Interview with Orome

 by 3D Addict
(April'98)








    3D Addict

    Orome



    Ok. Let's start with the usual question.Tell me a little bit about yourself.

    Hmm.......lets see. My real name is Ove Trengereid, I'm 22 years of age. I live in a really cold rainy spot on the south-western coast of norway, called karmoey. I'm presently just a lazy student, hoping to get a real job after this summer. I hate techno music, and love good old rock'n roll. My computer is my temple, and i worship to it everyday. Oh yes. I'm presently a member of the demogroup Talent, if anyone at #pixel should get the wrong idea of my info at scenest :))


    :)Tell me, are you a cool type of a guy or more funny one?Do you take life seriously or are you more relaxed and live the life without thinking much about the future?

     Well I take art seriously, too seriously maybe, because it really affects my studies (what studies). hmm.....i'm not really a cool guy, not funny eighter.....hmm, maybe cynic is the right word (or cynic wannabe). Love to use sarcasm as often as possible (Frasier/Niles Crane are my heroes). Apart from that i'm a nice person I guess :)))

    What was your first computer, and what computer do you use now?Do you also miss the the good old days of c64 and A500?

     My first computer was a c64 (no big surprise i guess), but I only played games on that one (well i used koala painter a couple of times, but drawing with joystick wasnt that great). Now I have a pentium 166, with 14' trust monitor(ARGH i need an 21' monitor! Size matters, it does! ), and no 3dfx card or any fancy stuff(buhh). It works well enough for drawing, and action supercross(who needs quake). Yeh I do miss the good old days, especially A500 (during c64 days, I was just a lamer). I miss doskpop/Swedish synthpop, and funk in demos. Well the scene is probably much better today, but I'm nostalgic, and that's that :)

    How and when did you become involved in the scene and when did you start drawing?

    Hmm.........well I bought my amiga in 1992, because i wanted to compose music and draw pictures. I'd been workin on a friend's computer before then, and could'nt wait to get my own, so you could say I became a scener in 1992, but we were just some lame friends who tried to make some productions (I wont even tell you the name of our group:)). Before that I had a little experience with c64(very little), and I had been drawing on my friend's computers for almost a year i think(or fooling around with deluxe paint is probably more accurate). I would'nt even be an artist, had it not been for a friend of mine who was very talented with dp, and did some great logos. I only wanted to compose music, but his drawing's inspired me, now I've totally quit the music composing.

    I see.Which hardware/software do you use for drawing, and where do you get the inspiration from?

    I am the lucky owner of an artpad, and it's what i use for my pictures. As for software, I only use fractal design painter(I could never get used to photoshop). I really like the interface in it,and it's a great program. Inspiration is everywhere i guess, but I mostly get inspiration from looking at other people's art. I have a whole cd with art downloaded from the internet, and i browse through it now and again, studying the pictures, zooming in to look more closely at the palette,etc. It's sometimes very depressing, because you see a picture that is extremely well drawn, but I try to think positive, and tell myself "I'll be able to do it someday too", and so it turns out rather motivating.

    hehe, I agree on that:)Lazur uses almost all of his free time on making gfx.How many hours a day do you spend in front of your computer, and how many of those hours are used on making gfx?

    Heh......I'm not surprised really. His pic's are so detailed it's scary sometimes. I'm not like that yet i think, but lately I've spent more and more time in front of the computer drawing pictures, so i'm heading the right direction i guess (heh, the first thing I did after coming back from tg(and after sleeping ofcourse), was to hook up the computer and start on a new picture (weird).) Well I dont like watchin TV, so I have an advantage there i guess. Basically when I get home from school, I find something to eat, and then I sit in front of the computer. So atleast 2-3 hours each day with drawing(6-7 when I'm really inspired), and 1-2 hours looking through pictures for inspiration (no not those kind of pictures), and the rest is eighter schoolwork, or playing action supercross(a man needs a break sometimes right?),ahh.......and then there's irc. :) (I can draw too when i'm on irc, but say goodbye to efficiency)

    hehe :) When drawing, do you have a perfect vision in your mind or do you draw more freely, by letting your image evolve in whatever direction you may feel like it.

