Copiing Angry Birds, the Title!

So for the first cartoon I chose was Angry bird.

Just to remind you, the first game of angry birds was released in 2009 by Finnish company Rovio Entertainment for Apple iPhone (read more). Since then it became a cartoon, then a movie and many many spin off games in between. Kids love it, adults love it and it seems that there will be no end to it for a very very long time. Which is great.

The reason for choosing Angry birds as a first copiing project is simple. They seem pretty easy to draw and I love them. I might also finlay learn the characters names. Birds', pigs', etc.

I usually start a series of sketches with a simple title: 100 mushrooms, 100 flowers etc. But here I thought, hey! The title is an image too! It also has a character! After all, creating a winning title is a very important step of creating any written/drawn/filmed - add missing - world! Be it a book or a movie, a cd or anything else ,designers and illustrators spend a huge amount of time and effort to create a perfect title. And I should respect that.

So first thing first - the title!

It wasn't easy, I must say! I really should have measured time because for sure since it took me a lot more than an hour to copy.

This is the result. I first created a pencil sketch. Then I outlined it with a very thin liner and then with a thicker one.

I'm not sure this is identical but it does look like an original title. So I guess it was probably worth the try.

One thing I know: making an exact replica of an original is not easy at all. I'm not sure that this is something I would want to do in the future, but it's obviously one way of learning and gaining experience.

Copiing favorite cartoon characters.

This post was ready to be published a month ago. Before pushing the Publish button I though, but why? Why would I want to copy from cartoon character in the first place? Is there a real learning experience in it? What would I really learn from this? If at all? Another thing that bothered me was that I actually didn't have any proper marker in my possession to make the experience complete and colorful. I am buying and buying  materials and since they are pretty expensive here in Israel sometimes I have to really think twice before purchasing something new. But then I though, ok, I don't have the colors but why not doing it in black and white and just contour it? Yes, it might be a bit boring, seeing black and white all over again but it will be way better than doing nothing. So I ordered some simple brush pen set and started working.

So...

To copy or not to copy, that is the question. Great masters of the past always copied from their teachers and fellow artists for the sake of the study. They used a life reference for the same reason. Some years ago copiing from others became some kind of a Tabu. Be original, they screamed, draw what's on your mind! My biggest difficulty in college was to be able to express my own ideas, when they came. (but that is another subject for another post). How can I do something if I don't know how to technically express it.

Only recently do I see people starting copiing from reference, they take somebody else's picture and they copy from it; a very popular do in recent years.

At this point of my artistic development - remember, baby steps - copiing portraits of people/animals etc is not really interesting.

But I've decided to copy my favorite cartoon characters. First - I love cartoons. Second - they are cool and fun, so why not?

I will be doing several poses of each characters, all in different media. A brush pen, some markers, colored pencils - time will show.

The main thing is just to get in to action.