Just draw ffs! CRITIQUE WANTED! (19/01/2013)

[JeffX99]

Hey Lord M - I'm glad you found that critique helpful and were open to it. Just to follow up a bit on the "why" it is best to learn through traditional media and approach. It is really very simple: traditional media are portable, allowing you to study and work from life - anywhere, any time. Traditional media is also faster than digital allowing you to explore more ideas, concepts, compositions, etc. Traditional media teaches you to really see and draw very directly without a cumbersome interface, drawing small, and all the other limitations of working digitally. Learning to really see form, shadow and light is extremely difficult and takes years to begin to understand - it takes tremendous focus and concentration - working directly with a piece of charcoal on a piece of paper - no interface, no distance between the artist and the work. The last main advantage is that traditional media teaches one everything they need to know about the fundamentals of making art - and it does it faster and in a more direct way.

In the end digital media is great - I love it - you can do a lot of really incredible things that you can't do with traditional media - but you have to know what you're doing first. You have to keep in mind it is only a tool - a different medium - and it actually has some serious limitations which make it a poor tool when trying to learn how to really see, draw and paint.

Anyway, I hope that explains some of the "why" behind my earlier advice. Famous Artist Course has some great stuff. My highest recommendation (if you really want to learn the craft) are just two books: "Drawing Essentials" by Deborah Rockman and "Imaginitive Realism" by James Gurney. I know you're pretty serious about improving so just keep at it!

[Pigeonkill]

I like the strong contrast and angle of the last piece. It doesn't really read to me as "old woman" It feels more scary like death chasing people on top of harp.

[LORD M]

kiwigarbage - Hehe ye it's one o' those harpys. Nasty creatures. And ye you got a good point there, triangling the wings would have been awesome. Oh well I gotta think of that till next time, but thanks!

JeffX99 - Yes I exactly see your point, I recognize a lot of the limitations of digital media you speak of and I agree with you. I have to admitt I have always been a bit irritated over what takes a short time to do traditionaly takes quite a while doing digitaly, but I am not as "adapted" to digital yet though. Since I want to improve as fast as possible I maybe should take a break from doing as much digital studies as I used to and focus to do the studies more traditonaly.

Oh and it seems I am in great luck, I bought myself a copy of "Imaginative Realism" some weeks ago. Although, I haven't had much time to look at it because of university. Gotta have a look at "drawing Essentials" as well since you recommend it.

And ye I am super serious about improving and I will keep at it! Thanks a lot for taking the time to talk to me about this!

Pigeonkill - Thanks man! Glad you enjoyed it, and yes I agree with you that it looks a bit more like death then an old woman, Maybe it is his mother.





Finaly I got myself a new scanner, and it was a real beast one! CanoScan 9000F - totally sweet! Compared to my previous 10 year old scanner this one takes 7 seconds to scan instead of 2 minutes, and you hardly have to tweak any in photoshop aftrwards.

So I thought I would scan some horribly-uneven-lines-crap I made the last 6 months till now, but it was way too many drawings so I chose the one I liked best. Oldest at top, freshest at bottom.

[Jamie Romoser]

Wow! great studies man improvment is evident on this page alone!
As for harsh crits cant say much man your doing all the right stuff so its only a matter of time. Maybe thinking more about each stroke would help?
Keep it up looking forward to seeing more
till next time
-Jamie

[kiwigarbage]

Great! The master's studies are showing through already!

I'd do uhm...some life (or nicely lit photograph) boob studies...they often seem misplaced or oddly shaped to me. You're already aware of your facial mistakes. But I think that where you're having trouble is in the distortion of 3/4 view around the brow bone. Do some isolated studies of that area of the face and everything will come together nicely!

Great work

[LORD M]

Omerta - Thanks for checking out my little sketchbook! I will think more about my lines, gotta find some way to train myself to get better strokes.

kiwigarbage - Hey thanks for visiting again kiwi! Ah I didn't notice how horrible the brow bone area were untill you pointed it out to me, how embarrasing - and yeah I will do some isolated studies of that area, self portraits should be a good way. And I will do more boob-studies aswell, thanks!




Been absorbed by the "The Dark Tower" book serie by Stephen King lately, reading more then I should be doing. (WARNING SPOILER FOR DARK TOWER READERS!) Just finished the third book and thought I would paint a scene from the book: The deranged Blaine The Mono leaving his cradle in Lud for the last time. Something I felt I just had to draw, plus 3 bodies from mind.

[LORD M]

I was going to enter Dominance War, but school got in the way (sorry kostas). But I thought I might finish it anyways without entering since it is too late.Here's some stuff I did for Dominance War plus a quick thumbnail for a potential scene I made today.

