Lack of Details

I find it is best for me to set goals for myself.
I am not talking about goals that are monetary or something like I want to start my own skateboard brand or whatever.
I am talking about goals for my art.
Each time I do a 13 Nights of Halloween I not only set myself a theme but I set myself a goal to achieve artistically where I feel my work is lacking.
It forces me to get better. It forces me to answer very valuable questions about where I feel I am artistically.
For example in this years 13 Nights my goal was to try to start examining depth of field and visual focus.
Frank Frazetta was a master at this. Frazetta seemed to always know exactly how much detail to give the viewer.

Check out this iconic "Death Dealer" image from Frank Frazetta. Notice how the back left leg has almost no detail to it at all. Also his midsection and right hip also have very little detail. It is assumed by the viewer that the character is fading into the ether, But it also has the effect of drawing the viewers attention to the details.I found that on many of my pieces I neglect to take this into account and my work suffers for it. To paint everything the same level of detail actually tends to make the image seem very flat.

So with 13 Nights of Halloween 2012  I am really hoping to address some of that in these 13 pieces. It was a good theme to do it with as Giant Monsters tend to be surrounded by smoke and explosions.

I will say that I feel I have had some success with it in this series. I cannot wait to reveal the images next week.