Yoakum Book (nudity?) *March-2.74-11*

[Justin.]

By looking at your digital work, I instantly see issues with Contrast, value, lighting, temperature, perspective- the list goes on. The tats are way cool, looking at wolverine gave me this idea that you have great control over value but you need to just practice and practice, do values scales constantly, and don't worry about color yet. Just focus on the basics, Anatomy, Perspective, composition- and draw from life

A GREAT strategy I learned. Grab all your paint stuff walk outside of your house and walk totally straight for 5 minutes exactly. Then sit down RIGHT THERE, and find the nearest intrerestig thing to paint. Do that once a nice, and you should see improvement in no time!!

[MonkeYoakum]

Taking Mr. Oaksford's comment to heart, Im not thinking about color and working on tonality. Hopfully Im doing things that will be productive in my persuit. Further Crits appreciated.

Here are two 30 minute speedies.

[MonkeYoakum]

How long will my child sleep!

this one really sucks though

[oishiiniku]

You've definitely got the right idea with focusing on tones. I'd recommend that you turn off opacity in photoshop and try to nail the big areas of tone - it will help improve your ability to recognise tones. Once your study is looking close to the reference pic at a distance (toggling between them and checking in the navigator tab is a good way of seeing how close you're getting) then you can start adding subtleties and details. Don't be scared of whacking down big, bold blocks of tone.

Also, keep in mind with faces that you want to try and keep your light side values and shadows side values separate. As a general rule, the darkest value on the light side of the model should still be lighter than any value on the shadow side. This is obviously a generalisation but is a good basic approach that should ensure you get as much form and contrast in your work as possible.

Hope some of this stuff is of use to you.

Cheers, Nick.

[Justin.]

He's right- If I were you, I would start by only defining 2 values (light and dark). But don't use black or white. Desaturate the photo and try to replicate the grays that you see without using the eyedropper. Then eventually move on to 4 tones!

The problem with photos is that 99% of the time, photos have extreme white and extreme black, such as the coat on that Bush photo. The mountain one is nice because you avoided using straight black. And don't be afraid to use the shift key for horizons!! It's not cheating!! =)

[MonkeYoakum]

I think this is a basic composition for a piece. Trying to do what the good people who care about spreading art knoledge are helping me do. Props to those!

Am I headed in the right direction? *edit* this is total crap.

[MonkeYoakum]

Ok I have little tolerance for drawing from photos, I wish I could lug my stuff outside but oh well.


Here is my first step in somthing Im going to focus on working on for a little while, but I have no idea how to translate my tones to color, How do you preserve the tone but still use rich colors, dont the colors effect the tone?


also this seems to washed out, but when ever I put the darker tones in it seemed off too. Please advise.

[MonkeYoakum]

This work week has been f*d. One person fired, one quit, the little girl piercer is driving me crazy thinking she is going to be the new tattoo artist, and there are so many college girls that I would like to open up on with some heavy artilery I'm loosing my mind. How do these girls, and guys for that matter, get into college when they cant decide wich nostril will look best with their UGGs. Man I want to move some place real. so this is kind of how I feel about things, what a lame background huh ha! AAHHHHHHHH!

[James Wolf]

I think your landscape value study is actually my favorite of the three, when you squint its the closest to the reference. it can be tough when working with colors but just keep keep your values in mind. It might be helpful to just load up a professionally done painting into photoshop and just eye drop your way around the piece to see where the colors and values actually land on the color palette, it may or may not help but just a thought.

[MonkeYoakum]

JamesWolf: I really admire your work and appreciate your crit and advice, I tried doing that with a piece, but I it was kind of before I had as good a grasp of value (not that I feel I have a strong one now) I think what it boils down to is "draw from life" Thanks again!




Damn it, I was hoping such would not be the case. Alas progress need strife. Most of my life studies are in a sketchbook and windows Vista on my new computer does not like my scanner, or printer for that matter. What a joke. Some day I will downgrade to XP and have a 3 page scanner dump. Anyways

Here is a 30 minute job, I hate the "temple"? in the background, I think I really f'd it up there.

[MonkeYoakum]

Quazi from ref.

[MonkeYoakum]

Morning

[MonkeYoakum]

My computer is about to get returned due to dissatisfactory working conditions. IE Windows Vista. My scanner and printer are not compatible, so when I return, some day. There will be a massive paper dump of mostly anatomy and very random scribblings. Until then Here is what I did today.




Until we meet again Cheers.

[TheGnoll]

i know i might some boring and not nice, but what i think is that you think of very comlepictures without the basic to build them, if that makes sense.Complex pictures like the ones you start require lots of different pieces thatneed to be put together, from anatomy to composition to color to value etc etc...and its very hard to learn everything at the same time, if that makes sense.If i were you're i'd try and study one element t the time, until you are partly satisfied with it...And if you are doinsd studies, like the ones in post 32 (thats good stuff to do), you should tr and do more and take more time on each one, since the basic objective of a value study is to get values right.
I hope i haven't been to harsh, my only intention is to help

most of all, keep at it!

ciao

[MonkeYoakum]

Here is some things I've been working on at work.









