My NOT MUCH NUDITY AT ALL, Somewhat revamped and editted sometimes Sketchbook.

[hitnrun]

--EDIT-- NEW STUFF ON LAST PAGE

Hey all, I'm trying to become more active in the forums. Here is some older stuff from my very first year in college way back when. It was great when I first did it and now I can't really stand to look at it. I redid some stuff and tomorrow I'm going to get stuff from my life drawing class uploaded. Most of it SUCKS for various reason, but my life drawing teacher seemed to like all the stuff I thought was complete crap, and she didnt like anything I thought was good. Either way, here's some stuff to get this thread started.

Number 1 is called Cosmic Shadow - I've toyed with the way this guy looks so many times, its disgusting. He's one of two characters in my head whom I change the look of daily. Sort of like batman action figures - theres everything from "Daytime picnic" batman to "Evil trumping cave dwelling batman with karate chop action and plasma bolt firing rifle"



Number 2 is a robot whom I used to like. I can see where I screwed up on him and I'm going to redo him probably tomorrow.

[Jamesy]

Yeah, I've seen in the forums. You commented in my sb way back in day. I remember you had like 2 posts and I was like "Wow, hitnrun just hitnran my sketchbook". When you say "pre-college", how long ago was that? Anyway, nice start and get this thing rollin.

[hitnrun]

Precollege is 8th through 12th grade and the usual summer vacation in between High School years. Right after that summer vacation I went to college for the Fall of '05 - pretty sure it was fall. One thing I'm going to post is actually very new and up to date but it was done around 1 in the morning, but I still think it looks pretty good.

The built demon with the arrowy hair and the big arrow I drew from a thing called Dark Demon in a book called How to Draw Supervillains. I can't find the book or an image of Dark Demon or I'd give you all a reference - even though I did a complete revamp of the character.



This next really ripped dude was going to be older, a little chubby, but still very strong and with a "Cable" inspired mech arm. Epic Fail for 1000 Alex.



Next thing was just because I like drawing muscles, and the idea of being a medical illustrator sounds fun, but I'm sure there are parts to that job, such as drawing a leg broken in half, that I might not be able to handle. Gives me the shivers..



PS, I know.. proportions, anatomy, etc..

[hitnrun]

The next load of 3 images.

The first is a trio of dudes, and something I should find so I can finish it. It's got Cosmic, who is more like a partner to the guy in the mask who happens to be my star character (I dont know if he looks very original..) and the absolutely GIANT dude whose reference is in the reply below, I named Lazarus. I always pictured Dolph Lundgren playing this guy in a movie, even though I doubt his country of origin is Germany.. Yes the built dude is suppose to be of German descent.



Next we have a friend of mine who took a picture and I liked it so I decided to draw it. It's pretty close to finished - I want to do a little more to it yet, but alas, its another one I can't find. I have like 10 sketchbooks all half filled (no word of lie) because I dont want to put my high school stuff in with anything that has potential.. It's like mixing oil and water, but at the same time it might be like a really cool time warp - one page you've got shit, the next page BLAM! good stuff! Oh, yea, here's the image!



Third and final is a concept sketch for my star character. I've since scrapped it.

[hitnrun]

The trio pic -the big dude on the right was referenced, the other two are from my mind.

heres the reference pic:

[hitnrun]

Any references needed for the vermeer reproduction? The other mannequin study was just a quick thing. The Vermeer on the other hand, seeing as I only spent one day a week on it, took me a few months. (I left it college when I worked on it, because I was afraid of screwing it up. I've since studied with oils more and I'm not afraid of screwing something up as I know how easily stuff is to fix with Oils. Acrylics and watercolor on the other hand I need to seriously bone up on).

My art teacher helped me a lot on the Vermeer and its still not finished, but at the moment, I don't want to take it any further because I like it the way it is.



Next is just a sketch of a drawing mannequin. I need to fix my scanner settings because it looks grainy and the drawing isn't.

[hitnrun]

heres a little more of my boring line art style. I think I just need something different - graphite is becoming "too much of a good thing" anymore. Ah well, 3 more sketches, no refs. By the way, on Tekk's foot, the one facing to the right - that little silver thing on his shoe was *suppose* to be a shine mark, even though he doesn't look that shiny. I was going for a moderatly polished look for that one.

