Xylene Fumes - updated - 05.23

[BlackDelphin]

Lots of great figure studies and co. on the other page. Solid strokes!
Keep sharing with us your wonderful work please

[Evxyza92]

Your clothing studies are quite extensive, and show a progress and thought process I myself should most definitely look into. Who are you studying for these folds and clothing designs? I think I may look into it. The characters designs are great, and will look even better with these drapery studies.

[HunterKiller_]

Hey, hey. Long time no see.
I think your life drawings have just made a leap in skill! Excellent.

These new characters are looking cool, but what happened to the sorceress??? I was looking forward to the finish.

[BludHund]

Mr.Pryminista -

Thanks man. I appreciate it.

Pigeonkill -

Yeah the leg muscles are a bit over-emphasized. Heh...yeah see, this was a brand new scanner...
the lesson is NEVER EVER use the drivers that come on the packaged CD they are always outdated.

kingkostas -

You are too generous, man I would love to do a collab with you.

liquidjack -

Thanks.

BlackDelphin -

Thanks...I surely will.

Evxyza92 -

OK wellll....drapery is a huge challenge. There really isn't one book or one silver bullet to it. The only
book I've found that really had good drapery-specific material is Cliff Young's 'Drawing Drapery from Head
to Toe' however the same material can be found more comprehensively in the 'Famous Artist Course' hand-
book in chapter 15. You may be able to find some of the pages online, but the whole book is like $400...

That being said...there is no substitute for spending a *lot* of time looking at and drawing drapery.

Finding good source materials is hard, so some of these drawings are from photos I took of myself
It also helps to do some research on clothing...how different types of cloth behave and how different
garments are constructed in terms of slack vs. tailoring and so forth.

HunterKiller_

Thanks. Yeah sorry about that...I will probably re-visit that set of sketches at some point but I really
just got stuck and wasn't sure how to proceed either technically or thematically. I kind of just jumped
in without having an idea of where I was going and then didn't know how build on what I had done.

---

Sooo....not dead as you may have noticed. I just have been stupidly busy. I am now the lessee of an
apartment in Los Angeles (in Pasadena, that is) but I still haven't quite moved in...or even finished pack-
ing...lol. SO still going to be very busy until January at least.

So I have a backlog of life drawings but not much else to share, except for some new hardware to show off:

I don't know if you guys have seen the Yiynova line of graphics tablets. They are a company in China oper-
ating in the US through a storefront on Amazon called Panda City. Basically what they are selling is Cintiq
type functionality at about a third or even a quarter of the price. The initial product line definitely had some
quality shortfall in terms of their styluses but the current models (designated by a letter 'u') are pretty much
on par with Wacom.

Of course I have not a Cintiq to compare to so I can't say for sure but they seem quite adequate for the price.

The smaller tablet, the DP10 (or DP10u) is USB-powered and runs at $300 to $350. So right there you have func-
tionality that Wacom doesn't even offer (the smallest Cintiq, at $1000 requires an AC power outlet). Its definitely
horribly painful to draw with compared to pen and paper, but, for some portable digital painting, it would probably
only be beaten by a built-in tablet PC functionality. A lot of the shortcomings for drawing are unavoidable...its
small, about the size of Moleskine in terms of screen size, plus you have to contend with lack of tactile sensation
and the fact that the stylus tip doesn't perfectly track the cursor from all angles. Its also pretty much unbeatable
as a portable display...extremely thin and light and of a high quality (compare to an IPS panel, I'd say).



anyways, in a three hour life drawing session I cranked out these examples on the older model (DP10)



So based on this experience I went ahead and plunked for the upgraded 19-inch desktop model, the MSP19u (at $560).

Again, simply as a monitor its pretty darn good. The 'u' model stylus definitely matches Wacom for pressure
sensitivity and pressure accuracy. One issue some people had is that there is a rather massive gap between
the glass surface you draw on and the actual LCD panel (about 4 or even 5 millimeters). However I really didn't
find this to be a problem. ALSO: You can't tell from this photo but there is a sturdy adjustable stand in the back
so you can quickly and easily change the viewing angle...also it has a standard VESA hole pattern for monitor stands.



