Sunsway's sketchbook [updated 16 August]

[Sunsway]

Subjects: Usually animals, fantasy, vegetation, people. I'm trying to move away from anime. I've recently become interested in sci-fi -- spacecraft and such -- but it's difficult. e_e

Specific things I want to improve: Perspective. People -- especially faces, and getting rid of the stiffness. I'd like to try some different mediums as well, as right now I mostly use pencil.

Things that I REALLY want to do but that are SO out of reach D= : Sci-fi (including spacecraft, cities); environments; storyboard type things; character design (Iain McCain - genius much?)

So the first sketch: [x] [x]

Both are the same drawing -- I'm having some scanner/computer compatibility issues and I'd appreciate it if someone told me which one of them looks stretched/skewed and which one of them looks normal (if you can tell the difference). I only need to figure this out once. =3

I'm blind when it comes to my own drawings, so please give some insight.  

[zathraya]

It's a really neat design. Making monsters is so much fun. whee

Anyway, because it's a monster I'm not sure how to critique it much. I must say though, that I think it would look even cooler if it had even broader value scale. In other words add some darker darks.

An amazing idea, however. biggrin  

[Griffonage]

The second scan has much better line quality, imho.

I really admire how precise you are with the anatomy of this creature. This sketch is kind of hard to critique because it looks like you more or less know what you're doing already. There are things you could do to improve in general such as learning how to express movement and emotion/drama in your pieces, but you definitely have the technical bits down.

Most people on gaia go for drawing pretty things without knowing the basics, so this is quite refreshing to see. 3nodding  

[Sunsway]

PREVIOUS SKETCH

I've worked over the sketch again and added some darker tones, as well as a shadow so hopefully it's a bit more grounded. Here's the new version: [x]

Pomato Soup: I think I understand what you mean -- one of my favorite art books constantly stresses the 'line of motion'. =) I'm not quite sure how I could stress it more here, though. I see a strong line following the spine from the head to the tail. How can I improve that?

I'm going to try to work more with perspective going forward, so hopefully that'll add a bit more emotion and interest. =) I found a very basic tutorial here. Who would've thought cubes could be so much trouble.

A new colored pencil sketch: [x]
It is kind of hasty (I got bored?), but it's representative of what my colored pencil stuff looks like. I just have this urge to stick a bunch of colors in it rather than use a few; and it turns out pretty dark. Unfortunately that sort of blends the whole thing and you can't see too many distinct features. Maybe I should try using fewer colors?  

[Syrella]

Hey, cool art. smile I like the way you draw your monsters. They are notably pretty difficult, but I think you get the gist across well.

What I wanted to talk to you briefly about is the overall balance of your works, mostly in relation to your second piece. Maybe it's due to the perspective, but I'm having trouble feeling like the creature is grounded. It looks like it might be in motion even. But at the same time, though, I can't make out what direction it's going or perhaps which way it's facing. Looking at it a bit closer, I think the head is the part off of the ground. Is this the case?

One recommendation I have for the future that could help would be to have slightly different values for certain parts of the creature, especially those that are in the background more. Creative use of back or under lighting may also help. This could help show the perspective a bit more too. ^^

As for the balance issue again, if the creature is meant to be still, work on showing that its feet are indeed touching the ground. Make sure it's center of balance is centered, if at all possible/applicable. If it's intended to be moving, then see if you can't convey the action a bit more. Study up on composition a bit. Typically you'll have a very dynamic scene if the creature is coming "out of the page". Could even add in "motion lines" if you want to go an extra step, or maybe have the grass reacting to the change in air pressure (like a car whizzing past). Might also help add another layer of drama to your work. xD Up to you, though.

Speaking briefly on the colors... I personally like the way they are dark like that. The combination of yellow/blue along with the darks is a nice match. If you wanted to fine-tune it a bit more, try changing up the values a bit more. Add in a clearer light source and go for it.

If you have any questions, let me know. xD  

[Sunsway]

RE SYRELLA'S POST

Yes, the head is the part off the ground. There is meant to be motion in this sketch and part of the monster was supposed to be off the ground, with a few of the legs at the bottom keeping it grounded (strange way to describe it, haha). But glitches with the execution, definitely! I can see what you mean about the values -- I should have left the blue more to the parts farther away. That would have made a better distinction between the overlapping head and torso and added some dimension.

The light source that I had in mind was on the top left, but it's not very clear, huh. sweatdrop I thought the yellows would be a sort of highlight, but it looks more like the actual body color of the monster. Maybe I should experiment with white, see if that works better.

