Jazz' Junk Draw' (Practice Enviro update, Aug 6, 2011)

[DeeStar]

Hi JazzW thanks for stopping by my sketchbook. I really like your portrait of the girl. Coming along very nicely indeed! It's good to see how much youve improved over the course of this sketchbook. I'll be checking back

[Jazz]

Hi, DeeStar!! Thanks to you too, for paying me a visit! And thanks so much for the comments! I hope that as I get kicked more about my confidence in this art stuff, I'll soon only need to nudge myself in the right direction, and have fun with it.

This week I didn't do much. Too much other stuff to do, but really I was feeling crappy anyway. So as my best friend said for me to do...I chilled... I chilled today, anyway!

Some marker practice. Oh, I got some awesome tutorials about blending markers and coloured pencils!

I learned about blending with coloured pencil and marker here, plus scratching away layers of a page to make "white" lines. You might be able to faintly make those lines out where the block's "cast shadow" is (3rd pic).
http://www.mooresartgallery.com/colorlessblenders.html

I learned here to use a plastic "bowl" to make a marker palette, like a painting one. It works for me!
http://www.letraset.com/design/shopc...sMarkers#depth

I'm using Prismacolor markers, and a limited palette at that. O_O It's really hard to blend, but I think that coloured pencil blending tutorial gave me another way to smooth things out!

Really great practice over the days! I wish I'd done more, but I shall! I hope I can make the strokes smoother even.

[Jazz]

Oh! Thought I'd update my brother's portrait! Sloooowly trying to get his form in my head... Dang it!! I need to work on the nose, amongst other things! But it's coming along!

[-ALFASZ-]

HEYY thx for your kindness before, i read your post from first till here...what can I say?
its a total improvement (and i love the madness post LOL)
try to read alot of magazines, it helps a lot, in sense of proportion, emotion, and contrast(colour)....
btw nice to meet you jazzW, next time try to draw your favourite jazz player in grey tone i think it will looks fantastic!

[Jazz]

Hi, ALFASZ! Oh, you're very welcome! I'm happy to meet you, too! I hope to see more of your works when you get them up!

That's a really good idea about the magazines! Actually, I'm so cheap, I COULD be buying some, or borrowing some from the library. Shame on me for not! o_o If I want to get some emotion and lighting down, especially, I think they would help.

Hee hee! I'll see which jazz player is tickling me most right now. Again, great idea! Thanks so much for it!

[Fregy]

I went through your sketchbook as well. I really like the head constructions on the begining and some paitnings at the end. I think the portrets are done to heavily, try to make it more loos. No heavy dark lines, but light curves. Not sure if you konw about the posemaniacs.com page, it's good for pracicing quick sketching. I didn't read the text in posts, just looked at the pics, so if you already know the link, good for you. Hope to see more paintings and drawings soon .

Thanks for the support and critique. Since I am a total beginner in digital painting, those things you wrote are a big help for me. I'll try to apply them the next time I paint something. So far I was just following tutorials. Also I am kind of new in character design, styll trying to work on that. The lenght of the post is great , I like longer posts more than short ones.

[alesoun]

Your brother's portrait look like it's coming along great! Are you going to keep it in b/w or add colour?

[Jazz]

Hi, Fregy! I'm glad to help you with your progress! I like those longer crits if I really feel stuck, but I'm glad it did well for you!

Thank you for your critique as well, I appreciate it. As far as the portraits, I'm not sure what you mean by "too heavy". The thick lines are more guidelines, though. I put them in a layer below the actual paintings because they'll eventually be gone. I'm avoiding having lines or curves unless to show off some sharper edges. ^_^

Yes, I do know about Posemaniacs. ^_^ I've practiced with them throughout my SB, but I try to vary up poses whenever I'm gesture drawing mainly, so I look in other places as well. Mind you, all of them are great for ideas! I haven't used PM for a little while now. o_o

alesoun, thank you! Actually, I tried to overlay some colour onto my bro's pic, and BOY did it have a different look! I think I'll try both versions and see which one I like more!

[Jazz]

Man, it's been awhile! Plenty's happened in my life, so that's why I decided to take a break and not overwhelm myself.

