LOT of women working in this field. One of our goals here at Artemisia is to find and promote those women—precisely because so few people are aware that we’re even here, and working. Even fewer seem aware of the fact that many of the women in this industry aren’t drawing pretty fairy girls in dresses. That particular market IS huge, and it’s been popularized by female artists like Linda Bergkvist, Melanie Delon, Marta Dahlig, and Benita Winkler; but there are more women who are doing awesome art that is comparable to what the guys in this field are doing.

The problem is that they are so overshadowed by the men who dominate the field that they’ve become almost a myth. Artists like Terese Nielson, Trish Mulvihill, Nicole Cardiff, Socar Myles, Anna Christenson, Jana Schirmer, Cris Griffin, Julie Dillon, Nei Ruffino, and Laurel Austin are some of our favorite artists here at Artemisia—and I’ve seen many people who assume that they are male simply because they don’t paint typical “girly” art. (Actually, small confession: until about three minutes ago I thought Julie Dillon—who goes by jdillon82 on deviantART—was male. So I’m an idiot, too.)

As women, working in this industry, it makes sense that we would be interested in magazines, art books, etc. that talk about the industry, give tips and tutorials, or are just inspiring because they show what so many of us are working on. It kind of sucks when you realize how little the creators of these magazines and books value your interest in them because you don’t happen to think with your penis.

Faerywitch said: “As for more males... Girls, when there are more girls you complain, now you have more guys and you complain!! ;) Now, seriously, again, I think it is catered to the people that spend the money.

She’s talking about Louisa’s post the other day about character design in video games, and how video games are marketed to men and ignore female players.

Yes, we do complain. And we will continue to.

It’s not really about the precise ratio of male characters versus female characters. It’s about imbalance. It’s about objectifying one, but not the other. It’s because we are here, we DO spend money on these things, and there are more of us than the industry seems to believe. We want the world to know that. We want them to stop stereotyping us, stop pigeonholing our gender, and start putting things out there that we enjoy because we are a part of this industry… whether men like it or not.

There’s a lot more to discuss here, more than I have time to go into right now. Expect some posts in the future on topics like video games and female gamers, conventions from a woman’s point of view, and what it’s like to be an objectified female AND an artist. Expect some interviews with some of the ladies I’ve mentioned here.

And expect us to hold what occasionally might seem like contradictory or conflicting opinions… we ARE women, after all. ;)

Heroes and Heroines: Assumptions in Character Design

2009-08-24T15:55:00.000-07:00

So Jason Chan is doing a cool new series of downloadable video tutorials for Massive Black DVD. Volumes one through three are on various aspects of character concept design for games - exploring style, designing heroes and villains. I can't wait to have a chance to download the full videos (Jason's "sketches" usually look like art I'd be proud as punch to call finished pieces) but for now, we've been checking out the sneak peaks that MassiveDVD have put up on Youtube.

It's this snippet of the Heroes volume that I wanted to talk about today.

The excerpt focuses on the female character he works on in the tutorial, which is pretty cool in itself, but some of the things he talks about considering when designing a female character were...interesting. It kind of goes back to something I said in my opening post on Artemisia, about how otherwise smart and talented people can come out with some surprisingly biased comments. The video is about five minutes long, and well worth a watch because the highlight is really watching Jason sketch as he talks theory, but here are some of the quotes that struck me the most.

"The first character we did, he relates to the player because he is similar to the player in some ways. The second character relates to the player because he is what the player wishes he could be. The third character relates to the player because she is something that the player can admire."

"So, a lot of the time female characters are sexy and strong, and it's almost like trying to sell love to the player audience. You know, you want to care for this character, maybe find her attractive, but also you are playing the character so she should be strong. So it's kind of a mix between attraction and the hero badass type of character where you feel powerful."

"You can also mix the female character with the weaker character for a horror game, and instead of making her strong you can make her weak, to drive that fear. The problem with it is that there could be a disconnect for male players and male audiences, because they do not feel that they are this female character. In that instance you make it more of a voyeuristic experience where you're guiding this character or you're watching over her."

"For female audiences and female players this character represents the hero, superhero type of character we just did, you know, it's who the female audience may want to be like. You know, she's strong, she's beautiful, she can do anything."

So. A couple of things here. I actually like that Jason goes in deeper here and talks about more than just what the characters look like, because it gives me some idea of what goes into a character designer's mind and why it ends up that female characters are usually rarer, or underpowered, compared to the men. Let me run through a few of the issues I had with Jason's process for designing female characters.

One. That he automatically assumes that the player is male. He talks about female players later, and possibly in more depth in the full video, but it's clear that his primary target is a male audience and that a female character is not seen as somebody a male player can relate to, or want to be like, but an object to covet, to admire, or to protect. Jason mentions that male players may feel a disconnect when playing a female character, but does he reverse the role and consider that female players may not feel fully immersed when playing a male?

Two. That he considers physical beauty a key characteristic in designing a female character. Look at the words he uses, "sexy, beautiful, attractive". I wonder if he considers looks as much when designing the male characters? Is it just as important for them to be good looking as it is for the female?

Three. That the woman is his pick for being the weakest character, allowing players to act as rescuers or protectors. Was there any such consideration for the male character - even the one who looked like a regular guy? It's true that at a similar level of fitness and training, a man will still have a physical advantage over a woman. But put a young, everyday guy of average fitness next to a woman who works out at the gym daily, takes martial arts classes and/or has a military background and who do you think will fare better in a fight? And stand Jason's average guy in jeans next to his warrior woman - tough enough to wear heavy metal armour and carry a blade as long as her leg, but out of the two of them, she is the one who is a candidate for being a weak character?

Four. Ok, so when you're only designing three characters, there is going to be a gender imbalance (well, unless "Other" is on the menu which hey, it's fantasy right?). So having two male characters and one female isn't a big deal on its own. But I can't help feeling a little let down by the fact that you have a variety of male characters and then you have...The Female Character. Just the one, and she is supposed to be the avatar for all the women who might play that game. She can do anything, because she has to do everything!

I feel I should add that out of the eight or nine character concepts Jason has produced for this series so far, I've only seen two who are female - a hero and a villain. So when you take a bigger pool, you do get a greater imbalance of male vs female characters. Again, I feel it goes back to the assumption that most gamers are men, and so women don't need more than one or two characters to represent them, and those characters have to do all the representing. We don't get as much in the way of variety.

It's obvious that Jason puts a lot of thought into his work and considers every step of his design process carefully. I wonder how certain ideas that can feel so very flawed to one person can make perfect sense to another, so much so that he doesn't seem to think about them - it's just instinct to design a female character with this mindset and a male character with another. Maybe that's the problem with a lot of character designers out there (in game art and in illustration in general). Do some concepts and assumptions about our audiences just become so ingrained into our world view that we don't ever really stop and take a close look at whether they're still appropriate, or relevant?

What do you guys think?

"Lovely and Talented"

2009-08-17T07:10:00.000-07:00

We’ve been a little quiet here, lately. It’s a problem that we’re working to fix. In the meantime, however, I wanted to write about something that bothered me recently. It’s a little thing. The kind of thing you probably don’t even think about, and yet once you do, you’ll catch yourself saying it and wonder why. Proof, I suppose, that sexism comes in many forms. The worst are the ones that we don’t even think about.

A couple of weeks ago I received an email from someone who wanted to use my work. He promised to attribute it, and to include the phrase “by the lovely and talented Melissa Findley”. I’m aware that he meant it as a compliment, but for some reason it got me steamed. When I get angry about something, I usually try to figure out WHY it makes me angry. And once I put aside the fact that this person didn’t know me, has never seen me, had never even interacted with me, and that he meant “lovely” as a platitude (false flattery, with me, often gets you the opposite of what you want), I started to think about the phrase itself.

I’ve said it myself. I know I have. Usually about other artists I’m promoting. Also, I only say it about women.

I ran a Google search for the phrase “lovely and talented.” Turns out it’s been applied to just about every female actress, musician or artist at some point in time. It’s vary rarely been applied to a male.

“Lovely and talented.”

There are deeper implications to those words than there might seem to be on the surface. Lovely implies many things. That the person is physically beautiful is the obvious one. That they are polite, sweet, kind, nice to work with. “Lovely” can mean many things… but my question is: why do we feel the need to qualify a woman’s skills by implying something first about her looks or personality?

I suppose just saying “talented” falls flat. “The talented Louisa Gallie,” for instance, just doesn’t have the same ring. When there are a wealth of other words that could be applied along with “talented”, though, why is it so commonplace to compliment a woman on her looks and/or personality rather than her skill or intelligence or diligence?

