Tchick's ArtPad - Update 8/11/07

[Tchick]

Hello!
I joined the guild on October 23rd 2007 but had been drawing for some time before I found myself here.
Here is a little about myself:

Name: Taylor
Age: 16
Birthday: 10th August
Zodiac: Leo (Rawr!)
From: England
Currently: In college
Studying: English Literature, French, Biology and Philosophy/Ethics
Previously: Did GCSE art (Year 10/11) and attained a B.

Art I like: Anime and simple styles, disney type drawing, art that is coloured well and looks ''clean''.
What I am good at: Creative ideas, eyes, colour contrasts and understanding how placement of colours can enhance a picture/set a particular mood and working hard.
What I need to improve: Body preportions, practicing more, not being TOO hard on myself, outlining work with photoshop (I find it really hard to make it look clean and neat and nice! crying )

My Photobucket account: Where most of my art is posted -- The good and bad.

I am REALLY keen to develop my own art style but with so many directions I could go I'm not entirely sure what I really want to improve. The one thing I really want to work on though is my body anatomy and people's faces. I would be willing to work on either realism or cartoony/anime/disney or a mixture of both. I just need to find a suitable mentor. ^^;
 

[Tchick]

PORTFOLIO

I have been drawing on and off for quite a while now. I've never considered myself to be that ''good'' at drawing, but I definitely enjoy it and know that the more I practice, criticise and try I will get better. ( Hence why I'm here y'all xD )

I'll post some of my very early, more cringeworthy stuff and then put up some of my newer stuff. I definitely see an improvement/difference in the quality and style of my drawing, but perhaps I am deluded. Who knows. . .

Anywho, have a look through my art and feel free to comment where you feel necessary. I am quite a good self-critic too, so chances are I will agree with what you say. xD

IN THE BEGINNING. . .
[ X 1]
[ X 2]
[ X 3]
[ X 4]
[ X 5]
[X 6]
[X 7]
[X 8]
[X 9]
[X 10]

. . . You have no idea how hard it is for me not to post a little comment after each one saying what I don't like about the picture and what is wrong with it. ><; xDD

[X 11]
[X 12]
[X 13]
[X 14]
[X 15 - Oooh colour xD]
[X 16]

Started to add colour to pictures with the free program that came with my scanner. . .

[X 17]
[X 18]
[X 19]

Okay, I think you're getting the idea. Enough of the old stuff, it makes me go seriously red in the face! xD redface

 

[Tchick]

PORTFOLIO CONTINUED. . .

Okay now for some of the newer stuff, the stuff I can look at without going quite so red; but which is also the stuff that I can pick flaws with...

I think my problem is that I get impatient a lot, and don't make myself practice regularly. This is something that I am going to try and /make/ myself do, especially that I am now here in the guild. I think I just need a little guidance sometimes on what I should focus on and where I am going wrong etc.

Anywho, now for the newer stuff...

NEARER THE PRESENT
I finally got a tablet, though it isn't a very good one it still sort of did the job. So I started practicing with it and trying it out.
[ ~ 1]
[ ~ 2]
[ ~ 3]
[ ~ 4]
[ ~ 5]
[ ~ 6]
[ ~ 7] <-- Pen & Ink is real fun!
[ ~ 8] <-- Watercolour paints are too.
[ ~ 9] <-- Pencil crayon and Pen & Ink.
[ ~ 10] <-- Biro pen outline time!
[ ~ 11]
[ ~ 12]

Aaand finally, some stuff that isn't Gaian avatar related art...

Elven doodle in colour
My cat - Done on graphics tablet
Dragon - Again on tablet
An angry face
Eye drawn in a realistic style - Graphite Pencils

 

[Tchick]

RESERVED JUST IN CASE...

 

[Tchick]

Tchick

RESERVED JUST IN CASE...

 

[Tchick]

Okay, so that's me I guess. There is a lot of art I did over the years that ended up in the bin xD, it's just how it goes sometimes. I also have some stuff in my art book that I did during my art course. Though there isn't much of it (I was a little lazy and resentful due to a terrible and very biast art teacher), but when I get the art book back I'll have a flick through and scan anything in I think is interesting/might be useful to either an art mentor or just for nosey people xD.

I've been drawing recently too, just haven't gotten round to scanning anything in, but will do shortly.

Anywho, as you have probably guessed, I can go on a bit. Please feel free to post now, I'm eager to know what you think as well as to get to know you better. 4laugh

It'd be more helpful to me if you critiqued my newer stuff, I have already critiqued my older stuff to death myself. But I'll leave it to you to say whatever you feel is useful. ^^;  

[Tchick]

The latest: 25/10/07

I've had a browse around the guild and have decided to go right back to the basics. My anatomy really sucks. And I've avoided drawing full body for some time. I read about the '7 heads high' rule and had a go at applying it myself:



I only added features to the face really quick so it didn't look so bland, so ignore the sizing of the eyes please. xDD

As for the body, it doesn't look smooth or fluid to me at all... The legs seem too bumpy, and even though I drew out the 7 heads high thing, placing the feet where the 'soles of feet' line is just made the legs look too long and ridiculous, so I placed them where I thought they looked roughly right.

I know there isn't much detail on the hands/feet, I'm trying to just get the placement of the body/torso/limbs right first... Having said that I don't think the feet are pointing the right way or are placed right. If someone could draw how they should lay that would be a big help.

I also don't think I've placed the boobs right and she looks a little bell shaped on her hips rather than hourglassed.

If you could draw over it and suggest what I could try doing/practicing to get this better I'd be really grateful. :3

I've decided I want to have a go at drawing one of my characters I use in a roleplay. The first step is to practice my female anatomy right, so here I am. ^^; I want it to look fairly realistic, so I really need to get the body nailed.  

