Lyraina's Sketchbook

[Lyraina]

Rock studies, photo referenced. I have yet to find a good way to get nice edges without losing texture. I think I'm not yet on the right track.

Oh, and some random value stuff, feels like a step backwards. Sadly I have to dedicate some time to university stuff now.

[Lagarto]

nice studies! the textures look really realistic. I like a lot the portraits in the previous post, especially the second one, though her left eye looks a little bit higher than I think it should. keep it up!

[Lyraina]

Lagarto: Thank you! Feature placement in faces is really high on my priority list of things I must fix, don't know why it's so hard :p

Here I tried out a different blending method, almost everything is smudged this time (normally I try to avoid that). I got a bit lazy on the face, I think I prefer other techniques there..
Photo referenced of course.

[cricketts801]

The rock studys are great and the Vampire I like the blending technique you did! Keep it up!

[Lyraina]

cricketts801: Thanks a lot!

Just a few Bammes studies, now that I am back where my art books are.
I hope to be more productive after friday when I pass my exam.

[Lyraina]

Not much to show today, my life is such a mess Worrying too much about everythink slowly but surely screws me up. Anyway, here's an attempt to loosen up a bit with “Figuren zeichnen” (Sharon Pinsker). Makes me want to draw some fashion illustrations!

By the way - does anyone have some exercises which help improve the line quality, or is it really just "draw more"? I'm doing blind contours and stuff like that, but don't know it it is just a waste of time... I just feel it would be really nice to look at my work once and not think "ugh, did you try to murder your pencil while doing this?".

[Jaik]

Hello! Thank you so much for what you wrote in my sketchbook, its helped a lot. I had to look twice because of how surprised I was to have such a long comment, thought I was in someone else's sketchbook

So I will try and give as detailed response here When I am struggling with the placement of features on a face I find it helps to redraw the brow and centre line and left the small + in the middle of the head, Loomis says to do this at some stage, forget which book. Because from looking at your faces you seem to put one eye lower (or higher) than the other in perspective. If you think of the face as a slightly curved plane and add the brow line it becomes much easier to place the features. Remember everything goes equally distanced from the centreline of the head.

As for your question about line quality, there is an exercise (easy to do traditionally) place two dots on a piece of paper, any distance apart (experiment with distances) and try and draw a straight single line hitting both dots, experiment with the angle of your stroke and the speed aswell. After that, draw two lines of dots about 3cm away from the edge of your page and just randomly connect pairs of dots.
After drawing straight lines becomes easy, add a 3rd dot halfway between the first two at a different height and try and draw a curve hitting all 3 dots, do it in two parts if you have to (dot-1 to dot-2, dot-2 to dot-3) Ive done this every morning for about a month and I noticed it did improve my lines a lot, so I hope it does the same for you.

Oh and this youtube video is what made a lot of the perspective stuff click for me. Dont know why or if it will help you in the same way, but its worth a shot video

I do see a great improvement in your work, your rocks at the top of this page are exceptional, and you are improving value practice isnt as interesting as colour, but it is just as necessary, keep it up!

[Lyraina]

Jaik: Ah well, I could relate to your stuff quite well, so I thought why not write something Thank you for returning some advice!
I will definitely look at my Loomis books again for faces, you are right that I always struggle with placing the features.
That line exercise sounds good, I will definitely give it a try and add it to my daily routine. I knew about connecting dots, but not with so many dots and curves!
Thank you for the video - awesome how he just eyeballs most of it and still it looks correct!
Thanks for commenting!

I'm now officially declared healthy again, so I can finally increase my coffein level and decrease sleep again to find more time for drawing, haha
Just some Bammes for now:

[Sushy]

those studies of those rocks are really good *v* nice improvement!

that's some great anatomy too, I should study some Bammes too I think :V

[Lyraina]

Thank you, Sushy! Yes, if you can get your hands on an copy of Bammes, you should definitely give it a try - I think he is a good complement especially to Bridgman, because his apporach is so much slower, more subtle, or what you might call it... less energy, but more accuracy.

