The Red Light District - Painterly Shenanigans ( Now with Enviros )

[Rostas]

More updates.

[WRappiii]

thanks for stopping by my sketchbook! nice work ethic.

this enviro looks great
and this study came out nicely!

[Rostas]

@Wrapiii - Thanks man . Anytime. I like supporting other people.

Two Game of Thrones studies. Not too great but it's all about learning lighting and mood. And color.

[Rostas]

A self-portrait that took about 30-40 mins. It looks like dung but i'm gonna be doing these everyday for 1 week from now on because it's harder to draw yourself than others. At least, that's what I noticed.

[vayne108]

A self-portrait that took about 30-40 mins. It looks like dung but i'm gonna be doing these everyday for 1 week from now on because it's harder to draw yourself than others. At least, that's what I noticed.

OH, yes, I notice this too Rostas. It's definitely always harder to draw your self. I mean when I do it..... I get total mind block and a feeling of awkwardness.

While anyways I know you did it in 30-40 min, but there are problems with facial proportions a plenty. The nose is in the wrong perspective (Slightly 3 quarters) and the rest of the face is straight on facing the viewer. The eyes are too big for the face and their isn't enough space in-between the eyes. However that problem might be solved if you make the eyes smaller.

[clockodile]

Wow, you have done a lot of thumbnails recently. You use of colour seems to really be improving too.

I hope you reach your goal with the self portraits, I only relatively recently started forcing myself into it, and after a few, it seemed to be a bit easier, even relaxing - if only because the tension faded, and one adjusts to the whole set up. I agree with vanye108's comment about the proportions, though I think you are heading in the right direction with the skin colours, there are a lot of tones in there. Self portraits can be a really good way to improve 'seeing' skills though, so I think you will improve on this pretty quickly with persistence.

[Rostas]

@vayne - Thanks again man . Yeah I know the eyes are off , but I'll see what I'll do tommorow on the next self-portrait. I could prolong the time to like 1-1hour and a half but I want to get faster at drawing. Taking too much time sometimes irks me.

@clockodile - Yes ,it is important developing "seeing" and "understanding" skills which virtually translate to patience and lots of analyzing. And yeah , the proportions are off. I could've fixed stuff If i stayed more on it but I thought i'd keep it at a minimum time to focus on other things and learn as I do them. Cheers.

Some little updates before I go to bed.

I'll turn these comments into words of " Self - Wisdom " to myself and to anyone who likes listening to idiotic rambles.

Never , ever , give up. I had some shitty days these days and I'm thinking more and more that my art is shit. Well , I'm thinking anyone has gone through this but this is the worst period so far that I had. I don't like nothing that I'm doing , nothing that I intend to do and my style of painting and drawing is just utter bollocks.

Thinking that way made me realise that I was not having fun with what I'm doing. Art is great but sometimes you must do things , things that you hate to improve , and sometimes you force yourself and you constantly do that and sometimes to not be consumed by the thought that you , as an artist , must "kill yourself" to rid the world of your shitty art.

My aspiration is to be a great artist , something that I'll be proud of , and even work as a concept artist/illustrator at some game/movie company. I really believe that day will come if I work hard enough.

So , I constantly think and rethink and try and analyze everything and sometimes, that hurts me. Take my word of advice. When you think your art is shit and it seems like your art is shitter than it was before , take a break. Not a long break, but a couple of hours , get a laugh , eat something. Just don't think about art , at all. It helped me and it helps me regain focus when I come back.

Now this turned into a novel , lol.

[Rostas]

And another self-portrait as I did say I'd do one everyday for one week to learn more about lighting and color and proportion and etc. .

Maybe I'll post my pencil sketches and studies also because my web seems to make pretty clear pics I guess. But later on that.

[Rostas]

Little update before sleep. Sometimes i have the feeling my art is getting worse..... don't know why.

[Rostas]

Update. Another self-portrait and some crappy sketches.

[Rostas]

Another little study on light sources and etc.

[CMLollar7]

Siiick studies! I like all the color too! [I seem to be afraid of color]

I have a suggestion on a type of daily exercise/study that you may find entertaining and quite effective in increasing one's skills quickly.

Non-blind or semi-blind contour drawing! Blind contour is only so good, really not that great, but I think semi-blind contour drawing helps increase short term memory, and contour drawing in general helps with gestalt, awareness of negative space, loosens up and quicken's one's linear perception. Try it with a rollerball pen for starters to get the feel of how it is supposed to be done - one continuous line, whilst breaking or stopping every once in a while to recalibrate. I'm still getting the hang of the technique in pencil, but I found a ballpoint pen can work in precisely the same way if you're aware of the technique over feel of the medium.

here's an example!
http://statigr.am/viewer.php#/detail...2386_294239190

[CMLollar7]

Siiick studies! I like all the color too! [I seem to be afraid of color]

I have a suggestion on a type of daily exercise/study that you may find entertaining and quite effective in increasing one's skills quickly.

