Jones Sketchbook

[Warburton]

Cool progress dude, your still persisting in updating regularly and drawing often, which in my opinion is the hardest part of the battle of improvement. Sticking with it through times when stuff feels crappy is always lame but it gets beter, i think ;p.

Keep hammering the fundermentals dude, and i look forward to seeing more of your progression ;)

[JonHop]

Hey man,

my bad on taking a while to comment here again. See you're working hard on your digital, studying some objects from life again is gonna help you in understanding form and light more dude. Even just doing basic ball or cone or cylinders etc but from life, having them and drawing them from in front of you.

If you can make it to any figure drawing sessions I'd recommend going, it will be of great benefit to you and your anatomy studies.

Keep putting in the hard work and pushing yourself like you're doing and you'll level up ;).

[Jonesoda]

@Warburton - Thanks, I try to work and update a lot. sure is easy to waste time though. Feel I could get a lot more done a day still though.

@JonHop - Nice seeing you in here again , I deffinately got to do more studies from life, noticed that a lot of my work doesn't portray light quite correctly on forms. Got it on my list of things to do soon.

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So I was thinking last night...Thinking about what I'm doing wrong, I read through every comment in my sketchbook again. I have a list now of the things I'm going to do, and I think my level of understanding on how to improve is also clearer.

Also with my linework and studies prior to now, I was always trying to do really tight lines without any foundation, I'm now working more loosely, and refine as I go along. Not as frustrating to do.

Today's work so far, about to eat dinner and I'll get back to it after.

Body/lighting study, had to use a some proportion guidelines to correct some mistakes, updated an old painting, seeing how much better I could make it - should have spent longer on it though, only went for 40 minutes or so.
Figure studies using lose method and refining

[JerryActric]

really good figure studies man ! and your drawing is also getting much better !

[joerdenleigh]

When you feel like you've hit a wall your actually just leveling up and need a break. Looks like your on track though, however here's some things that I use that may help , I dunno I'm about to hit the pillow here and saw your sketchbook.

feng > http://www.youtube.com/user/FZDSCHOOL

drawing script for life drawing(think a dagger posted it > http://lovecastle.org/draw/

gnomon(relative DVDs)> http://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/store/p...EsxxI1lTYg

[Jonesoda]

JerryActric - Thanks, Really been trying to improve my lines.

Joerdenleigh - That's good to know, hate when I can't get stuff done though, Also thanks for the link's, I've watched a good sum of FZD video's but haven't check the other two places out yet.


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Today's work, Still gonna be doing more this evening but I'm not sure I'll get em done tonight.
Female figure studies (with clothes) and I tried starting something I wanted to make 'finished' to the best of my ability, But I'm horrible at setting up a good composition, pose and all that. Seem's I'm brain dead when it comes to sketching up those. Just a plain complete side view for this one :/

Not sure how to improve upon that, I find that's my biggest hurdle right now. I would have pushed that thing further but it just looks incredibly lame how I set it up. I wan't to do more personal stuff, I have idea's but subsequently I'm discouraged by my abilities with setting up the pose and everything. Anyone got any tips on improving ability on making interesting composition and poses?

I'm thinking perhaps movie screenshot studies Idk, anyway Gonna get to those life light studies soon. Really wanna get more personal stuff done along with more studies - wanna keep a good balance.

[JonHop]

Just from looking at your re-do of paintings and recent studies you've already improved man, keep it up! Remember as well with painting your brush strokes can help to describe form and detail if used appropriately, one brush stroke can do the work of many( something I really have to keep in mind also!). I'll try to catch you livestream the next time you're on, let me know (if our time zones aren't too different).

[Jonesoda]

Thanks Jon, I should be streaming sometime soon, been testing it to see if everything runs well on this computer.

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Today's work, Tried an illustration but I disliked what was going on there. and didn't push it, partly because I wasn't sure how to render certain things out like the armor. I really liked the background though so I made my second painting from that. (Looking at it now I see the amount of cactus's looks a little wrong, should have had them spread out a bit more, some the the far background etc.)

[Jonesoda]

Today - spent a few hours on this photo study, hated my armor yesterday so figured I had to put some time into learning how armor really looks. I thought I would struggle on it but I think I did ok, My looser drawing is more enjoyable and I can get shapes down easier. Better apply this study soon.

Also I swear I'll get to those still life's in the near future lol. Never finished that figure study book, I dread having to go back, I look at some of the diagrams and wonder how It'll help me learn. I should get back to it though.

So many idea's floating about my head, but I just still lack much of the knowledge, mainly of how to set up my composition, perspective, pose and so forth of a character. Thinking I should learn to do portraits like this http://enliighten.com/blog/enliighten-de...edy-paint/ to start with (view and perspective wise, see that general direction used a lot) Also his approach to starting using shapes is interesting if you don't have a clear vision in your head.

[JerryActric]

yeah dude ! awesome study !!

[ramalooke]

keep rocking, you are doing great ;3

[Warre]

That study really looks good.

[Jonesoda]

Thanks guys :)

Today so far, Movie screenshot study, and a knight sketch, trying to apply what I learned, see a few other things I'm gonna have to study though.

Update -

Been tryin to do more imaginative stuff, but keep falling short, my biggest problem is getting idea's down on the canvas. Basically been trying to draw/paint knights to apply that study more but during sketching phase dislike them and quit, either because they don't work or look dumb. I got cool idea's in my head, just don't exactly know how to draw/paint a lot of stuff. But I don't want to just do studies either, and get good at those and then be lacking in my imaginative work.

Anyway, just frustrated...

[Sickbrush]

stop decomposing and analyzing every single thing you do wrong Russel. the danger of that is losing all the fun and relaxation that comes along with drawing. chill, play some good music and just enjoy it all man. there will be a time for fault-analysis but for now just have more fun.
best,
C

[Jonesoda]

Thanks a lot Cris, your comment means a lot. Gonna chill out

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Was going to go to bed, but wanted to get a bit more drawing in, found how useful thumbnails are for me, was able to bust out idea's and had a ton of fun. got a few in there I'm thinking of pushing further.

Never really used thumbnails or preliminary sketches, so maybe this may be an answer to my issues with starting things off A long with chilling out.

Off to sleep now, got nothin to do today so I'm looking forward to drawing.

[Jonesoda]

Update for today, imagination stuff.
Plan on pushing that robot further - gonna get to various studies later and just keep practicing characters.

anyway, off to bed.

PS - I found these music mix's on youtube, called 'chillstep' awhile back, favorite stuff to listen to lately.

[Jonesoda]

Finished this one, maybe too much rain though. I like the direction of the character though. Looking forward to some studies, thinking perhaps more anatomy tomorrow. Gonna try different methods of starting a body, shapes, line drawing etc. + going to start practicing using more reference, should help when I'm having issues rendering things out.

[Fincks]

I saw all your sketchbook and you've improved a lot in term of value.

Don't stop doing imaginative work, it helps you apply what you learn in your studies.
Improvement comes with time (:

[Warre]

The WIP robot looks like a very happy robot.
The one in the rain is great, I like the concept.

[Forrestimel]

Nice progress, I feel like something you are greatly lacking right now is use and knowledge of color. Honestly that's fine since you should be focusing on value at the moment anyway, but it seems a lot of the skin tones you do are incredibly desaturated. Try and really focus on matching colors of skins before you start to paint it on to the canvas, skin color often has a high saturation. But you shouldn't have to worry about color at the moment, focus on nailing values and once you're ready move on :) Keep posting