Right now I'm getting back into the swing of things, so I'm trying to do a CHOW! First individual one I'm trying! I have sketches of ideas mainly, and I'll just put one or two up in the actual challenge thread. But I made these "cute" characters with "cute" powers:

Jelly Parfait with her strange abilities to not only scoop some parfait from her belly...in the shape of a heart...which she'll fling with her automatic flinging spoon at any storm clouds to make them cotton candy clouds, BUT ALSO...she can regenerate! Works out cuz there's only so much of her. But then...she's got a weakness, stemming from something I observed as a little girl eating a yummy jell-o parfait: Mixing a parfait up makes it NOT a parfait anymore. ;_; That's where Stormy comes in!

Stormy makes cute widdle tornadoes JUST to mix things up for Jelly. He's more powerful when the storms are bigger, but then whenever she hits one of his crazy clouds and turns it fluffy white, he gets weaker. o_O

I think they dislike each other a bit. :3


Did some life drawing while failing to get ice cream. I scored a free hotdog, though!




More Jelly/Stormy ideas. I'm at a loss...




Ummmm...don't ask. LOL!!




Ideas of how they could look...


I'm NOT a chicken! I'm NOT a chicken!! I WILL enter this CHOW. But I could sure use some help.

[alesoun]

Free hot dog ftw! I can usually score a free ice-cream if I put my mind to it, but I never yet got a free hot dog!

Jelly is looking good. Maybe Stormy is a less stylish pig-headed little brother?

[Jazz]

I only come across free hot dogs in unexpected occasions...I almost ignored the invite, too! XD

Thanks about Jelly and Stormy, alesoun! I don't know what to do with Stormy to make him look like a cute little supervillain! Bah, so new at this. ;_;

[alesoun]

Think "annoying little brother", Jazz. Heh! My niece has a son would fit the bill perfectly; always getting his older and younger bro.s into trouble (and mostly getting away with it because of those big, cute, long-lashed brown eyes of his.

[Jazz]

Awwwwww...I like how you describe him! Maybe he IS the annoying little brother who wants to be a supervillain, but he pretty much gets on her nerves! XD Like soooo many...and yes, big cute eyes when in trouble. XD In that case, maybe he's...jealous that he was made into a stormy boy and not a yummy dessert boy. XD

*gulp* I entered CHOW!!! ;_; *hyperventilates*

[JailHouseRock2]

Hay there Jazz, how you doing girl?

Your doing well in here, I like your brother's portrait, good values and light!

As form the Chow I think your doing wonderfully! Jellys looking uber cute, which is the point of course. And I really like the colour ideas you've come up with!

All the sketches are looking great, but maybe spend a bit longer on one, maybe a still life or something

Keep rockn'!
matt

[Jazz]

Hi, Matt!! Ah, thanks for visiting!! ^__^ Wow, I'm happy about my progress AND about the CHOW idea! I hope I can finish it!

You're right about actually spending more time on a piece. I try and then I get way too distracted, get away from it, and that's it. That's the last I try on it. I need to break that habit!

[ImaGEEnation]

Doing great with those studies! Keep it up, Jazz!

[Jazz]

Ahhh, thank you so much! @_@ I'll do my best!

[Jazz]

First off, sorry for dumping it on like this! I know it's a lot to take in, but if I can just up and SHOW it, I'm happy!

After all this time, I have done some figure studies!! But one night before I could really sleep, I needed to figure out what to do to occupy myself. I played with markers!


Interesting thing with this picture. The "girl" at the front was the first to be there, but she had a HUGE arm...which I changed into the arm of a large friend behind her. Yes...I went there. Don't judge me! O_O Kiddin'. Still, this practice really helped me see how I'm doing with markers. I have NO idea what I'm doing most of the time, but with things I'm trying to learn overall with illustration, well, it's working!

Now to just get rid of those funny lines! I don't know how to do good lines AND markers yet.

Now the rest (except one) are poses from Posemaniacs. 30 seconds and 1 minutes gestures.
















The last one is yet another self-portrait! There came a time that I just had to say "STOP!!" or my portrait would stop looking like me. Looks pretty much like me now! I see improvement from the last one I did. @_@ Mom said I didn't do justice to the eyes...awww...maybe next time.

[Jazz]

Time's lost, ain't it? I have a couple things to show, but I've been run ragged this past week. August 13 I'm heading out for a long vacation! August 4 is my birthday! ^_^ Where's the shame in putting that in?

Anyway, I just kept to doodling.





