Wrat's arts - | back to basics |

**longwrat** · March 24th, 2007, 08:45 AM

Greetings everybody,

I'm a mostly self taught artist hailing from Australia but after a couple years of floating about with no real improvement and direction.. I'm considering going overseas for formal art training and to better myself in this industry that I've really fallen for. My next goal is to try and get into a good concept art school.

Beh.. enough blabbing.

Here's a bunch of art for you. Crits and comments most welcome!
A couple are finished, others are mostly quick paints. Big mixed bunch in here, I've got fanart and original stuff.
Can't say I've found a particular style that I'm most fond of working in yet. Only thing they all have in common is that they are all digital. I'm a Painter and Photoshop oh yes.

I'll progressively add more as I finish 'em.

thanks for stopping by,

Wrat.

**Sway West** · March 24th, 2007, 03:18 PM

Great start! Welcome to the boards, also. : )

You seem to have a great understanding of anatomy, and play freely with various poses and expressions. What's more, you seem to really love your characters (I have frequented your dA account several times in the past!), and a think this is extremely important in concept design. It's great to see so much color in your pieces, as well- I think you've got the fundamentals down, but you need to do a little "tightening" to really give 'em the extra UMPH!

**Sanest** · March 24th, 2007, 03:24 PM

Yea good start, I can't really crit sorry.

The archer and the priest are my favourite.

Keep posting!

**Delmar** · March 24th, 2007, 03:59 PM

Good start
I´m really fond of your character-animal designs, they have all very good-chosen and readable expressions, nice...

Some crits would be.

- In some of your drawings you don´t seem to be carefull with the lightning. For example in the picture with the guy killing the rat, you have at least three different main light sources. I suggest to really focus on the light situation (direction of main light; rim lights; colors etc..) right on the start of the painting.

- Some of the paintings could use a little mor contrast between the lights and the darks now your color range is mostly more in the midtones, if there is a lack of contrast things tending to look kind of flat, for example the armor.

I know i´m way not the best painter on this board

but maybe you cand find something useful out of it

keep it up

**smid** · March 25th, 2007, 04:09 PM

cool stuff man you have a good sense of color keep up the good work

**FactorZero** · March 25th, 2007, 04:59 PM

i really like your stuff. I'm interested to see what your rough sketch stuff looks like. Please share some sketches.

**longwrat** · March 28th, 2007, 02:58 AM

Sway West - Hey thanks for the kind words mate! They're really encouraging.

Delmar - You have a good point there about contrast, I will def try out colours that are further from midtones for my next painting. I'll try harder with the lighting too. Thanks!

Sanest, Smid, FactorZero - Thanks guys!

Here are some sketches from today. My hand skills have really gone down the drain since I discovered tablet drawing a couple years back, so my pencil drawings are suffering. I'm aiming to start doing one traditional rendering a day.

The rest are tablet drawings done in Painter. (green one was done last month) The landscapes are half-hour dabblings in Artrage.

**nilaffle** · March 28th, 2007, 06:48 AM

Awesome start to the sketchbook! I've seen your work on DA (I watch you, actually), glad to see you posting here. Glad to also see you exploring traditional media. I'd love to see some figure studies in here.

Lovely use of color in those landscape studies.

Can't wait to see more!

**longwrat** · April 2nd, 2007, 09:29 AM

Nilaffle - Thanks much!!

Going back to the basics.. now that I'm trying to learn anatomy properly I realise that my knowledge of them is pretty poor indeed. D=
Ew my pencil drawings are ugly.

**Merlkir** · April 2nd, 2007, 12:39 PM

Hi, longwrat.

Your art is awesome, now I appreciate your comment in my SB even more

I wonder if there's a way to bookmark threads here at CA.org...

**theredshoe** · April 3rd, 2007, 02:34 PM

wow man, a lot of nice works here. your digital pieces are very strong. your use of colors are great and you're also pushing your characters as well. you have expressions in them and good designs. any chance are you influenced by howl miyazaki (not sure if thats the right spelling)?

as for your traditional skills, you have a lot more room to improve on =p not really sure how you can be so good with the tablet and not even better with a pencil =p i dont know if this isnt said to you before but dont pet your lines. try to make it all in one stroke if possible.

cheers!

**deadred** · April 3rd, 2007, 11:43 PM

very expressive sketches! i like your strong sense of form. perhaps slightly enhanced shadow/light contrast would emphasize your characters even more.. i really like the priest and the hunter with the boar over his shoulders, and the pyramid head lady is giggle inducing

**longwrat** · April 5th, 2007, 03:15 AM

Merlkir - Hey thanks for stopping by!

theredshoe - Yea, I'm a huuuge Hayao Miyazaki fan! I've had this really embarrassing handicap of not being able to use traditional methods properly ever since I started doing digital art about 5 years ago.. it's pretty bad because I've gotten so used to drawing with the tablet I forgot how to draw well on paper. I hadn't sat at my drawing table for a couple of years before I started this sb here in CA to get into it again. Thank you for your advice, I'll pay more attention to making my lines on paper stronger and less hairy.

deadred - Someone else pointed out the point about how I could use more shadow and contrast too, I'll be keeping an eye out for my next painting. Thanks for your tip, much appreciated!

