Tag: Arch Enemy

2019, Portraits

The Moonlight Series – Alissa White-Gluz

Miss Escapist

“Escapist flights and lengthy nights. As some succumb to slumber awakes…”

The Agonist – Birds Elope With The Sun

Those who follow me on on Instagram will already know a majority of the following text but I feel like it’s important to share it here as well. The story behind this drawing is rather important to me and I’ve received a lot of feedback from fellow artists, sharing similar stories with me. Even Alissa herself contacted me about the drawing and the story behind it, so here we go:

Finishing this drawing was a huge challenge for me, more than it should’ve been. In the middle of the drawing process, a person whose opinion I care about very much gave me some not so very positive critique on the drawing. Until that point I was rather satisfied with the artwork but after receiving that crique, I suddenly began to doubt the entire drawing. I started feeling quite bad about it and thought about not finishing it at all – and my insecurity got bigger and bigger. It was dragging me down way more than it should’ve. It took me a few days to overcome my doubts but I’m happy I did. Because: it doesn’t matter what other people say or think about my art, it’s MY art and therefore I have the freedom to draw in whatever style I want to. I don’t need to adjust to people’s opinions and the only thing that really matters is that I’m having fun while drawing and that I’m happy with the result. If others like it as well: great! If they don’t…well, that’s also fine, they don’t need to like it.

Don’t let others tell you that you’re bad at what you’re doing. Who are they to judge what’s right or wrong for you? You’re doing it your way and this makes it a good way. Don’t ever try to do something just to please others or to meet anyone’s expectations. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying you should never ask for other people’s opinions or criticism. It can be very helpful. Just don’t let negativity overwhelm you and stay positive.

In the end, I’m super happy with the result and looove how the artwork turned out. As a matter of fact, I like it so much that I think of making an entire series in this style. You probably won’t be seeing part 2 of the series anytime soon as I’ve got other projects that need to be finished first. But let me assure you: it will come and it’ll be this year. I’ll draw Cristina Scabbia of Lacuna Coil (I asked my Instagram followers to decide which metal queen will be next, this was the result, so she’ll join the series as soon as possible).

Paper size: A4

Materials: ballpoint pen, Prismacolor pencils

Time: approx. 6 hours

Reference photo used for the drawing was taken by: Jeremy Saffer

2018, Portraits

Designing Cards

Miss Escapist

Maria Brink

In This Moment

Alissa White-Gluz

Arch Enemy

Floor Jansen

Northward & Nightwish

The idea for turning some of my drawings into card designs was actually born quite a while ago – to be more precisely, after I had drawn Maria Brink. I edited the drawing digitally to get it into a proper symmetrical form and then added a card layout to it. I never properly uploaded the picture, though. Same goes for the Alissa White-Gluz card, I created it a few months later and it also never found its way online. I just never felt like anyone would be interested in these cards as they were basically just an edit of drawings that already existed. As the end of the year was coming closer, I decided to give it a try and uploaded my first card design – and got an overwhelmingly positive response. So I felt encourage to upload the second card as well and even create a third card right away – Floor Jansen. I used the Northward drawing that I had done before for the edit. To my surprise, when I opened Instagram again after uploading that card, the first thing that I saw was my work – on Floor Jansen’s page. She seemed to have stumbled upon it and even liked it enough to repost it on her profile. Needless to say that I was rather speechless about this and felt very honoured.

Materials: GIMP, Autodesk Sketchbook

Time: approx. 5 hours

Reference photo used for the drawing were taken by: Jeremy Saffer (Maria Brink), Tim Tronckoe (Alissa White-Gluz), Northward album cover (Floor Jansen)

2018, Portraits

Floor + Alissa = Floorlissa ?

Miss Escapist

“One for all
All for one
We are strong
We are one”

Arch Enemy – Nemesis

The idea for this portrait was actually suggested to me by one of my Instagram followers and I liked it so much that I just had to draw it immediately. That idea was to merge the faces of Floor Jansen and Alissa White-Gluz in one portrait. I spent quite some time searching for good reference photos as the angles of the pictures had to be the same so that I could do a proper face merge. Luckily, I found two pictures that went together perfectly and was able to start drawing. At first, I wanted to do a regular pencil portrait but then I changed my mind and went with a ballpoint pen instead. I started off with Alissa’s half and then went over to drawing Floor. During the process I always had to cover the other half of the face because it was way too confusing to see a completely different face there. I tended to bring trademarks of Alissa’s face into Floor’s and the other way around so covering was the best that I could do. The first time that I had a closer look at the entire face merge wasn’t before the portrait was finished and I think it looks cool and confusing at the same time.