[lennon]

Keep working the figure, you're getting there, but there's still some road left. Try to flip the canvas after you end up with one drawing. Try to get more critic with the proportions, to get them as clean as possible, this is the most important thing. Don't make everyone with those muscles so thigh, try to see the flesh hang more, the weights and masses accordingly with the pose.
At this moment, I think that you're pretty close to nail the proportions, focus in that before moving foreward. In post 393 there is a construction drawing with black ink, it looks great, but you should do more of this, focus in this before jumping to more superficial subjects. Try to make this kind of stuff with a loosen hand, with quick lines at not a lot of effort (it's important beacuse the faster you make it the cleaner the lines will be and the easier it would be to jump into other details that give character to the drawing).
After you have made a thousand of this ones, work with the balance and the poses, then try to integrate hands, head and features into that, then render. Each of this steps should take several months and you always should came back to them for a couple of months again, don't jump into rendering if you can for at least a year or more.
The figure is very hard and nobody has it completly worked out, but it really pays.

[~KJK~]

wow thats one bigass update! keep it up, youre doing good! and thanks for stopping by at my SB!

[FrozZT]

Hey man! Awesome effort! I liked your studies on the past page, I think you should have pushed them for perfection a bit more, noticing the fine errors you've made and correcting them is essential in training your eye. See the slight changes in value, distances, angles, colors etc.. You could take your old studys, compare them with your refs and make markings and notes about the differences and errors you've made then start a new set of studys in which you can push to copy. When you are better at seeing it's much easier to study light, anatomy and such. Keep up the great work!

-Niklas

[LORD M]

lennon - Very good points, when you talk about how I always make the muscles too tight I realise I have never done any hanging flesh studies at all. That will have to change!

I agree on that I should halt the rendering for some time, and focus on fundamentals like proportions as you say. I will do more of the construction and build up, as in post 393. I think studying and reading Mentler amongst other will help me with proportions AND hanging muscle masses. As JeffX99 also said, I gotta study the basics - and I plan to do that for some time now, and try to avoid "doing art" as I have done so far (except sometimes I need to do something small to keep myself sane lol).

Big thanks for stopping by! I will repay the favour!

Parsakoira - Haha thanks for popping in my little sketchbook and for your kind words!

FrozZT - Hm I haven't thought of writing down my errors and what to improve on. I will definetly do this! Thank you!




Sum inspirin music!





Something fast (not really) for DSG 1591: Creature • GLISTENING BLACKISH BEAST SEEMS LIKE COMBO OF SLUG & DRAGON. Didn't turn out as black as I first planned to make it.

[ThomasM]

nice last post there! Thanks for stopping by on my sketchbook by the way.

You are certianly posting a huge volume of work. I would suggest doing a few more master studies if you have the time/chance. Just look up some figure drawings from people like Prud'hon or michelangelo (doesn't really matter) and do an exact copy. It will help loads with values and even linework.

Hope that helps!

[ladyknowles]

You sir are incredibly badass

[Sivonja]

This SB is simply amazing and it deserve 5 stars from me , i just love to see when is someone talented as you are keep posting

[LORD M]

ThomasM - Thank you and thank you for returning the favour! I am trying to do master studies whenever I can, it is such an amazing way of learning - to see how they proceeded and how they were thinking. For example I found the studies that Bougereau made for his "Nymphs and Satyr", really worth taking a look!
--->http://grandcentralacademy.blogspot....g-methods.html

ladyknowles - Hehe thank you.

Sivonja - Wow thank you so much! 5 stars, never thought I would get something that high for my humble scribbles! And thank you for your kind words!






Been studying the fundamentals as JeffX99 told me to; values, form and light etc. Drawn from life a bit too. God it is so horribly amateurish.

Most are studies after photos, but the 3rd last one is from life (used the worlds cheapes model) and the last two are from mind.

Critique very welcomed.

[Untouched24]

I'm really liking your dedication. Keep it up!

Only thing I'd say is perhaps gesturing out your figures more could benefit you. I'm not sure, maybe you already do, but it seems like sometimes your proportions are a bit odd in certain areas. I think lightly roughing in the figure, and really looking at the negative space, as well as how all the shapes relate to eachother in terms of proportion, before defining the lines, could help out. Also thinking of each thing/figure/limb you're drawing as a mass that fits into another mass may help too.
I see improvement in the last update and definitely do see drawings where it looks like you kept in mind the stuff I just mentioned, so keep at it. Also, the fat kittyman is pretty sweet.

Anyway, you're doing what you need to do, just thought I'd throw that out there in case it would help. Good work.

[LORD M]

Untouched24 - Hey thanks mate! Yes you're right, I realise I am doing some guesswork when fixing the proportion down, which I need to stop doing and measure more from mind. I need to imprint it in my mind!

Haha I'm glad you liked the fat kittyman.





Fast crap today, approximately around 2 hours. Was inspired by kingkostas when browsing through his sketchbook again and tried out his method for building up poses, first with a superquick sketch then fleshing it out with cylinders and spheres and at last adding muscles etc.

Tried out values and practising shading on this one.

[LORD M]

Fast one for DSG 1593: Creature • FURRY ALIEN'S EYES ARE FLESHY PERFORATED PLATES

[kingkostas]

Makrus awesome updates!!!specially post 393# U are totally improved. Love all the studies
Keep it up mate, u are doing really great!!!

