Stormslegacy's Domain

[Stormslegacy]

Here's my little sketchbook/gallery area =3 I'm 24 years old, and mostly self-taught. I took Art 101 at the local college, but didn't have the chance to go any further. I read a lot of books on structure, anatomy, drawing, lighting etc and am always happy to hear recommendations! Constructive crit is also very welcome.

My favorite subjects are animals. I do art in the anthro community as well, so there will probably be some updates with 'furry" work as well. Lately a lot of my drawings are of dogs--I'm a little dog-obsessed and also have access to a local dog park to take photos and draw =3

[Stormslegacy]

More Sketches!

The dog is of an animal I had photographed at the local dog park. I looked over all the pics and chose a pose I thought would reflect his personality. I'm not quite happy with it, I think there would be more energy if I lifted the back rear leg and had him on one foot which is not an uncommon pose in excited dogs even if it looks strange =3

[Stormslegacy]

I've been getting too tight and over-worked in my sketches so spent the past few days doing doggie gestures, here's my two favorite pages

[jorvaa]

The dogs are beautiful! I also love the background of the first piece.
You seem to draw dogs so easily, they look like they are leaping off the page.

[Stormslegacy]

Got a new book about drawing figures for my birthday "Figure Drawing: Design and Invention" so have been practicing my anatomy and my gestures. It's really improved my figurework, particularly without a model! I'm only on page 25 and it's really given me a boost of confidence. Here is a couple sketches made while I was out today, I was trying to come up with some nice pin-up poses for a project I'm working on.

[Rain Walker]

Stormslegacy .. your art story is very similer to mine.. well exactly like mine expect i love cats

if u do love to draw more of this subject (dogs) i recommend to u 2 books..

- this if u want to draw step by step (beginner)
http://www.amazon.com/Draw-50-Dogs-L...0070104&sr=8-1
- this if u want to draw realistic dogs (advanced)
http://www.amazon.com/Drawing-Made-E...0070104&sr=8-2

i saw them in a library and its all about dogs...

by the way i liked a drawing that u made a horse-man .. like top part is a horse and rest is human.. i hope u go on with this.. u this is kinda of fantasy art... its lovely

[Stormslegacy]

Thank you for your encouragement Rain, I hadn't seen the second book, I'll have to order it in my next amazon purchase =3 I love the first one, when I was a kid his books inspired me. They set me back a little bit (I'm not sure now, looking back, it's the best book for a true-blue beginner to start with) but I loved his drawings.

[Stormslegacy]

The WIP's watercolor illustrations for a character sheet I'm working on, and the sketch is the best from a batch I had done.

[Stormslegacy]

Had some time for sketching, trying to come up with poses for a quickie wolf painting. I LOVE the dancing coyote on the left-hand side I think I will develop in further. The leaping wolf is nice too but needs a bit of anatomy work.

[RyerOrdStar]

Keep doing the gestures and referenced work. It will pay off in the end

[Stormslegacy]

Thank you RyerOrdStar, I will definitely take that advice! BTW I LOVE the malinois in your avatar

Here's a painting I finished recently, titled "Waterwolf." I'm not confident enough in the composition to post it elsewhere, I'm a bit intimidated by all the awesome on this site. I've been trying to loosen up with poses while trying to keep an eye on anatomy. I also experimented with lighting since I'm in the midst of Gurney's book on the subject (OMG SO GOOD)

[Stormslegacy]

Posted this into the critique center so i could get critique but I am fairly proud of it so am sticking it here too =3

The pose for the zebra was challenging, I doodled in my sketchbook until I came out with a suitably dynamic pose. I wish I had used a differet paper though, I feel that may be responsible for a little bit of the muddiness of the color.

[Henrique Ventura]

Hi!

You do nice wolfs and dogs, they look amazing.

The humans you draw are also good, but need a bit of improvement, i feel they're shy and small : ) Try doing more humans, big ones, at different poses and you will sure get better. The guys around here recomended me Andrew Loomis books, and i'm also on this journey, maybe you should give it a try, cause you already got talent.

Keep going

[Stormslegacy]

Thank you for your kind reply =3 You're right, my humans do need some work. I hadn't thought of them as small before but looking at them I think I see what you mean.

I've been reading "Figure Drawing: Design and Invention" But checking out Loomis's "Figure Drawing for all its worth" looks good too. I really wish I could afford models right now to help apply that, I've been using Pixielovely's Gesture tool mainly, maybe you'd benefit from it too?

http://www.pixelovely.com/gesture/figuredrawing.php

[MatthewHD]

You should do a werewolf and werepuppy, and make sure to make them extra furry.

[Smvuy]

try hybrids :3

[DARKTHUR]

Hey cool sketchbook here! I really enjoy those animal studies, they look very dynamic and full of power!

[Stormslegacy]

haven't updated in a while, shame because I've returned to keeping a daily sketchbook that i take everywhere with me and I swear I've been showing remarkable improvement =3

These sketches were created a weekend ago on a trip to NYC--the darker ones were in a bar. One woman clearly was not happy with her date, I had some fun seeing how few lines it took to capture her expressions. The other couple was quite happy, with the man telling her secrets etc. The other sketches were from our hotel room window of tourists.