Paper size: A4

Materials: ballpoint pen

Time: approx. 8 hours

Reference photos used for the drawing were taken by: Fradellafra Fotografie (Alissa’s photo) & Steve Brown (Floor’s photo)

2018, Other Artworks

Mermay 2018

Miss Escapist

Mermay – what the heck is that supposed to be? and wasn’t Inktober already enough? Apparently, it wasn’t as another drawing challenge had caught my eye. It’s basically like Inktober – 31 days, 31 prompts, 31 drawings – but this time they were all about mermaids and not about the medium ink. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to do a lot of drawings for Mermay because my calendar was already stuffed for May. But I wanted to give things a try anyway and I had a few very special mermaids in mind. My basic idea was to combine drawing portraits of my favourite musicians and make just give them some fins. And that’s exactly what I did.

Alissa White-Gluz

Arch Enemy

Simone Simons

Epica

Christopher Bowes

Alestorm

Shagrath

Dimmu Borgir

Paper size: A4

Materials: blacklead pencil, chalk pastels

Time: approx. 60 minutes per drawing

2018

Meeting Arch Enemy Again

Miss Escapist

As I had managed to finish my Arch Enemy portrait in time, I was 100% ready for the meet & greet with Arch Enemy prior to their concert. There were quite a few “VIPs” this time and we only had a short amount of time with the band. Shortly after we had been escorted into the building, Arch Enemy already entered the room as well. It felt a bit awkward, though, as the band wasn’t really speaking for themselves but had some sort of “moderator” who did most of the talking to us VIPs. He explained the evening’s organisational procedure to us and then asked us to do something crazy to show that we “deserve” this meet & greet. In the end he even asked us to do push-ups. To me it felt like a total waste of time and money as I had wanted time with Arch Enemy, not with a trying-to-be-funny moderator. But that’s only my opinion and the rest of the meet & greet was fine. First, we got the chance to queue for getting a signed poster and for getting our own stuff signed. Once again, some of the band had already seen my drawing on the internet before and once again they complimented me for doing a great job. I quite vividly remember a little chat that I had with Michael about that drawing. When I handed it over to him the first thing he said was “Oooh, it’s you! You know, I’ve already seen this picture on Instagram. It’s great. You’re famous, you know that?” and I was like “Uuum…thanks. But I guess the only famous one here is you.”.  Then he signed as well and I felt very happy with holding the signed artwork in my hands. As soon as the signing session had begun it already ended again and we went over to taking our photos with the band. After that we all had to say bye and leave the venue again (which felt kinda stupid again, as we were allowed to get back into it for the show only a few minutes later – why did we have to get out then? Ah, never mind…). So after entering the venue for the second time I ran to get a spot in the front row (mission completed) and just enjoyed the show for the rest of the evening.

2018, Portraits

Arch Enemy The Second

Miss Escapist

“Always keep on fighting my friend. There’s a reason to believe.”

Arch Enemy – Reason To Believe

Question 1: Have I already drawn Arch Enemy before? Yes. Question 2: Are there a ton of other bands whom I still need to draw? Yes. So the most logical thing would’ve been to just draw any other band, but nope. I ended up drawing Arch Enemy again. But I had a good excuse: I had a VIP ticket for their concert, so I’d be able to get another drawing signed there. A drawing that I didn’t even have yet. But there were still 3 weeks left to draw another band portrait – and that’s exactly what I did. This time I drew Alissa first and especially the details on her shirt took me a while to finish them. I continued drawing on Alissa’s right side, adding Michael and then Sharlee to the picture (I have this bad habit of starting somewhere in the centre or even on the right side of the picture, which leaves me working from right to left. As a right-handed person that’s kinda stupid but I’m always doing it again). Then I added Daniel and Jeff. At first, I left Daniels arm empty because I only had three days left until the concert and I wasn’t sure if I’d manage to finish the entire drawing in time. And I felt like drawing the background was a bit more important at that point as that would be the place where the signatures go. Luckily, I managed to finish the entire drawing in time – WITH Daniels tattoos.