[I.P.Freely]

Proportionally, the legs are too wide and not long enough. If you just make the legs longer so that they reach the 7 heads mark (and maybe even a little further won't hurt) it should turn out better.

Another thing to not is that the arms are too short. When I compare my arm to my torso, I often find my elbow lines up with my belly button and my hand would be right up against my mid thigh. The hands are too small. They should be about the same size as the distance from the chin to the eyebrows about.

I think the boobs are lopsided. They should be parallel with the shoulders. V crotches are bad (or more like upside down V crotches). Look at your own crotch, is it a V? I said look, not touch... It's more often like a U no? Or a Y if you're squeezing your legs together.

The belly-button's misplaced. I'm not sure what happened, since you had a pretty well defined midline but you decided to put the belly button off to the right (your right) instead.

The legs are a bit lumpy but mainly because the pants/shorts cut them off. It'd probably be easier if you drew out the naked body first then add the clothes.

The lump where the knee is supposed to be--I don't think it's necessary or that it needs to be that defined. The thigh can usually stand to be it's own tapered cylinder that connects to the calf. The knee just subtly juts out.

The ankles are too small, thus making her feet too small to support her. The ankles should be a bit taller.

Overall though, you did very well with the torso smile and general anatomy of things. I like the head.
Sorry that it was so long and somewhat brusque. I hope it helped though.  

[loontje]

First of all: you're being very hard on yourself. Anatomy is very difficult and so is getting lineart to look right in photoshop (as you'll probably notice in my paintover haha). I know the problem, I've avoided drawing full body shots as well, because faces were always so much more fun to draw (they can tell you so much about a person's personality and they can be very expressive). Unfortunately the only way to get better at it is to stop avoiding it, and body language is a form of expression as well.

Secondly: here is a quick paint-over that I did. I hope it helps. wink  

[Tchick]

Right-o then, I've been doing scribbly sketches now and again during the week trying to work on some of the things you have both pointed out - Thanks so much for your advice.

I have also received advice from elsewhere so baring those in mind I am going to attempt another full body picture, the theory is that there will be at least some improvement.

I can't help but be too hard on myself loontje, I get so frustrated sometimes, and I want so bad to get better. I guess it's good in some ways because it gives me that drive to constantly seek criticism in order to improve. ^^; But I totally agree with you, faces are so much more fun to draw! But I definitely want to look into using the /body/ as a device for conveying emotion too. Thanks for the paintover, helped me to see where the contours should be.

Right, time to work on my drawing.  

[Errol McGillivray]

Tchick, if you like, I have a lot of figure models you can use. I think it would be best if you draw one of them to help you mesh together what you've learned and also be able to observe real proportions and the mechanics of the body. My msn is elvenboyslut@hotmail.com.  

[Tchick]

Here is my second attempt at anatomy, I have been doing sketches occaisonally through the week of people, but this is my sort of more refined full body one, my second one.

I am more pleased with how the legs turned out on this one, but think the ankle/feet area needs work. It just looks too fat to me. Also, now I look at it again, the ankles seem a little too bulbus, I'm making note of that too. xD

I'm also pleased with how the general torso area turned out, though I'm not sure if the boobs are *quite* right, I redid them many a time. But I am pleased with the ribcage area, I really looked at how the presence of the ribcage changes the shape of the torso, it isn't just a straight/sloping line or curve, it is a little more angular.

Anyway, here you can see the result of my 2nd attempt, I definitely think there is an improvement from the first but it is far from where I want to be. Ignore the facial details, I wasn't concentrating on that for the time being. THERE IS A MILD NUDITY WARNING: I didn't draw too much details on the boob area but I didn't draw any clothes on either, so I felt I should put at least some sort of a pre-warning. xD

Anatomy Attempt No 2  

[I.P.Freely]

Hope you don't mind, but I did a draw over of your new proportions smile
Here
(Don't mind the blue lines, they're just guide lines)

The main thing to work on is the legs this time around. You did fairly well with the torso. However, you put too much emphasis on the hips, invariably making the upper thighs too fat. The feet are too squished as well, they should be longer. I think the rest is covered by the draw over. Oh, and note that the right (her right) arm is curved slightly (and that I screwed up my draw over where the arm connects to the breasts--just ignore it). But there is a definite improvement from the last, so keep up the good work smile If there's anything you don't understand on the draw-over just ask.  

[Tchick]

Hey thanks for the advice and for appearing to frequent my thread. ^^;

The draw over helped me to see how wrong the left (our left) thigh looked, but the figure model I was drawing from did have that indentation and curve on it, I just don't think it needed to be quite so wide or jut out quite so far, so thanks for clearing that up for me. xD

I think what I'll do is have a bash at drawing loads of people waist down, sort of from under the breasts downwards...

This is going to pain me because I love drawing faces and upper bodies, but it will help me improve damnit! Then I'll have a look at legs on their own and feet. Then I'll try drawing a full figure again...

Man this is gonna be so harddd! gonk  

[KotokoPlum]

I see that your anatomy is improving greatly, but I'm just passing through at the moment. C:

The one thing I'd like to note, however, is your keenness on developing a style. I've found in my own experience that your style comes as you keep working. I'm very sure that everyone has their own influences from Disney to anime to abstract painters, but I saw that even Picasso, who ended up making those crazy (imo) abstract pieces, started out with realism and things of the regular visual arts.

Me, I'm still trying to find that niche style where I'm truly comfortable, but I feel that as we keep growing as both a person and an artist, our art will grow with us. C:

(Hopefully, this didn't sound too lecture-y. @_____@ Sorry if it did!)