Aaron's book of DEATH, like um.....lots and lots of girls........Yeah................

[SamC]

Read and re-read all the crits you're receiving, you're extremely lucky to be getting this amount of people giving you constant crits, even if it does spawn from the madster thing. Make sure not to feel pressured to produce, you're recieving tons of information in such a short amount of time, it's not all going to get better at once..just try not let the huge rush make you inpatient Keep it up.

[Aaron Death]

Thanks dile_, will do that tomorrow. My sleep loss is so bad today, that I can't concentrate long enough to do that.

Hyskoa. That's a very good point. Getting burnt out is bad. And I do want to enjoy my social life while I can~

SamC. I am very lucky indeed. Just trying to work harder to deserve it. And, anyway, it's fun to practice.

So, some posemanics and hogarth. Trying to keep in mind that I should always think hard before I draw a line. And it's marvelous how much those few seconds changed the whole picture. And I am still confused about adding motion to my picture. It's kinda hard to build the figure from the strongest motion. Will do better
Shading in Photoshop is harder than with pencils. What kind of brush should I use for this kind of shading?



Portrait from life done in 30 minutes. A lot better likeness than the last.

[Hexism]

Keep pushing! your gestures are getting better now , and I really liked the last portrait , would've been better if i didn't have to tilt my head , though :p .

Don't forget to do other studies too!

[Aaron Death]

sorry, Hexism my mom was nagging to use the computer. Oops.

[Arshes Nei]

I hate to make three posts in a row, but since they're about different things, and this one is IMPORTANT......


PEOPLE....PLEASE SAY THIS HONESTLY


I want to make a portfolio and apply for Ringling THIS YEAR. According my research, it takes 100,000 dollars including rent and everything. My parents will finance me.

IS it Possible?

What is the chance?

Aaron a lot of things are possible.

I wanted to say this though, have a backup plan if things don't go how you expect. Remember, there's also a Massive Black Division in China, if you're shooting this high now, think about other places to shoot for. That doesn't mean lose focus of this goal, but again if things don't go the way you want, the question is what do you do then?

Your studies show a lot of improvement, so don't loose sight of your goal.

[alesoun]

Aaron, slow down! Take your time (you're 16; you have time enough and some to spare). First, catch up on sleep; without sleep your sight gets foggy and your concentration is trashed.

Once that's sorted, take a breath and think. Instead of racing to do six 30 minute sketches out in three hours, take that 3 hours to do one sketch.

Draw anything,- a pet, your mom, a car, a vase. Take time to look at what you're drawing. Practice the line in your head, then with your hand in the air; then apply it to the paper. Look and think before you make the next line and the next, until your focus is not on "getting the drawing done", but on "drawing" the subject.

This is not a criticism of your talent or your work,- it's a warning of your mindset, If you rush around trying to do 15 things at once, none of those 15 things will be done well, if done at all. Take the time to concentrate on one thing; then give it another half hour to see if you can push it further and improve it in any way. You'll get impatient with yourself, and you'll get impatient with your work; but, trust me, it will pay dividends faster than you think.

I don't know what the situation would be with visas, but maybe you could take some of that pressure off of yourself by taking a one year college course that would give you time to build up a portfolio in your spare time?

Above all, quell that panic and give yourself space. Rushing things will only stress you out.

[JailHouseRock2]

Hi Aaron,
your stuffs getting better in here man, nice progress!

Really had to thank alesoun too, she gave some solid advice (ha I really need to get more sleep too),
Yeah I think taking some time to do a really nice portrait or something would be good, but keep doing all the quick sketches and studies too, just my opinion.

Good luck again Aaron,
matt

[Aaron Death]

Thanks Alesoun, Miss Thunder Empress, JailHouseRock2. I think about it again and I talked to a friend. He told me the Metro Comm College in Omaha has quite good art classes, and they teach fundamentals and life drawing instead of modern art. It requires no grades(my grades are not bad at all, I ranked 37 once in the best school in whole Sichuan province, a province with around one hundred million of people), and costs several thousand dollars for two years for foreign students. I am thinking about it now.

My mother took my camera away so I can't get my two one-hour still life studies into this computer. But I am doing very long studies, Alesoun. They are invaluable.

Anyway, I thought my quick portrait skills are bad so I took very quick sketches of the skull and other faces and tried to capture their characteristics. Lol, this is harder than I thought. And then it occurred to me to check their proportions by having another layer on top of the background and set its opacity to 30%.
Lol, my proportions are a lot worse than I thought.]



And then, I drew some photos of human figure with extreme perspective and check them with the original photos. Lol, I discovered that things which seem to be right may actually be very very inaccurate. So I drew it again and again. And these 4 figures took me 1 hour and a half!


Edge study, I don't quite get it.

[Chompo]

You are improving, keep going!
But don't skip basic things with this rush.
Great enthusiasm and talent!

[Arshes Nei]

Aaron, yeah edges you may not get the first, second third or even thousandth time. (call me Arshes lol) It took many different sites, places and books for me to understand a lot of the same principles explained in each book.

