The Art of Cédric Mnich

Just testing a functionality I discovered on Casey Serin’s blog.

Got trapped ? Nevermind, just leave a comment if you will

This post is not about Art today. I am currently losing some time reading everyday Casey’s blog. But that guy is interesting and funny. I think he is some piece of internet history, in a certain way. After all he was named the most hated blogger of the world by Cnet.

That guy is giving me ideas. Sweet !

2 more hours painting this evening. I have retouched the wooden hills again and (almost ?) finished the mount fuji summit.

It is getting closer and closer to what I have in mind… Oil is hard to master. But it’s worth the effort. I am considering trying to find a club or taking lessons in Paris to improve my technique because working alone facing my mistakes is not easy.

Like I said yesterday, I started working on Human Anatomy studying / drawing. I bought some book about Artistic Anatomy. I reproduced the following human body, hand-drawn (no transfer or tracing paper) and added the wings. It might become some oil painting as I drew on some special Oil painting acid free paper (with a light canvas texture). Size is 12 x 15.5 inches (30 * 40 cm).

Hi all, back from holidays.

On the way to my vacation place, I stopped in a famous place by chance (it was lunch time on the road) : Moulin Madame ! Wife, kids, dog and I stopped there and had lunch in the park I thought about you guys ! It was kinda funny to be there again but it missed Elmore’s crazy artists band

Did not paint as much as expected. Actually, only a few hours on two days… I (tried to) improve my samurais painting. I had huge difficulties in finding the right colors. Not sure if the result is good but seems better though.

Also sid some pencil drawing too for anatomy training (pic later).

Just started that new painting project. That makes two works in progress… Hum. I started drawing the underlying and working on shades levels and background. Don’t know for sure yet but the background should be dark crimson tone. Great challenge here but if I succeed painting this one, it’s gonna be a gorgeous elven pin-up !

Will be off for several days so do not expect much progress in the while. I am taking my oil set with me (Hey Rosa in order to (try to) paint on my vacation place.

‘Later dudes !

I can’t stop starting new projects before finishing previous ones. Stronger than me. Samurais is still in the works, “Anaëlle and Forest friends” still a project and now this one.
I am trying a new faster way to start a painting project when I do have an existing basis : Video Projector. Found a Niiiiiiiiiiice girl photo on internet and quickly decided to paint it. Elven fashion style of course, to give it the fantasy touch

I borrowed some unused old video projector from my office and instead of using tracing paper, I project the pic on the gessoed board surface. Just have to draw over it. Yeah, this is cheating but when you are not so much at ease with a pen, it is time won !

As I fucked-up the TradeArt #002 (which so became Trade #003 for those who follow), I am starting it all over. Not a very big deal but I lost time.

So, here is the Work in Progress :

I think I’m on the good way on becoming a great fantasy artist : my home office is very close to be as neat as Larry Elmore’s…:-)  Cheers !

I made some inventory of the four most famous artists from Dungeons & Dragons  recently sold on auction : Larry Elmore, Jeff Easley, Keith Parkinson and Clyde Caldwell. All these famous pieces of art were sold some months ago on HERITAGE.COM, an auction website. It is very interesting to see the spread of pricing between paintings and artists, according to their fame and to the success of books which they illustrated.

We had several discussions with Larry Elmore and other fellows (Kelly Brighbill, Thom Riley and Chad Culbertson I think) about the market value of famous TSR pieces. I am happy here to share that information with all of them here.

PS : No, i was not the buyer ( though I’m crazy to see some paintings I would like to own being sold at “relatively” affordable prices given the US Dollar / Euro exchange rate…)
My consolation : I do own a Keith Parkinson famous painting so nothing to complain about ;-) (Raistlin’s farewell, see Gallery).

Not much to tell today. It is National Day in France so not working.

Fantasy Art painting Status :

I have been painting yesterday evening, trying to find the right color levels for the hills on front of Mount Fuji on my “Samurai hunting” painting. Not as easy as I expected. Finding the correct color balance is tough. A chance I am working with oils, giving me time to experiment and fading the colors. Which would be very difficult, if not impossible at all, with acrylics.

I feel bad when I see my friend Jasmine Becket-Griffith from the Larry Elmore class who managed to paint a huge beautiful art piece in only two weeks, with exactly the same distance effects. Well, true, she is a experienced painter, and do it for a living. Which I am not.

The painting taken with Flash. The fresh paint can be seen. I deactivated the Flash in order to avoid the reflection, see below.

The painting taken without flash. Colors are less accurate than reality but fresh paint is not visible now.

TradeArt Progress Status :

The #002 TradeArt Series which was on ebay had no success at all. 36 visitors on the page (a few figures being me). I think I will be selling my art on my website at first. Ebay is costly if you don’t sell your art at first try. Therefore, TradeArt #002 is still for sale, at 100$. People interested, just send an email to contact@sequoiatradingclub.com . I will work on TradeArt #003 which is waited for by at least one person. I had failed making it for technical reasons and have to start it all again.

Last for today, I see that the number of visitors is growing everyday, slowly but surely. I would appreciate comments.

TradeArt #002 available for sale