Legend's Sketchbook_001

[cgmythology]

Awesome work here, love the amount of figures you drew! My only suggestion for your digital paintings would be to establish a stronger value statement in the beginning to help things pop out more. Right now it appears you start with them at around the same value which makes it more difficult to paint anyway so you might want to avoid that. Keep up the great work!

[Jephyr]

Welcome to the forum. You've shared an impressive amount of work and studies.

My only advice is to keep it up and keep posting....

[Lege1]

@cgmythology Thank you so much and yes, I have put some time in over the years. I agree with your value suggestion and thank you for that.

@Jephyr Thank you and of course. I look forward to producing a lot more =)


A fairly quick study using both imagination and photo reference...

[Jephyr]

Looks pretty good — especially for a quickie. : )

I see you doing some really nice edges on the work you shared on the first page like this one http://crimsondaggers.com/forum/attachme...e1_96r.jpg

So I'd recommend even for quick studies to practice that — ie softening the hard edges on her jaw-line and shoulder.

You did do some of that with nice contours on her nose.

Anywho — I know sometimes you just wanna rip some art out — so please take that as a gentle critique and keep posting

[darktiste]

@cgmythology Thank you so much and yes, I have put some time in over the years. I agree with your value suggestion and thank you for that.

@Jephyr Thank you and of course. I look forward to producing a lot more =)


A fairly quick study using both imagination and photo reference...

I think you manage to capture the nose and the eye pretty solidly in term of volume the chin look out of place but it possible for the jaw to move sideway when your make a mean face.

I would still advise that you post the reference for comparison purpose otherwise you get general banal comment and critic. You will never for example get comment or critic on the likeness of the character or the expression being not there yet for example.

[Lege1]

@Jephyr Thank you so much and I appreciate the good words. Yes, the elephant piece I did with some other brushes I really enjoy using, I definitely would like to keep a lot of that in my work. It's strange how evolution can sadly lead to degression sometimes in trying new things and getting away from some of the old stuff that was being done. I just keep pushing and pulling though, I know what I mostly want my work to look like but I am very guilty of constant experimentation. Exactly, sometimes I just want to rip some art out for sure, and that is what this pretty much is. I'll def be posting more as I continue producing, it never ends, lol.

@darktiste Thank you and anything is possible on this one. I started working from a random reference online and then decided to go off road with it in the idea of not using reference. You're right about posting the original reference for comparison and critique, I'll start doing that. I went back in on the image tonight for a few on some more imaginary fun....maybe I ruined it, lol, I don't know...

[darktiste]

It hard to communicate your intention purely from a picture to someone who is outside of the visual direction that why i think rough sketch are necessary specially in the format of this sketchbook thing are WIP so it make sense to get a bit slower but it not necessary either.Finding an approach that save you time previously doesn't always end up saving time as every drawing is different.

One thing i would say on that is that painting is kinda taxing time wise if you aren't careful and don't plan a head with let say an under drawing. Using line work save alot of time during the gesture phase and atleast to me trying to capture gesture through blocking shape doesn't seem to be how one should approch gesture.Not that it something i observe you doing.

Dealing with less ''pixel'' as long as possible is a safe route it much easier to erase a line then to place value.But it would be stupid to approch figuring out the lightning of a scene using line... there always an exception to expectation apparently...

I think some thrive when the work is messy because they still see throught the chaos.They seem to be deceptively messing around for to long but each messy line is a note that eventually pay big for them ''failing fast'' is how to see clearly for them.

[Lunatique]

The hair looked better before because it had a better sense of volume. What I always tell my students is to draw and paint hair the way sculptors do--in masses and layers, because if you don't simply hair into that type of structure you'll end up with the "spaghetti" hair looks with way too much visual noise.

My advice on studies of people for artists who don't have a firm grasp on faces and figures yet, is to focus on doing faithful studies from references and don't try to make up shit. The reason why I say that is because at that stage of artistic development, the person is missing so much knowledge that when they try to make shit up, it always looks wrong/bad, and because they're missing so much knowledge and insights, they need to focus on fidelity/accuracy until they know enough to be able to start making things up (with the addition of studies of structures like anatomy and understanding of surface properties).

I would also advise to not over-render. Focus on general structure and go light on micro details that don't really contribute much to the overall feel of the piece. Take a look at these examples from artists I like in my pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/roblunachang/portraits/

[darktiste]

If you don't want to invent a sure way is to invert the reference you draw from this ''switch your visual thinking from a '' i think i know'' to a more of a ''i don't know what i am looking at and therefor i don't have preconceive idea about the subject''. It a great exercise to become aware of were own need to fill the gap of what we don't know.

But it doesn't ultimately teach you about the deep stuff like proper proportion and volume or anatomy

Observation is great but it fail at giving you a way to reproduce what outside of what you can reference.That why i encourage people to learn human construction method with primitive form because you can always evolve that construction method as you learn.From a very basic geometric form to more complex volume.

[Lege1]

@Darktiste: I agree with what you are saying about the rough sketching and everything else you mention there really. It all goes back to the idea that one cannot polish a turd, and trying is futile. If the foundation is not proper then the finished proper is destined to be a fail. I'm definitely going to get more into some of the more basic studies to develop better properly. I think that doing skull studies will be a great start and then gradually move forward from there. Thanks for the great advice as always. I'm definitely not here to try to impress, just to keep motivated to continue learning and improving, thank you Darktiste =)

@Lunatique: Thank you so much for that honest input and I take your input very serious because your work speaks for itself. I understand what you are saying abou the hair being constructed in clumps and I will be following that rule more to avoid the spaghetti hair. I definitely will be going back and working from reference and posting the reference as well. Every now and then I do like to test myself to see if all the studies and work from the past has paid off in any way, hence my recent posts, but I see that I still have much work to do before I can think too much about getting carried away from imagination. Not over-rendering is great advice, along with going light on the micro details, and trying not to contribute so much to the overall feel to the piece which I feel is a hard one for me right now. Excellent Pinterest board, I see what you mean, all those pieces look amazing. Thank you for your input and guidance.