How do we introduce men? We don’t say “the lovely and talented Jason Chan,” even if he is “lovely”. We might say “the amazing and talented” or “experienced and talented” or “young and talented” or “smart and talented” or “driven and talented” or “ dedicated and talented.” (Actually, we have said all those things. Or other people have. I ran a Google search for “and talented Jason Chan”. It’s an interesting experience. And I’m not picking on Jason. I have a lot of respect for the man.)

For women, though, “lovely and talented” seems to be the phrase of choice. Although in my searches I ran across more than a few “beautiful and talented”s as well. The “amazing and talented” type of compliment was more rarely used for women, even if those sorts of compliments were better deserved.

So, again, I have to ask: why do we do this? Is it just one of those phrases we use without thinking? I know I did. Not anymore.

If you’re a female artist, or have ever had that phrase applied to you in any way: speak up. How do you feel about it? Does it bother you? Does it just roll off your back? Or have you honestly never thought about it before?

I hadn’t thought about it. But now that I have, in regards to me, I would wish people would find another phrase. I have few illusions about myself. “Lovely” is not a word that fits me comfortably.

Women in Fantasy Art on Ninja Mountain

2009-07-16T08:15:00.000-07:00

This week's episode of Ninja Mountain features a segment with Anne Stokes and Socar Myles talking about women working in fantasy art. They talk about how their gender has impacted their careers, some of the more egregious missteps people have made with them because they are female, and how being female has influenced their work.

So head on over to Ninja Mountain and have a listen (or download it on iTunes!)

Anne Stokes
Website: http://www.annestokes.com/
Email: email@annestokes.com

Socar Myles
Website: http://www.gorblimey.com/
Email: rats@gorblimey.com

ComicCon 2009: Are you kidding me?

2009-06-15T13:42:00.000-07:00

Women don't play video games.

Women don't like action movies.

Women don't know about computers.

Women can't paint fantasy art.

And to add a new one to that list, apparently women don't go to comic conventions. At least they don't go to San Diego's Comic Con, according to the video game site IGN and the LA Times.

This will be news to Leigh Brackett and Katherine Kurtz, who were attending the convention way back in the early seventies. I guess they were just figments of the imagination? I mean, if women don't read comics then they surely don't write science fiction and fantasy. And whoever heard of a chick working on Star Wars? Come on!

Apparently IGN didn't get the memo that women would be in attendance, or perhaps they did, because their promotional contest for the film District 9 originally went out of its way to exclude women.

This sweepstakes is open only to males who are both legal residents of the fifty (50) United States and Washington D.C. and who are at least between 18-24 years of age as of July 23, 2009.

Thank you to the articles at io9 and Tor.com, firstly for bringing this to my attention and secondly for capturing the original rules of the contest. As of Sunday, IGN amended the contest rules to include a separate drawing for female contestents, but not before they tried to blame the whole fiasco on their marketing team.

The eligibility requirements for this contest were determined by Columbia TriStar Marketing, the marketing team behind the District 9 film, and were passed on as a directive to IGN as Sponsor of this particular Sweepstakes running on the IGN.com site. While IGN supports gamers of all ages, genders, shapes and sizes, these guidelines were created to foster a buzz for the film among a very narrow target group that the film’s promoters felt would be extremely passionate about the film’s subject matter.

Boys, if you're so proud of having balls, you'd better be prepared to use 'em. Passing this off on the marketing team? Yes, they should be fired for even thinking that kind of sexism would fly, but you are the idiots who approved it for publication.

(The subject matter of said film, by the way, is a sci-fi approach to bigotry and the segregation of those who are different and (in this case literally) alien. Because men as a gender have a long history of being treated as second class citizens and women couldn't possibly identify with that stuff.)

At least IGN had the sense (or the screaming lawyers at least) to try and make things better. I've yet to see an apology for this stunning piece of journalism from the LA Times: The Girls Guide to Comic Con 2009! Yes, women apparently need a manual now to go to a convention. You see, while they aren't "just for nerdy guys anymore" (again, I refer you back to the early freaking seventies, catch up already!), there's a twist!

And it's not all just about the influx of squealing "Twilight" girls, either.

Yay! Wow, that's a relief. Er, except...

But we've got a pretty good idea of what eager girls can expect (aside from one heck of a line for the "New Moon" session)...

Edward and Jacob appear shirtless in the upcoming "Twilight" sequel, so arrive to Hall H early – as in a week or two before...

For the poor girls who couldn't cram themselves into the "New Moon" panel...

Since the writer can't stop mentioning Twilight, apparently they're convinced that it really is all we're interested in and any extra stuff is just a bonus for us to check out from a distance while we wait in line to get Robert Pattinson to autograph our forehead.

Repeat after me. Not. All. Girls. Love. Fucking. Twilight.

Ok, perhaps that was a little harsh - the purposes of this little article/photo gallery actually is to reassure us girls that there is plenty of variety at Comic Con to entertain us. For example!

Women will be rushing the stage, offering to do star Jake Gyllenhaal's laundry on those washboard abs that he acquired for the film, since he spends much of it fighting, shirtless or both.

Yes, you read that right - offering to do his laundry. Yes, that's the first event on the list that we should be looking forward to. The film? Oh, it's the Prince of Persia something - forget about that. Focus on what's important, which is apparently being overcome with such a frenzy of lust for Jake that we will rush straight into the kitchen to wash his fucking clothes. Because THAT'S how good women show love!

There's more. Oh, how there is more.

Picture the wonderful sappiness of "The Notebook,"

Oh yes, bring on the bittersweet tears.

Plus, you know the wardrobe of Rebecca Romijn, Sara Rue and Lindsay Price is going to give those "Desperate" housefraus a run for their money.

"Battlestar Galactica" taught us that there are girls galore watching sci-fi...

"Caprica" adds an element of family drama and even soap opera addiction...

And some girls may steer clear of high-testosterone action films...

The words "female empowerment" make it into this little guide once (it was swiftly followed by that quip about the fabulous wardrobe) and while they manage to sprinkle in the odd reference to ass kicking female heroines, my ability to appreciate them was lost in the surge of bile and overwhelming rage I felt while reading this tripe. Normally I'd appreciate the nod to all the hot men in science fiction and fantasy but frankly the whole idea seems to be that the shirtless guys are the ONLY things we could possibly appreciate in "high-testosterone" action movies. This is what they think the attraction for women is? Tissues, relationship drama, and giggling over hot boys to entertain ourselves through the boring car chases and gun fights? This is how they think to get women to walk into comic, sci-fi and fantasy cons with their heads held high?

And they have the nerve to call Echo from Dollhouse "a bit of an airhead".

Featured Artist: Ursula Vernon

2009-06-03T11:36:00.000-07:00

Artist Profile

Name: Ursula Vernon
Job Title: Author/Illustrator
Client List: Harcourt Brace, Penguin Dial
Education: BA in Anthropology
Years Experience: 12
Favorite Medium: digital
Specialties: small, cute, disturbing
Accepting Private Commissions? No

Contact Info
Website or Web Portfolio: www.redwombatstudio.com
Email: ursulav@metalandmagic.com
Twitter: ursulav
Online Art Communities: DeviantArt
Prints: www.redwombatstudio.com

The first time I saw a painting by Ursula Vernon I decided that she was one of the most brilliant artists I'd ever encountered. Through the last few years I've watched her grow even more as an artist and a professional, and go through hard times and good times, and through all of it her sense of humor and quirky personality has remained a constant source of inspiration for me, and a ray of sunshine.

From writing and illustrating comic books like the award winning "Digger" and children's books like (the also award winning) "Nurk", to the darker paintings of Gearworld and her collection of odd animal saints and winged phalloi, Ursula demonstrates a unique and incredible talent for finding humor in the oddest of places. I consider it truly my good fortune to have the chance to interview her and find out a little about this woman who isn't afraid to walk on the wild side.

My first introduction to your artwork was five or six years ago, over on Elfwood, where I saw a painting you’d done of a vulture delivering a zombie baby (rather than a stork). It was brilliant, and made me laugh, and the description of you waking up in the middle of the night to tell your husband about the idea reminded me very much of my own midnight insanities. Do you remember the first time you put your sense of humor into a drawing? How does it continue to inform your work?

I think the first time I recall putting my sense of humor--such as it is--in a painting was a piece about a thousand years ago, titled "Bride of the Warthog." It was a kind of classic cheeseball fantasy Boris Vallejo sort of thing, except the lovely maiden was clinging to the ankle of a large warthog. Fortunately for all, this painting has been lost to posterity, but I still recall the title fondly.

The vast majority of my art today involves my sense of humor--I always had a vague desire to be a serious, significant artist doing works of Deep Meaning. Unfortunately, what I'm really good at is hamsters and other small cutenesses. Given that's the hand I seem to be dealt, I have to treat it with a sense of humor...it's hard to do serious angst-ridden rodents for very long.