    Hmm.......I dont know about perfect, but basically I do have a vision of the picture, but It never turns out like that in the end, so there's a lot of experiments along the way. When drawing my tg pic I spent a whole day trying to do a skin palette that would work with the background, and I became really frustrated in the end, but I think i found one that worked properly(I'm never completely satisfied).

    Please describe in steps how do you create an image.Do you start by making an sketch on paper, or is everything done on the computer.

    It varies really.....I like to try out different ways to create a picture. I didnt use sketches when the only goal was to copy an image, unless I wanted to use the paper sketch for further drawing(meaning I drew the picture on paper, with shading and all, and then scanned the sketch, and continued drawing on it on computer) With "just another story" I had a pretty good vision of how I wanted the picture to look, so I first did a messy sketch, then i found a "model" for the girl (some babe picture on my hd),and I drew an more accurate pencil drawing of her, which I scanned in. After resizing the scanned image to fit the whole picture i had in mind, I started to draw the rest,beginning with the giant. Now....I've had some bad experience with coloring front figures first, and then background, so I though I'd try the opposite this time. I plotted in the background, and tree colours. No details. The point was to get a general overview of the picture, and try to imagine it with detailed work. When I had found the right colours, I started with some minor detail work with the background, before I began with the front figures. Now, I did both figures in greyscale first, and used the "correct colours" function in painter to turn the grey, into a colour tone. With that, I worked my way with the airbrush, tryin to make a skinpalette. In the end, after tryin out various colour tones, I came up with something that atleast worked with the background. The rest was just ordinary detailwork. Now I'd never drawn trees before, so I had to use some reference there. I worked from a michael whelan picture, and one other, which I dont know the author of. With the knowledge after "redrawing" two of the trees on my picture, I could do the rest without reference, and so it didnt take that much time to do. Since I have some experience with redrawing people/faces, the giant wasnt that difficult to do. (Unfortunately, I wasnt able to do the finishing touches, due to lack of time) Still I had to work the giant towards the woman (meaning using the woman as sort of reference for the giants skin palette). I'm not good enough yet to simply draw everything from memory, and expect a good result.

    How long does it take to draw a good picture for you, and what are the most important aspects of making a great image?

    Up to 1 month(maybe more), depending on resolution of picture, and how much I actually draw during that period. It's incredible what one can achive when a little pressure is added. A good lo res picture can be done in a couple of days. Hmm......most important I think are right colours, not to mention colour combination (It's abit annoying watching a put together picture, where colours/contrast/light of the different parts of the picture doesnt match. I have done that mistake many times too). Also correct figures are important. It's very annoying to watch a very good technical picture, good colours and everything, but the figure is all messed up. All it takes is to use a little reference if one is in doubt. It's not the same as redrawing a whole picture, and you will learn from it.

    What do you find the most difficult to draw, and which phase of your drawing do you enjoy most.Personally I like mostly making the finishing touches when the image is about 95% complete.

    Hehe.......when my picture's are 95% finished, I'm so bloody tired of them, I just want to throw them in the thrash (hey, windows HAS a usable tool). Actually the most difficult part of drawing, which is the middle stage, is what I enjoy the most. It's when I try to plot the right colours, and have the right contrasts etc (figure is done before). It can go very wrong, or turn out a success(now that almost never happens, satisfying is a better word i think). It's at this stage I try to imagine the end result, so it's rather exciting (unfortunately the end result is always different than what i thought it would be, but as long as I see improvement in my art, it doesnt matter).

    Do you use any special techniques.Please describe which drawing tools and techniques do you use mostly.

    My tecnique is abit wrong maybe. I basically only use the airbrush (sometimes the finebrush). I often use small airbrushes, and dot in the colours (kinda like pixelling). I'm abit afraid of getting the oversmooth look on my pictures, so I stick to small airbrush. That way I have abit more control. What I really should do, is to learn to control larger airbrushes, but I'm always to lazy to try out new things. Also when drawing with small airbrush, I tend to do the textures abit grainy. It's a habit I recieved after studying too many jpg's up close, to figure out how a realistic skinpalette should look like. I ended up drawing almost like a jpg, dotting in variations of red/brown, and yellow/brown in the original brown palette colour. It's quite unnecesseary really. Better to have a good colour palette.



