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

[hitnrun]

Here's a thing I did on a pastel ground. We had 2 live female models, and my class spent say.. Maybe just over 2 hours on it? 2 15 minute breaks and a couple smaller ones.

Enjoy!



I know the figures are pretty "transparent" so to speak, and theres tons of issues with it, but I didn't feel like I had much control with the pastels I used. Crits/comments are welcome.

[hitnrun]

--EDIT-- Hence the NSFW warning, and maybe one or two other sketches posted earlier?

These were during my life drawing class. Happy with the pen/ink drybrush gestures, and the model laying down in conte, but the two models and the painting I'm not big on.

Here's the painting, which I had going with "fleshy" colors, then decided to do something less orthodox.



Heres my dry brush pen/ink gestures



Model done in Conte - If different colors are available, I need to get some.



Here is an absolutely terrible conte drawing done in my life drawing class. I'm VERY dissatisfied with it. (crits/comments discouraged for this one - I don't plan on working on it again - it's a complete failure in my eyes)

[Black Spot]

When you complained in the AD thread about not learning anything new in ages, I thought I’d take a look. It looks like you’re stopping just when you should be pushing yourself that bit further. It doesn’t matter if you mess up big time because you would have learnt what not to do the next time. Be brave, bold and go that one extra step – surprise yourself.

[hitnrun]

When you complained in the AD thread about not learning anything new in ages, I thought I’d take a look. It looks like you’re stopping just when you should be pushing yourself that bit further. It doesn’t matter if you mess up big time because you would have learnt what not to do the next time. Be brave, bold and go that one extra step – surprise yourself.

Hrm, push myself, be bold; I like it! Do you consider the Old Masters work to be a step in the "bold" direction? Seems I'm torn between wanting to be capable of Trompe L'Oiel (spelling? I'm tired..) and wanting to draw comics. I love the style of some comics - they just have so much oomph - but old masters paintings have such incredible skill involved. Perhaps in trying to combine realism and comic styles, my art is suffering? I dunno, I need feedback from more users, but without posting, my sketchbook gooooeesss aawwaayyyy.. Sort of like my mind right freakin' now.. G'night all.

[FiveFingerToolvayne]

Youve got some really cool pieces in here I like how your experimenting with other mediums. But your pencil drawings are really good and I can't wait to see what they'll look like finished.

[hitnrun]

This picture doesnt do the work justice. I'll get a better photo up when I can. In the mean time:

Size: 18"x24"
Medium: Graphite
Support: Illustration Board
Time: 15 Hours
(The robots lineart was the only thing I had decided on prior to starting)

[JeffX99]

Hey hitnrun,

Since you seem pretty motivated I just wanted to offer a little advice and insight...
you seem tough enough to be able to take it so I won't sugar-coat anything. And the reason for offering the advice is because I think you're off to a good start, but are getting a little bit of a "bum steer". So please accept the following feedback in the spirit it is intended, as good, realistic advice that will hopefully inspire and help you mature as an artist.


Never start a statement/thread with, "I don't mean to sound egotistical,...". Mainly because; A - it does; B - it is an amateur thing to say; C - it can only go downhill from there.

You tend to make excuses for your art (many do around here - you're not alone). Don't do that. Post it if you think it is worth posting or if you want critique - do not "qualify" your work with any excuse, justification, it's old, my scanner is crap, etc. Just bad form - it's like saying, "I'm actually a really good football player...but my ankle hurts today."

Resist offering critique to artists who are beyond your current skill level - even when you might be right. They will check on where the critique is coming from and will resist (with good reason) your observations - again, even if you're right. Just nature's way. Edgar Payne (20th century landscape painter) once said, "Knowledge precedes execution". He meant that we can know and understand something intellectually before we can actually execute, but until you can walk the walk, so to speak, best to sit back and learn as much as possible.

So that advice has more to do with attitude and communication...now on the technical side:

Glad to see you're taking life drawing - though it seems like you got into a class that isn't well structured as far as fundamentals go - seems more like an intro or overview because the instructor has the class using a variety of media, not to mention two model setups - very advanced stuff. Do your best to stick to the fundamentals no matter what medium you use.

Set up a spot in your apartment/space (like a corner) where you can set up simple still lifes and light them with a single light source - without influence from ambient light. Draw from these every day.

You seem already aware that drawing and painting at an easel is the best approach so I won't go into that - you're getting that experience in your life drawing and Master's studies.

Be aware that just copying Bridgman, Loomis, etc. from books isn't all that productive - keep in mind they drew from life - much larger than those little reproductions - people seem to forget that.