One of the things that has always stood out to me about your work is that your creatures and characters aren’t typically “girly.” Your heroes are shrews, and wombats, or little dragons and slugs. Is that a deliberate choice on your part? What draws you to atypical heroes and heroines?

Well, part of it is the aforementioned cuteness problem. (I find slugs cute.) But part of it is probably just that I hate doing what everybody else is doing--I always want my stuff to be weird and unique. There's enough big-eyed wasp-waisted heroines and studly tormented heroes out there, I don't need to add to the pile--or if we're going with animals, there's enough foxes and wolves and gryphons to wallpaper a battleship. But there's very few heroic shrews and wombats. And even when I do something relatively normal, like dragons, I try to--god help me, I'm about to use the phrase "subvert the paradigm," that's probably a bad sign--but at least make it odd and unexpected and fun.

Part of it is also, I'm embarrassed to admit, but way back in the day, random people on the internet would get mad at me for painting dragons that didn't look like their notion of dragons or unicorns that ate carrion and lived in dumps, and they would send me long screeds about it on e-mail. Ten years later, I still get a sneaking pleasure from the notion that somebody somewhere is annoyed by my work.

This undoubtedly marks me as a terribly juvenile individual, but I'm coming to terms with it.

You seem to dabble in a little bit of everything. You’re a humor columnist (EMG-zine), author and illustrator of several books for children and young adults, a comic book writer and artist, a card game artist, and you also do gallery shows and paintings of adorable phalluses. Do you have a favorite creative outlet? Is there a direction you’d like to explore that you haven’t yet?

My favorite creative outlet tends to be the one I'm not doing right at this moment. Other than that, probably gardening. Gardening is very low-stress--the only audience I need to please are the bees and the butterflies and the goldfinches, and they're generally a pretty unjudgemental audience.

I'd really like to get more into sculpture. I haven't because I'm not really any good at it, and I don't really know where to begin. Occasionally I start in that direction, but I don't have any of the skillsets, or the equipment, and I'm easily distracted, but that's a place I'd like to get to eventually.

I read in your bio that your mother is an artist, too. What kind of work does she do? How do you feel that’s influenced you, as an artist?

She does very very realistic paintings, and she's brilliant. Part of it is just attention span--she spends a month on a painting, and I get antsy if I'm working on one for more than three days. But she's definitely influenced me--I occasionally find myself throwing in random elements from her paintings, like disembodied hands--and a series she did when I was young heavily influenced a whole series of paintings I've done, the Gearworld work.

Even more than individual elements, I think being surrounded by her art helped cement my view of What Art Looked Like.

Okay, I have to ask, what’s up with the adorable penises?

Lord. It just kinda happened! My boyfriend sent me a link to some *cough* erotic chess-sets, and some of them were these little winged penises, and that reminded me of my long ago archeology classes, and I went rummaging through the internet until I came up with the ancient Greek and Roman "winged phalloi" where they'd have little penises with feet and wings and tails and sometimes even little genitals of their own, and...well...I mentioned the cuteness problem, right? And the problem with images that simple and iconic is that you can do anything with them, they become a great blank canvas. It's sort of like My Little Ponies. Except...err...with penises. With feet.

I'm not well.

How do you feel being a female artist working in this industry has either helped and/or hindered you? Do you ever get strange looks because you’re a woman drawing anthropomorphized wombat comics and blue penises in the mist?

Being on the internet for the vast majority of my career has, I think, really blunted a lot of the sexism, or perhaps I'm just oblivious to it. But since 99% of my clients know me as a portfolio and a screen name, it just doesn't come up as much as it probably would if I was going into offices and so forth. It's probably out there, but it's not something that impacts me personally.

I do catch occasional flak on the penises, but I suspect I'd catch a LOT more if I was male and painting them. You get random trolls, but I think most viewers see them for what they are--absurd and silly and kind of weirdly non-sexual in a way.

One of the things I'm proudest of about "Digger"--the wombat comic in question--is the fact that it's mostly about female characters--and that doesn't MATTER. People don't spend a lot of time going "Digger's a tough female character!" they just go "Digger is tough!" (Half the time people don't know she's female until somebody mentions it.) Probably a lot of it is that most of them aren't human, and that we fool with gender roles a bit with the hyenas, but still, I feel like the next stage after "Girls can do anything boys can do!" is to have the girls just DO whatever it is, and nobody feeling a need to comment on the fact that they're girls. And for the most part we seem to have gotten really lucky with Digger in that regard--her problems aren't that she's a female wombat in a male wombat's world, it's that she's got to deal with dead gods and crazy priests and vampire squash.

This isn't intended as a slam on comics that are about being a female whatever in a male whatever's world, because I think there's a lot you can say about that and say it well. It's just not what I particularly had to say with Digger.

Any advice for other girls out there who have oddball senses of humor and an urge to paint?

I hope they do! It's not exactly a lucrative field, but it's the best job in the world. I have more fun doing this than I can imagine having doing anything else at all.

Image Credits:
Above: "Battle Hamster Raid" ©2004-2009 Ursula Vernon
Below Left: "Phalloi in Flight" ©2009 Ursula Vernon
Below Middle: "Owl Saint" ©2006-2009 Ursula Vernon
Below Right: "Cthulu's Day Out" ©2008-2009 Ursula Vernon

Twitter! Email! Links!

2009-05-31T17:41:00.000-07:00

Artemisia has its own Twitter account now. We'll be updating it periodically with links to stuff of interest, cool new artists and websites we find, basically all the stuff we don't have time to post articles about. You can follow along at http://twitter.com/TheArtemisia

That's not to say we won't have articles, of course. We've got two or three in the works at the moment. Two interviews and a post about art that will be coming soon. If you've got ideas or suggestions for things you'd like to see us talk about, people you'd like to see us interview, or whatever, drop a comment here, or send us an email at ArtemisiaAdmin@gmail.com. We'd love to hear what you've got to say. Put the word "Suggestion" in the Subject line so we don't lose track of them.

I also just finished a whole slew of banner ad designs for Artemisia. If you're interested in showing your support for our site by linking to us, and have room on your page for a banner ad, send me an email at the above address and let me know what size you need, and I'll get that to you. I'll make a spot on the sidebar to link back to supporters.

Ninjas, Tutorials, and Masculinity

2009-05-22T13:34:00.000-07:00

Hey all. Sorry for the gap between posts lately. Melissa's had the builders in and a bunch of projects to finish up, and I've had a tough couple of weeks at work. So this post is a bit of a pick-and-mix (instead of sugar candy, we substitute eye candy) - just a few things I've been taking notes on that don't quite justify a full post in themselves.

Back in March we pimped out the Ninja Mountain right as they added the first female voice to their podcast, Anne Stokes. Since then Anne has been back and Socar Myles has also been on a bunch of times. As a matter of fact, she's on this week (I'm listening as I type) and let me tell you, if you thought the podcasts were funny before, you will be splitting your sides when Socar joins in. Back when I first stumbled across Epilogue she was The Artist whose advice and articles I read over and over, and I still hear her thoughts on colour theory in my head when I paint. It's even better listening to her in person - she's very smart, very deadpan, and very very funny. Go and listen! The podcast is excellent no matter who is on, but if you're especially interested in hearing Anne and Socar, start around episode eight.

It looks like the post on stock resources and reference for the male form was pretty popular, so for those of you that haven't seen it yet, this might be of interest to you.

Melissa does an hour long live painting session every Wednesday on Ustream and this week she spent some time sketching and discussing the differences between male and female faces. Ustream records her video sessions so you can view it later as often as you like - the male/female face portion starts around 23 mins. She also has a short tutorial on just painting young male faces here on DeviantArt. Have fun!

I recently posted a finished piece of artwork (featuring a guy - this is important) on one of the bigger art forums for feedback. One small comment caught my attention.

"It's more provocative than masculine ;)."

The painting was absolutely provocative and I'm not debating that - it was intended to be. Like we say whenever we get onto this subject - there aren't enough sexy male portraits out there. It was that "more provocative than masculine" remark that took me aback. Since when are the two mutually exclusive? Is it an either or situation? Men can be sensual, in your face sexy OR masculine, but not both?

Thinking on it, apparently so! Do you see many paintings of men sprawled elegantly over silk bedsheets with a come-hither expression on their face? Do you see them standing in the middle of a battlefield pouting, attired and posing in a way that says, "Oh! Hello, miss! I seem to have had a terrible accident and lost all my clothes except for these very fine leather boxer shorts and my sword. Is there any way you could assist me with this? I'd be so very grateful."

