John's Thread (Used to be super active! Still the longest thread name ever in CD)

[Triggerpigking]

Nice work on the updates dude, keep practicing them hands, are the hand gestures from life?.

[smrr]

Ayyyyyyyy Lawyer John!

Great stuff with the consistent hand and portrait studies, seeing some of that juicy improvement already

Don't forget about the landmarks of the hand ;)
It's the bumps and crevaces that help visualise what a hand looks like and how to draw it @ diff angles in space

[John]

@Mechanizoid - Mech! Thanks man!
@Triggerpigking - Hiya Trigger. The hand gestures are from Quickposes timed gestures. Found here if you're interested! 
@Sketchosoph  - Aye.. still a long way to go.
@smrr - Bumps like the knuckles? Sometimes, in timed drawings, I cheat by drawing the negative spaces in between the fingers instead of the fingers themselves! Yeah.. I probably should go back on the hands in different perspectives.

Thanks you guys.
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Hand gesture:


Bargue Exercise:

[John]

Hand gesture:


Bargue Exercise:

[neopatogen]

Your consistensy is awesome! You`re going to be a hands drawing pro soon ;) I`d like to try Bargue， too!

[OtherMuzz]

Bargue studies are looking good. Still a bit out. The goal should be to place the copy over the original and see no difference. You should try and match values exactly too.

Slow down with the hands. They are too sloppy, i doubt you are learning anything from them at this pace.

5 well drawn hands is better than 100 sloppy hands.

[John]

@neopatogen - Ahh Bargue.. My go to exercise when my head is drawing blanks on what to do..
@OtherMuzz  - They are crappy aren't they? Haha! Thanks for always being that guy who me calls out on the bad stuff. I know you don't recommend me doing them fast, but doing them really is like a warm up to me. Regardless, I do need to be more mindful, and not act like an aimless nutjob. And by the way, the Youtube quick gesture clip you sent me awhile back helped me a lot. Even though I may disagree with you at times, that does not take away my respect towards your thoughts or opinions. Thanks for that Bargue tip, you are absolutely right and on point on that. And finally thanks for that kick in the ass when I need it!
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Hand Gestures:




Something I'm working on:


ugh... so uninteresting. And I thought it was going great yesterday. Will change the pose.

[OtherMuzz]

No worries dude. I get that the hands are just a warm up but you are spending the time drawing, so you might as well get something out of it.

Maybe try a new process? Something like this? (not the best drawing lol)

[John]

@OtherMuzz - You kidding? That's awesome! I wish I could see how you saw those initial construction lines. I wouldn't have figured it out that way. I always operate by blocking in an under drawing. Is there a name for that approach so I could Youtube or Google it?


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I shouldn't have taken free time for granted. Never know when real work will loom its ugly head.

More hand studies:

[OtherMuzz]

Those initial lines are just looking at the entire mass, and working out the proportions and basic angles.

I would say that this approach is 2d accuracy, as opposed to a constructionblockout. Both have their purpose, as they give you different insights.

Ron lemens youtube page is a really good resource for this stuff. https://www.youtube.com/user/ronlemen1/videos

[John]

@OtherMuzz - Definitely worth a look. Thanks for this!
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Hand Gestures:


Bargue:


I'm getting sloppier. Need to push hard to a more focused direction.

[John]

Hand Gestures:




Color Study:

[Ambiguity]

Aye John, killer amounts of time put into those hands, way to go :). I thought I'd mention something that helped me with them recently that I was neglecting though: the gesture. Often I feel I can get the hands to read as hands a lot quicker just using the gesture, and after that the structure becomes somewhat of a cake walk to add on top because I already have a strong scaffold. Most people agree it works for building up the figure, so why not the hands :)?

[DQ_Nick]

@Broadway - Hi! How I wish to have that kind of discipline. As for the portrait, you're right and good eye. I should've pushed the highlights farther. Thank you for the kind words and critique. Totally appreciate it.
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Hand gesture:

Movie still color study:

Yeah Blade Runner!!! good film choice for lighting

[OtherMuzz]

It looks like you are using two separate parts of your brain for the bargue studies and the hand sketches. You really want to try and use the part of the brain you are using for bargue , and doing the hand studies to speed it up. Like you want to make the comparative measurements in your head, so they become an automatic thing where you don't need to draw them. Harder said than done, but it should be a bit of food for thought.

[John]

@Ambiguity - Thanks for the advice! While I'm not particularly sure how you tackle gesture drawing, I've tried laying down implied lines to indicate where the shapes are and the line of action method, both blew my proportions way off! I'm really comfortable with the blocking in method in quick sketches. I am open to doing them again after I figure out a way to make things look passable.. I am still open for suggestions for other methods!

@DQ_Nick - A little secret. Whenever I open my browser, I have your sketchbook opened. Not even kidding! I adore your film studies. I'm trying to squeeze something out of your sketchbook! I haven't properly thanked you for the inspiration. Thanks!

@OtherMuzz - That is an interesting way to tackle the quick sketches that I actually tried it! But instead of pulling off 60 seconds, I gave myself 2 whole minutes, (which in turn decreases the number of hands I'm making). A minute won't cut it for me! I just realized there's a lot of second guessing, thinking, and measuring whenever I do the Bargues. You're pretty much on point with saying there is a different thinking process to different approaches.

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Hand gestures (2 min):


Gray scale portrait:

[OtherMuzz]

Nice head study :)! And yeah those hands look like they are going in the right direction now.

[JyonnyNovice]

Yea that head is great, you've really developed a great shading style, it looks effortless but I know those strokes are filled with purpose! (I know it's so since I can't do stuff like that in digital)

Did you read 'Drawing Dynamic Hands' by Burne Hogarth? (you can find it around the web someplace). I don't particularly like his hand drawings, they are too exaggerated and not so appealing to me but the book is filled with little tips that you can use in quick drawing. Stuff like where the tip of thumb aligns with the other fingers when hand is bent, how the knuckles of the first and third fingers line up with each other etc etc. It's a great book to scan through and study as needed.

[John]

@OtherMuzz - I was expecting another slap on the back of my head, and what I got was a rare slap in the butt... Hmmm... you're probably not Muzz!

@JyonnyNovice - Hiya Jyonny it's been awhile! Those heads, those were just copies from references, so there's nothing really much to them! I don't have Dynamic Hands and I adore Hogarth to death. That's good advice. I should check out! Thanks!
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Hoo boy, another rejected application from another game company.. It's worth mentioning because they actually critiqued my portfolio! Very surprising, disappointing, and motivating.

Hand gestures:


Something I'm working on:

[John]

Hand gestures:




Personal :


I'm already seeing where I did wrong. Tighter rendering on the next.