Also about going to a local college, that also is not a bad idea and usually more affordable. It's a good start to get the credits you may need for a bigger school. That way as stated in the Realities of Going to Art School thread, you can take all the boring basic courses first, pay less then go to a higher end art college and take the advanced courses.

You might enjoy this instructor's site and his book. http://www.henryyanart.com/ Henry Yan is very nice and inquisitive, if you order his book tell him about your situation, I'm sure he'll have some nice advice for you too.

[SamC]

With the painting edges, try always using 100% hardness on the brush to get clear edges where you need them.. its still easy to make soft edges with aswell, the soft brush is not needed. Make sure you read what came with that painting edges painting... its important Keep it up.

[Dile_]

Pencil! use the pencil more.. You already seem to know how to copy values and color over in digital.. now do it with pencil. Enforce your fundamentals with the pencil first.. I promise you its really useful.. do some studies in it.. digital is to fast to pick 'a lot' up in short time.. its better with traditional when you have to think a bit about every decision you're making. Anyways.. its looking good.. and about edges.. they will just appear out of nowhere one day.. and you will just get it that day. Thats what they are like if you want to force it, there are some good links that I think you've already found.. try to think of edges as gradations between planes in space.. and as dof or focal-point enforcer hehe :0 whatever.. keep it up.. but more with pencil!

[Dimension]

That last portrait painting is looking pretty good. Looks like you're paying close attention to values. Getting some nice lines in some of those bridgman studies too.

Edges have to do with how light travels over forms based on the angle of the light and the angle or change in angles over forms if you haven't been able to look it up. Many books go into much more depth. At this point though in your development, drawing is much more important, though it doesn't hurt to do the occasional painting.

Don't use Grays anatomy. There's way too much information in it not for artists. One book I've found very useful is by Joseph Sheppard. I forget what it's called (I don't have it handy, away from home), but it's great for connection points, names, placement of bone and muscles etc. Hogarth and Bridgman are great too. You can never have too many anatomy books.

One more thing, I think you'll learn more from doing some longer studies.

Keep it up!

[ashess]

hey there Aaron!
I really like the progress you're making; but what I read on the side worries me. the advise on taking your time is invaluable; but I got another one for you: leave that computer and take your sketchbook outside.
walk the streets, have a drink at a terrace. then draw when you see something worthwhile. or do it in the country; take a lunchbox and just walk around all day with a big sketchpad (A3? A2?); maybe ink and watercolors, or just charcoal. I dont know where you live, but if it's the northern hemisphere it must be getting near spring for you too. take a week. take two if you can; make a vacation out of it. you'll feel like a new person afterwards.
you can set yourself goals for that week. or you can just go with it. then when you're done, come and chat about what you made in here.

as for sleeping; I had that problem when I was about your age. only thing that worked for me was tire myself out around 19:00/20:00. swimming worked best for me, 'cuase it had my whole body working. and got rid of any backpains (which are pretty much cured now thanks to regular excerzise).
pls take 1-2 hours every day and get that excersize. then try if sleeping becomes better after a few weeks. if you dont like swimming try aerobics or a fighting sport or walking. anything.
and then pls try to sleep regular, 8-hour nights at a fixed scedual. dont go partying in the weekend, or on painting streeks after midnight . get your body into a clear, healty rithm. do it now; once you get used to sleeping 4 hours your body and mind will adapt; it will get harder and harder to get enough sleep. in a few years time you'll be suffering insomnia for sure.
btw; dont start thinking you can just adapt to 4 hours and be done. living like that effects your mind; like the ability to see and notice things. you need to have your senses at their best if you want to make art

[Aaron Death]

Thanks guys, you're awesome.

Chompo: Thanks, yeah, working on basics now~

Arshes:
Henry Yan is amazing, he teaches Riley, so I know him a bit.
Yeah, maybe your method is better. I should certainly do more researches on Metro Comm.

SamC:Wow, I should try it, but I have a hard time blending with HARD BRUSHES, that seems impossible!

Dile_:I still love pencils, but it's so hard to post them. Oops. Anyway, I find shading with pencils a lot easier than Digital, it takes forever to blender with Photoshop. Will do more pencil studies.

Dimension: Thanks for that thought on edges, it makes sense somehow.
Joseph Sheppard is awesome, thanks for telling me that, bookmarked his homepage.

arshess:Thanks, but I don't find it that necessary to do that now. I mean, I'm more or less depressed, but I'll be fine. Life is not hard for me at all.
I should do more street sketches though, that would be FUN!
About insomnia, I tried every single thing I can think of, no use. Gave up.



Spoon studies in pencil. Metal texture is hard, lots of specular reflections.




Drawing based on Nathan Fowkes' tutorial. His construction lines are awesome. Learned so MUCH from him. He's one of my favorite artists now.
So I spent hours looking and copying his tutorials and applying them to photos.
I constantly check my drawing with the original picture and discovered plenty of mistakes. But the last one is finished without checking the photo, and it fits! Wow~

[a la bapsi]

keep going, aaron.
keep studying

[Aaron Death]

Thanks a la bapsi, I will.