No, not usually, but I now know what I'm doing for my next painting.

No, you don't get many male pinups. Men in art are DOING stuff. Manly stuff. Oh sure, you get character portraits, but they generally tend to be fully clothed, or at least mostly clothed, and radiating attitude that's rarely about seduction. On the rare occasion you do see a picture of a man that's purely seductive, he often tends to be...soft. Pretty. Delicate. I'm all for pretty guys but sometimes it's as if the artist has deliberately gone as "feminine" as they can get away with because nobody could possibly deal with the sight of a man as a sex object...unless he looks like a woman.

Women can multi-task while being objectified, you see. According to fantasy art, a woman can topple an army, decapitate a demon, fly a spaceship, rule an empire AND sprawl elegantly over silk bedsheets with a come hither expression on their face or stand in the middle of a battlefield after a terrible clothing-related accident at the same time. It's all in a day's work.

Would you look at a seductive female character and think, "Well, she's more provocative than feminine?" I doubt it. Certainly we all have different notions of what the word "feminine" means to us, but I don't think that's the sort of femininity we're talking about here. I think what we're talking about is sexuality. Breasts and buttocks are sexual in a woman. In men, bare chests and butts are also sexual, but it's apparently taboo to portray them as such - if a guy is showing skin, it's usually in a Rawr, HE-MAN, my muscles-let-me-show-you-them sort of way. To quote someone who was commenting on the portrayal of male and female characters in comic book, "Men are strong. Women are sexy."

Yes, women can be sexy, and they can be Doing Stuff (but only if they look sexy while doing it). Men can either be Doing Stuff or they can be sexy (but only if they look like women while doing it).

Look, female artists deal with having our own gender sexed up to the extreme and thrust in our faces every time we log onto a fantasy website. I'm pretty sure any Real Men in the audience can put on their big boy leather shorts and deal with it too.

Featured Artist: Sam Hogg

2009-05-05T12:40:00.000-07:00

Artist Profile
Name: Sam "Zephyri" Hogg
Job Title: Concept Artist
Freelance? Yes, but only as a sideline to my main job
Client/Employer List: Jagex, Bizarre Creations, number of independent authors
Education: Nothing after the age of 18! Interestingly, Art was my lowest graded exam at 18.
Years Experience: Professional years of art experience, about 3, though I have 8 years as a graphic designer under my belt too.
Favourite Medium: Watercolour and pencils and Photoshop.
Specialities: Adaptability... the ability to work in a variation of styles, subjects and mediums, but subject wise, dark romantic images featuring couples.
Accepting Private Commissions? Not currently, no.

Contact Info
Website or Web Portfolio: www.zephyri.com/ www.zephyri.deviantart.com
Email: sam@zephyri.com
Twitter: zephyri
Online Art Communities: Deviantart, Conceptart, Pixelbrush and CGTalk, all under the name Zephyri
Prints: Available through my deviantart gallery.

I've been a fan of Sam's work since before she signed on with Jagex and joined me in the world of the games industry. She first caught my eye over a Pixelbrush with some seriously sexy WIP pieces, and since then I've been in love with her versatility and unpredictability. From miniatures to coloured pencils to digital painting, everything in her gallery is a little different, but still has that touch of something which is uniquely "her". I grabbed hold of her for a brief interview about her work and her life as a concept artist.

Often artists will show a bias towards one gender or another, but you seem to paint men as often as you paint women, and quite a lot of your art features couples. Do you consciously try to keep up a variety, or is it just something you do naturally?

I think it's just something I do naturally - both men and women have traits that I find fascinating. Couples are often a good way of dealing with the contrasts of both at once, and I love the interplay between human beings. A lot of fantastical art focuses simply on the aesthetic, or on the emotions of a key character, and I find that strange, given the subtle emotional things you can work into two people interacting - it's kind of like using a complementary colour scheme, one augments the other

You can go from Luis Royo (disturbingly sexy) to Art Nouveau (soft and romantic), but almost all of your art has some degree of sensuality, even the darker, more tragic or sad pieces. Is it a favourite theme?

Most definitely. Sensuality, contrasts and balance are the big themes in my work and myself as a person. Emotion is what my life is governed by, be it good or bad, and art is the main outlet I have for dealing with it. It's one of the reasons my subject matter is so diverse - it's reflecting the myriad of emotional states I go through. I get most joy out of a piece when I can sit back and look at it and still feel the base emotions that sparked the piece in the first place. And being a realism artist means that sometimes emotional content can be diluted by the need to make sure everything looks right, be it anatomy, or composition, or finding the right reference. Having said that though, getting the same emotional responses from people who view my art is one of the reasons I keep doing it. I'm a romantic at heart, but I'm also very much a pessimist, and grounded in real life, which is why many of my images seem to hold a melancholy undertone to them. A moment of happiness can be made so much more intense by knowing that tragedy might follow, or has gone before, and trying to capture that little piece of story telling in an image of the emotions between two people is something I take great joy in.

I believe you write as well as draw and paint. Is storytelling a big part of your artwork too?

Writing is something I'm less confident about, in terms of sharing with the masses, but it's something that seems to come more easily to me than art, weirdly. It used to be very much something that inspired my art, and vice versa, but with working for others a lot more lately, it's showing up less in my art. However, having said that, when I work on personal pieces, I find images weave stories about them, or stories might spring from random things I see or hear during the day that in turn spark imagery in my head. Sometimes I find the two are almost blended to one... that telling a story with an image is just as important as painting pictures in someone's head with words.

The games industry in the UK isn't the biggest to begin with, and so the number of women who work in it is even smaller. Has being a woman ever been a help or a hindrance to your career?

This is very true... I'm one of only two women in a 60 strong graphics team at my company, and our overall female to male percentage is 15/85%. However, having come from a design background, where it's less of a contrast, but still a mostly male-run industry, it was never a big shock, or something unexpected. Being a woman can be both a help and a hindrance. For one thing, we're something of a curiosity, and that can be turned to your advantage, as it can make you stand out in a crowd of guys. I have also noticed I can get away with a little more than my male counterparts do when things go wrong... not that I don't get held accountable - I'm usually the first to hold up my hands, but the backlash can sometimes not be as blunt. In terms of how I'm treated with the work I do, I don't think it's ever been an issue that I'm a woman. It's more to do with how you conduct yourself, and being professional and approachable is more important that your gender. The only downside I've found, oddly, is on the whole social bonding thing. One thing I'd never considered going into a wholly male environment was that I might not be seen in the same social light as the guys in the office. Sometimes I get the feeling they don't invite me to play games, or hang out because I'm a girl and I don't do guy things, or because their other halves would have an issue with it. Both of which wouldn't be an issue if I were a guy.

I've found that as a woman, I'll approach concepts/design differently to how my male coworkers would have. Do you find the same thing? Do you think having a female influence makes a difference to the direction the artwork takes?

This is a tough one! On the one hand I'd say there's not that much difference, but I notice it most when it comes to creating both male and female characters. I think we're both hormonally bound to approach these things differently.. my male counterpart's women always have a very sexy bent to them whenever he gets the chance, and are about the way she looks, whereas when I'm concepting for women, it's more about the kind of personality they might have which will dictate how they look. I definitely err on the side of confident, strong women in my art, rather than the brainless sexy type. Same with men, I'm bound to design guys I find visually appealing when given the choice, whereas guys will generally revert to the stereotypical brawn strength. I guess it's a case of both sexes projecting what they want to be or are attracted to.

Doing the concepts for Bizarre has really pushed me to think about how I concept for guys though, as they work I'm doing for them has involved a variety of male characters, from your typical gung ho confident type, to something much more refined, to the nervous everyday-looking guys. Interestingly in this particular modern genre, I feel there's much less of a divide between a male and female concepter, than there might be in the more exaggerated types of fantasy characters.

Finally, as someone who has worked both sides of the fence, how much of a change was it to go from a freelance illustrator/designer to an inhouse artist?

This one's a no brainer for me. I'm rubbish at planning my own time when I'm working solely freelance, and I have no business sense, so freelancing was hard, even though I really enjoyed having my own time, picking my own projects and being able to arrange my own schedule. It was a little bit of a shock to have to suddenly get up so early in a morning, but I'm super lucky in as much as I work for a company that's strictly 9-6, and we rarely if ever do overtime. I love the structure of having to work in an office, I love the social aspect of it, there is seriously nothing better than having other artistic people around you giving you feedback. And I get way more done in an office than I would have done at home. It's tough sometimes on the days where you just know you're not going to get anything done or anything you do do is going to be crap, but that's vastly outweighed by the sense of team accomplishment when things go right.