So here we have a dude I drew in high school, and one thing it has going for it is that both back then, and now I still like him. No name for him, I just drew a dude with two claws on each hand.



Next is a concept sketch of my star character, and this is what he'd pretty much look like if he used desert camo.



And of course, we all know Tekk. Your friendly little robot side kick who I'm going to redraw; he's going to have speakers, a mic, and a few other little doodads to make him look functional, and not just like some retarted drone.

[JRStagg]

Loving Tekk lol, nice work.. proportions could do with work and anatomy, like the absolute ripped guy aswell (muscly)

Keep it up and post more.

[DStraX]

thanks for commenting on my SB now to the crits.. you say you like reallism? I dont realy see any real attempts at drawing realisticly herI know cartoons are fun to draw, but the real challange is to draw something that looks real
I challange you to do that!!

Tim

[hitnrun]

thanks for commenting on my SB now to the crits.. you say you like reallism? I dont realy see any real attempts at drawing realisticly herI know cartoons are fun to draw, but the real challange is to draw something that looks real
I challange you to do that!!

Tim

Perhaps I'm using "realistic" in an improper sense. What I usually mean by realistic is stuff such as Annibale Carraci's "Flight Into Egypt", Caravaggio's "Entombment", "Calling of Saint Matthew", or a work by Velasquez, which I believe is called something like "Maids of Honor" - some people in the painting have realized that the King is standing there in the doorway, and some are already bowing. Velasquez painted himself in there too. That is what I call realistic. Apologies for any misspellings of artist names.

The pencil drawing of my friend eating that apple, I also consider realistic. The other stuff, true, is more representational but stylized. I will say though, the dude that looks like a midget, he's all up in the air with his head back - the head I just couldn't seem to get right.

Maybe I'll post some Sheppard drawings I did. I love his work.

Thanks for the comments too!

[hitnrun]

We've got some Work In Progress pics here - and I've since pretty much stopped working on it because I need to paint something that is more planar because the subtle changes in shade, I have difficulty with. I have to go back to where I started with graphite, and do the same thing with oils/acrylics. Here's the pics:

Probably about an hour into it:



Guessing maybe 3 hours into it (I have a TV in my "studio" too so I take frequent breaks on some days)



From here, until I decide to finish it, I have no idea how long..

[hitnrun]

Here's one that was just suppose to be a bound winged figure, with a blindfold even though it looks like he has a mask on that is obscuring his vision. In many ways this was a success, but in more ways, I consider it a failure. The shading on the wings for example, I was going for a "spawn" style - and I failed hard. I'm going to redo this bad boy, and see if I can't get better looking chains, better shading on the wings, and two feet that look normal. The one that has "Bound" typed up, I was seeing if I could make it look like a book cover.

[hitnrun]

Here ladies and gents, we have a lovely vine charcoal practice piece on newsprint, and a samurai that a friend asked me to draw. I'm happy with both, but I still have work to do on them. Crits/Comments both welcome and encouraged!



--edit-- The graininess of the samurai is due to my scanner being good, but not that good.

And the Vine Charcoal practice, which, I'm going to redo it on better paper tomorrow (7/21/09)



Also a HUGE thank you to Noah Bradley, for telling me how to get my posts looking like this.

[hitnrun]

More works in progress with the samurai I'm drawing for a friend.

First pic:



Second Pic:



Enjoy!

[hitnrun]

Ok so the first "Cosmic" was bugging the heck out of me with the severe anatomical flaws. The new one isn't perfect, but I'm playing the "style" card there. I'll definitely post images when I get my life drawing class going, sort of to show I can draw a normal human figure if I want to. I like this version a lot more - however it is technically a work in progress - I don't know if I'll add wings, and I want to come up with a good, final version of his scythe/sickle (w/e it is). Then I may even ink it, not sure yet.



And this is a work I'm proud of. I think it came out really well, and I've caught a few mistakes, but keep in mind, this started off as the black face and part of the hood, and I tried to keep a good hold on the anatomy. There are only one or two things I'd do different if I redid this guy, but I'm satisfied with the way he currently is.



By the way, if anyone wants to tear the absolute heck out of any of these works, please feel not only free to do so, but also encouraged.