Now, one major caveat, and again, I don't have Cintiq to compare to, but my old Toshiba never seemed like it did
this: there is a large amount of 'jitter' in your strokes as you draw. Basically, when you draw a line, then zoom in,
you will see a regular jaggy pattern like an etch-a-sketch or pixelation. I've been told that all display-tablets have
this problem due to electromagnetic interference. It seems that software is being used to compensate. When you
draw a line *quickly* the jaggy effect all but goes away, so I'm assuming the software finds it easier to interpolate
on faster strokes. NOW: I was able effectively mitigate the effect by running LazyNezumi (basically the same effect
as the smoothing in Manga Studio, only you can adjust it). Also using a thicker line, and zooming in as needed, red-
uced the effect to being almost unnoticeable.

I drew this stuff as a test...again, super fine linework is not feasible, but this seems adequate for sketching or painting.



Thats my product reviews for now

More art soon, I promise...hope you guys are all doing great!

[kingkostas]

Mate great info on these stuff. Although personally i dont think i could work very good on a cyntiq, the way i catch penclis and stuff is strange ahahhaha.
Lovely, lets do this, we will push it and we will both learn. How you want to start?I could prepare a linework sketch and go from there. Dunno anything is good

[HunterKiller_]

That's really excellent news on the alternative tablets. I firmly believe that any corporation that holds a monopoly over anything is evil, unfortunately in this case, I'm forced to use their products (Wacom).
Hope these upstarts will really get somewhere.

I've tried the latest model of the Cintiq briefly and frankly, I wasn't hugely impressed. Unlike common expectations, it's not like drawing traditional at all; the glass surface has no friction and feels worse than regular tablets (for my taste) and the offset distance caused by the glass actually feels quite jarring (so pretty much the same thing as you described with your display tablet).
No way I would pay a few thousand dollars for one.

[BludHund]

PMkingkostas -

OK man....here we goooo

AMHunterKiller -

Yeah, when it comes to control there definitely is no substitute for physical media...yet.

Which is kind of comforting, in a way

---

Ok, working on a collab with Kostas. He began with thumbnails..or mini-paintings, really

I really struggled with the perspective, trying to get both figures at the same scale. I guess
I understand the basic techniques of 3D layout but I'm really really slow, need to practice.

Guess I'll dust off my Figure Drawing for All Its Worth



Once I had the poses and the perspective, sketch took about an hour, including some time to
play with the framing of the image. In the end I came back almost exactly to where I started.

I did make some changes to Kostas' poses. For the Kungfu guy I want a bit more dynamism, but
the main thing is that for the gunfighter I wanted him to be still in the process of drawing his gun.

The way I see it this guy's advantage is his speed, give him half a second and he will get you. The
Kungfu master has to defeat him by keeping him off-balance. Also I wanted to make sure the viewer
could see the gun on his hip, just about to be drawn.

I also added a cigarette...not only does the smoke give a little sense of motion (like the martial artists'
longer flowing tunic) but it also enhances his character as a hard-living nonchalant type, in contrast
to the martial artists' (we assume) discipline and dedication.

So yes, basically thinking about expressing character design on top of composition.

[kingkostas]

yo mate, i played with values today. Dont know what style we want to go with it. I felt that i needed to change the composition. Anyway stylewise it doesnt look like anything classic. You can also try some values and maybe we can find something interesting. Or just tell me how we can go with it

[HunterKiller_]

Radical work, you two.

[0000]

Mr.Pryminista -

Thanks man. I appreciate it.

Pigeonkill -

Yeah the leg muscles are a bit over-emphasized. Heh...yeah see, this was a brand new scanner...
the lesson is NEVER EVER use the drivers that come on the packaged CD they are always outdated.

kingkostas -

You are too generous, man I would love to do a collab with you.

liquidjack -

Thanks.

BlackDelphin -

Thanks...I surely will.

Evxyza92 -

OK wellll....drapery is a huge challenge. There really isn't one book or one silver bullet to it. The only
book I've found that really had good drapery-specific material is Cliff Young's 'Drawing Drapery from Head
to Toe' however the same material can be found more comprehensively in the 'Famous Artist Course' hand-
book in chapter 15. You may be able to find some of the pages online, but the whole book is like $400...