Non-blind or semi-blind contour drawing! Blind contour is only so good, really not that great, but I think semi-blind contour drawing helps increase short term memory, and contour drawing in general helps with gestalt, awareness of negative space, loosens up and quicken's one's linear perception. Try it with a rollerball pen for starters to get the feel of how it is supposed to be done - one continuous line, whilst breaking or stopping every once in a while to recalibrate. I'm still getting the hang of the technique in pencil, but I found a ballpoint pen can work in precisely the same way if you're aware of the technique over feel of the medium.

here's an example!
http://statigr.am/viewer.php#/detail...2386_294239190

[Rostas]

@CMLollar7 - thanks for the advice , but I have to make an instagram account xD . Will do later. And indeed I've tried blind contour. It is very helpful in building a good eye-hand coordination when trying to do studies and also understanding nature and negative spaces.

It would be a good practice to be honest . Thanks. Also , you posted twice xD.


Here's a small update on another light study. Will do more studies since my fundamentals lack a lot.

[Rostas]

Posting the Self-Portrait. Will come later with updates.

[Rostas]

A little sketch before sleep. Will post more tommorow . Another self-portrait and some things I've been working on.

[Eightball_]

nice studies. my critique with your paintings--too much black in your shadows. pure black seldom exists at that strength in real life. try using other colors in the shadows. an easy tip to remember: cool light-warm shadows, warm light-cool shadows. this means depending on your light source, your shadows can be warm (brown, orange, desaturated dark yellow, etc) or cool (blues, purples, crimsons). try to eliminate black from your shadows and your paintings will take on a new luminiscence. hope that helps! keep it up!

[Rostas]

Two enviros. Nothing too fancy. Will post the Self-portrait soon and some other updates.

[Rostas]

And the other update I said. I did some traditional sketches but I won't post them too soon. So the Self-portrait for today and a orange light phase.

The last one was from imagination. I learnt a lot from these.

[Rostas]

A sketch. Pretty lame but wanted to try and drawing something from my head. Although most of the time it turns out 80% less awesome than how i see it. Yeah , the ye old trouble of not being able to live on par with my imagination. :/

[Rostas]

Last update for tonight. Will post more when I wake up. Cheers .

[palladium]

Hey there Rostas. Great work in here, really like your studies. Here's a link to a bunch of free tutorials by concept artist Feng Zhu. http://www.fengzhudesign.com/tutorials.htm.
I've watched them over and over. they are full of useful information. Keep it up.

[Rostas]

@palladium - Thanks palladium . I know Feng Zhu. I've watched many of his videos. I know most of the artists with channel's on youtube and am subscribed to them. Thank you for telling me though . I love Feng Zhu.

And the update for the self-portrait. Will post more later tonight maybe.I wish I'd never have to sleep and could draw constantly. Alas , i'm always distracted by some nonsensical bull.

[Rostas]

Apparently some of my old posts do not show . The images. I've tried re-uploading but it doesn't work. Hope it gets fixed soon. Anyways I'm gonna post the last self-portrait. Now I'm starting Master Study + Still Life study week.

I'm gonna do each of those daily , each one consisting of 40 mins each. I learnt a lot from the self-portraits. Just by drawing yourself you tend to be more self-conscious and pick up more stuff than when drawing someone else. It's a different view and experience. Had lots of fun.

[Rostas]

Two master study updates. 40 mins each. Now this week I will do 2 master studies as I said each day. That's 14 master studies in a week.

First a Ilya Repin one , and a Sargent enviro. Amazing stuff ( not mine ofc ). Just when doing these kinds of quickies you realise the elements , colors , composition and placement of everything line and contour. Simply astonishing.

[Rostas]

Coming out early with a Robert Henri study ( Salome ). Will come later in the afternoon with the other study. Hope you enjoy.

[Rostas]

The other master study for yesterday. I'm feeling kinda bad lately. I'm feeling really tired for no apparent reason , and I'm not making excuses. Will come later tommorow with some updates. For now , bear with my shitty updates.

[Rostas]

Posting this small sketch. A little try to test out what i can do from some scribbles.

[Rostas]

Posting some of the traditional stuff i did too. Some pencil sketches. Will post the first batch because I wanna see if i resized them correctly so i can put the others too.

Cheers. Will come later with the master studies.

[Rostas]

And the other batch since the resolution seems fine. Please excuse the quality as my scanner is pretty much useless right now and making pictures with the webcam seemed like the best solution to post these.