Image Credits:
Above: "Colours of the Wind" ©2006-2009 Sam Hogg
Below: "Underneath It All" ©2008-2009 Sam Hogg
Bottom: "The Prince's Dance" ©2006-2009 Sam Hogg
All images used here with the artist's permission

Art Rant: Headless Torsos

2009-04-30T06:14:00.000-07:00

Okay, I admit it. I read paranormal romance.

There. I've said it.

Yes, I know I'm an intelligent, modern woman who believes in feminism, equal rights, etc. but part of me really, really loves a love story with a happy ending. If that love story involves full moon nights, faerie tale creatures, demons with souls, or a little bit of magic, all the better. Yes, sometimes it's cliche, and sometimes it's smutty, and sometimes the premise sounds good but I still end up throwing the book against the wall in disgust. Even my ability to suspend my disbelief has its limits.

But what I really hate about paranormal romance is the cover art.

Seriously. Here we have an ENTIRE GENRE that is being marketed toward women. Many, many of the publishers in this genre have been around for many, many years. Some of them are small presses and epubs, to be sure, but c'mon Harlequin, you're not new at this. But, oh, the awful cover art! Most of the time it looks like someone just got their first pirated copy of Photoshop and are mucking about with the filter section and blend modes. You can almost hear their inner fifteen year old girl thinking oh! I can make him blue! Blue is dark and spooky and fantasy looking! Maybe he has a magic tattoo! And he turns into a werewolf, so lemme just cut and paste a werewolf back here! And a full moon! And a CASTLE! Maybe there is a little BLOOD!!!

There are so many cliches in the ParaRomance cover art slop bucket that it ought to be hard for me to pull out my least favorite. It's not though, and unsurprisingly it's one of the most common cliches in the romance genre period:

The Headless Torso

I envision the auditions for these covers as a pectacular version of A Chorus Line. The art director flipping through model photos and muttering about needing a torso that really tells a story. One with pathos. One with some real expression. Maybe this guy gets cut because his shoulders aren't empathetic enough, or this one because his nipples aren't manly enough. Screw the face. Who cares if the guy's face is hot? Women want man-tits to look at! After all, it's not like we have some of our own.

Sex sells, right? And these covers are all about peddling the sex. They might as well ditch the title and artwork and just print "smutty sex scenes within" and be done with it. It's not like any of us actually read these for the plot, after all, and sometimes skim over the too long, kind of boring sex scenes (two whole chapters for a sex scene, by the way, is WAY TOO MUCH. Also, the next author who calls it a "clitty" I will punch in the crotch. So, knock it off).

These covers do nothing to tell me anything about the story. I should probably thank someone for that, because at least they don't have yet another cut and pasted image of the same freaking wolf floating around nebulously in the background. God forbid you be able to somehow get across that they're a shapeshifter without having floating wolf heads in the background... oh wait. Sometimes they do that too.

And a bonus! Floating lion heads and TWO headless torsos! And some claw marks! Thank goodness it's an ebook cover and no one will have to be seen in public, carrying that badge of shame.

Isn't it bad enough that pararomance already suffers from the social stigma of being thought of as women's soft core porn? Does it have to be branded that way, too? I'm not normally a fan of graphic design cover art, but at least it has some dignity. Or, you know, give it a painted cover more reminiscent of modern sci-fi or fantasy books. Something other than headless torsos, please!

Of course, it's entirely probable that the only reason these guys keep getting everything above their lips cut off is to disguise the fact that there are only three men in the entire world who look like that. Or maybe they're too embarrassed about being on these covers to show their faces. Yeah, that's possible too.

Still, none of these covers strikes me as even the least bit appealing. In fact, of all the books shown here, I only own one of them (and no I'm not telling which one), and that only because I'd read a review that intrigued me enough to ignore the cover. As a woman, if there's going to be a fantasy man on the cover for me to drool over, I want to see his face. I want to see at least a hint of intelligence lurking behind his (hopefully not photoshopped so they're neon green) eyes. I do not want to be left staring at his nipples and wondering if he waxes. (Because if he turns into something with four legs and a tail once a month, he's probably normally a lot hairier than these covers would have us believe.)

Sadly, though, even some of my favorite authors have been falling prey to the headless torso plague, lately. I won't post their covers here because I feel badly for them. It's almost as if some zombie had been noshing on their covers. You don't want to put that in public. It's depressing.

Surely, something has to give. Perhaps the models will rise in revolt! "Can't you love us for our feet?!" They will cry, "Or our noses?! We have noses! Bob over there has some really hot ankles, too! We can't take our shirts off in public without being recognized and pelted with new copies of Acheron! Have you seen the size of that thing? It hurts!" Or maybe the art directors for these publishing houses will finally get a clue.

Something. Please. If you don't do it for me, do it for the nipples.

Please, think of the nipples. They're so cold...

Cover Art Reviews: Bone Crossed and Knife

2009-04-15T08:19:00.000-07:00

Melissa's pick: Bone Crossed

Artist: Dan Dos Santos
Author: Patricia Briggs
Publisher: Ace / Penguin

If I hadn't already been following the Mercy Thompson series, and hadn't already been a fan of both Patricia Brigg's books and Dan Dos Santos's artwork, this cover would have sold me on both. I saw the cover art on Dan's site months before the book was due out and could hardly wait to get my hands on it. Even better? Instead of going straight to paperback like the previous three books, Bone Crossed was released in glorious, full-size hardcover, making this gorgeous cover a showcase piece for my bookcase (if only I had ROOM on it. :D).

What makes me love it? While the book has some romantic undertones, the cover doesn't cater directly to the traditional paranormal romance crowd. No faceless torsos or photoshopped werewolves, or glowing eyes. Instead we get the hint of the supernatural in a spectacular tattoo that sleeves her entire arm (and can I just say YAY for showing a woman with a REAL tattoo and not a girly butterfly on her back?). Although her outfit is clearly designed with the "sex sells" concept in mind, too, it's not blatant. She looks like she could actually work in her clothes, and has. Mercy, the character in the book, is a mechanic, and a damned good one (again, not your typical profession for a heroine), and the cover shows how strong she is and how willing she is to get dirty to get the job done. Having read the series, too, I can also say that when I saw the cover for this, I knew what the rain symbolically meant--which does somewhat heighten the impact of the image. That aside, however, it's a beautifully composed scene, and the lighting and palette really set the tone for the book.

What would I change about it? Maybe a teeeeeensy bit less cleavage. Other than that, not a thing at all.

Louisa's response to the Bone Crossed cover:

I first saw this cover when I went to stay with Melissa and her family a few weeks ago - it was on the top of a very large pile of books that she set down in front of me and gave me firm instructions to read. With the Mercy Thompson series, I needed no convincing. I'd already brought the second book on the plane with me. I fell in love with this cover right away and picked it up several times just to look at it. It's more than just a pretty girl standing in the rain. It tells you who Mercy is as a person - what she does, where she works, a little about her ancestry (note the earring) and the tattoos clue you in further, especially the one on her stomach. Yes, it's the details that do it for me. I love it when books use full illustrations like this for covers instead of simplistic, generic photomanipulations and this is one of the ones that always comes to mind when I think of good cover art.

Louisa's pick: Knife

Artist: Brian Froud
Author: R. J. Anderson
Publisher: Orchard

I'll hold my hands up and say I haven't read this book yet. It's on a list (an Amazon Wishlist, to be precise) of books I've been recommended but haven't gotten around to buying yet (I have to pace myself. If I bought every book I was entranced by immediately, I wouldn't have the money for internet). However, it came very highly recommended by Sarah Rees Brennan, a very wise and funny author I generally obey without question, and it had a Brian Froud cover. Brian Froud? Brian Froud fairy? SOLD.

I think Brian's art, as a general rule, is either gorgeous or adorable or both, and this is both even in its simplicity - just the heroine, Knife, standing in the centre of the page. What I like is that she is not your typical wide eyed, guileless and gentle fairy in a flower petal dress. She has a scowly, stubborn little face, wide planted feet and fists firmly planted on hips and the kind of attitude that tells you to keep well out of range of her tiny fists.

Excerpt from Sarah B's review:

KNIFE: Come no closer human, or I will stab you with my magnificent blade.
PAUL: ... Did you nick that letter opener from Dad's desk?

If there were a fairy version of Lyra Belacqua, this is how I would picture her. She draws you in as a character and looks kickass despite obviously only being a couple of inches tall (and can I just say how impressed I am that Brian Froud could convey her size so clearly without anything else on the cover to compare her to) and she makes me want to read her story. The colours and the glow are beautiful and create a darker, mystical mood and a sense of adventure - at least that's how I see it.