    Which of your own images do you consider as the best one and which was the most difficult to draw?

    just another story is probably my best one......Not the best tecnique, but i'm fairly pleased with the overall look.

            

    download steps from "Just another story"(539 KB)


    "scared stupid" or "masisau" are as I recall the two I had most difficulties with. The hair on the female in "scared" was a real pain to do, and also jim carrey, which I only had a really small pic on a cd label to look at(I didnt finish the picture). Masisau was one of 3 pics I've done, where the general idea was to make it as exact as the original (tecnique exercise). It's where I started to use that small airbrush dotting tecnique. I'm never doing a picture like that again. But I did learn abit from doing it.

    Is drawing in 8 bit color mode a limitation or a challenge for you?

    Hum.........I would say a limitation. I would consider it virtually impossible to do what I do in 24-bit now, with 8 bit, and I dont see any reason to make things harder for myself. Still pixelling has it's own charm. It's great for design work and such i think. Fit's well for lo-res, but no way I'd pixel a picture in 800*600.

    What do you think about raytracing?

    Love it. Pictures are becoming better and better, but raytracing is more for animations i guess. I've tried 3d-max abit, but not completely into it yet (far from it I should say). Ofcourse there are people who just rip objects, with textures and all, and make their own animation of it. That is very annoying really (The tg98 winner animation was a disgrace). Still i'm rather impressed with the productions of real 3d artists. There were a few very good productions at tg I think.

    ....and what about redrawing?

    Nothing wrong with it I think. Very important for building up one's tecnique and style. I really dont understand people who are hooked on the no copy statement, because as I see it, there isn't anything that can be called no copy. There's always reference of some sort, whether it's in memory, or from taking parts of other pictures, and putting them in your own. But as for copying a picture exact, it can be abit boring in the end I must admit. That's why i'm trying to do a picture more "my own way", when copying (meaning experiments with other colours, contrasts, light setting, etc(just using the original as a light reference)). It becomes more fun to draw that way. For me there really isnt that much sense in doing "no copys", except for when I've planned a theme for a picture, and everything is clear in my mind (I know just the type of figures I want in the picture, the lightsetting, perspective, etc). If I start copying parts of that picture, it can ruin the overall look, which I had planned(It did partly in my tg picture, but I didnt copy that much fortunately). But I can still use some reference when drawing such pictures, and it wouldnt affect the result that much (atleast not in a bad way). I see no reason whatsoever to do a no-copy of a simple face, or a girl standing straight, and such. Well if people can achieve a good result, they may as well do it, since it's more fun not to redraw (you're more able to play around with colours, contrast, etc. When copying one is automatically trying to make it exact the original), but what I've seen from "no-copyers", are several errors in their pictures(maybe with exeption of one or two). Use reference. It's a good way to learn (am I repeating myself?) :)

    Being an active scener for some time now, you must have seen a lot of pics made by other graphicians.Who is your favourite graphician and why?

    Hmm........dont think I have one spesific favourite, but I really like the art of: Made.....Great ideas, lovely design of the pictures, good tecnique and good colours. lazur....I love his colourwork, and the details he put in his pictures. He has some really good ideas in his no copy's too, even though some of those pics have a few technical errors. Danny....Lovely women (sorry, I just couldn't resist(I know it's an over-used joke!!)). No seriously, he has a really good tecnique, and I really like the way he does skin textures. Shame he left the scene, but I understand his reasons. Ofcourse there are several other artist's that I'm inspired by, but hard to remember all.

    Do you have any favourite groups, musicians, coders, diskmags?Favourite demo?

    To tell the truth, I'm not really paying that much attention to the scene anymore. Hardly ever watch demos and such. (OK, I'll get my act together!!) :) But as for the good old days of amiga, I was a great fan of Sanity, and their productions. I think Jester, bit-arts, nuke(oh allright, spaceman then), mantronix&tip, brainbug, virgill, moby, audiomonster, lizardking (love doskpop), d-luxe, vinnie, don-cato, jason and jukebox where of my most favoured musicians (probably forgot a couple of names there):). As for coders, I'm not one, so how would I know. But as I said, I liked Sanity's prods, so maybe Chaos/Mr.Pet. Diskmag=Upstream (Imphobia was quite good too) demo= ARTE!!!