[Stormslegacy]

Went to Dr Sketchy's basically a twist on a one-off lifedrawing class where the setting is a bar and the models dress in themed costume. It's a lot of fun, there's prizes, and I've yet to find a less-expensive art class. Sometimes the models move (they're not professional art-models per say) but it's still mush better than what I was getting =D

These four were my best from the other night, the one in ambers was 5 minutes, all of the others were 10. The one in black ink was for one of the contests, where you had to draw without ever lifting your pen from the page--a challenging task! For materials, I mostly use copic marker on cardstock.

[Stormslegacy]

My best from last night's Dr. Sketchy's. This is the one that I felt was best for the night =)

I really with I could get my "normal" style to look like my gesture one. Much more loose. Does anyone else have that issue?

[Stormslegacy]

A piece called "Vixen Alarm Clock," done at the request of a couple in exchange for a generous donation to the rodent rescue I am part of. The husband is a late riser and his wife is an early bird. Since they both use animals to represent themselves, this picture was born =)

I wasn't thrilled with the vines at the bottom, I think I applied the colored pencil too soon when it could have been fixed but as I went to fix my mistake it started to look overworked =/ next time I will stick with the watercolors as their translucence is a lot more forgiving.

Medium is watercolor and colored pencil, 9X12

[Stormslegacy]

More from Dr Sketchy's, the life-drawing classes at the local bar I mentioned above (hence the adult themes, though the models never actually get naked) My best two of the night.

Unfortunately, this month there were some major electric issues and the lights kept flickering off for a fem minutes at a time. In the brown one, the models kept moving in ways so significant I had to draw much from memory and it showed. It was supposed to be a 10 min pose but I did several in that time so probably more like 3-5 minutes. The greyscale one was 10 minutes and aside from the hands the models did a great job holding the pose--the lighting changed a couple times so I tried to fill in the lighting myself from the main light.

I'll need to post more charcoal studies, I prefer to work in marker at the bar because it's much less messy!

[SpiralHorn]

The Dr. Sketchy's thing sounds like a lot of fun, even if it is adult themed. I'll definitely have to go to one if I ever get the chance.

It's good to see you working on humans, a lot of people that do animal and anthro stuff never bother, and it really shows.

Anyway, I'm glad you're here. I always love to see animal/anthro artists branch out from the furry community bubble.

[Stormslegacy]

Thank you for stopping by!

Dr Sketchy's is great! Mines in Northampton MA, but there are groups all over the country, you can find your nearest one here: http://www.drsketchy.com/

I admit, I've been really intimidated about posting for that reason, I know a lot of people are very against anthro artists due to the unprofessional reputation of many in the community. I'd like to think that it's a minority though!

I'm finding the transition between anthro to humans is a bit hard, but it's also easier to self-critique since the flaws don't hide themselves well (yay neuro-circuits set to human faces!).

[Stormslegacy]

Spent last night doing hand studies from one of the gesture machines out there, link is on my ipad but not this computer, sorry!

These weren't timed and are done in ball-point-pen with gel ink. I'm trying to learn how to model form better and wanted a medium that forces me to think about layering. Tonight's studies will be in charcoal =)

[Stormslegacy]

I'm 1/2 through a series I'm doing of watercolor pinups of the ponies from My Little Pony for Bronycon this summer. They're inspired by the old-school kind of watercolor pinups one might see in magazines or on posters.

So far my favorite is Twilight (the purple one). I like Applejack's (the orange one) but I wish the blue was more on the warm spectrum--this is what i get for painting it at night to an old light! Shouldn't happen again though, as I replaced the bulb in my worklamp to day-spectrum =D

Medium is watercolor and colored pencil, 9X12

Characters are owned by Hasbro.

[Stormslegacy]

Two more watercolors from the MLP series.

I tried experimenting with changing the horizon, as many of my characters are done from the same viewpoint. I'm also trying to limit my pallette. In the case of the one with the unicorn, I am of mixed feelings about the background--I wish I hadn't gone back to try to correct some "issues" with the paint, but doing so I made a good thing mediocre--I accidentally introduced water splashes into what would have been a lovely finish.

[Wilson38115]

I'm kinda in the same boat took some art classes at my local college and now I'm teaching myself. I love your animal sketches and I think that's what my next venture will be.

[Stormslegacy]

Thanks! Animals make great subjects, and unlike drawing people it's not considered rude to stare at dog (as long as its not in the eyes of course!). Dog parks are awesome places to sketch.

I've found that reading and practicing a Lot as well as seeking critique from knowledgeable people goes a long way for learning. Good luck with your ventures

[Stormslegacy]

Been doing quick sketches of dogs from the numerous photos I've taken, after spending time observing them play (unfortunately, too cold for sketching outside, brrr!). If you're curious about my dog photography, I've started a tumblr

They're out playing in snow, hence the abrupt disappearance of paws. I had fun capturing expressions from body position and eye-shape =)