AfricanVoodoo's Sketchbook

[AfricanVoodoo]

I have been blessed. 

XFiles: 

your faces often bit samey, not such a terrible thing but maybe try some variety, maybe you can do portrait study of a different face a day to start seeing the range of variations out there.

Oh, word?.... And to think I was doing fine with diversity in faces. I guess I was staying in my comfort zone too much. It doesn't hurt to be a little free with shapes and asymmetry once and awhile. I do need to go on that weird website, earthsworld, again because the faces and people there are priceless.

dry different approaches. draw quick, slow, loose, structurd.. and find which one lets you observe and retain that info the best.

 Drawing slow, looking at the reference carefully and taking notes, and drawing something with reference and then trying to memorize it and draw it again are the keys to victory for me. I stopped with the whole "quantity over quality" phase because that was not helping me remember things.

Thank you all for this! I hope you all have a blessed day!

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... *pops neck unexpectedly* hello how are you doing?



the mood

Last Week









i apologize for the wide shoulder girls, it is was a sin i regret doing



(Art): 






(Art): A sketch for the Dragon Knight. This was sketch was mostly here to find a mood for the armor. I just looked up some reference on medieval armor, dragons and other video game designs and just... did something with it. Because of the body type, it didn't really look as cool as I would like it to be. I want them to look... threatening? Like, they are suppose to be knights and guardsmen for the royal family so if someone tries to fuck with royalty, then the Dragon Knights can pop up and growl at them or something.

I'll see what I can do with this. 

Tuesday



(Art): Hmm... I actually like the dark block of shadows on this one. Didn't sketch all day because school and people are draining and my A/B honor roll hunt is still going strong this year. This is the only thing I could muster. 

Wednesday + Thursday




(Art): So, I got this book that was like... the history of wardrobes and stuff and it is actually pretty cool looking. So I was just drawing the people that was in this book.  I am kind of mad about the man in the second image though, I don't like that I gave him a big head when the most defining thing about the ref is that he looks... macho. A small head with wide shoulders suggests this dude is tough business. 

I literally reversed the sizes and now he looks like a wimp. Which... I am fine with actually. No where in the book does it mention him being a knight, fighter, whatever. He is just that thicc. BUT, I think he is supposed to be that Prince Charming sort of person who gets the ladies so I suppose the body type is needed.

ANYWAYS, people like the drawing, i dont

(Oh, and I am doing more with the dark blobs of shadow. Ya likey?)  


The Plan

So uh yeah. I was given some wisdom from two lovely, wonderful, extraordinary,  terrific  people. And here is what I got.

 In a nutshell, my main problems is form, construction and a lack of real world info/visual library. Other issues include:

• Samey faces (i guess? I gotta ask XFiles for more specific answer) 
  
• Color theory and values
  
• Not as convincing or dynamic poses for characters
  

Yeah.

So, what I would like to do to get rid of this problem is to just...  do a variety of faces and figures like the guy up there (real creative). I'll go into Earthsworld and look at the faces, analyze and draw a face, then try to turn the head around to see how their features would look in different views. I'll try and do one face every single day, this is so I can focus on one face at a time (it also helps me contain more info that way) Then for the poses, I would just do more figure studies and studies like the buff leg bard person. The poses the people have in that book is pretty much what I was looking for in character designing so I might as well take advantage of this before I have to return this thing back.

Friday



(Art): Heh, still having trouble drawing Arron. The dude's eyes are the problem and I am still pretty indecisive about how his face should look like. Can't ask writer friend since he literally has no idea how his characters look anyways so I'm left on my own. I'm good though, just gotta keep on exploring.

(also.. the dark blobs makin a comeback ayyyy)

Saturday



(Art): Warm ups... at like, 7 pm. I didn't do anything all day other than finish watching some shows... It's a fucking weekend leave me alone.

FACE OF THE DAY - 1 



(cosplay by: ShinrajunkieCoslay on DeviantArt)

I was actually talking to writer friend one day while we were waiting for his family to pick us up to go somewhere and I mentioned that Arron was going to look similar to Wakka from FF10. He asked who that was and I was slightly offended but I looked up Wakka on Google anyways, this was when I saw this cosplayer and I was like... "woah. That's a good cosplay That is (kindasorta) what I want Arron to look like!!"

That was like... a month ago though.



(Art): So first, I looked at the ref and drew it, then tried to draw from memory, then draw it again from the ref to see how I fucked up, then I had to go to Dave & Busters....

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... didn't come back till 12 am

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(and no dark blobs for this one. damn.)

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So as you can see, I did not do that much sketching this week. Lots of school-related shit is happening, I learned that one of the biggest scholarships that I can get into is now out of the question because of one fucking credit, drawing and pottery assignments (which is gonna get worse since I am getting two drawing classes now), I STILL have to do a virtual school class, maintaining that sexy ass A/B honor roll and... sigh.

I'm doing well though, I think I'll be fine. I just need more energy for drawing! People of the world, give me your energy!!