Melissa's response to Knife:

Crap! Not Froud's cover, because this one rocks. I mean it's crap that the awesome Froud cover is UK only and our US cover (and title) makes this look like a completely different book. Over here in the US, the book with the awesome title "Knife" is changed to "Faery Rebels: Spell Hunter" and the wicked looking cover has been replaced with precisely what Louisa was glad Froud's cover wasn't: a "typical wide eyed, guileless and gentle fairy in a flower petal dress." The US cover artist is Melanie Delon, whose work I admire on a technical level but... seriously? WHY did they whitewash this character so badly on the US cover and make it look like a book for *very* young girls? I guess because the target market in the US is only girls ages 9-12, when it looks like it would probably appeal to a wider age group. The Froud cover is spunky and fun, and would likely appeal to teenage girls and adults who read YA fic. The Delon cover is pretty... but definitely more suited to pre-adolescent girls who think that faeries are pretty and sweet. From what I can tell of the book, the faeries in this book are anything BUT pretty and sweet.

Flip Side: Female Force comics

2009-03-30T20:30:00.000-07:00

Let’s switch things up a bit and talk for a minute about men drawing women.

Specifically, men drawing women to go on the covers of comic books.

You’ve got that image in your mind’s eye already, don’t you? Big breasts, tiny waist, costume that leaves nothing to the viewer's imagination—and is utterly impractical for fighting crime (or participating in it, depending). Doesn’t usually matter the genre—fantasy, superheros, sci-fi, horror—the stereotype is alive and well in the world of comics.

So it’s a breath of fresh air when an artist comes along who draws women tastefully, beautifully, and in a way that shows them as intelligent, powerful, and interesting for more than their gravity defying breasts.

Meet Vinnie Tartamella. If that name seems familiar, you’ve possibly heard it on the news recently. His covers for Bluewater Productions's Female Force series is making serious waves in a rather unexpected kind of artistic ocean: politics. Each comic is a biographical look at a female political figure, and they don’t discriminate based on party affiliation, either. On the covers, Vinnie portrays these powerful women (Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, and Caroline Kennedy thus far), with strength and patriotism rather than trying to turn them into comic book sex symbols.

Despite having already been interviewed on MSNBC and featured on Regis and Kelly, Vinnie took some time to answer a few questions for Artemisia readers.

Can you tell us a little about the Female Force comics and how you came to do the covers for them?

Female Force is a series depicting strong and influential women in our society. The series is a great way to learn more about these women, their lives, and their accomplishments. Each issue is a one shot bio book. I've been doing work for Blue Water comics for a few years now, the publisher really likes both my comic book and portrait work, so he asked if I'd want to take part in this. I was excited to work on these and soon became the lead cover artist to the series.

What has been the most challenging aspect of this project for you?

The most challenging part has been making each person's traits and likeness 100% accurate. Each woman I depict has her own accomplishments, so its been a little tricky to nail down an image that would represent them really well and/or just to be very iconic looking and be able to sell lots of books.

Which is your favorite cover?

I'm most proud of the Hillary Clinton cover. I was asked to make her at the last minute, and I was able to finish her in about a day and half. For a piece that was done so fast, I'm really happy with how she came out. At the moment Princess Diana is my absolute favorite. (I made her recently for the next series.)

Personally, I think it’s really inspiring to see strong, intelligent women portrayed so well on a comic book cover. Have you heard any feedback from any of the women you’ve depicted?

I've been really happy hearing the feed back on this series. And just recently we had heard back from Bill Clinton's office. He has asked for a few copies of the Hillary issue and wishes us luck on this project! It’s a great honor to hear that! (And we had also sent the cover I made of Bill for the male series "Political Power")

I read that the Michelle Obama cover has been very successful. Have you gotten any figures back on how well it’s selling? What about the others?

It has been selling very well. It's now the highest selling comic book from an independent publisher! The last figures I saw were about a month and half ago. The sales on the preorders alone went from about 28,000 to 40,000 in a week. And on ebay I've seen the single issue going for as high as $350! And the issue doesn't even hit stores until late in April (about the 29th of April I believe). The first 2 issues sold out in about a heartbeat. Second printings are in the works for those as well.

The Female Force covers have gotten a lot of national media attention lately, too. How many interviews have you done so far?

Yeah sure has, I've personally done about 4 or 5 (Sun Sentinel, two for MSNBC, local CBS) with a few more to come. Next month I have one planned during a signing I'll be doing in NY at St. Marks for a Japanese morning show, the week Michelle's issue hits stores. The publisher has also been featured with the series on CNN.

If you got to pick, who would you want to put on a Female Force cover next? Will there be new editions?

The one I really wanted to make was on Princess Diana, which I've done for the new series. So, yes there will be more series after this one, and yes, the men will have a spot light as well. But I do personally love creating these all and its really great that young girls (and women) will have a chance to learn more about these strong woman that have had such a huge impact on the world.

If you’d like to see more of Vinnie’s work (and he’s good with the more traditional comic book females, and also does some awesome comic heroes) you can check out his work at www.Vinroc.deviantart.com.

Female Force comics are available through your local comic book stores, and will soon be available on Amazon.com.

Image Credits:
Above: "Female Force" © 2009 Bluewater Productions, art by Vinnie Tartamella
Below: "Michelle Obama" "Caroline Kennedy" and "Hillary Clinton" ©2009 Bluewater Productions, art by Vinnie Tartamella.

Images posted with permission from the artist.

The Male Form: Stock Resources and Inspiration

2009-03-28T15:27:00.000-07:00

When women paint women, we tend to find it easier than painting men. We absorb visual reference from all around us, and so when we starting to paint or draw men, we can find ourselves unconsciously falling back on the features and forms we know best - the ones we see in the mirror every day. This is why sometimes our guys can start to turn out unintentionally androgynous or feminine, and we have to forcibly correct ourselves.

Another reason it can be tougher to paint men is the lack of good reference material. The female form is definitely more popular with photographers and artists, and women just seem more willing to strip down and dress up in the name of good stock photography. You might have a boyfriend or a spouse at home, but they may not like being photographed and if they are, do they even have the right look or body type for your subject? (Incidently, if you do happen to have a gorgeous, sexy and ripped male partner who is completely happy to strip off and pose all day long; firstly, I hate you, and secondly, any chance you could share the photos?) However, there are resources for the male form out there if you know where to look, and I'm going to share some of my favourites here.

Most of these are on DeviantArt, except for a few at the end, and are therefore free to view (though not neccesarily to use)

DeviantArt Stock Photographers

DeviantArt figure stock artists are seriously generous individuals who make life a lot easier for many artists, by setting up a home made photography studio and providing the dA community with a wealth of human reference - nude, costumed, modernly clothed, with props, with varied lighting, poses and locations! The boys can be hard to find, but you'll find a few of the best here. I'll note whether you can expect nudity or not. I will also link to their terms of use where applicable. These guys are artists doing a community service, which does not mean their stock is free for all and any purposes. Some may prohibit commercial, or outside of dA use, while others just want to see the final picture when you're done. Please respect their rules.

Deviant: Justmeina
Stock Type: Full nudes. Classic. Great for fine art studies and general reference.
Terms of Use: http://justmeina.deviantart.com/journal/11567868/

Deviant: JadeMacalla
Stock Type: Action man! Guns, combat and extreme activity poses
Terms of Use: http://jademacalla.deviantart.com/journal/17216777/ - See footer

Deviant: MJRanum-Stock
Stock Type: Male and Female. MJRanum photographs mostly females (costumed AND nude) with a fetish theme, but he has some great male models too, who are all clothed for now. You can go directly to his male stock here, although I highly recommend the rest of his gallery. Fantastic costumes and professional quality.
Terms of Use: http://mjranum-stock.deviantart.com/journal/12259531/

Deviant: Watchstock
Stock Type: Full body nudes, but the face is always concealed. So, good for figure drawing and muscle studies.
Terms of Use: Unavailable, but he states here that no permission is needed for using his stock, and his main goal is education. I would recommend you contact him and check before doing anything commercial with his stock.

Deviant: Tigg-Stock
Stock Type: Male and Female. Male stock is here. Modern, clothed, urban style, with some nice face close ups.
Terms of Use: See "Stock Rules" on their main page. You may need to scroll down.

