Need crits for Batgirl

[BlackLightG]

Hello everyone,
I just finished colouring this picture of Batgirl and I would like some comments on this. I got some great feedback on my last thread in this section and I have tried to improve. I have uploaded the process for this on my sketchbook Thanks a lot.

[arenhaus]

"Figure Drawing" and "Successful Drawing" by Loomis, half a year of practice with pencil on paper.

[Star Eater]

Please reduce the size of the image. Thanks.

[Amara91]

Hmm, BlackLight I am ignorant and my work is sub par at best but hopefully my words will be of use. Hopefully you are kind enough to listen.

Starting with the illusion: to me, it looked like you simply added white to the flesh tone and black or a dark brown to the flesh tone to make it darker or lighter. Maybe you should try a different approach? How about taking into consideration the color/temperature of the light source? Even if the light source was cool, the light and shadow plane colors in that picture wouldn't look like that. Remember warm light, cool shadows and cool light warm shadows. Thats a principle that I think holds true in most paintings. For example, in cool light, lets take a red cube: the local color is red right? But as the planes of the cube catch the light from the light source, the planes not only get lighter but cooler: the planes would shift in hue from a red to a slight magenta red. And in the shadow, the red would get warmer: the shadow plane would get darker in value and warmer in temperature (because this is cool light) so the shadow planes would lean more toward a red-orange hue. Sounds complex but break out a color wheel and you'll see what I mean: the color wheel/hue circle is a godsend when trying to see how colors shift in warm/cool light. Likewise, if we were to take the same cube in warm light, this time the light planes would shift toward a red-orange and the shadow planes would shift to a red-magenta. I'm no skin tone master, but looking at your image, I don't see much evidence of this warm/cool light and shadow play.

As far as form goes, maybe a lot of people may disagree with me but I think you blended a bit TOO much. You really don't HAVE to blend that much to make something look three dimensional. Judging from your picture, its confusing to me because you haven't clearly separated the light and shadow on the figure as well as I know you could have. From there you can build half tones, reflected light, center lights, high lights, core shadow, edge planes, cast shadows, dark accents and so on: all the light and shadow planes that create the illusion of form. Halftone is what turns a form, not excessive blending.

The drawing is decent--not dynamic but decent. There seem to be more glaring problems in other areas. I could nickpick but you can nickpick everything because nothing is perfect.

As far as a design standpoint goes, the composition could use a heavy overhaul. But all the composition and blending and rendering and anatomy in the world wouldn't matter if you don't have something to communicate with this image: Why did you paint this picture of batgirl? What idea were you trying to get across? what SINGLE idea were you trying to communicate? If you can answer that, design and composition become TOOLS to bring out that idea. But for starters, it would help to not put batgirl in the center of the composition: a dead area in almost any painting. Do some more thumbnail sketches to play around with value structures: the value structure of your pictures looks really 'scattered'. Some lights here, some darks here..kinda willy nilly. Learn to 'group' your values into lights darks and middle values to create a better abstract design.

man theres just a lot to say. Hope some sentence in here helped.

[arenhaus]

The drawing is decent--not dynamic but decent. There seem to be more glaring problems in other areas. I could nickpick but you can nickpick everything because nothing is perfect.

Your analysis of the color is fine, but I would disagree with you on the above. This drawing lacks awareness of form: it lapses into formulaic flatness in many places, and the proportions aren't good. The artist should practice drawing solid forms in perspective.

[BlackLightG]

Thanks for the feedback guys.
arenhaus : I will improve this one a bit and then move to more studies.
amara : thanks for taking the time to write so much. You gave me a lot of information to chew on. I will try to work whatever I can into this one and keep the rest in mind for future. And the idea actually was a costume redesign!

stareater : reduced size of image.

[Hexokinase]

And the idea actually was a costume redesign!

If you intend on painting a costume redesign, you'd either want to do a character sheet, or at the very least have a very neutral standing pose where we can see the whole body. Not much of a redesign if we can only see the torso.

And while we're on the subject, this doesn't feel like a costume redesign. It looks like a crude photo of a fan in a half-assed/sexy Halloween costume. Nobody in their right mind would fight crime like that (especially when the goal is to use stealth as a weapon). No armor, batbelt/gadgets, cape, etc. If you're going to paint a recognized character, jump into it 100% - this looks like a person you decided to turn into batgirl partway through the painting process honestly.

Something to think about for future pieces. If you're goal is a redesign, you'll have to start over.

[BlackLightG]

So I painted it a little more. Tried correcting her eyes, used bluish light and red shadows and tried to give her more depth.

[BlackLightG]

Well it just started with the idea of Batgirl wearing a bat shaped bra honestly so I dint bother much about the rest of her body. Will keep that in mind for future work. Thanks.

[Danilo]

[BlackLightG]

Hey Danilo,
I am not working on this image any more and I have left this one behind as a learning experience. However thanks for taking the time to edit it and post here. I will surely try blurring the skin, not as much as you did though, in my next work.
Thanks

[Chris Sanders]

i think he means blend the skin, you don't want to blur it. Get on here and study - http://www.pixelovely.com/gesture/figuredrawing.php

[humboldt squid]

http://gyazo.com/70f5a3ca57f721a85a3a148aa6ce5823

some blur will make that skin better, also the hair need to look hairy

As a total aside, that's a weird ass image host. Just use imgur or the attachment tool.

[BlackLightG]

Oh blend the skin, (or perhaps use the blur brush to blend?). Interesting because Amara in post #4 says that I blended too much. Anyways this work is old now and I would be grateful if anyone can drop by my sketchbook and comment on more recent work.

And thanks for the link Chris, will do those.

[Danilo]

Choosing where to blur and where to detail is one of the crucial questions.

[Chris Sanders]

Oh blend the skin, (or perhaps use the blur brush to blend?). Interesting because Amara in post #4 says that I blended too much. Anyways this work is old now and I would be grateful if anyone can drop by my sketchbook and comment on more recent work.

If your being told you blend to much it's because you don't understand how form works. It doesn't matter what you paint with it's knowledge and observation that determines the outcome of all image making, that's why pros get really annoyed at beginners asking for their brush sets. Someone who understands form could paint soft skin with a jagged rock brush better than a novice with a soft brush. It's might take a hell of a lot longer than using a soft brush, but in the end it's all in the artists head. Tools just aid the process. A pilot could get from A to B faster in a jet than he could some beaten up old second world war plane. But someone who doesn't know how to fly a plane would crash and burn in either so it doesn't matter how good their plane is. Same with art, having the best brush for the job won't make you a better artist.

I've done a painting with just a hard round brush, and i would suggest you learn with it as well. When i say blend i mean create a believable transition from light to dark based on the light and form.

@Danilo - stop saying blur it's confusing rather than helpful. when you say blur people assume your talking about the blur tool or something, when your trying to say soften. Blurring and softening are different things. If your going to post a concise crit at least it's well explained or it serves little purpose.

[Danilo]

well its actually a blur tool. Nice work Chris!

[BlackLightG]

Thanks Chris, your version looks good. The original image was also done entirely using the hard round brush.

[Chris Sanders]

yeah i realized that it was round brush after my rant, The whole brush issue just annoys me and i was letting off some steam. Probably at the wrong person but hey it's out there now. I confused Danilo's version with yours. Either way i hope it helped lol.