Anyway - that's plenty for thought right now. I will close with my highest recommendations for two books you should get (especially if you want to teach some day):
"Drawing Essentials" by Deborah Rockman
"Imaginitive Realism" by James Gurney

Good luck to you! I look forward to seeing your progress...

[hitnrun]

For tonight, I'm dog tired, so I'll just say thank you for the reply, I do appreciate the feedback. I agree with much of what you said, and now that college is done, I can work on fixing everything and getting CURRENT images up. Check out the "Show your Studioes [RELOADED]" thread because I have 3 pics of my "studio" there.

Tomorrow I'll give a much more in depth reply - because I made an error - my last final is tomorrow at 8 AM and I have to study for at least another hour.

--edit-- Very sorry I haven't given that in depth answer yet, I'll give it tomorrow morning (3:30 AM now) and hopefully all will be good!

[hitnrun]

Here's a quickly sketched skull from a book by Paul Levielle called "Drawing Expressive Portraits".



Here's a decent sketch of my main character, PD.

[hitnrun]

Hey all, just a few small things here. I'll start off with the two portraits I'm doing from magazine covers. BTW, possible to change the thread title? "HitNRuns Feature Presentation" was an attempt at humor, and now it's bothering me.

Reference:


Drawing (*WIP*)


Amy Poehler Reference


Drawing (*WIP*)



Thanking God I remembered how to do that. Anywho, here's some other stuff. Comments and tips on both portraits are greatly encouraged! I don't think I got the childs portrait quite right and I think the eye brows being too high are one reason. Perhaps when I finish the shading it'll be more energetic?

And Amy there just needs more work. Going to darken the other eye area, get the hair massed, make the shadows stronger, etc..

Here's a beasty lookin thing and what became a skull. These two were done yesterday I think.



More in the next post.

[hitnrun]

Here's the last two for tonight. I'm planning on painting something tomorrow; going to TRY To use acrylics (which never usually works out for me, the dry time is too fast ARGH!!)

So far he's called "Penance" and he's one of 3 characters I"m trying to design. Cliche and unoriginally named "Penance", "Judgement" and "Death Sentence". Death Sentenced was changed from Death Penalty because I'm trying to figure out how the three will intertwine. Might go back to Penalty, I really don't know yet. And for those wondering, there aren't really any religious roots here, just what I'm calling Super Villains for now.

I'd like to make Penance more of a zombified thing, perhaps mess up his body a little bit, have parasites or something comin' out of him. Right now he's just a seriously buff dude.. I promise I will get better, more accurately sized images too! The inked version is a LOT bigger than the concept! The splash of color is the friggin prismacolor markers bleeding from the shitty looking version of Judgement..



Here's the smaller thumbnail I did.



Here's the concept and terribly executed result for Judgement - and yes I know the concept is terrible.. Stiff as a board!




And the sole sketch which started off as a monster and is now my concept for Death Sentence. If this dude looks familar, it's because the shape of his head is taken from the Angel of Death or whoever from Hellboy. I just gave him the face of a skeleton and I'll edit it more. Throw some details, maybe a few chips and battle wounds.



And finally here's one more cat like beasty lookin skull, and an explosion I was sketching from imagination:



For now, that's all I've got!

OH and sorry about the random dark streaks on the images - the studio light I have was between the overhead light I used for the photos, and the actual drawings.. Took me a minute or two to figure out how to get rid of that shadow and then the obvious hit me - move the damn light. I can't count how many times I've nearly knocked that thing over (which is why I didn't actually want to move it, it was in a good spot to be out of harms way, but I had to /ramble)

[Ven S]

I finally found your sketchbook Great stuff you have here man .

[hitnrun]

Wanderer, thank you for the comment and the compliment dude! I'm about to upload the other sketches I have so far of Judgement (the prismacolor markered version of him is HORRIBLE. Lost so much from the pencil drawing), and the only sketch I have for the creature portrait I've decided is concept 1 for Death Sentence.. Unfortunately I'm finding many of my inspirations coming from YuGiOh cards. I'm not TRYING to base my creatures off of those illustrations, it's just sort of happening.

--edit-- On the first page is a robot that I drew a while back. Here he is, redone and editted.



I'm thinking the perspective is off in some places, but I wasn't totally sure how to handle it so I did my best.

