Peter's Sketchbook

[Peter]

your presentation and line weight are really nice, its just the drawing its presenting is super stiff and lacks a lot of natural feel to it. Like take that pose yourself, try to be as literal as you can, even for the object shes holding, why would her arms be so wide apart? if you were clutching like a book to your chest, your arms would come in closer so it doesnt fall through.

Her (her) left forearm (which is half the size of the other arm,) is just barely touching her other arm, not adding any strength to the grip at all. her face is better, but the way its positioned is strange and unnatural feeling. Like the way her back is straight up and down looks uncomfortable and it lacks the natural curve of a spine

here i googled up some references of a similar pose for the arms
https://previews.123rf.com/images/gbh007...ground.jpg
https://d2gg9evh47fn9z.cloudfront.net/80...959249.jpg
https://fscomps.fotosearch.com/compc/CSP...178352.jpg


The weight of the book(?) is cradled in the arms, it feels like its there. Why is her dress pooled out so far back? I see youre going for  like a bougeureau thing with the plants and the seated girl but bougeureau had a good eye for shape seperation in composition.  With yours i cant tell what shes sitting on since the busy plants obscure the seat and clutter the scene

Notice boug has a clear seperation for the purpose of the read of the image and the plants are a detail and not a focal point

https://cdn.topofart.com/images/artists/...eau095.jpg
https://ae01.alicdn.com/kf/HTB1T5rQKXXXX...40x640.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c...886%29.jpg
https://imgc.artprintimages.com/img/prin...und=fbfbfb

Its usually a big stone block with a clear silhouette.

I dont think this is the best you can do, keep pushing yourself and exploring, this will be a weak image no matter how much you paint or finish it, you have to keep striving for a good pose that works and has energy and subtelty and a composition that reads well from afar.

A good challenge is draw the pose say 100 different ways, but quick like 30 second stick figures with varied camera angles and loose lines with big sweeping gesture, then hone in on the few of those 100 that work and refine them, dont just finish the first thing you sketch, explore more dont paint this stinker luv you no offense

Thanks for your feedback it's much appreciated, no need to worry about offending me haha.

The reason I put her arms that far out is becuase she's meant to be cradiling a lantern, I thought if I put her arms closer like you showed with the book it wouldn't be realistic since a lantern is much wider than a book she'd be crushinmg it.

At this point I wish I didn't include those bloody plants! Can't draw plants for shit, especially when they are meant to be detailed and well designed. Might just tone down on the amount of plants.

I'll see if I can fix this again or not, I think I'm just gonna spend less time on this and work on it over a couple of weeks so that I can still study/learn during the week rather than taking another 2 week break from studying just to work on this. Can't work on my art full time due to my day job and I don't want to keep on altering a piece thinking i can do better when the smart thing would be to take notes on where I'm currently going wrong and actively work on those areas for next time.

Forgot to add, I had her dress pooling to the side as I wanted it draped over the rock she is sitting on, again I'll probably change this.