Did some portraits(more of structure studies actually) and figure drawings. I drew them first and then drew some correction lines in another color. I found I tend to draw forms too thin, oops, especially with darker edges. Anyway, I found some sports and ballet pictures, and well, they're so different from posemaniacs. Never thought I should find another source of figure pictures, but well, they teach me a lot about balance and motion. Posemaniacs pictures tend to be more still. Oops. Back to drawing

[RBeek]

good studies,, a fun way with the pictures, that looks good keep it up man!

[Dile_]

yes yes yes! do more... and spend more time at it.. thats all for now.. keep it up

[Sig.NAL]

Hey dude looking at your stuff you seem to have a good eye for values and forms and it's good to see someone being good about working from reference (Something i must work on) I like your looser more gestural figure sketches, some of the others look kinda blocky, the ones that took you and hour and a half above were definitely worth it, they read very clearly I'll be back around shortly

[Ruivo]

Go, keep doing studies, anatomy and gesture and value ones too! Your in the right path!! Keep posting!

[Greywoods]

You're on the right path dude. You are really good (especially for 17), and you are doing all (well I dont know if there are any missing) the right stuff to improve.
I think what you should pay attention to when you draw is this:
Try being more confident, even though this usually comes by itself working on it wont hurt. Maybe as an extension of this try pumpin up your values and add more contrast.

[SaiVix]

Nice facial feature studies

[Aaron Death]

Thanks. Rogerb, Dile_, ruivo, KLEVER, greywoods, Saivix.

I went to Blick art store yesterday and bought some art supplies including:

CretaColor Blackbox

General Charcoal pencil set

General Pastel Chalk Earth Brown

Strathmore Charcoal paper sketchbook


Anyway, I totally fell in love with Charcoal, maybe I'll throw away my graphites now. I made this decision because of Henry Yan, Nathan Fowkes, AztcFireFlower, Raileyh, Chase226. It's awesome because it's so much easier to shade. And I love messy stuff(like my bedroom).

Personally I love VINE charcoal. It's so soft and smooth, I can't get used to compressed charcoal. It's impossible to have good shading with it. Charcoal pencils is not as smooth as vine.

So here are some studies in Charcoal.

SHIT, my camera reduced the value range a lot. It's actually a lot darker than the photos.

Doodling

Cloth Studies





Portraits from Nathan Fowkes' tutorials. Nathan Fowkes is awesome.

[Mat Kaminski]

Man, this is really nice work you've got going on. You are going up in skill by leaps and bounds very fast! I can't wait to see how much you've improved by the end of this summer if you keep up this pace.

Your forms definitely seem to be your strong point by far. And I'm glad to see you combining digital with traditional; it will help to keep you more well rounded

Welcome to the SSB as well

Cya soon.

[Sig.NAL]

Hell Yeah! Glad to see you've posted today! I'm really excited about SSG X! Let's all get better together and so we can start taking people's jobs! And i encourage you guys to give me shit when i don't post up on time, it'll keep me on task

That last pic, is there white charcoal in there as well? Or are the highlights just erasure? Think it's cool you like the medium for it's messiness, that's what gave me the most trouble when i worked with it, It's also cool that you're only 17 and are making your way already to becoming a career artist, it's tough at times, but starting this early, and learning your foundations like you obviously are (and well at that), you will be so much better prepared later on, and proper learning will save you having to re-teach yourself later and break bad habits (i still carve my pencils deep into my paper before i've figured out where my marks nee to be, and it makes sometimes for extra hours being added to my work) Keep up the good work!

[Aaron Death]

Yes, there is white charcoal pencil, but it feels like oily cream or whatever. It cannot give you very bright highlight, and it blends poorly with charcoal and the white paper.

Somehow, i feel it's more blue than white~

[SamC]

Try using tan paper if you want better whites, because your adding shade and light onto a midtone and not just adding shade and light onto pure white. Keep all this up

[Ruivo]

Aaron, i'm glad that you are experimenting new mediums, it will keep studies interesting and you will learn how to handle new materials, keep it up!!! I wil try to do studies with another mediums too .

Keep it up my good man!!

Edit: I recommend that you see scott robertson's dvd's about matte surface shading, it will give you the knowledge to continue the studies that envolve light and values!!

[Chaser226]

I'm glad you're taking up charcoal, Aaron! I hope you have fun with it.

A little helpful advice I picked up not too long ago - analyze what you're drawing, and then transfer that onto the page. It sounds kind of obvious...But between the eye seeing something to your brain's interpretation then to the stroke your hand make, a lot can go wrong. Like others have mentioned to you, take your time when you're drawing. Take as much time as you need to draw it right. Think about every single stroke. Speed comes with experience. Don't be too caught up in doing tons and tons of drawings because you won't gain much from them if you're not putting in the effort to learn and absorb.