Kool DJ Herc Tribute part 1

After completing my illustrated tribute to Gil Scott Heron I wanted to pay homage to another godfather of Hip Hop. I found the picture below on the net of Kool Herc messing around with an old record player. This picture is a great gem of Hip Hop history so I wanted to incorporate it into my piece.

I took the picture into Art Rage and started painting Herc. As I was painting, I decided that I wanted the graininess of the old picture to show through, so I put the picture behind my painting and finished the remainder on top of the photo. I was careful to leave some parts unpainted so the photo could show through. I also set my painted layer to multiply so the painting had some transparency.

I continued painting Herc in selective places over the photo until I was satisfied with the texture and the rendering. The piece was supposed to feel like a quick loose sketch/painting so I incorporated some over-lapping brush strokes, and some sketchy pencil work.
At this point I was looking for a sweeping design element to add in the background leading upward. I was thinking of the B-boys wearing Adidas and Puma track suits and shoes back in the day. I added three stripes, but I later abandoned this idea once I took the piece into Photoshop. I'll cover that process in the next posting.