Olooriel's Practice Blog

[kencentric]

nice stuffs, keep on with the studies, you'll get good in no time ^^

[missimoinsane]

Loving the work... can't wait too see what's next :) I hope you don't mind I fave bombed your dA and added you to my watch :)

mii

[Olooriel]

Thanks kencentric and TonariNoPunpun! :) And thank you so much again missimoinsane, how could I possibly mind you faving half my gallery <3<3<3

What's next is... mostly lots of scribbles I'm afraid ;)
I have been on the lookout for an alternative to Photoshop, so I've scribbled a bit in a trial version of Mischief earlier last week (didn't do as much as I had planned, because the program is still quite limited, and because I had to use my boyfriend's computer (mine couldn't handle it). I was very disappointed and frustrated with my first attempt, as I basically reverted to a standard girl figure I would have drawn exactly the same way 10 years ago... and I know that her eye is off, but I didn't even feel like fixing it. Then I scribbled a couple of reptiles, not meant to look pretty, just wanted to understand their body type - not sure if I actually _did_ learn something, certainly didn't produce anything worth looking at.

The third sketch was again Photoshop, and just made as a quick birthday gift voucher for a plane-loving collegue of my boyfriend. I thought I might as well make it my daily study, I've never drawn a plane before (the clouds are mostly copied from the skyscraper study, because I was lazy :-P)

For the final two, I went back to SAI. I rather like the program, but I haven't quite figured out how to paint in my usual stye with it yet. Both the landscape and the girl profile are from imagination.

[Tygerson]

Love the colors on these. The windmill scene is really serene. My little daughter was super excited to see the airplane!

[Olooriel]

@tygerson: Thanks! :) Aww, how old is your daughter?

Checked out the gesture tutorials of Proko and Sycra that someone here recommended earlier, and tried to apply the technique. Having a hard time drawing fluent lines, even with the stabilisation in SAI (the 2nd and 3rd one).

I also experimented a bit with a new painting style in SAI, something very colourful and simple that would work for childrens books or the like, but I abandoned the idea later. Anyway, the bird is from reference, the robot from imagination and originally intended for Illustration Friday (topic: power), but I didn't finish it on time. In the second version I tried to get a better motion and perspective, but ended up not really liking the result.

And finally, I corrected one of my earlier perspective attempts (hopefully) according to some comments I got on another forum. I also did a couple of basic exercises to practise drawing from the shoulder (with pencil) and to practise using keyboard shortcuts (with an english Photoshop and a german keyboard, I had never bothered figuring it out until now), but I'm not going to show you pages full of lines, scribbles, ovals, cubes and rectangles, nothing to crtitique there.

[Olooriel]

More gesture studies, I'm so bad at these, I don't even know where to start and how to judge the results... despite watching every tutorial video I could find several times...

Also, still experimenting with new styles in SAI, on simple photo studies. Eyes, and just to see if I can make SAI do what I want it to, a screenshot study attempt at realism. I like how blending works in this program, could actually get used to this.

[Raedrob]

Nice studies going on here!
I should definitely do some Loomis stuff myself.

[Olooriel]

Thanks Raedrop! Yeah, I can definitely recommend Loomis!

So, here's more gestures, and I'm gradually getting worse at these :/
Also, two silly cartoon figures for an assignment my boyfriend gave me after an argument about whether or not I have the skills to work as an illustrator... (and yes, the faces are heavily referenced from 'Fun with a Pencil' because I've never drawn cartoony humans before).

[Matija Vuk]

Good figure studies :) I like the colors on that bird too

[Tygerson]

Really like that cartoon fellow with the stack of wood and robin. You gave him a really friendly face, and nice colors.

[Olooriel]

Thank you Matija and Tygerson! <3

More little figures after "Fun with a Pencil" for Illustration practice... it's been a while, man I'm so unmotivated...

[Olooriel]

Just one of these little guys this time:



Some scribbling based on a QI screenshot because I was bored (somehow liked the style though):



Some style experiments based on Leyendecker drawings:



And an actual Leyendecker study (I so need to study the heck out of this guy):



And all of these made me realize that I had to practise fabrics, so I did a couple of studies:

[Olooriel]

Right, it's been a while (first post for the year, yay!)
Actually I did most of these last year, except for the composition thumbnails, but whatever...

First one was just a speedpaint inspired by the 50th anniversary of my favourite TV series:



The second one was again just a bit of fun I had at Christmas, I got a book of my first childhood hero, this little cartoon bear (tired to figure out how to draw him instead of copying one pose from the comic, failed largely):



And now back to actually working on my skills. I'm concentrating on Master Studies for the moment, so you can expect more of those.
Sargent to start with:



And then there's the recent value thumbnails:

[Adam Lina]

Nice looking fabric studies. I need to work on fabric one of these days... You should pick up Michael Hampton's book Figure Drawing: Design and Invention for help with your gestures. He has a really great way of breaking down the figure drawing process. Keep up the good work!

[Olooriel]

@Hypnagogic_Haze:
Thanks! I've mostly used Loomis for my figure construction, would you say that Hampton is better?

I just realised that it has been three weeks since I last posted anything here - need to change that. I actually managed a couple more master studies last month, but nowhere near the number I had wanted to do in February. They frustrate and demotivate me, so I eventually decided to do some stuff from imagination for fun instead.

[Adam Lina]

Nice imagination stuff. I go through the same thing with doing studies and then falling out of the routine. I think breaking out of the study mode and doing some imagination stuff for fun is a necessary thing. You cant just do studies all day every day until you're a master artist. You'd lose your passion if you didnt also have fun with it. Doing studies can be fun too but variety is the spice of life they say. And to answer you from before; I think Loomis and Hampton both have plenty to offer and you shouldnt choose to only study one method. Look at all methods and take what parts work for you personally and develop your own process.

[Olooriel]

@Hypnagogic_Haze:
Good point about the methods, I'll check out some others.

Another funny figure, a portrait photo study (for a concept cookie exercise), a strand of hair to figure out which brushes best to use in Manga Studio before I do a longer photo study (if anyone is curious, dense watercolour seems to be the winner), one colour master study (Julian Onderdonk) and a couple of value master studies (Thomas Moran).

[Olooriel]

Again, long time no post. I have been painting a lot though, just not been motivated to share.

For starters, here's that longer hairstudy (photo reference):




Then there's another more cartoony character for Illustration Friday (imagination):




Another set of masterstudies:




There's probably the first pencil drawing in this thread (I haven't used pencil in years, so I have to get used to it again, but I started a sketchbook now, so expect more of this soon, of similarly low quality (sorry I don't own a scanner):




And finally there's this portrait from imagination (paintover of a 7 year old piece of mine to see if I've improved):




See you soon with more (I promise!) :)

[Olooriel]

More masterstudies:


Eyes (photo study):


Sketchbook page (people on the train and at the station, poses from observation, faces from memory):


Photo study, aiming for a more rough style (and failing):


So I did another (very quick) study in my usual style, then decided that turning him into a cartoon figure would be more fun:

[Olooriel]

Bit of a posting break there, because I have been away from home, and while I have been drawing in my sketchbook all the time, I haven't yet taken any photos of those pages. Also found it surprisingly hard to get back into my digital practice after this. And now I'm going on a week's vacation, so it'll be more sketchbook for me...

Master studies:



Expression exercise for Concept Cookie (that's my old RPG char):



Some Hampton from my sketchbook:



A Maleficent fanart:


And some outfit design for a contest on a game (character base is not mine), was an interesting exercise in adapting my style: