Neopatogen Sketchbook

[neopatogen]

Thank you so much guys! You really cheered me up:) Although, crits are always welcome as well!
some updates - Proko anatomy and studies for Artstation challenge.

[neopatogen]

I started those environments for Artstation challenge  following EDrocks course, but seems like I don't have enough speedpainting skill to do tons of iterations. So here's the story and some WIPs 2 concept shfor 2 illustrations and 2 concept sheets.
The story takes place in 2082. People learned to use hyperspace to go to faraway places in the galaxy. Robotics is one of the most deveoped areas, as well as prosthesis and bioengineering. The viewer is a geologist working for the World Space Organisation.  His purpose is to advise engineers on constructing geological robots (soil sampling machines, drill rigs) for further exproring energy resourses of other planets. 

1. The hero is visiting a robot factorys
- Location: robot factory
- Time of Day: midday? evening?
- Mood /Emotion/Themes: awesomeness, huge vs. small, science
- Weather:  cloudy
- Period:  future-times
- Focal Points: geological robot, military robot
- Activities: looking in microscope, climbing out of a mech, repairing, checking robots, a scientist greeting the hero?, a scientist chasing a robot who stole an artifact

---

2. The hero is on a planet (temporary code 754) with a set of robots, meeting an alien race
- Location: other planet (rocky, mushroomy, with scarse cyan vegetation)
Mushrooms and lichens are an essential part of life on the planet. Most creatures are symbiotic and can't live without shrooms on
/inside them. Rocks are ancient shrooms turned to stone.
- Time of Day: late morning? early evening?
- Mood /Emotion/Themes: suspition, tension
- Weather: sun and probably some clouds
- Genre: science-fiction
- Period:  future-times
- Obstacles / Objectives: path to an alien city
- Focal Points: an shroom-alien riding a shoom-dinosaur
- Activities: alien peering at the viewer holding weapon, while the geological robot is busy taking probes and the defencive + transport robots nearby

[Baoto]

Woah, I love the little robotic arms and legs studies you did a couple posts back! The arrows make the whole thing a lot more understandable.
I also quite enjoy those concept sheets and the 3D model of the beetle robot, more of that please! :)

On the ther side I can see some issues with your value thumbnails. The focus is a bit all-over with them. The greatest contrast should be at the point were you want people to look first. The thumbs and wip in your last post seem a bit undirected and the sometimes muddy shapes don't help get the story across. Maybe squinting at your thumb or zooming far out could help?

[neopatogen]

Another pile of shite found on my PC.
The 1st environment for the challenge turned out pretty bad in terms of values and composition because I skipped grayscale thumbnail stage, so I'm working on it with the 2nd environment.  Thanks to @Baoto and discord guys' advice my 4th comp is an improvement compared to the previous ones.
Some random stuff I did for drawabox last month and Proko as usual.

[neopatogen]

2nd environment and 2 concept sheets for the challenge. DL is today so I leave it black and white efor now, but might work more on the robots and maybe play with colors for the environment.

[neopatogen]

Some studies for now

[Dreschler]

Hey! I loved the way you make notes in your studies, that kinda spired me to do the same hahaha I see that all the time, but neve actually tried, think I'm losing time here lol
So, I think you should be a little more careful about the values, that scene with the robot and the scientists lacks of different tones and values, it kinda looks all the same, kinda greyish, the "doctor" running has the same values as the ones that are farther away, so I can't see da depht in your image, even though you positioned the other doctors far behind, also, the machine should have a darker value if you want it to catch people's eyes... Well, it's just a thought :) keep goin'!

[neopatogen]

Thank you for the crits Dreschler! Yep I really forgot to change the values of people in mid- and background. I also think that the whole lighting overall is poor, the glass wall on the bg making no sence, and I somehow managed to screw up the perspective of the big robot although I mad the blockout in 3d.

Anyway, some stuff here.
It might seem weird that I there's so much anatomy and no characters to apply it, but I still follow this short daily routine and almost got the torso section done (only neck left).

Took part in a challenge again and this time it's a weapon for Monster Hunter. It's a  longsword called Vertebrix. Once the Spirit bar gets filled, the sword gets elongated, which provides increased range and damage (hard skin between the spikes increases the cutting effect). It is made with the use of  skin, bone and spike of a creature from NH universe, Cephadrome.

[Fedodika]

Cool sword!

[Shalis]

Happy birthday neopatogen, although you are the one giving me a gift with this amazing sketchbook and your inspirational progress.

[kikindaface]

wow very cool sketchbook, tons of work, really inspiring ! keep pushing !

[Fedodika]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

[bagenew]

Happy birthday~
the spirit bar active ver. vertbrae longsword,I think u can do a handle transformation too,since such a long sword would be hard to use with one hand if the handle remains the same.It's my little thought when imaging using that blade.

[neopatogen]

Thank you everyone!
@badgenew great point, I think of tweaking this sword for another project so your advice may come in handy!
Back from a trip, managed only to do a few sketches traditionally. Did my first steps in watercolors, a pocket set and 9x13 cards were quite convenient to use. 
And I'm back to my daily anatomy :)

[neopatogen]

Worked on 1st character for a project, looks about how I imagined him but turned out not appealing at all. Will probably switch to vehicles for same or other project for a while, so warming up with Feng Zhu-ish escercise.
Also playing with 3d a bit. Still doing Proko dailies but I haven't made photos of the hand bones assignment (drawing rotated objects instead of following refs/checking  which is super fun) this time which  is super fun).

[Fedodika]

Hey neo, thought'd i'd give ya  big steamin pile o crits. 

First, see this? watch it; the whole series, it's like an hour total


Next time you do a gesture, do what he's doing, no more straight lines in your figure drawings when establishing the gesture. I don't care how nice the rendering is, nothing will save a stiff pose from looking stiff. You have a cool design here, it's like a dude from the matrix and the rendering on that metal thing is fucking awesome. Love the little smoke effect too, so don't sweat that stuff.

The problem is just stiffness. And flatness; which you need to evaluate carefully. If your shapes are a graphic shape, that is literally showing no turn of direction, it's flat and it kills depth. some examples of flat things:

https://s7d2.scene7.com/is/image/dkscdn/..._White_is/
http://dreamicus.com/data/face/face-01.jpg
http://www.dreams.metroeve.com/wp-conten...eaning.jpg

Now if you were to turn those things slightly, that makes them show volume, and the appeal of realistic drawing is in the depiction of volume/structure. You have a solid research strategy for character design; highly respectable. 

I think you should invest time into gesture and try to get your figures alone to look good, and this will make your design soar. If the anatomy and pose and face are appealing with no clothes, more than half the battle is won. Plan your poses more, show things turning, show volume. I know drawing correctly is tough, but the good news is, if you get the essential and inital curves right, the drawing will do itself in a sense. Even to the point of letting you leave things out for the sake of maintaining the gesture. Nothing is more powerful in drawing then gesture, it makes or breaks the piece. It pisses me off how little information there is on it in anatomy books and vids... so crucial!

Also, work the cloth into the gesture. Cloth can blow this way and that, look cool in big shapes. Use those C curves and S curves to show advantage. We are all made of water and water moves in waves, which is attractive... I'm getting too philisophical, but it's true!!

Cloth... it moves, if changes shapes, don't just go for that flat graphic shape, we've seen that! Make it interesting and make those sexy shapes as shaddi safadi would say. Sure sometimes, flat shapes are okay, but always bear in mind they ruin depth and if you can avoid em, do it!!


https://marko-djurdjevic.deviantart.com/...-481313459
https://marko-djurdjevic.deviantart.com/...-481094974
https://marko-djurdjevic.deviantart.com/...-480397973

Luv you bebz, keep goin at it!!!

[Hobitt]

Hey Neo great work as always!, I would disagree with Fedo gestures are a waste of time at this stage, i see you do a lot of anatomical draw overs over photos those are great , i would suggest you try to draw these parts from your head from all angles (if you do them already disregard this advice) make sure you always think of structure first later on you can combine all the parts and draw the figure from any angle.

[Mysti.S]

Hey, thanks for visiting my sketchbook, nice studies you have here, keep practising you can do even better. :D

[neopatogen]

Thank you guys! 
I will definitely need to re-draw this character, he doesn't fit into my story as he is. Here's a vehicle for the character, going to leave it for a couple of days begore rendering because I can't see perspective mistakes anymore.
And studies, yep I draw stuff from different angles sometimes, like hand bones here.

[xelfereht]

nice job on the bike. i'm so weak with perspective stuff like that
ill get around to it eventually
did you learn that stuff through Scott Robertson's books/videos?