Nothing much until a couple nights ago. I decided to fool around with a character of mine.


I'm mad at the marker paper cuz it wrinkled. Now he's got wavy hair! O_O I don't WANT him having wavy hair! XD Maybe next time I'll try bristol.

[alesoun]

The self portrait is looking good, Jazz! Maybe a little more work on the hair would finish it?

[Jazz]

Thanks! I'm afraid to do anymore on it, alesoun. It was more a passing-by idea, but I could tackle that hair. I don't know exactly how to make the hair look more...worked on. Hee hee... I suppose it wouldn't hurt to look.

[alesoun]

You could try blocking in some masses, then smudging them.... you have great hair!

[Jazz]

Awwww, thanks, alesoun! Before I saw your response, I tried to do more with his hair... I blocked in stuff and made some subtle "strands" but forgot to smudge. >_< How does one smudge marker, I wonder!



I also remember his "other" side, so I put a little of that in on his face. O_O Oh, and I had to darken here in Photoshop cuz the scanner didn't do it justice. Honestly. Also, used a bit of reference for the hair!

[alesoun]

Well, you could try using a spare piece of paper and experiment with water and a tissue, I guess, but don't take that as Gospel, I don't use marker much....

[Jazz]

Yes, I would have to do it pretty fast, too! Ohhh, and there's some advice about...using coloured pencil with a marker's colour blender. Eh, well I won't do all that tonight! But it's a wonder I thought of it NOW. XD

I could also try out that idea you mentioned, alesoun! Thanks!

PS: ...What the heck did I make him wear? Poor thing. ;_;

[DeeStar]

wow, i love the guy character you have here. Jelly storm ideas looking delicious. I like the pencil ones best.

[Jazz]

It's waaay late but Dee, thank you for the compliment! Hopefully I'll be able to improve upon my efforts with those characters!

Sooo long, and I didn't complete a single picture (at least of characters) because so much has happened in the last months! See, I got into art university as a visiting student from the computer science faculty. THAT was tough enough. Now I'm doing tough classes! I've never done this kind of thing before. >_< So, I'm nervous, I must say! I'm also discouraged with character design at the moment (cuz I haven't done anything for months), but I'm doing a neat project in illustration class to create a character design from a phonebook name! I'll show that!

Right now I'm gonna show you some of the project stuff I did so far. It's not much, but it's helpful!







I used the above pics to help me create this Product Identity: the bubbles and fruit in fizzy juice! But this isn't the final. I have to work on colour to make the fruit stand out more; make the bottle look more like a juice/pop bottle; make the "water" and "bubbles" stand out as such...


Did an exercise in class: choose a style that I'm not used to and draw my project using it. I chose graffiti. I NEVER touched the graffiti style before!


Another class exercise. I was supposed to draw a face real and a face in a cartoony way, both having the same expression. Maybe it's me and little time, but I couldn't get the real face looking right!


Oh yeah, I did this on a whim one day. I like the curves, but I wanna do more! >_<

[Jazz]

Some sketches I did for the week... Too much schoolwork!! Bah!

A little Posemaniacs fun






Dunno why I put this here, but I was practicing with one type of pose. I always seem to use this one, and I still have all kinds of trouble with it!


Trying CHOW 176...well, not officially, just for practice. I like checkers. :3

[Jaytea]

ooo your gesturefigurethings are pre-tty cool. Nice rhythm developing in those works. :b Oh, and this one's awesome. It's like SUPER AWESOME FANTASY RPG yes so awesome I love that word.
also I share your pain with bananas. :C They always have to be foreshortened one way or another how annoying. For those still lifes with the fruit/vases [haha, great job. I wish I was that un-lazy], I think you should introduce a darker graphite into the works and push the contrast a little further. C:




and now that that's out of the way

GIRLS

[Jazz]

Thanks, Jaytea! The "vase" (it was supposed to be a bottle and I changed it. XD) and fruit are from a project that I already passed in. I ended up not really using graphite in the end, but coloured pencils and markers!

Funny you should mention graphite for darker tones! I was using just regular art pencils and then decided to use the graphite that I bought, and I just started doing poses using that! So thanks for the heads-up, cuz it's very true about darkening things up.

---

Hmm...posemaniacs because the model pics I had from a book can't be opened anymore. Well, for all except the first set here. I was just fiddling last night with that.






I did a little more freehand stuff in this one.