Today's bits and pieces:
a Loomis proportions study on paper
a nib pen drawing I completed over two days(gillott 404 nib)
a couple of quick unreffed heads in Painter
and a 20 min doodle in Artrage.

**nilaffle** · April 8th, 2007, 08:51 PM

Heya! This last update is looking good.

That's a helpful exercise in proportions, I should look at Loomis at some time. And the ink drawing is most impressive; good contrast and detail. I can imagine that took two days!

Also, I want to say thank you for your comments in my sb. I think that's an excellent suggestion you made, doing daily color studies. Amusingly enough I think we've got the same struggle, but in reverse. I hope to get to your level of digital painting somewhere in our next 20 pages

I'll be keeping an eye out here, keep posting!

**longwrat** · April 11th, 2007, 02:47 AM

nilaffle - cheers once again!

Just a small update this time round, Easter holidays messed up my drawing routine and I didn't get to draw as much as I should have.

**Sway West** · April 13th, 2007, 01:50 PM

Really glad to see you're still posting, longwrat! You've got some great studies up-- I'm really exited to see how much you progress in this SB.

Also! Do you have any rats at the moment? The last of the three I had most recently died late last year, and I always swear that I quit rats after they go-- it's just too painful! But now I'm itchin' again. :3

**longwrat** · April 17th, 2007, 03:28 AM

Sway West - Yea I've got 7 rats right now.

People tell me I'm crazy for having so many, but I can't help it, they fascinate me too much. Are you getting more?

Updates for today.. a bit of bone studies from the Sarah Simblet book and a WIP:

**JERI** · April 17th, 2007, 06:06 AM

Hey longwrat nice SB.

I personally reckon that some of your colored images could use stronger contrast, but as most of your subject matters are Asians, I think the washed, muted look is pretty appropriate.

This one is my favourite http://www.conceptart.org/forums/att...1&d=1174738668

**perilous** · April 19th, 2007, 12:35 AM

Thanks for the kind words! First comment for me ever! Great work! especially the tablet stuff. great color. makes me want to go buy one, as im still working with basicly just pencils (and just getting into paint and ink). I think its time to make the leap. cheers. dyl.

**maxetormer** · April 21st, 2007, 06:04 PM

cool stuff bro.

**longwrat** · May 5th, 2007, 05:33 AM

A few things, all done in Painter ~

**Utum** · May 5th, 2007, 07:18 AM

Going through your sketchbook is a really pleasing experience. Your work with the tablet is very inspiring. I really find it strange to compare your pencils with the paintings. Regarding colors I can not crit, its really good. About the tablet, what size is it? The smaller tablets force you to work indirectly, a small trace produces longer stroke. You just need to get used to pencils, so practice a lot.

**longwrat** · May 9th, 2007, 03:27 AM

Jeri, perilous, maxetormer - Thanks guys!

Utum - I'm glad you took the time to have a look at my sb, and thanks for your comment. My tablet is an intuos2 6x8, and my monitor is a 22" widescreen lcd. So yeah, quite a difference in size between the two! No wonder it was such a strange sensation working in pencil again.

==

Couple of things:

Bottle was done in ink, some pencil sketches of arm studies, and the rest are digital stuff done in Painter. Last one is my COW from a couple weeks back.

**longwrat** · May 11th, 2007, 03:41 AM

Some pencil sketches, and some digitally drawn ones. Can you spot the difference? haha. I still have a long ways to go to bring the raw stuff to the quality of the digital stuff..

**nilaffle** · May 11th, 2007, 11:12 AM

Cool studies as always. Love post #17, the skeleton and that last painting, very dynamic. Solid anatomy in the last post too - the lady's legs are a bit big, but that might be a style thing, and she still looks cool. Your pencil strokes are getting more confident. The sketch of the kissy dude (and the kissy chick

) are great; awesome faces and angles. I'd love to see more fully rendered pencil drawings.

Awesome paints as usual, especially how you handle fur and hair.

**Merlkir** · May 14th, 2007, 07:47 AM

cool updates, I like the couple by the stream in a forest..

**iMaiM** · May 14th, 2007, 07:53 AM

Great stuff! I especially like the guy with a mouth for an abdomen in your first post. Another great self-taught for me to watch! Keep it up, man.

**gmags** · May 15th, 2007, 10:18 AM

Hey Longwrat, thanx for your comment! I really appreciate it and was wondering if you would have any tips for a rookie. I really enjoyed those digitals. A lot of good stuff in here. Keep postin more cool stuff!

**longwrat** · May 18th, 2007, 03:19 AM

nilaffle- No it wasn't a style thing, it was just me drawing her legs too big ^^; I still need to practice on the ladies. Thank you!

Merlkir- Thanks Merl!

iMaiM- cheers man!

gmags- Thanks mate, I'll pop by your sketchbook!

==

updates this time:

- quick pencil sketches of my hand
- a 15min speedpaint in Artrage (eyeballed some ref)
- rough paints of a pair of commissioned samurai characters
- attempted to colour the kissyface ogreman but this was as far as I got because I can't get the colours working right. bah