Speed Painting

Speed painting is a digital art process where artists create realistic paintings using Photoshop or Paint. They start with a blank page and usually within five hours, create a very realistic art piece, which often looks like a photograph. Most speed painters keep records of their projects in the form of youtube videos, with each video lasting about three to seven minutes and set to music. Some of these artists even make their own music to play along with their video, and they often set the pace of the video to the pace of the song accompanying it. All of these artists have their own webpage too, where you can check out all their speed painting videos.

Here are some of the best speed painting videos I have found on youtube:

Spiderman by Nico Di Mattia. In this video, Nico uses photoshop to paint a picture of Spiderman after a battle. He starts with a sketch and then uses many details to create lighting and a realistic look.

Titanic. This particular speed painting seems to use a different technique from other speed paintings. Instead of starting with a sketch and becoming gradually more detailed, the artist starts with blobs of color and eventually adds details.

Dragon. There are many great dragon speed paintings, but this one is one of the most popular. The artist even adds realistic fire coming out of the dragon's mouth. But what is most impressive about this drawing, I think, is the fact that it comes completely from the artist's imagination, meaning it is not copied from a photograph the artist looks at while speed painting.

Lamborghini.This is one of many realistic car speed paintings. However, I chose this one because it uses only black, white, and grey colors and it still looks like a photograph. In general though, car speed paintings tend to be the most impressive.

Kirsten Dunst by William Shamir. It's obvious Shamir is a big fan of Kirsten Dunst, since his speed painting of her is so flattering. He starts off with a sketch, and then masterfully adds light to his sped painting to make it look like a photograph.

In general, I am a big fan of Shamir's work. Last week, I spent some time watching all his videos (and pretty much all of them end up looking like photographs). If you become as fascinated with speed painting as me, then I highly recommend you check out his webpage.