I've picked one of my favourite pieces by Frank Frazetta, a hugely influential artist for me and arguably the father of high-quality fantasy art. Frazetta has a countless number of great paintings so it is tough to pick a favourite but I went for this one below, a piece painted for the John Carter of Mars series. This image has probably already appeared on my blog more than once but that won't stop me!
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| Frank Frazetta - A Fighting Man of Mars |
Compositionally this piece has been designed for a book cover, like many of Frazetta's paintings, which leads to the figure being centred with large areas around it being left quite plain. This leaves the overall image feeling very stark without any text over it but I think this adds a certain mood to the painting. The whole centralised figure composition for covers has seen a resurgence lately too, below are a few examples with the A Fighting Man of Mars book cover in the top left.
Comparing the images above, just look at the colour differences between the modern game covers and Frazetta's painting. The game art covers are all near enough the same colour, with only the Mass Effect cover having contrast because of the orange sun flare, yet they are still rather safe, probably because they were designed by a board meeting to maximise sales.
Frazetta's painting on the other hand uses a wide range colours subtlety, the greens of the atmosphere, the reds and blues of the mountains and rocks, all of these colours feature within the skin of the characters too, which really helps in placing the figures into the scene.
The form and lighting are in my opinion the two strongest things about this piece, and overall one of Frazetta's strongest areas. The figures are lit with plenty of contrast, especially the male around the head which shrouds him in mystery. The lighting I think resembles a comic book style, yet by keeping the heavy contrast around the figures the attention is kept entirely on them. The actual form of the figures are exaggerated too but it again doesn't distract from the overall image.
I think one of the best things about this painting is the careful balance Frazetta has used to exaggerate certain features, to direct the viewers attention, without making the image wildly unbelievable. Every area has had careful thought placed over it of when to push or when to tone down and this is something I would like to bring over to my art, especially with my use of colour and line quality.
Looking over this painting in more depth has actually been more beneficial than I thought it would be. I've looked at Frazetta's painting many times before but because I have studied this one for a longer period of time I began to notice things I've never seen before. Some things that should be quite obvious, like the warrior is actually wearing leopard skin pants (Who knew?!) or the more subtle, like Frazzeta's use of colour, notably around the skin. I will probably start looking into the old master paintings in more depth as I begin to paint more myself, because this task has shown me that many of subtleties will be missed if you just glance over it and these are the things that can really make your work next level.
Frazetta's painting on the other hand uses a wide range colours subtlety, the greens of the atmosphere, the reds and blues of the mountains and rocks, all of these colours feature within the skin of the characters too, which really helps in placing the figures into the scene.
The form and lighting are in my opinion the two strongest things about this piece, and overall one of Frazetta's strongest areas. The figures are lit with plenty of contrast, especially the male around the head which shrouds him in mystery. The lighting I think resembles a comic book style, yet by keeping the heavy contrast around the figures the attention is kept entirely on them. The actual form of the figures are exaggerated too but it again doesn't distract from the overall image.
I think one of the best things about this painting is the careful balance Frazetta has used to exaggerate certain features, to direct the viewers attention, without making the image wildly unbelievable. Every area has had careful thought placed over it of when to push or when to tone down and this is something I would like to bring over to my art, especially with my use of colour and line quality.
Looking over this painting in more depth has actually been more beneficial than I thought it would be. I've looked at Frazetta's painting many times before but because I have studied this one for a longer period of time I began to notice things I've never seen before. Some things that should be quite obvious, like the warrior is actually wearing leopard skin pants (Who knew?!) or the more subtle, like Frazzeta's use of colour, notably around the skin. I will probably start looking into the old master paintings in more depth as I begin to paint more myself, because this task has shown me that many of subtleties will be missed if you just glance over it and these are the things that can really make your work next level.
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