[Jesus Food]

hey man great sketchbook so far, love the amy pohler sketch from the magazine cover

[hitnrun]

Okay, so here's four new sketches. The Skullish demon head was done in roughly an hour and half, maybe two hours at most. I remember my mom saying we'd been at this one auction yesterday for an hour already and I'd started drawing as soon as we got there. So, roughly 1 1/2 hours - 2 hours. Also, he has four horns, but the two on the left were in shadow because my sketchbook didn't play nice with my scanner so I cloned them out. Just better aesthetics.



This next one is a bare bones knight sketch - No clue where I wanted to go and I've discovered I have difficulty sketching knight helmets. Could be because I insist on drawing the back of the head any time I draw a head.



Here is a concept (albeit a crappy one) of my most basic look for a character I'm attempting to develop. The swirls leading into the highly unrefined and obviously unreferenced hands is a place holder for debris. My moleskin sketchbook is pretty small. Considering normal to me is like 18x24, small is roughly 8.5x11. OH and by the way, that's not supposed to be some sort of weird looking pope hat either - I was going for a hood, which, I think I may have missed in my haste to put something together here.



And I'll leave off with this last sketch referenced from a magazine. I don't remember the magazine but if anyone out there has it, post the title and I'll link it or something. Took about an hour and the reference size was maybe half of the drawing size.

For now, that's all I have, but look on the bright side - it's not on the plain white paper I usually use and if I can find a way to upload the oil portrait I did (monochrome so far) I'll get that one and my WIP oil portrait of Mariska Hargitay up too. That one is incredibly muddy at the moment because I was trying to amplify the shadows (As if there were many there to begin with.) and it's not working too well right now. I'll probably end up going very high contrast with it.

[alizak]

Thanks for stopping by my sketchbook and for the critique.

I really like the last sketch - it has attitude, I'll be subscribing to you sb to see your progress

[hitnrun]

Okay, so, small update. These pics were all taken with the wonderfully high resolution 2 MP camera on my phone. Heck it's good enough for like 5"x5" sketches, long as I can keep a steady hand. Can't find my digital camera ANYWHERE.. Anywho, first guy is my most recent and serious attempt at drawing an anatomically correct, albeit exaggerated (so right off the bat we have a contradiction) superhero. Not much to look at, but hey, wasn't going for fleshed out, overkill decor superhero.


Obviously this sketch is based off Spiderman/Venom/Carnage, Just love how they look! This guy has "symbiotes" jetting off him the same way carnage would, but again, camera phone..


This next guy is a D3 fanart. The barbarian - which, I don't think I really captured the essence of him - I think in general I may have him a little small.

sketch of a novice soldier who thinks he knows everything.


Barb Helmet - design eyeballed from an image from the Barbarian video on the D3 website - copied it so I could figure out why it was so badass!


Basic orc head. Was just trying to explore outside the usual human facial proportions. Don't think I quite managed to get where I wanted to be with this..


So, crits and comments welcomed - and I plan on practicing hands and feet because they are obvious weak areas of mine. So, besides saying "study anatomy of hands and feet" - I'll take whatever crits/comments you've got.

--edit-- If anyone has any ideas on how to make the sole of a boot/shoe/any footwear that has a sole look better than what I can do, PLEASE, let me know! All I know to do at the moment is draw it as a separate part like in the first image. Again, any crits/comments welcome, and if you know how I can make any of my stuff look better (besides photography comments), I'm all ears!

[hitnrun]

Digital sketches - no clue what I'm doing with digital except building framework and doing some simple massing in. No idea how to do any sort of rendering. Any tips?

Also I discovered why folks put a color palette in their image area.. Less hassle when changing colors. I know, I've advocated against digital, but since I've seen some good work done with it, it's stoked my interest. Consider it me attempting to grow as an artist. These three sketches are completely representative of my ability to render digitally.. I have no clue wtf I'm doing. Also please note, I want to know how to create soft edges WITHOUT using Alpha Channels, Selection Tools and options that do the feathering for you! I'm looking for a way to do it WITH THE BRUSH! (yes, traditional technique in a digital work - can it be done?). Once I learn how to do it with only one or two tools at hand, I'll go into deeper stuff. Any tips from anyone? Info is always appreciated!

One


Two


Three - the white circled areas are example of hard edges that I don't know how to soften (you can see them in all the sketches, they're just blatantly pointed out here for clearer visual example).

[hitnrun]

So some stuff I've done within the past couple days.. The last two watercolor images were done just last night.

Watercolor Yoda was just last night, but the copic one was done a few nights ago when the Star Wars with the classic "I, am your father" line. Am I the only one who thought that was the most cliche, non-dramatic thing ever?