Photo study time!











And from imagination:

[Lyraina]

Aaaand something small before going to bed. I did not plan this very well. (Not at all, to be honest. More like an alchemy accident )



Oh, and some value studies. I must confess that I really don't always understand how to get the highest contrast in the foreground... especially if there are strong light sources in the image. I guess I should go read a book about that.

[Hemispheree]

Nice sketchbook. I love browsing art.

[Lyraina]

Hemispheree: Thank you! I'm glad you like it.

Today's dump is a bit random...

Bammes studies:





Photo studies, trying a different approach (less "exact")







I also tried to focus on heads again... the Loomis method just doesn't click for me, Hogarth is a bit better... I scrapped so much of what I drew today, but I hope that I will still remember at least some basics about feature placement.

[Lyraina]

Environment practice "Jungle". I tried to be very careful about my values, but was very unsure about the colors...



Next one will be something like this, I don't know which one - but so far I like the second thumbnail from the wide ones best I think. I just have to be careful I won't lose the "cave" feeling.

[Jmob]

loving those environments especially that first one! keeeeeep on going yo.

[Lyraina]

Jmob: Thanks a lot

Yesterday I was out at a swimming lake, drawing my friends sleeping in the sun and other people wearing bathing suits. Since we don't have life drawing in my city, I'll try to get out more often and just draw people, if only they wouldn't move so much..!

[LtPlissken]

The might and force that you achieved with your pencil
drawings is indescribable. And the last thing you told me,
is that you have struggled with baking pancakes. It is totally
untrue. I can surely tell that your baking quality is much higher
than you think, and not to talk about your paintings. They
are marvelous. A true gem on the maharaja's crown. How
do you get up in the morning? What is your first step?
Cause there is a birth of another star on the sky, every
time you put your beautiful feet in your pompous slippers.
Photo referenced vampire girl is looking
smooth, cause you have captured the passion and anger
in her eyes and face. Her un-showered body is ready for
some hard core hupmtee dumptee. Her nipples gives an extra
experience to the general image. As you studied anatomy more
and more with your pencils, your mind became more gentle and
your feelings more soft. You have just started to realize your true
power and capabilities. Every time you draw a pair of breasts,
another child is born in Bangkok. The last digital face, has that
highly powerful expression, a mystic haze of justice. Something
that not many of us can imitate. A true carnation in a beautiful
rose bush is what you are.

[Jaik]

holllyyyy crap, those last enviros are amazing, i love the jungle ones, you really have improved your values too. Awesome stuff

[BigEfru]

hey

it is a amazin thread.

ich bin froh das du dran bleibst. machst echt gewaltige fortschritte ich wünschte ich könnte das von mir behaupten. deine photoshop sachen sind auch klasse ich sollte auch unbedingt mehr mit Photoshop machen aber ich trau mich da nicht so ran.

wünsch dir weiterhin viel erfolg ich melde mich.

cheers efru

[Lyraina]

LtPlissken: You really are a master not only of art,
but also very gifted with words!
There really must be many newborn in Bankok by now...
Thank you for your visit and the lovely comment

Jaik: Thank you very much, glad you think there's an improvement visible!

BigEfru: Nice to see you're back! You shouldn't worry so much, just give it a try
if you would like to - the beauty of working digital is that you don't waste any
materials if it doesn't work out. Thank you for your nice words


Admittedly I was a bit lazy with scanning my drawings the last days,
but at least I did draw - so here's the first bunch for now.
I kind of tried to imitate a charcoal-like feel, and are currently
trying to screw up my courage to try out charcoal myself.
All photo referenced, about 10 min each figure.

[Cojac]

I think your rock studies are great. Keep doing those.

[Lyraina]

Cojac: Thank you! I will


Ugly:



Less ugly:

[Lyraina]

A new experiment, inspired by a "what I wore today" blog I visited some years ago...
I wanted to draw some basic outfits in a more graphic, illustration way. Less painterly.
It will give me a nice excuse to experiment with some different styles and approaches,
and hopefully force me to be more deliberate with my lines etc ... I'm not satisfied so far,
only like the last one. I'm really not used to working "clean"...