[TASmith]

I like the rendering of the samurai. I suggest much more studies from observation, both from life and from photos. Also, start posting some studies of those anatomy artists you like so much. Copying the bridgeman books, especially helps. Having been through an art ed masters program, I can say they'll only look at your art during the admissions process, and their standards aren't all that high. If you want to really respect yourself as a teacher, work a ton now on self improvement. Start with pencils, move to oils or acrylics. Learn techniques in ceramics and watercolor, also digital (these are all a must for art ed). Because, no matter how much you can fudge being an artist in school, the second you walk into a classroom, those kids want to see real skills. Kids have impossible expectations. You have to be a master artist, buff, charismatic, a kung fu expert, whatever. Or at least wise enough to shrug off their silly expectations and seem like you know what's more important (don't worry you don't have to actually know what's important in life, you just have to fake it). If you're not really skilled as an artist, though, kids will be let down, and it's all downhill from there.

[hitnrun]

I like the rendering of the samurai. I suggest much more studies from observation, both from life and from photos. Also, start posting some studies of those anatomy artists you like so much. Copying the bridgeman books, especially helps. Having been through an art ed masters program, I can say they'll only look at your art during the admissions process, and their standards aren't all that high. If you want to really respect yourself as a teacher, work a ton now on self improvement. Start with pencils, move to oils or acrylics. Learn techniques in ceramics and watercolor, also digital (these are all a must for art ed). Because, no matter how much you can fudge being an artist in school, the second you walk into a classroom, those kids want to see real skills. Kids have impossible expectations. You have to be a master artist, buff, charismatic, a kung fu expert, whatever. Or at least wise enough to shrug off their silly expectations and seem like you know what's more important (don't worry you don't have to actually know what's important in life, you just have to fake it). If you're not really skilled as an artist, though, kids will be let down, and it's all downhill from there.

<B>TASmith</b> Thank you for the valuable input, both about my art and about myself becoming a teacher. I'll get my bridgeman studies up asap. I just reconfigured my scanner to scan at 100 DPI instead of the 300 DPI it was using - so I can get things posted faster now. I also have a sketchbook filled with gestures, so maybe I'll even scan a few pages of that (it's hardcover and book bound so I might have to settle for some lower quality photos). I just figured theres so much of that stuff on here already, it might make my already plain sketchbook even more, predictable?

As for some of the other stuff, I'm happy to say I'm already breaking into acrylics, and I've done some work with oils. I'll get the other vermeer I'm working on scanned, and I'll be sure to get the acrylics up soon too - probably later today. Oh and theres a ceramics class in my curriculum too, so soon enough I'll learn about the techniques you suggested.

On a downsided note, I'm not a big fan of digital work. I've attempted it, but I can't say I have much respect for it. If it's really that necessary then I'll try to learn it, so if you have *any* tips at all to make a prospectively torturous journey any less painful, then please by all means, share them!

Thanks, too, for checking out my sketchbook, and leaving good input for me. I appreciate it.

p.s. the dude I'm drawing it for, and a lot of his friends like that samurai too

[hitnrun]

Ok, all of these are old drawings. None are perfect, or finished ideas even. -my girlfriend wrote "i wuv woo" on the one page

Exhibit A of "non finished/far from perfect idea"



Exhibit B



The potrait



The reference



some gestures

[TASmith]

"On a downsided note, I'm not a big fan of digital work. I've attempted it, but I can't say I have much respect for it. If it's really that necessary then I'll try to learn it, so if you have *any* tips at all to make a prospectively torturous journey any less painful, then please by all means, share them!"

Not have respect for it? For me, the respect comes from seeing master works made with it. Here's just a sampling of digital sketchbooks here that practically make me cry:

Jaime Jones: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...d.php?t=116258
Min Yum: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=46487
P Levente: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=90718
Mathias Verhasselt: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=73169
zhuzhu: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=92563

I'll be honest with you that I'm not the greatest artist. I'm more of a fan here than an expert (pains me to say it). You can check my work and judge for yourself. But, I'm definately no expert in digital. My advice is to examine the works of the people above and look for their tutorials/videos. I know zhuzhu has some recent ones in his DA account.

Also, I think you need to take another look at the work you've posted and realize that, in order to reach your dream, you need to reach the next level. The anatomy of these figures is wonky. The legs in exhibit B are stretched at an unnatural angle, and his face is undefined. Your gesture sketches have obscured the gestures of the poses. Try less lines. The portrait of the little boy is a poor copy, especially his nose. The nutcracker is the only study from life, and it's poor for a couple reasons. First, we can't see the whole item, because his legs went off the page. Second he's not in any recognizable place, he's just floating on a blank page. Third, their's not much rendering, or any sense of light wrapping around him. So far, everything posted is flat.

