Valya's Sketchbook - harsh critique welcome (update: 23/03/2013)

[teapo]

great improvements in both composition and colors Val! seems like the co-worker portraitures will do you great. not sure what you should tackle first but doing both likeness and color will push you even more !

[Kjesta]

Thanks for stopping by my SB! Looking around your SB I'm very impressed by the amount of colour work you do, that's something I'm really bad at. Some of your environments have a very LOTR-ish feel to it.

I really like the portraits you've done last, personally I feel the top right works best - it feels like skin, the bottom right one, for example, doesn't work quite as well. I think it may be because of the contrast between warm and cool colours used: the bottom one seems like it's mostly the same colour using different values but without great change in hue.

I hope I could be a little helpful

[rumpenstiltzkin]

wow so many portraits lately, looking great! and i always enjoy the colors of your enviros

[Valyavande]

Lightship69: just thanks for stopping by =) I'm always happy to see you around!

teapo: I hope you're right and it's still a good thing to tackle colour and likeness at the same time Thanks a lot for commenting!

Kjesta: Thanks for your words =) I think LOTR had really influenced me. I still love all the works the concept artists have done there. I feel like my passion for concept art started mostly with the movies. And now I'm going to watch the Hobbit next saturday (even if I'm not that excited about it at moment)

rumpenstiltzkin: thank you! =)

little update. First some co-worker portraits again. Ah, still so difficult to think about anything in such a short amount of time!

[MeteorCat]

Excellent portraits Valya!

[n1frit]

Nice portraits!

[ja1307]

Really nice portraits like the girl with the cat on her lap, like her costume design a lot. What's the cultural influence there? Really like the historical element you bring to your work.

[Rhubix]

Lovely stuff as usual!

wanted to comment on this bit:

More coworkers of mine. I feel that I'm less stressed now than in the beginning while I'm painting. That's the first improvement. But I feel like I should decide for some time if I want to concentrate on likeness or colour. Both things at the same time are so hard to get! What do you people think about that?

lovely colours in the peacock feather lady in post 334. I've recently taken a shine to artists like Kai Carpenter. or Leonid Afremov- it's almost magical how they can just throw in neon green or purple into the skin and it works so beautifully.

Having said that, if you're selling portraits you have to be pretty good at likeness. Personally I like to do a detailed sketch to get proportions correct before I start painting. Working digitally it's easy enough to overlay the line art to check that you're not straying too far from the person.
If the proportions and values work, you can use just about any colours you want.

Happy sketching!
Happy sketching!

[Valyavande]

thank you guys! =D

@ja1307: I had some idea of doing some norse, northern, celtic whatever version of the Kumari. I didn't work to much on the concept, but that was the initial idea. And I'm glad that there seem's to be some cultural feeling =)

@Rhubix: yeah, the thing about the colours is true! If I get the form and the values right, I really could use any colour. I just don't know if the models would be so happy if I would do them in neon green Anyway, it's even a practice to see colours. there's just so much to explore while painting portraits! D= I hope I can do some again soon. Now is time for christmas holidays. thanks a lot for your comment and the artist links =)



some more work I did months ago for the RPG "Das schwarze Auge / The dark Eye". (c) Ulisses Spiele 2012

[MeteorCat]

What cool paintings. I especially the black & white pen drawings done for the RPG. They're really well done.

[Lightship69]

Hi matey

just swung by for a look see and to wish you a very happy new year, all the very best for 2013 my mate and lets hope its a good one.

[Lightship69]

Hi matey

just swung by for a look see and to wish you a very happy new year, all the very best for 2013 my mate and lets hope its a good one.

[kasblue]

the unicorn and the girl with the cat are painted beautifully! specially love the environment for the unicorn.

[aks9]

heya Valyavande!

I'm digging that unicorn picture! the forest especially, really great job with the mood and feel of the whole place. i really like the colours, and how you added all the elements together, it feels very "whole".
and i know just what kind of trees those are just at a glance, so great job!
the black and white ink panels you did for the dark eye are also really nice pieces.

ive been paying lots of attention recently to the "3d"ness of forms, as its something i really need to work on, and from that observation a crit was born:
something i see with the girl and the cat, is that her face seems a little "2d", so the 3dness of the object (her face/head) in terms of perspective of the forms and values is incomplete. so for example,

the eyes both seem to be identical except for the shape indicating one is left and one is right, but you'd expect that one would be perhaps slightly higher than the other, the one closest to us slightly bigger, etc.
the value on her face is the same on both cheeks, though to really make it look like a 3d form, the side of her cheek that curves away and becomes hidden should appear different than the one we can see full-view (and not just because of extra rim-light effects or thing like that).
the same for her ear: at the angle we are seeing her face, if her ear were like that, it would be sticking out quite a bit, instead of being "pointed" toward the back of her head. perhaps you can also accentuate the round-ness of her head by exaggerating ever so slightly the size change as her braid-plait crosses over her head and wraps around.

hope you've had some good holidays, lets make 2013 a great one for drawing!

[Valyavande]

MeteorCat: thank you, I'm glad that you even like the bw drawings =)

Lightship69: thank you! I hope you had a good start too in 2013.

kasblue: thanks =) I felt like it was a miracle, that the unicorn imagine turned out to be nice. I was working on my laptop that has a very bad way of handling colours. It's always a surprise seeing the finished piece on a real computer screen.

aks9: wow, thanks a lot for this comment! It is really helpful and definitely a subject I have to care about. You're making good points in there. I hope I can use that in my future works!

My first little update this year. And it contains some fun stuff, just overpainting really old and awful portraits. I can just laugh how bad they were! And now I wonder, how long it takes my to say the same about the new versions. Other one is just a screenshot study from Game of Thrones.

[Linzwinz]

Hey thanks for commenting, I thought I'd come peruse your sketchbook. Good stuff! I really like the unicorn's enviro up above, really vibrant... and I like the whole before and after thing you just posted. XD

[teapo]

a major step up in your digital paintings. it's nice to see the comparisons from old work to the current pieces

keep it up Val

[rumpenstiltzkin]

hey there! really loving that unicorn, the colors is just so happy and feel good!
also thanks for sharing your before and afters, its really inspiring to see those from other artists!

[lupre]

wow, just great sketchbook. beautiful.
l.

[Valyavande]

thanks a lot for the comments guys! You make me always happy. And I feel so sorry that I can't spend more time around here. There's so much stuff happening... Most of it not really positive. Have to get a new job/ new jobs in a few weeks because the projects I was working on comes to an end.

But at least I can make a big update now =)
I'd like to introduce "Memoria" to you! I'm working as a character artist on that game since last year.
Some News [english] about it: http://www.destructoid.com/daedalic-...s-249025.phtml
german: http://nandurion.de/blog/2013/03/18/...-nachfolge-an/
and a Video for the german speaking people.


these are two character arts that got published, so I think I can show them here too. I made them many months ago and never thought they would end as marketing pictures XD


Some art I made for "Das schwarze Auge / The dark Eye". (c) Ulisses Spiele 2013


4 of my co-workers. This portraits were painted as a goodbye-present because their internships ended and they left the company.


n00bish environment sketches

[Valyavande]

I've started a new painting and it's supposed to be my first real personal piece this year... But I feel like I'm just doing crap and can't tell what sucks or not x_x
It would be really nice if you visit my thread in the critique center. Here you go.