[Lege1]

Some head studies...I'm doing these on a desktop computer with a Wacom Intuos Pro tablet.

[darktiste]

I am talking about the drawing with the sphere you can find the explanation in the ( )

(I think the skull is a bit more difficult to draw as it a pretty complex shape i suggest drawing the skull using the step from 2 to 4 and as you start to understand the shape jaw of first and how it attach to the sphere you move toward the cheek and the nose.(Helping yourself with the shape that form a skull reference sheet to figure out what shape to use)

Don't try to draw straight full skull that look like step 4 right away get comfortable drawing step 2 in different angle draw maybe 10 or more try your hand at step 3 see if you have some success if not step back and do 10 more of the step 2 once you feel thing solidify move to step 3 doing 10 head using the back and forth between the construction to solidify the understanding of the jaw check bone. 

One of the big step is going to get the volume of the eye socket right and the cheek bone it a very tricky organic form.

It not just a question of understanding the volume but the proportion learning the landmark of the face will help.

Using the reference provided should give you a chance to start with shape that are simple and effective.

What is great is that the shape doesn't change much for the area around the eye since those area are really close to the bone compare to let say the lips or the nose that as a completely different shape than the cavity underneath.

Skull are great if you like the macabre and you should study them alot if you plan to use them often. Otherwise i argue and i am gonna say this with a grain of salt learning the skull is not essential it allow you to understand how you can push the limit but muscle are probably going to be more important to learn to get facial expression right but those muscle still attach to the skull so ultimately it the relation and understanding of anatomy of the skull that is primary.

I argue that with construction method what underneath the skin become secondary but we cannot deny that what under it is accounting for alot of what we see.

What i am trying to say is that i don't necessary suggest approaching learning the head by drawing skull first learning the muscle second and finally learn the feature. I think you should focus on what we see first and then get nerdy about it and get underneath as you progress.

For example taking the arm as a subject matter for example learning the inner muscle before the superficial muscle would be kind of strange there is an orderly fashion you can go about learning but it just not an order you can figure out without some experience or someone that as is own idea about that order.

On that note i am gonna shut up and let the real anatomy expert speak. I am out of my wheel house when it come to human figure i barely touch it in all honesty my opinion are just base on what seem logical and comparing different popular construction method.

[Lege1]

.....

[darktiste]

I always want to measure two thing when i make observational drawing one is the vertical longest length of my object and the other is the horizontal longest length of that object i generally do that with a ruler but i do it lightly so it can be erase when need be it alot easier in digital and probably not such a good idea traditionally. Once i got that figure out i create a cross of that vertical and that horizontal that way i have my proportion taken care of pretty much the rest is just calculating inside those guide.After that you can additional take a ruler and divide the verticale and the horizontal futher this way i got additional guide for the smaller detail just like on a ruler.

One thing with visual measuring that is important is awareness of angle and taking notice of the ''amplitude of a curve'' a good exercise to practice accuracy is to do pair of curve that you make identical or try to make diagonal with the same degree which you can measure afterward with a angle measurer. Making small or longer stroke depending on the difficulty you want to practice.

The idea ultimately is to think with the grind in your head and not on the paper using the pencil to measure distance should be enough when you know where your invisible guideline are it can be done quickly when you get the hang of it(i never really used that idea that but a pencil is also a measuring stick if you think about it...) using the pencil grip illustrated seem to be the way to go when using that measuring tactic.

By placing the finger nail of the thumb on the pencil you get point A and the distance between the thumb and the end of the pencil head you get point B.This sometime probably make for awkward grip sometime but it doesn't matter that much when you are just barely making mark as guide for later on.

That of course a technique that prove only useful when measuring object that are unanimated.There is technique for visual measuring specific to live drawing but that an other subject for later perhaps...

[Lunatique]

When you do studies, one of the things you can do to get better at simplifying and identifying where to selectively detail, is to just block in the general shapes with flat values with the thick/wide side of the graphite pencil instead of the tip (or if working digitally, use a big brush instead of thin lines). This will force you to just sculpt the form down to its most important structure. Once you have that solid foundation, you can then selectively put in some smaller details.

[Guardian1]

This place is legendary. How do i become a part of this?

[RottenPocket]

Something I have been meaning to try myself and may appeal to you, I don't know...

Using colour brushes for preliminary drawings like Blue and Orange is useful, most digital artists use it as their base sketch and then do lines on the new layer. In traditional media, you do the same but can paint over the drawing with a semi opaque colour in the same hue as the base sketch. It doesn't always erase it but leave traces of your construction lines. I imagine the same thing can be accomplished digitally without just deleting layers or setting blending modes. 

Sometimes when you sketch your hard final lines over a coloured base sketch it lets you see things you were otherwise desensitized to, and correct it. 

If any of that makes sense.

[Lege1]

Really great advice and examples from @Rottenpocket and @Lunatique. @Guardian1 I think you have figured this much out already; but if you haven't definitely start a sketchbook for yourself.