I hope you don't take this the wrong way, and remember that I treat my own works just as harshly - I hate about 90% of what I make. I think the works here show that you can learn to be a great artist, but you're not there yet, and you really need to work to get there. Definately sketch more from life, spend more time on each work, and don't listen to any non-artists around you, when they give you praise. Remember, to a non-artist, anything looks good, and your friends and family will praise you just to make you feel good (I've been there, believe me).

[hitnrun]

Man, I have so much to say, but I don't want to sound like I didn't read your post because I did read it. I also thank you for the astounding level of detail in your post - I dont get that kind of input much. I also agree with 99% of it. But, keep in mind, and not to make excuses, but the newest piece of the stuff under "Exhibit A" is at least 2 years old. Posting this stuff is looking back, for me. The *only* piece I consider finished, is the winged angel/demon dude on the gargoyles head. (Official name: Cosmic Shadow - don't know if it's taken yet or not, but thats my personal name for him. BTW he's only a few months old) The anatomy on him is messed up too, and I can see it, but I'd like to hear any input you have regarding him on light sources, style, applying textures to the gargoyle - he doesn't look like stone, I dont know how to make him look like stone. Once I find those damned bridgman sketches, I'll post them. I'll also post the horrible sheppard ones I did the minute I find them. I think they're in my attic.

Once again, thanks for your post. My skin is thick, I can take a good beating when it comes to my art. Again, the winged character on the gargoyle and the samurai - please, any good feedback on them is appreciated. Also, I dont mean to sound like I'm making excuses - I'm used to giving the constructive crits, not being on the receiving end, so I'm not entirely sure how to respond to it yet. I'm just trying to explain why some of it looks bad. It all comes down to not enough time spent on it. I'm going to get some drawings from objects done tomorrow. I'd like to get some drawings from objects/life done and posted. Enough with the cartoony stuff for now.

--edit-- Can I send you a private message?

--edit-- Last edit - all those links.. Only little red X's show up!

[TASmith]

I like the gargoyle piece, with the city background. It's playful, and I think it works. Flat isn't always bad - take a look at some graphic work by Aubrey Beardsley: http://www.zeno.org/Kunstwerke/A/Bea...Aubrey+Vincent

Thanks for having thick skin, I've been burned before when giving advice. One thing, if you can't make the gargoyle look like stone - look at some stones! Choose one with a texture you like and study it.

There's a famous quote that an artist should be able to make anything look beautiful, even a rock. It's a bit of a loaded statement, though, because all rocks are really fascinating if you take the time to look. They're exercises in abstraction, and it can be tough to actually make a sketch look like a rock.

If you think your studies of Sheppard are terrible, don't look for them, redo them

You can PM me anytime, and be as harsh as you want on my work too.

[hitnrun]

Tas, good idea with redoing the sheppard sketches. Maybe I will, and I'll throw them on toned paper too. That cuts down on the work like crazy. I made the mistake of not using it for the intial work I had to hand in.. Man.. hours upon hours of extra work for tonals, when with toned paper all I had to do was throw on darks and highlights. I'll get my bridgman studies posted too, they're actually not bad at all. I just need to find the sketchbook they're in. Wont take long.

No need to thank me for having "thick skin" - it's a requirement for artists, and I assume, when I critique, the person can handle me pointing out the flaws in their work. One must remember though, to point out the good things too because this lets the artist know they're on the right track in some places.

Hehe oh and yea all that other stuff from "Exhibit A" down, just stuff I posted to get some more material on. Again, stressing the "Old and incomplete" part. The samurai and the "Gargoyle" piece are both after my anatomy class. Much of everything else is before I had that class (with a few exceptions)

[hitnrun]

I'm going to post the rest of the stuff I scanned. Here's some bridgman studies (I have more coming soon) and a character I drew. I'm trying to find a calligraphic font for the word "Berserk". If you know of any, or where I can find some, please let me know. I have a more scanned working coming, but I have a few things to do first. I'll be back to fix up the post.