Paper size: A3

Materials: Faber Castell blacklead pencils

Time: approx. 14 hours

Reference photo used for the drawing was taken by: Katja Kuhl

2017

How I Got My Arch Enemy Artworks Signed

Miss Escapist

After weeks of impatiently waiting for the new Arch Enemy album to be released and the signing session to come, it was finally time. I arrived at the record shop quite early and had about two hours left before the signing session was about to start. Of course, I wasn’t the only early bird and so I had some people to talk to while waiting. The time passed by quickly and Arch Enemy entered the room and took their places at the signing table. I was among the first to get to the band and I started to get out my drawings. Michael was the first one to sign so I handed him over my band portrait. “Really? You want me to sign THAT? Where should I sign? I don’t want to ruin it. Hey, guys, look at this.” … and so on. Some of them even knew the portrait because they had seen it on Instagram before and they seemed to be really interested in it. Daniel for example closely examined his tattoos on the drawing, telling me that I did a good job, and then asked me how much time it took me to draw the picture. When I reached Alissa, I got out my other drawings as well and asked her to sign them. She immediately recognized the drawings as she too had seen them online before. She thanked me for taking the time to draw all those portraits and told me she really likes them. The ballpoint pen portrait was the last drawing to get signed but I decided that I didn’t want it to get signed. Instead, I gave it to her and told her that she can keep it if she wants to. She thanked me once again and then gave me her pen, saying “Actually, I think, YOU should be the one signing this”. So I ended up signing a portrait for Alissa White-Gluz (felt pretty weird, I usually don’t get asked for signatures). Of course, I didn’t have a lot of time with the band as there were dozens of other people who wanted their stuff to get signed, too. Nevertheless, it was really cool and I just love holding a signed drawing in my hands. Back home I framed the drawings and hung them up in my little “gallery” where I can see them every day.

2017, Portraits

Arch Enemy

Miss Escapist

“Feel the strength rise from within. If you really want it the world is yours.”

Arch Enemy – The World Is Yours

A few weeks before the release of “Will To Power” Arch Enemy announced a signing session in my home town. I was super excited about this because I saw a chance to show Alissa the drawings that I had made of her in person. And to get them signed, of course. However, I felt like it would’ve been a bit unfair to show up with a bunch of Alissa drawings without having a single drawing dedicated to the entire band. I mean, I love Alissa but I also love Arch Enemy as a band and I’m really into their music. So they deserved a band portrait anyways. I picked a picture from a promo shoot for their upcoming album as a reference and started drawing. First, I drew Michael, followed my Jeff. While Michael was done quite quickly, drawing Jeff consumed a bit more time (I’m not good when it comes to drawing light hair). I continued working on Sharlee and Daniel (whose tattoos took me ages and required a lot of patience) before I finally started drawing the lady in the centre. Luckily, I already had a lot of experience with drawing Alissa and so I didn’t struggle with depicting her. As a final touch, I decided to draw the background as well. After that, I was done with the portrait and all ready to get it signed by Arch Enemy.

Paper size: A3

Materials: Faber Castell blacklead pencils

Time: approx. 15 hours

Reference photo used for the drawing has been taken by: Katja Kuhl

2017, Portraits

An Alissa Ballpoint Pen Experiment

Miss Escapist

“So many times its a matter of degrees from being up on your luck to down on your knees.”

Arch Enemy – War Eternal

For Alissa’s birthday, I spontaneously decided to draw another portrait of her. If there hadn’t been one major obstacle: I didn’t have any pencils with me! (I was working abroad at that time and hadn’t packed any pencils – I mean, I was there for work) Buying a new set of pencils just for one drawing seemed a bit over the top for me, so I took a different route. I had a cheap ballpoint pen with me and I started thinking “Maybe you can pull it off with this”. And so I challenged myself to try drawing an entire portrait using nothing but this one ballpoint pen. In the beginning it felt very strange but I quickly got used to my new drawing tool. Drawing the outlines and the darker areas wasn’t too difficult but getting lighter shadows was another thing. The pen reacted extremely sensitive to even the slightest adjustment of pressure, so I had to be extremely careful. But there was also a great advantage to drawing with a ballpoint pen: the portrait was done in absolutely no time. And it actually looks pretty cool, I like the edginess that this drawing style creates. I think it goes really well with Alissa’s outfit and style in this one.

Paper size: A4

Materials: ballpoint pen

Time: approx. 3 hours

Reference photo used for the drawing was taken by: Tim Tronckoe

2017, Portraits

Alissa White-Gluz – But This Time In Colour

Miss Escapist

“No progress comes from pleasure. We smile in ignorance and learn in pain”

Arch Enemy – Avalanche

Who would be qualified better for another coloured portrait than the one and only Alissa White-Gluz? And as I had a pencil in just the right shade of blue, it wasn’t that much of a question anymore. I had a picture of her in mind that I had wanted to draw for quite a long time, so I jumped right into it. First, I did a rough sketch with a blacklead pencil and then I started to fill everything with colours. Shading the skin went a bit better this time and when I was done with it I moved on to the part I had been looking forward to the most: her hair, of course. I wanted it to be the catchy highlight of the portrait and i put a lot of effort into getting the colours and the texture right. The last thing to draw was her shirt, which didn’t consume a lot of time as it just consists of black and white. I ended up very happy with the result and when I uploaded it to Instagram I even received a comment by Alissa herself, telling me that the drawing looks awesome and that she thinks I’m really talented. Yay. đŸ™‚

Paper size: A4

Materials: Faber Castell coloured pencils

Time: approx. 8 hours

Reference photo used for the drawing was taken by: Jeremy Saffer