That being said...there is no substitute for spending a *lot* of time looking at and drawing drapery.

Finding good source materials is hard, so some of these drawings are from photos I took of myself
It also helps to do some research on clothing...how different types of cloth behave and how different
garments are constructed in terms of slack vs. tailoring and so forth.

HunterKiller_

Thanks. Yeah sorry about that...I will probably re-visit that set of sketches at some point but I really
just got stuck and wasn't sure how to proceed either technically or thematically. I kind of just jumped
in without having an idea of where I was going and then didn't know how build on what I had done.

---

Sooo....not dead as you may have noticed. I just have been stupidly busy. I am now the lessee of an
apartment in Los Angeles (in Pasadena, that is) but I still haven't quite moved in...or even finished pack-
ing...lol. SO still going to be very busy until January at least.

So I have a backlog of life drawings but not much else to share, except for some new hardware to show off:

I don't know if you guys have seen the Yiynova line of graphics tablets. They are a company in China oper-
ating in the US through a storefront on Amazon called Panda City. Basically what they are selling is Cintiq
type functionality at about a third or even a quarter of the price. The initial product line definitely had some
quality shortfall in terms of their styluses but the current models (designated by a letter 'u') are pretty much
on par with Wacom.

Of course I have not a Cintiq to compare to so I can't say for sure but they seem quite adequate for the price.

The smaller tablet, the DP10 (or DP10u) is USB-powered and runs at $300 to $350. So right there you have func-
tionality that Wacom doesn't even offer (the smallest Cintiq, at $1000 requires an AC power outlet). Its definitely
horribly painful to draw with compared to pen and paper, but, for some portable digital painting, it would probably
only be beaten by a built-in tablet PC functionality. A lot of the shortcomings for drawing are unavoidable...its
small, about the size of Moleskine in terms of screen size, plus you have to contend with lack of tactile sensation
and the fact that the stylus tip doesn't perfectly track the cursor from all angles. Its also pretty much unbeatable
as a portable display...extremely thin and light and of a high quality (compare to an IPS panel, I'd say).



anyways, in a three hour life drawing session I cranked out these examples on the older model (DP10)



So based on this experience I went ahead and plunked for the upgraded 19-inch desktop model, the MSP19u (at $560).

Again, simply as a monitor its pretty darn good. The 'u' model stylus definitely matches Wacom for pressure
sensitivity and pressure accuracy. One issue some people had is that there is a rather massive gap between
the glass surface you draw on and the actual LCD panel (about 4 or even 5 millimeters). However I really didn't
find this to be a problem. ALSO: You can't tell from this photo but there is a sturdy adjustable stand in the back
so you can quickly and easily change the viewing angle...also it has a standard VESA hole pattern for monitor stands.



Now, one major caveat, and again, I don't have Cintiq to compare to, but my old Toshiba never seemed like it did
this: there is a large amount of 'jitter' in your strokes as you draw. Basically, when you draw a line, then zoom in,
you will see a regular jaggy pattern like an etch-a-sketch or pixelation. I've been told that all display-tablets have
this problem due to electromagnetic interference. It seems that software is being used to compensate. When you
draw a line *quickly* the jaggy effect all but goes away, so I'm assuming the software finds it easier to interpolate
on faster strokes. NOW: I was able effectively mitigate the effect by running LazyNezumi (basically the same effect
as the smoothing in Manga Studio, only you can adjust it). Also using a thicker line, and zooming in as needed, red-
uced the effect to being almost unnoticeable.

I drew this stuff as a test...again, super fine linework is not feasible, but this seems adequate for sketching or painting.