    What are your future party plans, are you heading for assemblly'98 or the party'98, other parties?

    Well, there has been discussed assembly, but not sure yet. Part from that, I probably will attend Tg next year too. No plans really. Hmm..........I would really like to attend wired to, but I noticed only 256 cls pictures in the graphics compo, so I probably wont (Well it's a good excuse, rather than admitting you dont have any money, isnt it? ). :)

    What does the scene mean to you, and which aspects do you like/dislike about it?

    The scene means alot really (Even though I dont watch demos that often). Most important it's a good place for people to discover their talents, and to improve their skills. For my part, I'm sure I'd never do any drawing, if not for the scene. Now there are always a few annoying things occuring, when you're a part of such a large party. Arrogance is the worst I think. Especially arrogant newbies, because they dont really know what they're talkin about (thereby the term newbies). Did I sound abit arrogant myself there? Well I didnt mean to. It's just that I sometime get the feeling that people try their best to notice the worst in other's productions, so that they can feel better about their own productions. Now what would you gain by doing that? Some people care too much about the charts. Now as opposed to those people, there are those that are more interested in learning, and that's a real positive aspect of the scene. You can tell the two apart real simple. The first says "hey great scan" to the author of a good picture. The other says "good picture, how did you do it?". Now I realize some people do scan, and it's a shame really (I still dont understand why. Since you learn nothing, there is no point.), but only about 10% (or maybe less) of what certain people would like to think. Generally, people often speak before they think it seems, so there is some arguing (There's the coder, or musician who accuses the graphician of scanning, because to them it looks like a scan. Amusing, but also annoying). Ah well, I suppose it would be rather dull, without those argues. :) Part from this the scene is a good place to meet new people. Frienship is a positive aspect.

    Have you ever considered a carrier as a professional graphician?

    Considered yes. Nothing yet. I have studies that have nothing to do with art, and I expect a job from those this summer, so no professional art drawing yet. But I won't stop drawing because of that. Maybe in a few years I'll try to go proffesional, working for some company or something (I really dont have a clue how a professional graphician would work)

    What are your other interests/hobbies, besides your scene activities?

    Well I play some basketball, and I eat alot (Love cookies.....mmmmh). But I'm no sports person. I play ball, because I eat too much cookies (need the exercise:)). There's not much activity besides that really (drawing takes time). Well I'm a member of a computer club, but what I basically do there is draw as well. Were tryin to do a game now, for fun, but heaven knows when that will be done (probably never). I also love to read books (especially Tolkien /Robert Jordan), and listen to music ofcourse (when I'm drawing). I'm a real funkaholic. ahh.......and ofcourse there is action supercross (call me a lamer, I dont care). :)

    Who is your favourite artist outside the scene?

    Difficult one. Lets see. It varies really. For the present I'm really inspired by the brothers Hildebrandt, so maybe they. Well Ted Nasmith and John Howe are also of my clear favourites.

    Do you believe in God?What is the meaning of life?

    Read previous question. To become god. (well I can dream can't I?) :)

    One last question: how did you come up with your handle/alias?

    Taken from the master himself, j.r.r.Tolkien (I'm not very original am I) :)

    Would you like to say Hello to anyone?

    To more than I can remember now I'm sure, but anyway. Hellos to the guys at #pixel, #amigano, #amigascne, #hdf, plus hello's to all members of talent, the demogroup who probably will never release a demo (rib, get your act together, and code us a brilliant demo soon! :)). Personal greets to pix(now when are you goin to get that super-computer, and start using an artpad?), no12 (you really are spoiled with that dual pro of yours), cedex (wohoo, oh allmighty warez king). Hum....I could greet more, but since they probably wouldn't read it, so :)

    Thank you for your time, and best of all in your future plans as a graphician. :)

    Thank you, and same to you (as a 3d modeller) :)

    thanks ;)

    check out Orome gallery





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