F* Yeah, its my weekend!

[AphexTweak]

I saw your signature in a sketchbook I was browsing and couldn't agree more.
Fatherhood = ( / + )
Thought I stop on by and take a peek in your sketchbook.

I believe this was touched on earlier, but I think it would be helpful for you to have a more defined focus with an end goal in mind. Right now you seem to be all over the place. You're drawing, painting, doing anatomy studies etc. Which is why I think you are getting overwhelmed.

Try and do a bunch of anatomy studies and some still life work. Just draw it; simple pencil and paper. Start looking for and breaking things down into simple forms: cubes, spheres, cones etc. Get comfortable with that, and then move on to looking at how light and shadow play off of those simple forms. You'll soon develop a much better foundation that you can then bring into your paintings while building up your color theory and incorporating other ideas, such as subject matter, mood, composition etc.

Hope you can find some of this info useful.

And because everyone needs a little your tattoo work is amazing. Your more recent work is coming along nicely and you've received some good pointers thus far that you seem to be taking to heart. So all thats left is to keep up the hard work and keep posting. Thanks for sharing with us.

[MonkeYoakum]

Thanks for the encouraging words man, I appreciate it. Right now I found a loomis book online http://www.austinsketchgroup.com/sha...IGURE_draw.pdffor free and I am focusing on, and working until, I can recall from memory and reproduce perfect proportions of a man, then I'll move on to a woman, then the different proportions. It's slow moving, but I can see a big improvment, its crazy how lengthening the legs makes such a difference. I will however break that up I think with some breaking down of simple shapes. I feel like that advice is strong and helpfull. And thanks for the props of tattoo work, though like most artists usualy feel, I dont think it is as good as it could be. Ill keep working on that too. Thanks again!

[MonkeYoakum]

Here is some stuff, porportions are all fucked up, but atleast its progress.
Fuck the size of this scanner. I only included the second one for the figures at the botom.

[Dose206]

hey man,
I see improvement over the life of this sketchbook so far, in the beginning of it you seemed to have an idea of what you needed to work on but not really working on those things, and it seems now as though you're starting to get down to it and study some. I'd say more studies (I know I need to take my own medicine) would do you a world of good.

Oh yeah, you're a far better tattoo artist than I, I congratulate you on that skillset. If you have any pointers for me, shoot me a PM, I'd love to hear it.

Chris

[Diphallia]

I read your signature and feel like an ass for being a teenager since it's more like: for my dad.

[lennon]

Hey good stuff man, I'd like to see more b/w drawings. As they look interesting.

[MonkeYoakum]

Dose: Thanks for the good words, yeah more studies needed for sure. I need a live model, that would be sweet.

Diphallia: Hey in my book as long as there is one smiley for all the frowny pissed off faces I'm having a good time. But yeah, not looking forward to the time when my daughter tells me she hates me. I got like a decade before that though. Oh well.

lennon: Thanks man! Ask and you shal recieve.


Mostly done for the legs, but whats wrong with the torso?

[MonkeYoakum]

One more, how lame are the hands and feet? Really f*d that part up. I intended him to look heavy and solid, but he didn't come off like that at all so I threw a gatorman trap on him. Any one have advice for carrying the center of gravity into the ground?

[MonkeYoakum]

Startin reading the Loomis head book, thats some good stuff. Stay focused! Figures!. the head is part of the figure? ok true, but focus on the overall. ok. Still trying to add weight to my figures, I think through planar shading? I dont know. somthing like that.

[MonkeYoakum]

Here to a happy and prosperous new year all. The liquid flying from the military skull stomach is guiness to clarify.

[smuli]

Lots of your sketches have great line quality so it shows you're a tattoo artist. On the figures though, your arm and leg lengths often seem to stretch when there's perspective in the play. Marking places like knees and ankles with ellipses before drawing the contours might help for that. You seem to know a great deal about bones and muscles already but drawing simplified figures with the muscles laid out of mind every know and then could be a surer way to learn proportions. Keep reading and copying Loomis too.

I think the Gatorman's well in balance by the way, just his right heel looking above the ground gives a bit shaky impression. To make it look heavier, the feet and shanks could be much larger and head maybe smaller. The way I get it, the less mass at the top and more at the bottom, the heavier look.

Keep it up, hope to see more of those value studies as well as figures.

[Farin]

The first pic in this sb is great.... I got a new desktop-background
the tatto-stuff is also cool

[TheGnoll]

hey man, cool to see your started doing some studies, and they are already paying off.I really like the tattoo work, esp the last one you posted.Loomis is a great resource, and there's no worng way to use his books...you'll learn tons by continuing to do what you're doing, so KEEP AT IT!

ciao!

[Diphallia]

Guinnies sounds like a fun beverage
Isn't it black?
Anyhow, that's a wicked idea.

No, I don't do other drugs than legal ones, see explanation in my SB

[MonkeYoakum]

I am currently making my tattoo appointment wait while I scan resize and f* around in photoshop. hmmmm... oh well here it is, some sketches again












Can I get a god damn 4th page already!?!