[TASmith]

I'm no expert at all on Calligraphy. All I can suggest is play with MS word and photoshop and see what kind of fonts you like. Then play around with letters.

Keep posting more, and make a vow to only post new works from now on. This is supposed to be a journal of your progress, not what you drew over the last 5 years in no particular order.

[hitnrun]

I'm no expert at all on Calligraphy. All I can suggest is play with MS word and photoshop and see what kind of fonts you like. Then play around with letters.

Keep posting more, and make a vow to only post new works from now on. This is supposed to be a journal of your progress, not what you drew over the last 5 years in no particular order.

You know what, quoted for truth!

[hitnrun]

Ok, this one started as the graphite image I have posted - I transitioned the very first image posted onto an 11x14 image (hence the darkened left/right and bottom, the scanner bed is about 9x12) - and I've been hitting it with an ebony pencil on and off for the past 2 days. I'm slowly getting the tonality I need. The anatomy isn't perfect, it never has been, so I'm concentrating on getting the values right. Life drawings coming soon - I've got a life drawing class starting Monday, I'll photograph all of it and post the coveted "Life Drawings". For now, this will have to do.

[TASmith]

You're getting the volumes well, but what about the light source? You could choose one or two different light sources and make a killer image out of this, but you have to choose it, and have the shadows follow from that. Right now it's out of whack because of it. Also, think about the edges. You like to outline things heavily. Elwell has a great, short tutorial on edges in the tutorial section. Look it up. I'm not sure if he's supposed to be nude at the waist or wearing body armor. As a stylization it's fine, but I'm still not sure what you're going for. I'd also like to see a few more layout lines before all this rendering starts - full body at least, if not background. As a character study, fine, but as a character doing something in a story, it'd be good to see more planning.

[hitnrun]

You're getting the volumes well, but what about the light source? You could choose one or two different light sources and make a killer image out of this, but you have to choose it, and have the shadows follow from that. Right now it's out of whack because of it. Also, think about the edges. You like to outline things heavily. Elwell has a great, short tutorial on edges in the tutorial section. Look it up. I'm not sure if he's supposed to be nude at the waist or wearing body armor. As a stylization it's fine, but I'm still not sure what you're going for. I'd also like to see a few more layout lines before all this rendering starts - full body at least, if not background. As a character study, fine, but as a character doing something in a story, it'd be good to see more planning.

Hehe, I'm trying to get the values correct, they're actually quite difficult to imagine. If I had a good reference, this would be finished by now. Body armor, or nude. I don't know myself actually. If you saw the guy with the body armor, you know I can render it. I'll look up Elwells tutorial because I do outline heavily (it can be erased, cleanly, so its not too dark). As for layout lines, it's a transition, I didn't use layout lines - unless you mean something different than what I think. But yea, you're right, minimal planning went into this because I just wanted to redo the very image posted, with some more detail. Again, not trying to make excuses, just explaining things.

[hitnrun]

Keep up the anatomy studies; you can never do too many of those. But remember that anatomy is only a means to an end, the end being the accurate description of the form. I think you're doing something that I've done a lot of; thinking that drawing a figure is just a matter of drawing all the muscles. I think your figures will improve if you focus more on the form itself, the planes and the structure, and only worry about the underlying muscles where they influence that. If that makes any sense.

Also, I think your drawings would benefit from more delicacy in your lines. Your dark lines are reading as accents and throwing the whole value scheme off. Delicacy and subtlety is where it's at.

That's going to be difficult for me to do. I've always drawn figures by making some loose guidelines and then adding the muscles, then trying to do values from my head. I have to remember to check out elwells tutorial - but now that class started today, it's going to be difficult to find time. My first life drawing class of the semester is today, so we'll see what some hands on instruction can for me. Keep in mind, everything I've got posted here, I think 90% is from my imagination. So if it looks made up, thats one reason why.

[hitnrun]

So yea my life drawing class today, which I was going to take pictures of and post - was cancelled (for Monday, not in general). In Lieu of this I went to the library on campus to find some books by Bridgman and Sheppard (and learned that Bridgman's middle name is Brant. How cool is that for a middle name?)

So I'm gonna find those books, take them back to my apartment and then see how many drawings I can fit into the last couple pages (I have many other pages, but they have stuff taped to them and it'll take forever to take that stuff off, while maintaining the integrity of the paper). So yea, some life drawings/anatomical drawings coming soon!