Breadcrumbs ~ Sketchwork of Ali

[Eikoae]

Hello everybody!

I've loved this site for years, and I'm finally buckling down and looking to improve myself as an artist. I work as an iPhone game artist doing mostly vector pieces, but I've always been heavily into concept art and paintings. I'm hoping that by making this sketchbook, I'll have something that I can come back to and see how much I can improve in a year, in two years, or even in 10.

Please help me by providing constructive criticism and feedback, and I will do my best to do the same the more I learn from this community. Thanks!

EDIT: Can anyone tell me how and if I can change the title to my sketchbook thread? Thanks!

[Eikoae]

Some Older work:

[Eikoae]

I've been doing some studies, beginning with noses. I had a lot of fun with the curves and the shading around the tip, but found the underside rather challenging. You will see that my worst depictions are when the nose is lifted up and we are looking at the underside. I've been using three circles to begin the nose, and when it is facing that way, it seems that the middle circle is obstructed, or that the shape is changed. I have to find a way to sketch out the basic form and work off it, but my next 50 will be more about overcoming this challenge.


Also, I plan on investing in a new scanner, but until then my pencil drawings will look a little off-colour and wonky as I take pictures with my camera.

[Eikoae]

Things have been insanely crazy with dealing with crunch time at work. It's left me very little time for personal art, but I did get some work done for an iphone/mac game that just got released.

[Eikoae]

Okay, after FINALLY having some time for personal work, I've got two here to show you!

This first one was obviously inspired by the classic tale of Beauty and the Beast. I didn't have too much trouble with it, though I did struggle a lot with the folds in the blue dress, and maybe even the background. I wish I had planned out an idea before I started adding details, but by the time I thought of it, I couldn't get anything to look right. Oh well, with every mistake I'll learn for next time!




This second one is a Work in Progress. I'm having a lot of difficulty with the lighting and colors. I want a heavy feeling night snowfall in the woods, so any comments or critique would be GREATLY appreciated. I'll keep working on it in the meantime. I'll also attach a post-illustration mockup of what the lighting is going to look like when I'm done with it.

[tabletoppler]

good job with your studies and paintings : D i wish i could help crit but i'm terrible at painting/drawing in general so i may be wrong ;x nonetheless you should check out pic 3 from post #4. it might just be me but it seems kind of stiff && the arm seems kind of.. bent? if you know what i mean o: ? may just be the sleeves though :d

[Eikoae]

I've been wanting to work on my color and lighting skills a little bit more. I'm always really inspired by jellyfish and the way they seem to glow under LED lights, so I went ahead and made one with a tophat and a moustache.





I'm also working a little bit more on the Winter scene. The composition was bothering me, as well as the lighting. I still haven't gotten to a point where I'm happy with it, but I'll keep playing and remind myself to do studies next time.

[Eikoae]

Another update. This is what it's going to look like with the post layer effects (dark lighting around the border, brighter light, snow falling down). It's not rendered beautifully right now, but i'm waiting until the rest of the piece is finished before putting the time in.

[Fungus]

Wow, the sheer quantity of work here, I'm surprised more people aren't commenting! Your portraits are looking good, especially in the lines of the face. You seem to have trouble with edges, sometimes, like the arms of the girl in the purple dress in post #4. They kind of look cut out from paper and glued to the page... they don't really seem to work in space. But then you clearly do know how to render the appearance of form because the nose and lips of the aviator in the same post are really lifelike. Just keep at it and I'm sure capturing the form will become second nature.

With regards to your last piece, the winter one, yeah I can see why you aren't satisfied with the composition. It seems a little cramped to me. I've done a quick paintover (hope you don't mind!) and tweaked the lighting a little bit.



Basically if we're assuming the light from her lantern is the only light source (and maybe a little fainter ambient light from the moon/sky/overcast clouds), then because she is carrying the light source, she will cast a shadow on the ground and onto the tree. I stretched the picture horizontally to give it some space, maybe also moving the trees so they don't clash in importance with the central subject. Hope that gives you some ideas at least!

Cheers.

[Eikoae]

Finally finished!

[Eikoae]

Started a new something last night. I haven't done a value/tone study since college, and never before done in Photoshop. Reference used, but going to be using my imagination for the clothes/jewelry/story (and elf ears!)

Would anyone care to give some advice about transitioning from grayscale to color? I'm experimenting, but I've never done it before. I'm very cautious about applying opaque paint on top of my tonal study because I got it mostly to the point where I'm happy and I don't want to have to redo it all.

[Eikoae]

Update

ugggh, the clothes are going to be hard to do. I can't find a good reference!

[Eikoae]

another update.

Put in a little ring there and some hints of clothing. I'm going to work on the clothing details tomorrow (and add some sleeves), plus some more accessories, fiddle more with the hair, and eventually some cleanup work.

[Toffers]

If you're having problems with overlaying colors, try opening a new layer and setting it to "color" mode.
Then the values won't be affected, only the color and saturation. can be very handy at times.
I like your stuff, but you might consider doing more studies. It always helps, never hurts.

[wolfnooM]

I love your final renders, You have really nice stuff here, but don´t forget to do studies too, your final renders are not yet profesionals, you need to do a lot of studies and really aim for a better level in order to improve.
What I really want to say is... Your have enjoy study your discipline, so you will improve quickly.

[Eikoae]

So, I've been doing some pencil studies! I haven't scanned them in yet, but they'll be up here soon. For now, I started working on a photo reference study of a cute little bird. It's not done yet, but pretty close. My idea is to keep it slightly blurry just to retain that softness. I'll be adding some details to the leaves and some more color to the branch. I need to do lots of bird wing studies if I'm going to continue drawing angels (which, i do a TON of, but haven't posted any.)

