No, Really. Pay Attention To Me.

[Weeda]

I guess I'll just say a little about me: I'm 17 and I doodle a lot in school. Other than that, I don't have a great deal of exposure to art. I don't take it very seriously, as you can clearly tell. I just like to have fun with it. I just ordered a Wacom Graphire recently, for when I become a bit more inspired and motivated, but it would seem that the very moment I ordered it, was the moment I lost all my creativity.

[Weeda]

Anyway, here are my first couple attempts at painting (in order):

I got incredibly lazy when I got to the hand on this one and I just kind of forgot to fix it.

[BohemianChaos]

Not a bad start. If you're lacking inspiration, browse some of the other artists on this site, or elsewhere... I know sometimes that helps to light a creative fire under my ass! My suggestion to your current posts would be for you to study human anatomy. Good luck!

[Weeda]

Thanks for the advice.

Also, I've been wondering, what's a good way to practice different basic poses? The only time I really get to sit down and look at anyone is in school and really I only ever see the backs of their heads.

[JoeEffect]

hehehe!!! like a lot those funny sketches.

[Weeda]

Thanks. Like I said, I just like to have fun.

Anyway, here's two pics of a work in progress that I probably won't be able to finally finish for a few days because of work and school:

Depressed Clowns. Hilarious.

[Weeda]

If I don't have time to make a serious attempt (due to work and school), I might as well make a very quick sketch. It may at least help me get used to using a tablet.

edit- Whoops. Deleted...

[Weeda]

It's really weird but whenever I'm busy all I want to do is sit down and draw and paint for as long as possible but whenever I actually have the chance, I just don't feel like it. All I can bring my self to draw are these crappy little doodles.

I'm really hoping that the next time I get a chance to update, it will be worth it.

[Weeda]

Bob Marley WIP for someone at work.

[Daroy]

The depressed clown is funny as hell! Nice doodles.

[Weeda]

[Weeda]

Hey, I was wondering if I could get some feedback on these muscles. Do they seem reasonably accurate? I actually used a reference to draw the muscles. That's the closest I've gotten to an actual study in a long time. I've got to get on the ball.

Excessive and unnecessary additional explanation:This is just a WIP I hope to continue tomorrow. We'll see though. Sundays are the only day I ever really have off and for some reason I have absolutely no ambition on that day of the week. Ever. I'm probably going to end up clothing most of the flesh, especially to the bottom and left side of the page (as the lack of detail on these areas is testimony to), and that's why I'm posting it now, as it is. To get some feedback on the muscles.

[Weeda]

Wow. I actually got a little further today.

But should this have taken me about 5 hours to do? I'm guessing not. It always takes me so long and yet I get such unimpressive results.

[Weeda]

[Seedling]

Looking good so far! Keep going!

You might be interested in my Concept Art 101 thread. The link is in my sig. . .

[Weeda]

Thanks, Seedling. That's a great thread there and I'm definitely going to be trying some of those assignments.

Anyway,

This is the picture I'm considering using for Teen Challenge #29. Not out of any delusions of winning, but rather to hopefully help get me into a routine. I might end up starting over though because I really didn't like this picture from the start.
I assumed that most people would probably do zombies so I wanted to try to stay away from that, however now I hope I didn't stray too far from the topic: "Outbreak." Basically it's making fun of the way the News often leads you to believe you could very well die if you do not stay up to watch their 11 o'clock program.
I also tried to encorporate a couple different styles into the painting.


Oh, and there's definitely something wrong with my color. Everytime I upload a painting, it loses color.

[Tigermilk]

looking good bro, the bob marly portrait is very nice, I like the skin tones.
honestly I think you should focus on drawing though, learn the basics better before you tackle colors, which is a whole science in it self.

My main advise is to start drawing a lot from life, bring your sketchbook all over and draw what you see. You'll learn heaps of new stuff quickly.
Other than that I'll just wish you the best of luck.

btw, I'm 17 too, cheers to that too
/tiger

[Weeda]

Hey, thanks a lot, Tigermilk.

I've been working on forcing myself to draw from life more often, although I usually don't bother to post the results. But I'm definitely going to be getting a new sketchbook soon. One that is sturdy enough to not require a desk under it.

[Weeda]

Hey, I got a WIP of a painting I've been working on in Photoshop lately.
But don't think I've ignored all your advice, I've been doing some drawing too lately and I'll post some of that when I'm ready to post the finished version of this. But I thought I should maybe get some feedback on what I have so far before I do.

What have planned so far is adding a lot more graffiti, more dirt and grime, more cracks, maybe some grates or something on the wall, and other miscellaneous little details like advertisements, etc. Also, I hope to make the subway itself a hell of a lot better or get rid of it all together, but I was having a little trouble with it so I just put it on hold.

I don't do many enviornments so this was a fun change.



EDIT: Oh, I also need advice on how to make the bench look like it belongs because to me, it just doesn't.