Deviant: Lindowyn-Stock
Stock Type: Male and Female. Male stock is here. Fantasy style costumes, with a few modern and quirky ones thrown in for good measure. Both outdoor and studio shots.
Terms of Use: http://lindowyn-stock.deviantart.com/journal/

Deviant: Katanaz-Stock
Stock Type: Male and Female. Male stock is here. Modern fashion and mostly fully clothed, though there are a few yummy shirtless guys. Professional quality!
Terms of Use: http://katanaz-stock.deviantart.com/journal/19323626/

Deviant: Snak-Stock
Stock Type: Bond. James Bond. Fully clothed, modern/urban fashion, plus action poses with swords and guns.
Terms of Use: http://snak-stock.deviantart.com/journal/19648719/

Deviant: B-e-c-k-y-Stock
Stock Type: Male and Female. Very cool sports, music and dance action shots, mixed in with beautiful full body and face portraits. Male stock is not separated, but it's a small gallery and I highly recommend looking at it all.
Terms of Use: http://b-e-c-k-y-stock.deviantart.com/journal/9286216/

Deviant: Jesper-Stock
Stock Type: Varied outfits and styles - modern/costume/gothic. Some underwear shots but no full nudes.
Terms of Use: http://jesper-stock.deviantart.com/journal/19617369/

Deviant: Felixdeon
Stock Type: Full nudes, and some group/action shots.
Terms of Use: http://felixdeon.deviantart.com/journal/14418485/

Figure Photography

Sometimes stock isn't enough, or sometimes you aren't looking for a stock photo. Sometimes you just want some inspiration, or you're struggling with complicated lighting (which most stock doesn't come with), or you want to see more of a variety in muscle definition or bone structure. This is where checking out the artistic photographer galleries comes in handy. I've found galleries chock full of sensual, gorgeous nude or semi nude men which are SO instructive for learning about the way strong light falls across a ripped body, or how those particular muscles bunch that way, or getting inspiration for poses, or studying skin in high res, perfect detail, or a hundred other little things. Including lifting my mood. What they AREN'T for, of course, is outright copying, as they are fully finished pieces of art by themselves and the photographers or models are posting them as portfolio pieces. So...

DO: Look, Admire, Get inspired
DON'T: Copy, Trace, Manipulate.

Of course, I'm sure I don't really need to tell this to the majority of you.

Name: Phil Wood
Gallery: http://holdmycoat.deviantart.com/
Nudes: Yes, artistic.

Name: Sita Mae Edwards
Gallery: http://sitamae.deviantart.com/
Nudes: Yes, artistic/fashion, male and female. The gallery has mostly female models, but she has amazing male models too and they aren't hard to find.

Name: Fabien Bosdedore
Gallery: http://fabienbos.deviantart.com/
Nudes: Yes, artistic/emotive, and a variety of ethnicities too.

Name: Andre Pizaro
Gallery: http://andrepizaro.deviantart.com/
Nudes: No, but fashion/glamour type photography, so some underwear shots.

Name: Raymond Corbett
Gallery: http://racorb.deviantart.com/
Nudes: Yes, classic/artistic/fetish (pretty mild, though)

Name: Tony Gibble
Gallery: http://modeltonygibble.deviantart.com/
Nudes: Yes, artistic/glamour

Name: Michael Kilgore
Gallery: http://studio4496.deviantart.com/
Nudes: Yes, artistic/glamour

Other Resources

Character Designs: An Artist's Resource

Character Designs is a free site for - you guessed it - character designers. My favourite part is the free photosets (under Archives>Photosets) which are high resolution and professionally shot. Most have an interesting twist be it dynamic lighting or a gorgeous costume, and there are a ton of poses to choose from in each different set. Most of the sets feature female models, but look down the list and you'll see a few with male models too.

FantasyStockPhoto.Com

Tons of royalty free, high res stock photos especially for fantasy and science fiction artists, featuring male and female models posing as knights, samurai, barbarians, space troopers and more! Most you have to pay to download, but it can be as little as a few dollars per photo and they have few really nice free samples for download too.

Human Anatomy For Artists

From the same people behind 3Dsk, this is a subscribers only site (although they do have a handful of free samples), and they have a huge database of models in all shapes, sizes and sexes, used by professional games companies and 3D modellers/concept artists. Check out the site to get an idea of what they have to offer, subscription options, and pricing.

Image Credits:
Above: "Body Paint Study" ©2008-2009 Melissa Findley
Based on "Body Paint 3" (Stock) ©2006-2009 Becky Van Ommen

Image used here with the artist's permission

Featured Artist: Christine Griffin

2009-03-22T10:15:00.000-07:00

Artist Profile
Name: Christine "Cris" Griffin
Job Title: Illustrator/Portraitist
Freelance? Yes
Client List: Fantasy Flight Games, Alderac Entertainment, Ellen Million Graphics Portrait Adoptions, WhiteWolf, Pinnacle Entertainment Group, Loose-Id Publications, Liquid Silver Press
Education: BFA Marshall University, MFA(painting) George Washington University.
Years Experience: 10+
Favorite Medium: Currently digital (but that could change at any moment)
Specialties: Portraits in the dark fantasy style, be it historically flavored or contemporary
Accepting Private Commissions? Yes

Contact Info
Website or Web Portfolio: http://griffingirl.epilogue.net and www.quickreaver.deviantart.com
Email: alizarin_griffin@yahoo.com
Twitter: quickreaver
Online Art Communities: Epilogue and DeviantArt (as listed above)
Prints: Available through EllenMillionGraphics.com

For the last few years I've been a fan, and then a friend, of Cristine Griffin. One of the hardest working women out there in the industry, Cris juggles (well!) the pressures of being a full time mother and a freelance artist. Her bold male and strong female characters, mixed with a dark fantasy style, are uniquely her own--and her client list just keeps growing. I asked Cris a few quick questions about her work, and her thoughts on being a female artist in the fantasy industry.

There are a ton of gorgeous guys in your gallery. What made you decide to focus so often on painting male characters?

The chainmail bikini. I marveled at the number of hot babes in fantasy, and was a bit befuddled by the lack of attractive men that tickled my particular fancy. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against strong, sexy women depicted in fantasy/scifi/goth art, but as we all know, it can easily degrade into sexually gratuitous and vapid imagery. There was…and still is…a conspicuously lopsided ratio of hot male-to-female figures in the genre. The male characters are typically fully clothed and tough as nails, whereas the females are barely dressed and frequently passive. Sure, the Tarzan/Conan muscle-bound hero has become iconic, but I prefer a man with the gleam of feral intelligence in his eyes. The thinker, not the brute. I quickly realized if I wanted to see that, I’d have to do it myself.

How do you feel being female helps or hinders you in the fantasy art industry?

A great many of my ‘fans’ didn’t realize, for the longest time, I WAS female! So I have to say being female hinders me only in that I’m also a wife and mother. My job as a freelancer is secondary to my husband’s profession, which brings home the bulk of the bacon. I’m the one that must cook, clean, play Florence Nightingale, etc. Now I’m not complaining, per se…I CHOSE this path…but this is the way it is in a great many occupations. I can’t attend the big conventions or out-of-state workshops, nor spend money upgrading my programs or equipment, because the family would crumble and with three kids, finances are always stretched thin. My career is simply not a priority for anyone but me. Such is life!

But I’ll tell you, to my observation, women really do get the same opportunities, and make the same pay grade (at least as far as freelancers are concerned) as men in the industry. Good work is good work, period, and most Art Directors understand that. The quandary arises within juried art situations, such as annual art books and exhibitions. The subject matter becomes woefully skewed, in large part because the jurists are mainly male. They select what they enjoy seeing and frankly, a heterosexual man isn’t quite so appreciative of a male depicted for titillation, as he is a female. And let’s face it…a lot of fantasy is geared toward titillation. That’s why, in part, it’s called ‘fantasy’.

If you could change one stereotype associated with women and the industry, which would it be, and why?

I thought long and hard on this, and honestly, I couldn’t come up with a stereotype that wasn’t backed up by anecdotal evidence. By the same token, it wasn’t easy to come up with stereotypes either! Some of the best ADs out there are women, and I really think the reason we don’t see more incredibly successful female illustrators in the field is the fact women must split themselves into umpteen different people on a daily basis, instead of having the luxury to focus exclusively on one ‘job’. Art takes FAR more time and effort than anyone realizes, from research to execution to all the many adjustments we must make to accommodate the clients’ wishes. It’s crazy.

So here’s what I CAN say: it seems to me that women tend to be less receptive to criticism about their art than men. We take critique of our work far more personally. This is especially telling in the niche affectionately known as ‘The Fairy Artist’, which is predominantly female. This sub-group indulges in art more frequently as a hobby, so they’re typically coming at it from a non-academic background. For them, the very act of creation is the joy, not necessarily accurate perspective or color theory or ‘The Golden Ratio”. They encourage self-expression and positive reinforcement, so being told “Your anatomy is way off; take life drawing courses.” is usually met with irritation and hurt feelings. I suppose if you’re female, and paint any sort of fae, you’ll get lumped in with this group, and that may be a less-than-ideal stereotype to wrangle.