[wolfnooM]

OMG o.O for me this is on a new level from what you did before, you are improving! really nice done my dear. Hope to see those pencil ones soon.
And it´s me or that bird is angry? jaja.

[Umbravita]

What beautiful paintings. I think it'd help to use hard brushes a little more to draw the eye in, everything seems to blend together a bit because it's so soft, but otherwise, beautiful work here.

[Syle]

Beautiful stuff. Even though it seems that you are a beginner (like me ), you seem to already be settling into a style of your own. It's great!

Perhaps some more traditional studies? Still lifes. Gestures. Long figure poses. Etc.

Keep it up!

[Eikoae]

Thank you so much you guys!!

I'm currently without a scanner, so I had to take these with my phone and compile them with Photoshop. Sooo, here's some traditional studies. It's been AGES since I've done any, and I know that the anatomy sucks with them. I forgot how difficult it is to draw super super fast and be able to capture the gesture and pose of the model. I noticed that I scribble a lot when I don't feel comfortable with what I'm drawing, mostly because I am trying to find the form and I know that if i scribble, I will eventually find it and draw a darker line on top of it. What I really want to do is to be able to find it right off and use as minimal lines as possible with confidence. You can see that I tried to do it with some of my gestures, but got really frustrated (I wrote notes!), but it's something I'll keep doing to improve my eye and hand.

Here we go!

[Umbravita]

Those are some good studies. Keep up the good work.

[Eikoae]

Some more studies!

I'm looking to do some more things from my imagination this weekend (tomorrow), so look forward to some of those! Today I warmed up with some gesture studies and then got sidetracked with drawing the head from different angles. I found a PDF file of Loomis "Fun with a Pencil" and pawed through it. His plan to teach others how to draw is amazing! I was pleasantly surprised. I love how he takes you through the process of finding forms in a cartoon face, and then later how to make it more complex for realistic figures. I would say that facial features is one of my stronger points of interest, but that capturing an accurate angle is not. I hope to do some more practices from my head based on what I studied, as well as more detailed figure drawings.


It's embarrassing, but you can see where I struggled a little bit with the Loomis style of constructing a cartoon face. It's so foreign to me, but I tried it anyway and laughed at the result! I'll have to do some more with features that I'm comfortable with to see if i can create some interesting expressions and forms.

[wolfnooM]

Don´t worry you are doing great, i like to see how you are showing us things at you are not so strong, that means you really want to imrove! Thats so good, I hope to see more of your posts soon.

And yeah loomis is amazing, I love to learn from him too, he is also so inspiring

[Eikoae]

Thankyou so much Noomwolf! I'm really happy to see that you check back now and then, it makes me inspired!


For Sunday's study dump, I did some more Loomis samples with construction of the figure. I did some of my own from stock photos, and then tore myself away from the computer and sat in a different room to draw from my head. I have to say that after doing so many studies, it's hard for my imagination to take its toll. Every time I try and draw something from my head, I get frustrated because I can't get the anatomy quite right, or the pose seems off somehow. Drawing from life and photos seems to be becoming my crutch and that worries me... but at least if I do enough studies, I'll be able to update the library in my head and remember how to draw them correctly for when I DO get around to making some characters up on my own.

Also, sorry for my lack of a scanner I hope to get one for Christmas!

[Eikoae]

A WIP of a new piece. Yay, imagination is coming back! I'm using my new knowledge of posing, value, composition and lighting for this one. I have a few photo references, but going to try and avoid from painting exactly what I see. I'm wanting to test my ability to paint objects with my own knowledge based on reality.




Also, I guess I forgot to post the finished pieces of my other studies. So, here's the bird and the girl. I wanted the girl to be so much more than what she turned out to be. I had this plan to do really beautiful and rich looking clothes, but my lack of fabric understanding really prevented me from a realistic approach. I did paint the ring, which was my first time really doing anything metal. I was proud

[Eikoae]

A new WIP. I thought that with the long skirt, the placement of the knees looked weird from my original composition. Plus, standing him up gave him a sense of power and grace that I really thought fit his character. I kind of like that he seems to be a bit off-balance, especially because I think it's believable with the addition of his wings.

Just to give a little bit of backstory:

The winged man is Nyrium, an aerial based elf (not an angel!). Below him is his daughter, Eikoae, who is a half-elf who lost her human mother and has only him left. He cares for her only in that she is his blood relation, and not as a person, so he often manipulates her desire to be close. In this image, I want the theme to be "Searching" or "Search", because he is constantly searching for ways to gain power and use others to his advantage, while in the meantime, his little sheep of a daughter follows him because she is forever searching for a love that will never be returned. He is unaware of her presence, and she looks up at him with longing.

[Umbravita]

That's a sad story. Do keep us posted on its progress.

[Eikoae]

Some grayscale work:

I changed quite a few things from the sketch. I made the pose a little bit different, edited the head, the cloth, added some texture to the rock, tried to focus on some anatomy, etc. I'm using this piece as a test to see what else I need to really focus on. So far, I would like to do more posing so that it comes a little more naturally to me, anatomy of course, and fabrics.

[wutangclam]

WAAAA incredible work~

[Eikoae]

Thankyou, wutangclam! (amazing name, by the way). It feels good when others like what I do


Another quick update... not much has changed. I thought my previous post would be the last one for tonight, but I couldn't sleep and had to work on it a little bit more. I started to add in some textures and a little more detail to the figures. I think I need to do something about the man's right hand. The silhouette makes it look very stumpy and doesn't read very elegant. bummer.