Thats my product reviews for now

More art soon, I promise...hope you guys are all doing great!

hi there man, the tablets stuff catched my attention, i have a cintyq 12wx and a lenovo x200 tablet i have to tell you that i prefer using the lenovo digitizer a ton more than the cintyq, that bunch of cables, the receptor box, are a pain in the ass, even though the x200 has 256 pressure levels, man it feels much more natural and confortable than the cintyq, the stylus i as ton more slimer, feels like using a mechanic pencil, and hey you can change the orientation of the screen vertical or land scape, you have built in keyboard, and if you want you can go on full tablet mode and use a wireles one, you can take it with you and draw on bed, the battery last 3 hours, the screen is tft and is almost not reflective, and has some handy tablet shortcut buttons that you can configure and program, and it comes with a solid state drive so it boots an reacts in a blink.

i strongly recomend you to get this awesome tablet, is really light, it makes 0 noise even in fullcharge. And if you have spare money then get a lenovo x201 that comes with an i5 processor.

[Danny_K]

dude, where are you? I hope you did not give up on art or something, cheers!

[BludHund]

0000 -

Thanks for the feedback. Actually I opted to go for the non-tablet version of the Lenovo. More options for upgrading. Plus I figured better to have a full-size tablet that I can really put in some work with from day to day.

Danny_K -

Hey dude, you guilted me into breaking my silence...lol.

Where I am is in California, and no I am not giving up on art. Quite the opposite, I am starting classes at the Concept Design Academy on Sunday. I actually have some stuff to share because I went to the Doctor Sketchy's 26-hour drawing marathon...whoa. Although I only stayed for 16 hours. However the only internet I have at the moment
is through my cell phone so...how about a teaser?

[kikindaface]

nice sketchbook man ! for your anatomy, what you need is gesture drawing, do tons of em, until your hand bleeds, then, you'll be good at drawing any pose in any angle ( anatomy is just a matter of shapes, only a few muscles are quite important and you can also learn them this way ! ) ! keep it up !!

[HunterKiller_]

Good luck with your studies at the school!!!

26 hour life drawing is absurdly cool.

[Mr.Pryminista]

Dude, it's been a while! I see you're living in California now and you're going to art school. AWESOME!!! Too bad about the lack of internet at the moment. Would really love to take a deeper look at all your sketches/drawing from the EPIC drawing marathon.

Seems like you're in a good place and have been making some real positive moves for yourself. Looking forward to the updates!

For feedback on the image posted (I know how much you love feedback ), the drawing on the right looks cartoon-like due to the drawing only have 1 line weight. The proportions and volume/density looks solid and she genuinely feels like she's sitting on something so nothing wonky there. The drawing on the left looks like you ran out of time before completing it. My problem with it is strong contrast of values (the strong dark and most of the rest being white), having a few intermediary tones in there would've unified the drawing more. But, like I mentioned before, you probably ran out of time.

Anyways, good work and all the best with school and keep us updated when you have time.

Cheers!

[kingkostas]

yoooo welcome back mate!!! haahh you are doing it hardcore right? great!!! lets keep up !!!

[black-swan]

Nice thread, a lot of improvement over time.

Be aware of line weight with your figure drawings, outlining them with a dark, hard line tends to make them look flat. I would also say that some of the figures from imagination are over detailed (especially the clothing), simplify, don't just describe the clothes, suggest them instead, leave a little to the imagination (if that makes sense) maybe practice doing 30 second poses.

When shading the figure, push your values more. Generally the core/ crest shadow is the darkest part of an area in shadow, not at the very edge of the figure (if that makes sense), have a look out for it next time you're in life drawing.

Some of your figures have really nice gestures and movement. I hope you keep doing what you're doing, great sketchbook.

[BlackDelphin]

No more teasers man, lets see the real stuff!
Nice work in here, as always.

Looking forward to those updates.

[BludHund]

OK, sorry guys. I've been meaning to post on CA for the past couple weeks and its just been ridiculously busy.
But, this week I decided to make it a priority, so here we go.

Thanks so much for visiting and commenting, everyone.

AMkikindaface -

Thanks yeah I been trying to do more gestures, I also need to go out and sketch people at cafes and stuff...just need to carve out some time.

PMHunterKiller -

Thanks man.

