Fear and Learning in ConceptArt (Updated not-so-daily!)

[TrottierJS]

Keep at it.. just takes time and lots of practice.

[keeptime]

Thanks everyone. I'll take a look at some perspective tomorrow, maybe even tonight before bed. Just did some more figure drawing today: seven 30s, four 60s, two 5:45m, and one 10m. I'm noticing that I'm feeling a lot more comfortable with the shorter time spans than I was last week.

[Jaik]

your lines are very loose and fluid which is very good. I'm sure you have been told this but have a gander at some anatomy book, hogarth, loomis (especially drawing the head and hands) and work through drawing some of those and you will improve very quickly. Good to see you are starting at such a young age! Wish I would have started when I was your age.

[keeptime]

Thanks Jaik! Last post of the night, I swear. Was bored so I took Jaik's suggestion and worked a bit on Loomis's head and hands.

[keeptime]

Sort of a rough day today so I'm just unwinding with a few more Loomis heads.

[keeptime]

Did some proportion work with Loomis and an attempt at a figure in perspective without Loomis. I think I might need to tackle the latter with Loomis.

[keeptime]

Still struggling with the full figure.

[keeptime]

Whoops, went on a bit of a road trip to Ontario for a week and ended up neglecting my art because I couldn't handle drawing in a bumpy car.

I worked on the environment piece a little bit more. I tried adding colours in a "multiply" layer and everything's really dark. I tried playing around with some other blending options and none of them worked well. I don't think I understand how to add colours to values in photoshop properly. Either way, I think I'm finished with this forest piece. I don't think the piece itself is finished, but I'm sort of at a dead end for what to do next.

[keeptime]

Sketched some trams last night to relax, and a speed skater this morning. Both are from reference.

[Psychobuddy]

Hey, theres about a million and one ways to add colour in photoshop. You are on track with multiply; overlay, soft light, hard light, and just straight colour blending modes do really well. It's all a matter of knowing what how the layers work. Multiply, I don't really know how to describe it, but it sort of uhm...okay...it adds the value of the colour you're painting with, to the value of the colour underneath it. In short, it makes everything dark. XD Keep persevering though, you'll get the hang of it!

[jinny]

Hey keeptime, I'm sure you will but I just wanted to say go into your first year university art classes with a big can-do attitude. It'll take you a long way. Many of the people at my college that didn't have that attitude aren't coming back or progressing.

Hope you enjoy your first year! Keep on posting.

[keeptime]

@Psychobuddy, thanks for the tip. I should have guessed that "multiply" means it multiplies the values, but I had no idea. I'll have to give colouring another shot.

@jinny, thanks for the encouragement!

Ho hum, more figures.

[keeptime]

Realized I forgot to give my raccoon eyes and a nose. Okay, I think I really am finished with this piece now. Bit off a little more than I could chew, but it's alright. At least I learned a few new tricks.

[keeptime]

Started working on making a semi-realistic Pidgeotto of Pokemon fame. Ideally in the end he'll be catching a Magikarp. Just fleshed out some of the main shapes and colours. I haven't been able to figure out how to incorporate the crest without it looking cartoonish. Might have to vary the palette a little too.

[keeptime]

Started filling out the feathers and then realized I'm doing the same mistake I did on my raccoon piece with the fur. I think I'm going to do some shape light studies today because I realized that if I understood how a ball is lighted I could more or less apply it to the head of the Pidgeotto.

[keeptime]

Did the ball first from imagination and then tried drawing my pencil sharpener from life. I think it's safe to say I have no idea what I'm doing.

[jinny]

Hey, I like that pencil sharpener! You should do more lighting practices from life.

[keeptime]

Thanks! I tried doing my cereal bowl shortly afterwards but it didn't turn out so well. The reflections of papers and junk on my table in the bottom part of the bowl sort of confused me. Also there was a spoon sitting in it, hence the weird random shadow on the left.

[mistersomes]

I think you should render with pencils first so you won't be too overwhelmed by digital painting. Watch out for your proportions too! Keep it up!

[keeptime]

Thanks for the advice mistersomes. I usually like doing my studies in pencil, but today I already had my tablet plugged in and in front of me so I figured I'd do some digital ones.

Some more figure work today. I think I'm getting better, even if it's just by a little bit.

Also forgot to upload some stuff I did the other day from a Vilppu(?)-inspired tutorial. The first two box mannequins were basically copied from the tutorial, and the last two were ones I tried on my own. Not sure if I really like this method.

[keeptime]

The head of my spoon and a roll of duct tape. Then filled out some basic shading on the Pidgeotto. I'm not sure how well it's coming across, especially the chest. Going to keep plugging away at this.

[keeptime]

Tried to do a simplified skeleton so I could get a sense of the form and ended up discovering that I didn't do a very good job on the anatomy the first time around. I tried fixing it up but I think it might actually be worse than the first one. Thoughts, anyone?

[keeptime]

Only meant to spend a maybe twenty minutes on this to just unwind a little and I think I ended up spending an hour and a half. Not a fan of the big sausage hands but I wanted to get this drawing over with tonight. I'm sure I'll hate the entire thing next time I look at it. Now off to bed and let's hope this weird strain in my forearm is gone by tomorrow morning.

[latus]

Nice progress keeptime!

Try to use brushes with lower opacity to soften some edges.

Keep on good work!

[[Rhÿnn]]

I really do like the pixel kitty!
I also like the composition of the purple image, It's taking a nice direction.

[keeptime]

Thanks Rhynn and Latus! I'll have to try adjusting my brush opacity sometime.

Didn't do much art today. I spent all day watching "You Have Been Watching". The first set of digital doodles is what I did listening to an episode. Frankie Boyle, in response to a television show about dissecting exotic animals, said "Why were they so amazed at everything they found? They're scientists! They cut open a giraffe and go OH LOOK AT HOW MANY VERTEBRAE IT HAS IN ITS NECK! It's a giraffe! What were you expecting to find, a fucking horse with a periscope?". The image stuck with me all day.

But I digress. I did a page of quick birds, and a facade from a university building while waiting for the bus. The awful mess of graphite on that same page was an attempt at drawing my hands while on the bus. Not a feat for a beginner artist.

[keeptime]

Handshandshands. I initially had the timer set at 60s, but I found that was too fast so I changed it to 120s. Some images got recycled after the switch, hence some of the duplicates.

I move in two weeks and start my degree in three. Crunch time!

[jinny]

You're gonna hit that campus running! Keep up the good work.

[keeptime]

I sold a textbook for $100 and immediately spent $60 of it on art supplies. Bought a new large sketchbook, some black ink pens, and a twenty-four pack of Prismacolour pencil crayons. I thought it'd be fun to take a few requests on DA to give them a test run and immediately regretted it once I started working. I took them waaay too seriously to do for free and found it really hard to shut off the perfectionist part of my brain. Both of these were done in about an hour and a half. Not terribly proud of them. Greek gods are weeping at the waste of expensive pencil crayon.

[keeptime]

Some more randomly generated two-minute hands and the security guard at the health building. I realized halfway through drawing her that there's a very real possibility I could look like her in another decade or two. Unfortunately I wasn't able to capture any specific facial details.

Forgot to mention that once I move (twelve days! Aaah!) I'll have my very own scanner up and running, so you guys won't have to suffer camera uploads much longer.