Image Credits:
Above: "The Woad Blue Sky" ©2006-2009 Christine Griffin
Below Left: "Devil Inside" ©2008-2009 Christine Griffin, first published in "Kobold Quarterly" magazine, #6
Below Right: "A Patient Wolf" ©2007-2009 Christine Griffin
All images used here with the artist's permission

Opening Statements Part II: Louisa

2009-03-17T17:53:00.000-07:00

For fantasy art freelancers or anyone even slightly interested in the practice (or for anyone who wants to listen to a group of very funny artists with assorted interesting accents chat about their jobs), you want to subscribe to the Ninja Mountain podcasts. They've done seven so far and they've announced on Twitter that the eighth ( to be released later this week) - will feature the first female voice on the show - Anne Stokes! She's a UK based gothic and fantasy freelance artist, whose dragon artwork is a constant source of envy for me.

I'm not a freelancer like Anne or Melissa. I've been working in the games industry for about a year and a half now, after four years on a Computer Arts course in Scotland. When I chose my degree, I confess that I was totally ignorant of what the games industry was like. I was fifteen years old, addicted to digital painting but with no idea what I could actually use it for as a career...and then while tending my other addiction (that would be Final Fantasy), a lightbulb came on. "Hey!" I realised. "Somebody has to do the art for these games!" On an unrelated note, too much time with computers and Final Fantasy games absolutely does not kill brain cells.

I hunted down courses, accepted an offer from my first choice, and turned up on the first day of class, eager as can be, and cast an eye around at my fellow students.

Every single female who has ever been in a computer related course knows where this is going.

There were roughly sixty students in the first year. Including myself, five were female. And one of them dropped out later that week. It did get better as the years went by.

By fourth year, we were up to five again.

(There may have been a sixth, but she was one of those elusive creatures for whom turning up to class was not only optional, it was apparently not recommended at all.)

In my final honours year, I did my dissertation and final project on female characters in games. I'm fairly certain I don't need to tell you what the results of that study was, but during the pitch and critique sessions we went through that year, I got some interesting feedback on my chosen topic and research. Two arguments were raised that reappear again and again in this arena.

1) "But you are working in the fantasy genre. You have to expect that the representation of women in games is going to be a fantasy."

Apparently they missed the part of my pitch where I pointed out that over 40% of gamers are women. Big breasted, scantily clad women are certainly ONE fantasy, but they aren't the fantasy of most women - hell, they aren't even the fantasy of every man. Why shouldn't we have our fantasies catered to as well? Perhaps it's assumed that the male group want that particular fantasy, and the female group want to be that particular fantasy. I'm sure some women do, but a lot of us just want to kick ass and take names and LOOK like we can as well. Most of us want a female option, period (there are a whole lot of games that don't have one). And dammit, don't tell me we don't still want OUR share of eye candy too!

2) "Be careful - a lot of people will read your title and think 'rabid feminist'."

Let's not get me going on the idea that women should watch out for being thought of as feminists, as if it's such an ugly thing. I can assure you that while there may be some academic institutions that let you write papers containing the kind of language that could be described as rabid, my uni wasn't one of them. My title, subject, and the thirty pages of introductions they make you write before you get to the actual paper were about as inflammatory as a dry, stale cracker. But when you study and work in a male dominated environment, suggesting that just a hint of bias may have crept in and and maybe it's time to address that, you get a knee jerk reaction like this. Even when both you and the knee-jerkee are intelligent, reasonable adults (which both the men who posed the above two questions were - they were professionals who really knew their stuff. And yet...)

The funny thing is, this kind of defensive reaction is entirely unnecessary. Are Melissa and I plotting to purge all bikini clad characters from the art world and replace them all with half naked Johnny Depp lookalikes? No.

Our mad scientists are still working on that last part.

We are going to carve out this little corner for ourselves, and others who share our tastes and opinions. Melissa mentioned some of our plans and I'm all aboard for reviews, features and interviews, and we have a lot of great ideas for the future too. What you may see more of from my side is a slant towards concept art and video games, which is my area of interest just as Melissa's is cover art illustration and freelancing.

And now if you'll excuse me, we have some half-naked men to paint!

Opening Statements: Melissa

2009-03-16T14:43:00.000-07:00

I first heard of Artemisia Gentileschi in college. I wasn’t planning on being an artist back then, I was going into theater. Artemisia came up during a script study course. A local author had penned a play based on her early life and our school would be producing it. I eventually was drafted to do some sketches for props and a full size replica of one of her paintings as it might have looked in progress. The play was… less than stellar (if I’m going to try to avoid saying that I thought it sucked). Artemisia’s life, however, was intriguing.

Artemisia Gentileschi was not the first female painter to make a name for herself, although she is arguably the most famous of her era. Her life was tumultuous and fascinating: tutored early in life by her father, denied entrance into the all-male art academies of the time, raped by her mentor Agostino Tassi, put on trial and tortured to prove her innocence, Artemisia later traveled all over Europe and was the first female artist to be accepted into the Accademia di Arte del Disegno in Florence. Her paintings are often held up as examples of early feminism due to their strong female protagonists and often violent imagery or subtext. She was an intelligent, confident woman living and working in an era when women, and women artists especially, were considered inferior.

It seems appropriate to name this blog in honor of her. Female artists are no longer as rare as they were in her day, and no longer stymied by the constraints of propriety—but we’re still struggling in a male dominated field that caters mainly to male tastes.

Pick up a fantasy art yearbook—Spectrum or Exotique—or walk into your local bookstore or comicbook store and you’ll see what I mean. While women, traditionally, make up the majority of readers (at least here in the US), you’ll find an astounding amount of art that is produced by men, judged by men, and geared toward male tastes. There’s a reason why fantasy art is often stereotyped as pictures of big-breasted babes in chain mail bikinis, clutching the arm of an over-muscled hero with bigger bulges on his elbows than in his leather loincloth. In sci-fi art they’ll switch the chain mail for spandex or latex spacesuits and the hero for a hulking robot, but the thematic imagery is basically the same. Don’t even get me started on comic book art.

Paranormal romance has at least gone far enough to put the big breasted chick popping out of her costume somewhat aside in favor of headless, muscular oiled up male torsos—but is that really all that much of an improvement?

Last year I submitted artwork to Ballistic publishing’s Exotique 4. Of the four paintings I submitted, only one was of a female character. That was the one that was accepted. I didn’t question it much at the time, and was disappointed somewhat that my paintings of male characters, which I felt were stronger, weren’t quite up to par. Much was explained, however, when my copy of the book arrived in the mail. At a glance I’d guess that nearly 90% of the book featured female characters. There were half-naked girls with robots or dragons, big breasted girls in skimpy costumes toting giant guns or swords, pretty anime girls with katanas or looking angsty and vulnerable at the viewer. Scattered throughout, as rare as four-leaved clovers, were the men. Some were the typical hulking barbarians, some were of the androgynous sort that made you wonder if the judges were aware that the character was male, and some were monstrous and alien in appearance. There were a few male characters who were just normal enough to be non-threatening to a male point of view, but they were very, very few and far between.

Talking to several other female artists, the consensus seemed to be the same. Our paintings of female characters made it in, our male characters did not. These were not arm-chair artists who’d submitted on a whim, either—most of them were professionals in the field whose male character art is easily on par with their female characters. It’s hard to ignore that kind of pattern. Perhaps the parade of tits and ass in Exotique isn’t the result of a male chauvinistic (or at least an unquestioningly male) approach to the genre and we’re all merely paranoid.

I doubt it, though.

Since then I’ve felt it almost a personal mission to try to paint more characters that I feel appeal to a female fantasy audience, and to try to promote female artists, who I also feel are underrepresented. Check out Tor.com’s cover art roster, or Massive Black’s instructor list and you’ll see the reverse of the problem with artwork. Female artists are few and far between, often relegated to “fairy artists” whose work is good enough to market to the Hot Topic crowd but not good enough to grace fantasy book covers.

Yet there are dozens of women working in this field, many of them doing incredible work and getting very little time in the spotlight. There are women working in comic book art, as illustrators for gaming companies, as concept artists for films, as cover artists and more. Unless you’re one of us, it’d be difficult to name ten.

What can you expect to see here on Artemisia from me? Hopefully features and interviews with female artists working today, reviews of artwork by both men and women that I feel particularly appeal to women—especially in cover art illustration (which is my main topic of interest). Maybe even some book or film reviews. Louisa, who has generously agreed to be my partner in crime for this project, holds similar views; although, we may not always agree on some particulars. Our views are our own, but we hope that there are enough people out there who might be interested in hearing them.

We might not be able to change the art world—but we can at least paint it from our perspective.