Mr.Pryminista -

Thanks man, well I got internet now and its FAST Let the time wasting and distractions begin woooo

I agree about the line weights, and on the other one, yeah ran out of time, I was so pissed...and it was a 30 minute pose so I am SLOW

PMkingkostas -

SO hardcore! But not hardcore enough...there are so many amazing artists out there and you are one of them!
So please do me a favor and stop drawing for about a year so I can catch up

black-swan -

Thanks man. One thing that he teachers at CDA are all pushing over and over is the need to edit reality and create a focal point.
For whatever reason its something I have a hard time thinking about when I am drawing, but I am starting to at least see it.

I think some of the problem with my drapery is thats its like a hangover from studying drapery a lot. Again thats why you have
to edit even when doing studies...which is hard because you don't already have some narrative in mind, like when designing.
What I've been trying to do lately is set myself a series of timers for doing a study, one so I don't over-render, and also, I give
myself a good 3 minutes or so before I even start drawing just to look at the subject and analyze it and create an 'attack plan'.

AMBlackDelphin -

As you wish...

Gonna drop these in a couple chunks. Digital Painting first. Any critiques or advice would be GREATLY appreciated.



Greg Manchess study



Greg's original painting

[kingkostas]

yoooooooooooooooooo. Man greg manchess, thats clever. Studying this sir will make you doing confident strokes. I can say that even though i dont know lots of his works, i am very influenced by his approach.Definitely keep it up. The spheres are awesome and very important, good job.Hmm dont know what kind of feedback do you want, i am sure if you seriously study manchess [i would even say study them a la greyscale] you will gain very good info. His way for me is the way someone should work at least at the beginning stages, also his thumbnails are lovely.
laterrrr

[HunterKiller_]

Hey bra,
Material studies - nice work. Personally, I would stay away from using that type of photoshop gradient when painting the chrome and glass materials. They are more 'symbols' for a glossy surface than an actual glossy surface and look artificial. Also, using a photoshop tool to do it does not give you practice on painting them.

Still life - colours and tones are looking good but watch out with the edges! Hard, soft and lost edges; remember to use them.

[erdbeerfeldheld]

Awesome sketchbook, keep up the hard work! Your linework could be more loose though, it looks kind of stiff IMHO. Also try variating the line weight. Here are some examples by Rene Gruau (famous fashion illustrator) to illustrate what I mean by 'loose'. http://www.google.de/search?q=rene+g...w=1920&bih=987

[p sage]

Nice works Bluddy! Wish I could come up with some cogent critique for ya... but how about just a thumb up instead?

Glad to see you're back at it!

[BludHund]

Kostas -

OK, thanks man.

HunterKiller_

I agree about the spheres, for the assignment we were told to use a soft
round brush so, yeah. Suffice it to say that the teacher of that class
and I do not think much alike, particularly on process.

Edges, agree again, the main crit that I got consistently was that every
thing was a soft focus. Especially that the focal point should have had
more punch to it.

erdbeerfeldheld -

Hey, welcome to my sketchbook! Thanks.

Yes, I think thats true that I have a tendency to stiffen up, especially
when putting in 'finishing marks' on a project. I imagine in Mssr, Gruau's
case he probably went through many interations of each image to get that quality.

p sage -

Well...ok for now

Thanks man...*always* drawing, not always posting. A bad habit.

---

OK so. Here is a smattering of the better stuff I did this semester.
I mean to be regular and active and tread some new ground very soon now,
but at the moment I am just kind of digesting and re-orienting my priorities.

I swear I did not mean to go two months without posting, very sorry about that!

From Analytical Figure Drawing:



From Head and Figure (basically a transitional class between drawing and painting):





From Viscom I / Dynamic Sketching:

[Papu]

Great sketchbook. You seem to be doing really well, so I don't have anythign to critique. Just keep it up! : )

[HunterKiller_]

Level up!
Significant improvement, man.

[kingkostas]

truly !!! These are all so beautifull!!!I especially love the thumbnail studies, you really got the underlying design.
Keep up the great work !!!

[BludHund]

Ahh, you guys are gonna make me blush.

Kostas: I do have to admit I am a little proud of those thumbnails, but
I also think I could have simplified them more. Just need to do MOAR.

[BludHund]

Well, the site is finally back up, guess I better update, huh?

[kingkostas]

wow mate, these are totally cool!!!! I feel you are now on the right track, like using your powers. Very cool !!!!