Also, I didn't design the clothes, they are mostly just stuff out of my wardrobe...

[BigEfru]

hey

your experiment looks like good. i hope we see more of this great stuff tomorrow

the woman with the grayscaled hair looks like a bit wonky.
ich kann dir nur den tipp geben wen du sie von nem ref gemalt hast das gesicht in der pose ein paar mal zu wiederholen so lerne ich zumindest am besten aus meinen fehlern vieleicht hilft es dir ja. alles in allem sher schöne beiträge .

lg Efru

[Lyraina]

Efru: Thanks, I hope so too!
I didn't use "one" ref for the portrait but multiple (eye-tutorial for example), but I'll try out your suggestion as well.
Thanks for visiting

Sketches are partly photo referenced, partly from mind.








I thought I might profit from doing some faster faces with less rendering, just for the skin tones. So I colored some of my faces-from-photo-practice sheets.
Not much to loose this way, I guess, so I can play around until I learn skin tones... I try to imitate other people's colors, but even when I try to remember the
hue/saturation/brightness stuff in shadow and light areas, I seem unable to reproduce it on my own. Long way to go!



Random:



With this "floodede cave" WIP I'm somewhat stuck, I just don't know how and where the hell I'm supposed to use perspective, I don't know how to maintain a "cave" feel, ...

[Jaik]

I really like the way you are experimenting with hues in skintones.
In regards for the cave, not sure what you mean by the perspective, caves stratigraphic layers dont tend to form in perfect brick-like layers so you dont really need regimented perspective there, just the right general feel which I think you have captured nicely, in regards to making it read more as a cave maybe add a boat? something to give a sense of scale?

[Lyraina]

Jaik: Thanks! Well, I always have the feeling there must be some underlying perspective I just don't get, especially when I see some people use perspective lines in completely random landscapes... but you're right, I guess I can be a bit more abstract here. Adding something for scale sounds good as well, thanks!


More of the same, I think I should practice something not skin related now. Like facial structure for example, haha...

[Feil Magnus]

Hi!
First of all, thanks for the comment on my sb, the tip on colors is very valuable and i tend to forget it sometimes.
Concerning your work, you have some tremendous good studies on post 200, the kind of those i love to have as a wallpaper, it seem you 've taken a step higher regarding line control.
Concerning your colors the skintones studies are very usefull and you should maybe keep doing some untill skintone choice becomes natural, or at least think about it, i mean thinking about color and drawing is half of the job regarding improvement, if you think and understand you can do it.
Your black and white enviros are very very good too.
I think the key when doing studies is just after if you have time, to draw stuff from imagination and wonder what was i trying to learn with this study, how am i going to use it now on this "great piece of art to be". I know it's easy to say and hard to do but it can save time in the learning process.
Keep up the great work!

[Lyraina]

Feil Magnus, thank you for your kind words!
I agree, the faster skintone studies feel more useful than spending too much time on one,
at least as long as I'm still completely lost and just experimenting.
You're right about applying the learnt knowledge, it definitely is something I tend to forget
easily, so thanks for the reminder!

Random update! It is very hard to not play Diablo 3 too much, but I'm very determined to stay strong and paint instead.


New environment, not too satisfied this time, because I feel I should have been able to do that better (I liked two of my thumbnails, though).





Master study - this time a bit faster, my focus was mainly on the brush strokes, less on color accuracy. I would like to be able to paint a bit looser sometimes, more painterly.



Failed still life.




More to come as soon as my connection is a bit more stable..

[Lyraina]

"Flooded Cave"



Some kind of mine, not sure about the colors yet, maybe a ordinary gold mine, or maybe somthing more colorful with crystals...



And this stupid thing absolutely confuses me, I have no idea how to continue - I tried to draw every painting in perspective and got lost, I tried to use google sketchup but didn't know what to do with the image afterwards... ugh, I'm such a perspective noob.