nat's sketchbook

[- nat -]

Done at work today (break)

1.5 minutes each http://www.quickposes.com/

[- nat -]

Another pic from quickposes

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

A noseless Velazquez, 1 hour 15 mins

[xerenity]

Ah, keep plugging away. ^^ I like your quick gestures, you're really selling movement and pose with em.

[- nat -]

Korra from The Last Airbender.
Painted directly in color

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

Bad application of hands

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[kdiegert]

Great work. Your line studies are looking particularly good and show solid proportions. You might benefit from some hand anatomy studies to know when and where to exaggerate a knuckle or other landmark.

With your digitals (and every other medium for that matter), think about controlling your values and edges. Identify each block of a given color or value. Identify whether the edges on each side of that block are hard or soft.

I think you might be getting distracted by using brushes with pressure-controlled opacity. What happens is that as you fill in an area of color the brushstrokes criss-cross over each other and you end up with an area that doesn't have uniform color or value. The variations within a block compete with the changes as the block transitions into an adjacent block and the image gets confused.

I am aware of a few ways to combat this. I often use brushes with 100% opacity to block in my areas of color, then go back and blend where I want soft edges. Many people will use the lasso tool to draw out a block of color and then fill with the paint bucket.

As you get more advanced, you will use the pressure controlled-opacity and textured brushes to make interesting messes, and carefully pick and choose where in the mess to push or pull, harden or soften, to encourage an image to form from the mess.

I also highly recommend doing a few digitals in black and white, or at least to keep your palette very simple. Correct value relationships are much more important than correct color relationships.

Oh, one more tip. Always pick the biggest brush size you could possibly use for a given job, then go one size bigger. Make one big stroke, then erase bits of it back out.

[- nat -]

You're definitely right, I'm always struggling with values. I feel that they are random, like there is no logic to the brush strokes (especially in the speedpaintings from imagination). And your words shed a lot of light on why, thanks! I'll try to use a 100% opacity and think the edges through.

Thanks for the critique it's much appreciated

[pixel cheetah]

I like your studies, especially the latest set. I also like the two more detailed one in post #69. Do more of those! Are you working digitally?

[rokushoxxx]

Hey! Its good to know you have improved a lot since i left. It might help you to work a little bit more on your arms values. try to undestand them as cilinders and that might help you render themin a more organic way. Values and thumbnails are amazing, keep it up!

[iven]

You might benefit from some hand anatomy studies to know when
and where to exaggerate a knuckle or other landmark.

In life drawing I am not very experienced yet, but I kinda practiced the
HAND. In my sketchbook are a lot of Hand drawings. It is very interesting
to see the progress after I drew them with the BOX.

VEERY important fill out a hole letter size page, draw BIG not small.
Drawing big allows you to really feel the structure/ planes in the HAND.

I really like your studies with just the arms/ legs something I could try too!

[- nat -]

@ pixel cheetah,
I try to mix, depending on how comfortable I feel with the media that day (Digital or traditional), but most of gestures are drawn with Photoshop

@rokushoxxx, Yes sir
Cylinders it is, I'm also planning on doing eye/nose painting studies as well. Thank you!


@ iven,
Added to the list of things to do; draw hands/arms/legs/feet in mega scale. That's the only way. Thank you for the advice!

Gestures 90sec each, (from quickposes.com)
I had a rough time in the past few months and I'm easing back into art. Not magnificent, but it's a start.

[- nat -]

Quick sketches of historic (and modern) outfits. Source: OMG that dress

Evening-Dress-1855-1860


1872-1874 half-mourning-dress


1894-1895 Queen Victoria


Pierre Cardin, 1969

[- nat -]

From imagination

[- nat -]

[- nat -]

[Bowandbrush]

Great studies! you should try to do more backgrounds for your characters, it really helps them to pop out!

[Nihil_]

Hey there, nice studies! I'd suggest backgrounds\enviro too as well, but the decision is up to you of course (=

[- nat -]

@ Bowandbrush & Nihil, Thanks for stopping by! You're critique is spot on I do need more enviros (with and without chars) and the will be coming soon ^^



8 minutes each, study from photos. I wanted to keep the values distinct in order to understand surface changes.

[- nat -]

15 minutes waterfall study, used 100% hard-edged brush (with the exception of fog/mist)