Anywho: Watercolors









Watercolor Yoda with half cocked light saber!



Copic Yodas




I'm also realizing uploading from a URL (such as a place like Imgur) is probably a lot easier than uploading from my computer..

[PMMurphy]

thought i would drop by your sketchbook since you gave mine a visit. My only comment is i look through your stuff and i see improvement from the first page to the last. Alot of improvement actually and i had to let you know that. But at the same time which isn't a bad thing i don't really have a sense of what you like and dislike about art from your sketchbook.

I don't know, it might just be me. But i like to explore everything and do it slowly. All styles all everything. But of course paying close attention to the fundamentals is the most important so i do some things much slower then others.

But anyway back to my ramble. I like to explore art so i'll do some abstract stuff, ill do some designs, ill do some 2D art, ill do some surreal art, ill do stuff from imagination, ill do something cartoonish, i'll toss in realism. Etc etc

Then i start REALLY discovering what i myself enjoy. Then i keep what i enjoy the most (enjoy drawing that is and aesthetic quality) and keep those things and find ways to incorporate those things into my work.

Right now i like the following styles in order of what i like most to least, impressionalism,surrealism,(all realisms starting with hyper , photo, then regular), abstract, cartoon. I'm not gonna name anymore because i have yet to mess with those.

But this is what i did 4 years ago. I cared about this stuff. Now i am sitting down and learning the fundamentals after not drawing for 2 years. So EVERYTHING is so off and not as refined as it use to be when i was coming straight out of my art classes and such.

But yea i still go searching and i pick artwork even if its amature work that i like. Then i create a library of all the various styles of art. My library is my deviantArt account. I have yet to really study masters or old masters, but i will.

But as of today my most influential artists are M C. Escher, and Armin Mersmann. I see art as a journey and a exploration. Something that each individual will find and discover on their own, some take the difficult routes some take the more clear and easy to navigate. Some get lost and give up, while some find the destination they were looking for or whatever reason that brought them into becoming artists in the first place.

But yea i completely just wrote a wall of text on your sketchbook and i am done talking about this subject!

[hitnrun]

All good man I appreciate the feedback. I'm just trying my hand at other media since I do so much drawing - Drawing in general is my comfort zone, so I'm trying to break out of that - which, since I'm about to upload MORE drawings, thats a funny statement to make.

Uploading a few things - everything has been done from the past few months, up until possibly last night. I've got quite a few images coming up so I'll break it down into a few posts.

first batch - apologies if I have some uploaded already.
Please note the LAST TWO are photo referenced and possibly NSFW

Alien (based on Venom) done with drying up PITT marker


Cosmic Shadow as Mage - concept 1


Cosmic as Soldier - Concept 1


Demon sketch


Next are LAST TWO of Post - NSFW

First of LAST TWO NSFW - Photo Referenced-

NSFW
NSFW
NSFW



Second of LAST TWO NSFW - Photo Referenced

[hitnrun]

Second Batch of Six Images

A few Hand sketches - most done at a Doctor's Office lobby.









Next is a portrait, photo referenced - it was a practice sketch before I started the commissioned piece.



Lastly for this batch is a Before/After piece. Show's progress I've made. It was suppose to be the anatomy as good as I could get it. I think the "In with the New" work I could get a little more detail, but not much.

[hitnrun]

Next Batch. Four images left.

"Skeleton tormentor" - fanart based on some D3 stuff I've seen in the artbook. Those folks really know how to draw a demon skull!



Next is a head I based on Venom's face and something next to him that's.. I dunno, some kind of toxic caterpillar?



This *was* an attempt at venom - I need to reference some body builder pics because this thing is coming out too stylized for how I want it to look.



Lastly is another D3 sort of "fanart", which could also be called a DBZ Super Saijan because I realized I missed those lava glowing veins that Barbs who've used "Wrath of the Berserker" have. Oh well. I still think it looks cool.



And for now, that's about it folks. I'm going to try to get the two commissions I have finished up and I'll get those uploaded. One's a double portrait and the other is a logo for a small business. Once they're done, I'll see about some watercolors, and two oil portraits I'm working on. One's Mariska Hargitay and the other is some random ghost face I made up - looks like an attractive 20 something woman with "Fear" (yes the game) based eyes. Was kind of shooting for Alma at first. I have a bad habit of trying to draw figures like Spider Man, Super Man and Alma without reference material. Hence, my attempts usually fail and I get something interesting instead. OH I have a lineart captain planet to upload soon!

Okay, for now, that's all!