[That fat kid]

Heya

After taking a look through your sketchbook, I'd say there's definitely been improvement in your work over the last year. I just bet it isn't as much as you expected which I put down to your ability to intepret what you're seeing and translate it onto paper isn't up to par with your ability to see what's in front of you. That gap is always going to be there, no matter how much you study.

And, after the thread in the Art Discussion section, the speed at which you study has an affect. I'm of the personal belief that spending a significant amount of time on a single study is more beneficial than a dozen short studies. If you can go through a study and pick out all the mistakes and errors in color, proportion, value, edges and what not and then do your best correcting them, the next long study you'll already have the mind set to pick out the mistakes earlier so then you won't have to correct them later. Plus, as you correct mistakes, you won't be basing decisions on mistakes while your developing an image.

~Andrew

[LORD M]

kingkostas - Hey thanks man! Glad to have your support.

That fat kid - Thanks a lot for commenting Andrew and yes I do agree with you, but I have to admitt if I am going to be 100% straight that I have been quite lazy and depressed about art the last year. And I haven't either been self-critical, its first now I get it thanks to a friend who made me realise that.

Longer studies would probably be a lot better, I should have spent more time at home studying anatomy the days I didnt go to lifedrawing-class. Ok I will do long studies, thankfully i life drawing class we recently started with 3 hour poses, so hopefully I learn something from that.



Wow 2 monts almost since last post. Well at least I have been drawing nsince then, but then I realised I took "study the fundamentals" too litteral and studied things I already knew. Studied the wrong way. But I have tried to correct that.

I have more and more realised I want to go into digital art then mostly doing traditional in the future, if I ever get a job in art that is. There's more opotrunities for work if you have a good digital, aswell as traditional, base to stand on. I have got to hear this from a lot of people.

Here's something I crapped out by fooling around in photoshop creating brushes and just raping the hell out of the canvas.

[kingkostas]

thats also a great experience so its good to see you playing and knowing better the digital tool.Creating custom brushes can be really important in reproducing textures and stuff
keep up mate

[dan liimatta]

Underbara uppdeteringar - o all anatomy! o resultaten när du ritar utan ref ~ ah, skönt att se.

Gillar också technomage konceptet och snigeln ~ jobba på, ser riktigt bra ut.

kärlek, Dan ~

[Rain Walker]

i almost cried after seeing ur last anatomy update.. and i thought i did good and lots of anatomy work... ur anatomy is art by itself..its not a study its great great peace of art...

amazing.. just amazing...

[LORD M]

Been a while now since last time I posted in here but I will still reply.

kingkostas - Yeah the brush-creationing is great fun, and you learn so much from just messing around.

dan liimatta - Tack så mycket, Dan! Jättekul att se dig i min lilla tråd. Jag ska jobba på tills jag e gammal o grå och inte längre kan gå.

Rain Walker - Hey thanks, Rain! Very glad you like my old studies.



Just drawed today. Still life, too many hours - gotta get faster! Maybe to set a timer next time.

[LORD M]

Just drawed 2 buttons that fell off my army jacket. Oh well, good motifes though.

[Trefle]

Wow. What more could I say.. O_O Those are very beautiful, and your lines are very very clean. XD

Keep drawing, as per usual.

[p sage]

You're showing improvement just in this last page, which should be really encouraging. It's cool to see it happening.

Demand discipline of yourself; demand excellence. I think you have the ability to move up quite a bit if you are a bit more precise with your methods, a bit more meticulous in all that you do. For instance, if you draw a circle, really make it the best one ever. If you draw a line, demand excellence and nothing less.

Little refinements like that will really help your mindset when practicing, too.

Proportions are getting better; keep working on those. And conception of the third dimension is coming around. The Cambiaso study was good and more studies of 3D shapes would help as well.

Have fun as always

[dan liimatta]

Sköna studier - främst tangentbordet

[LORD M]

Trefle - Hey thanks man, will always keep drawing. Although breaks sometimes needed for foodstuff.

p.sage - I read your post 2 days ago and man you are so right, I really must demand more from myself and not finish till I am thourhoughly satisfied. I have had this mindset now and I think it might be taking effect since I redraw stuff all the time till i get it good. Fun is just the start of it! Thanks!

dan liimatta - Tack som fan, Dan!


Some bits from todays studies. Focusing on building up the figure, Mentlers thread Book of Bones is very valuable for studying how to draw figures from mind in any pose - which is one of my main goals within art (that and becoming totally awesome and a legend in history of coz, doesn't everyone have that goal?).

One thing I realised from a friend is that I don't look at the subject I draw from long enough. My friend had problemsd drawing feet, so he spent a lot of time just looking at Charles Bargue's drawings of feet - and from just looking he then became a lot better at drawing just feet. This is something I will take up and adopt to myself - and also throwing it out her just in case someone reads this uncoherent rambling I am tired what is the clock holy shit way too late I gotta go sleep gnight bai bai must become a lot better