Nude Woman Study

[TomEdwardsConcepts]

Hey guys. Heres a painting I did today. thought id add my process too. hope you don't think she's too over-the-top sexual, I was going for more beauty. please crit cheers

[JavierP]

Hi Tom,
First I would like to say that I have really enjoyed much of the work you have posted lately. I think you have skills and a lot of potential. However, it seems that you are more interested in the flash and trickery associated with concept work, rather than good, solid drawing. The image you posted looks 'okay' but it is obvious that you did not use a reference and that your understanding of the figure is not complete enough to make a woman out of thin air.
I urge you to work from life some more and use as much reference as you can, to build up a mental library to facilitate these kinds of images in the future. You have a lot of potential, but you do yourself a disservice by not shoring up your fundamentals. Drawing from imagination is fun, but you need to feed that imagination with real world experiences to be successful all the time.
Your drawing process is fine, it's your thinking process that needs some work. I hope you are not offended by my critique, but I felt it needed to be said. I hope this helps.

[Lhune]

hope you don't think she's too over-the-top sexual, I was going for more beauty.

If you're going more for beauty than sexual, why put a completely naked woman with huge breasts in the middle of a boring composition with no background or context and no particularly interesting lighting? Sorry to put it so bluntly, but there is nothing in this picture that suggests you were trying to illustrate the beauty and grace of the female body without any sexual intent. I'm not accusing you of doing so, but you may want to reconsider.

As for the actual form and anatomy, it's alright, but the figure isn't complete (obviously) and the hands are not very convincing/interesting. They are very complicated to do well, I know, I'm struggling with them too, but I've found that well-drawn hands can really contribute to a piece.

You may want to look up some guides/tutorials on how to draw hair as well. James Gurney wrote a guide on his blog, you should be able to find it on Google pretty easily. Look up works of old masters as well, they may really help a lot. Good luck! Must say I do like the way you render, it's quite smooth and solid.

[abone114]

Hey looking pretty nice so far. The proportions of the figure look pretty accurate. The face needs a little work both in the rendering and the placement of the features. The eyes are a bit out of line with each other and the invisible line going through the eyes isn't quite parallel to the lines that would go under the nose and through the corners of the lips. Double check those and make sure they are parallel to each other and all three lines should be 90 degrees perpendicular to the vertical center line of the face. Also there's too much detail visible especially in her eyes. If we were actually viewing a model from that distance there would be a lot less definition in her eyes, lots of those shapes would be blurred and softened by shadow. Also the eyes are a bit too white. It's a common misconception that eyes are bright white, they are normally viewed much darker than we think and are only perceived white because of the contrast with the darker shadows cast by the eye brows.

This thread helped me out a lot:

http://conceptart.org/forums/showthr...light=portrait

keep it up!

[Lightship69]

Good advice from Javier as usual tom, and you got to admit as a research assignment its got promise too. Cor look at naked babes for research cool!! Lol

I agree with Lhune too this needs an environment, its like a bodyworks catalogue for womens bits at the moment, go on tell us a tale with it.

I have liked all the stuff you have posted lately mate I just havnt commented because you were already in better hands than mine.

Keep at it mate and all the best.

[williams73]

Tom if you haven't figured it out by now I am a big fan of your work and you can't post a picture of a naked woman and then say it is not about sex appeal.....now is she in a see through nightgown alone in a dark forest...anyways ...

part of sex appeal is the eyes if you don't get the eyes right it can ruin an entire piece, on this I speak from experience, So I agree dont forget the eyelids add shadow and give weight to the eye and don't be afraid to have the iris fill the whole part we see.....anyways I hope I have given you some help, but more than that I look forward to seeing more of your work.....

[TomEdwardsConcepts]

Hey guys, thank you all for replying, I really appreciate the feedback

JavierP: Thanks man. I'm not offended! Thats why I post, so people like you can give me great feedback. I'm trying to improve to a level where I can be employable, so all feedback is good feedback. I did use a few different references in the process though, but your right, more life drawing would be good. I did a full 2 years of life drawing/painting at uni, and I'm currently on my summer break. There aren't any life classes in my area. Might have to start painting my girlfriend . I might post some of my life paintings up soon, get some feedback on those, the lecturers aren't great for that lol. cheers man.

Lhune: Cheers for the feedback Lhune. Some great advice there, thank you. I'm definitely going to more of these in the future, so looking at older masters will help me a lot. thanks

abone114: Thanks man, and I totally agree. I thought it was looking a bit too 'cartoony' for me :/ This will help me out in the future thanks.

Lightship69: Thanks mate, I'll definitely make the next one more of an illustration.

williams73: Thanks man, the eyes on your paint over look great.

I did a few more of these last year at uni, so I might as well post them up in this thread. I feel they are slightly better than this though, which is slightly worrying lol. Again let me know what you think, And I used ref for these too. I did paint them differently though, I started with black and white value, then coloured after. Feedback would be great! thanks