Thanks for the comment =)

I practiced some basic perspective today. I took a horse in a simple standing pose and put it in various boxes that were drawn from one focus point, so they each had a different angle.

The most important thing that I'd appreciate some critique for is the execution with the perspective and anatomy. I'm very well aware that the shadows aren't done properly. =) They're numbered in the order in which they were drawn. Funnily enough (sarcasm), I think that the first horse, done approximately at eye level, has the best execution. That's the angle I'm most familiar with. Link: [x]

Oh, and I have a question. Not sure how to phrase it, so to explain it better I'll refer to horse #4. I get the part where the hindquarters look closer than the head, but we're also looking up -- it's above the horizon line. Shouldn't the top, like where the tail starts, seem farther away than the bottom, where the hooves are? The cube doesn't allow for that, so I guess I'd need a second vanishing point... but does that make sense theoretically, or is my brain completely fried? Because I think I ignored the constraints on the cube slightly and adjusted for that anyway. o_O But if that's the case, wouldn't anything that's not directly on the horizon line need two vanishing points?

Thanks. Especially if you actually read my wall of text. ;3


EDIT 12 April: Regarding my question
Ah... new thought. With that reasoning, it looks like anything that's to the right or left of center would need a vanishing point, too. How did we go from one-point to three-point perspective?! D= I need a new tutorial.  

[Chinchillin Villain]

Wow, excellent horses. Perspective hasn't always been my forte, and niether have horses. That's one of the most difficult animals to draw in my opinion, so, excellent job on the general structure of the horses and getting them into different perspectives! It's something I've never tried before. Maybe I'll give it a whirl later this afternoon.

The first monster I found that the arm that was significantly higher than the rest was a little confusing. I couldn't tell if it was supposed to be onthe ground, or if it was raised. Perhaps you could start exploring drop shadows to determine whether a monster is grounded or not.

Syrella was mentioning using different values for certain parts of your monsters. This was something that was taught in college actually and there's a lot of different ways of showing your viewer what is in the foreground, and whats in the background. Objects in the foreground are usually darker and more in focus in the foreground, and objects in the background are usually paler/lighter and more out of focus. Also if you're going for a more cartoon look you can use your line art to vary things up as well. Objects that need to be grounded so to speak can have thicker lines at the bottom of the object, and parts of the character or object in the foreground will generally have a thicker outline than objects in the background. While still goung thicker on the lineart at the bottom parts of the character or object. Later this afternoon I'll draw out a simple example and splice it into this post. I just can't find any right off the bat.

Edit: Here we go, here's a goofy little sketch I'll turn into a signature later. http://i696.photobucket.com/albums/vv321/sarahcundari/CIMG1257.jpg
That's just an example of the varying line art to anchor a drawing down so to speak. How the lines are thicker at the bottom and at the foreground of the picture. It's not a complicated drawing by any means. But it does to trick to give a visual for what I was ranting about hahah.  

[Sunsway]

Yikes, it's been a while. I haven't been drawing a whole lot, but I did buy a stack of art books and was slowly going through them. =) I've been trying to draw people lately -- my big challenge right now is distancing from anime and going for a more realistic (or at least semi-realistic) approach, so my style is really being reconstucted right now and it's driving me nuts. I have a hard time making them look attractive. Another rut is that I've been staring at my own drawings so long that it's hard to reconcile how the facial features are supposed to look with what's on paper.

Another problem for me is understanding the planes of the face. A neutral expression isn't too bad, but it gets tricky when I alter the mouth or something and then can't figure out how the other facial muscles are supposed to look. And if I put too many lines in they look old. D=

Lastly, a few of those books I bought are Burne Hogarth books... I've been using them a lot and it's really rubbing off on my own style. I mean, I think he's pretty awesome with anatomy, but I don't like his style very much. e_e So now besides weeding out the anime I gotta soften his influence, too! It's especially visible in the second row of faces.

Link: [x]

Any pointers would be much appreciated!


EDIT: Chinchillin Villian:

Quote:

Whoops forgot to mention it, but I did actually read your comment -- not long after you posted it so a while ago, haha. I didn't respond because I had nothing new to add.

It's interesting what you said about the values -- it sounds like such a basic thing that objects in the distance would be paler, but I somehow always make them darker. D= It's something I'll have to be concious of next time because my common sense can be a bit obtuse when it comes to these things. x_x

Secondly, I'm actually trying to get away from cartoons. I understand that line thickness can do a lot, but ideally I'd like to make a thin, not too dark outline with a regular pencil and let the coloring do the work.