[Weeda]

I have a few questions I was hoping someone could answer:
1. When I'm on this site, I see a lot of really smooth line work and inking. How does everyone get such smooth, nice lines. I can't even get such nice lines with a pen, much less on my computer where drawing feels awkward and photoshop seems to lag whenever I try to draw a curved line quickly.
2.When studying people, is it helpful to use photos for references or is it only helpful to draw from life, because I wouldn't feel comfortable asking any of my friends to sit still for me while I draw them. Nevermind the fact that to learn the full anatomy you need naked models, I couldn't even ask them fully clothed.... Come to think of it, I don't think that would be legal. They're all under 18.
3. If I'm drawing a portrait of someone, is it generally frowned upon to use grid lines to help be get everything right? Because I think that would help the accuracy but I don't know whether or not it would help the learning process.
4. Those sketches of poses and skeletal hands I did near the bottom of this post- do you think those will help me learn to draw more accurate hands and people, or are they just a waste of my time?

Thanks. Any input on these would be greatly appreciated.

A very quick sketch of Alfred Hitchcock and some poses (For some of which I used some Norman Rockwell paintings as references)

Skeleton Studies - Because I hear that's a good way to learn.


A couple White on Black sketches:





If you look closely at this one, you can see that Shrek is coming to the local Pizza Hut this Tuesday for Kids Night! That... exciting stuff....


Finally, some life sketches from my work. Well, except for the fat ass on right, of course.


Do you think sketches like these will do much to help me draw hands and people or is this not right?





Anyway, Here's the not-quite-finished Subway. I'm sick of looking at it though and no longer desire to work on it. I know there's a lot of stuff that I could have done better: the subway, the graffiti, pretty much every other aspect of the picture, but maybe I'll go back and fix it up in the future.

[ndp]

I think you should keep doing portraits, there is a lot of improvement in those.

[Weeda]

Thanks for the advice, Jarri.
It's funny you should say that because my next picture is of a singer named Jack Johnson, which I promised to make for a friend at work.


Any crits on this? I'll probably still do some work on it before giving it to her.


Here are some steps (does anything seem wrong at all in my process?):

[Weeda]

Some People:

For this I used photos of Abe Vigoda and a Monkey as references. Hence the name Ape Vigoda. I don't know why he's wearing what he is. I just thought it looked stylish, I guess.

I just did this because I could never do eyes well when painting a portrait. It's not good but it was just a little practice.




This is an unfinished redesign of the SNES character Mowhawk and Headphone Jack




My First attempt at vector art:
I'm such an asshole.
Image at 40%

Image at 100%


Ville Valo portrait I made for someone at work. This is when I realized how much I love painting people with big, dark bags under their eyes.


I think this is probably the best picture I've ever made, so be gentle, please. It's Noodles, the guitarist from the Offspring. Heh. His name is Noodles.



Some Crappy, Half-Assed Environments:

An actual attempt at drawing from life. As you can see, it sucks horribly, which is clearly a sign that I don't do it nearly enough. Also, please don't tell me to stick to playing that bass you see there, because I suck at that too.

[Weeda]

I highly encourage critiquing, but be gentle. A few of these I'm a little proud of... Especially the Dave Matthews one, even though it really doesn't look like him.

Some Portraits: (In no particular order)

Old Guy Squinting


Dexter Holland (Pretty crappy, even for me).


Dave Matthews


Ape Vigoda... Get it... Ape? EH?


Some Environments:

Niteo Urbs Urbis.


Poorly Thought Out Picture of a Shrine


Other Crap:

I think this is pretty self explanitory, eh?


Prison Guard. Burmese, I think?

[Weeda]

Put two unfinished pieces together to create one poorly finished piece.
Also, tried to make the double light source believable. Not so sure I succeeded.



-

[Christian223]

Nice pictures overall, and nice to see how much progress you have made, congrats for that.

A common thing i have seen in your images, you use too much values that are close to total black, try to avoid that and leave it to very small parts of the images, because it makes things look like hollow, holes, and that doesnt happen in reality where light bounces everywhere, for example in the face of the guard, there shouldnt be so much black in the shadow areas because the atmospehre is also lighting everything along with the sun.

Check this image:
http://alanformstone.com/images/tula...li_statue.html

The statue color is dark, and in the shadow area you can still see the shapes in it (its not total black, unless almost no light gets there, wich is in very few places, actually, i dont think i can find values very close to black there), the light of the sun is reflected by the floor, and in the shadow area you can notice that its lighted from down to up, and in some parts you can clearly see how the blue light of the atmosphere colors some shadows (in the middle of the statue).

I hope that helps you to make better paintings, good luck.

[Weeda]

Thanks for the great advice. I'll make sure to keep it in mind.

[Weeda]

I was looking for an old painting to try to remake digitally. I don't know who Michael Wolgemut is, but this is a portrait of him. The first one is obviously my remake and the second one is the original by Albrecht Durer.


I wanted to make a really tall picture. I know that proportionally it is all wrong, though.


I might change this one a bit yet. I still want to add a better background and I forgot to add dirt and stuff to the shirt.
I know I completely ignored the previous advice on this piece but I was hoping to give it some kind of more dramatic effect. I may have overdone it.

[Weeda]

Some WIPs from an album cover I've been working on for my friend. Any suggestions would be appreciated, because I'm pretty lost.

[Weeda]

I guess I'll give that whole still life thing a shot. This took around an hour but only about half that time was actually spent on the apple.... In retrospect, it seems like it really took a hell of a lot longer than it should have.