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Hey hey hey, first post on here but I'm aiming to be pretty active. Hoping to be a concept artist some day and blah blah blah. You've heard it before, you know the drill!

Comments and critiques are always more than welcome.  Take a peek, lemme know what you think!

[Image: joao_by_epoch_owen-dabwkyy.jpg]

[Image: dead_eye_duncan__redesign__by_epoch_owen-dab9tuz.jpg]
You know what they say, a still-life a day keeps the devil away.
'Sup Nick, welcome to daggers and a great start to your sketchbook.

You've already done more in the way of colour and light than when I make an effort. My only suggestion, apart from the usual anatomy and perspective study, is to consider form and texture of all materials. Right now all elements of your paintings look like they're made of the same element, same texture. You've highlighted metal more than other parts of the images but consider how sharply light flares off the surface edge and hair, how light and shadow are used to define it, same goes with fabric.

Something to study, keep it up!
@RottenPocket - Thanks for stopping by! I've always struggled with texture, I'll do a few studies in the coming days and post them. Keep an eye out!
Your painting is coming togheter really good, apart from what RottenPocket mentioned about texture and materials, I think what would really benefit you right now is studying anatomy and perspective deeply, get those fundamentals and you will improve drastically.

As everyone says: A really good drawing, with a strong foundation behind it can stand by itself and be a masterpiece, but a poor drawing with exceptional rendering, can't.
(07-31-2016, 02:34 AM)VSTOLL Wrote: [ -> ]Your painting is coming togheter really good, apart from what RottenPocket mentioned about texture and materials, I think what would really benefit you right now is studying anatomy and perspective deeply, get those fundamentals and you will improve drastically.

As everyone says: A really good drawing, with a strong foundation behind it can stand by itself and be a masterpiece, but a poor drawing with exceptional rendering, can't.

Thanks for stopping by! I'm already getting the vibe that this community is a little more honest than others I've joined, seeing that I've already got a few people stopping by and leaving feedback :P I appreciate it man. 

Right now I'm going through James Gurney's book on Color and Light, so once I finish that, I'm going to move on to anatomy. Thanks again dude!
Monochromatic Self-Portrait, thoughts?

[Image: monochromatic_self_portrait_by_epoch_owen-dac8dnl.jpg]
Quick still-life before bed, trying to get more comfortable with different color & lighting setups.

[Image: attachment.php?attachmentid=2204223&stc=1&d=1470035983]
Hey we have the same first name :). I wanted to drop by and say your rendering is getting pretty good, as for the eye in values, just make sure you can indicate different materials well like you do in this still life.

Also, i want to warn you that focusing too much on rendering at this stage will waste a lot of your time; I made this mistake myself for years... Draw with pencil or pen as much as you can, more than you are comfortable with. The painting will eventually work itself out if you can shade those pencil and pen drawings well... 

I did a quick draw over on your still life, imagine everything you draw has a box (around it) or a plane underneath it. Draw a line coming from the bottom of the object to the floor it rests on. Hell, draw cities of boxes (And spheres and cyllinders) sitting on top of eachother in perspective; the more you struggle with that the more you learn. And that helps EVERYTHING you go on to draw, i don't care what it is. Perspective is so important... take my word for it, everyone will tell you, don't ignore them.

You can learn most of it through gesture drawing and a little bit of theory.

Also look at this little thread i wrote a while back on the topic
http://crimsondaggers.com/forum/thread-6923.html
@Fedodika: Thanks for the feedback! For today's still life, I'll focus mostly on perspective because of what you said. Stay tuned!
Fellow Nick!
You've got a really intuitive feel for color and mood.

I'm going to echo what everybody else is saying about perspective, it's really crucial to understand form and construction as a basis for your drawings before you focus heavily on rendering. Especially for invented work (concept art/fantasy illustration), being able to visualize 3D space and figures as basic geometric volumes will save you a lot of trouble in the long run.

I think I see some Last Man Standing and Mad Max influence in your characters? In terms of creative direction you definitely know what you want to see so that's great. Your taste and ideas are your most powerful tools as an artist. The fundamentals just help to make things look better.

Looking forward to seeing more work in here man
@DQ_Nick - Man, there really are a ton of Nick's hanging around here :P It's good to see! But thanks for checking out my sketchbook, I'm trying to work on my perspective stuff now alongside color/lighting. A little more pre-planning might help my work out quite a bit. With my character designs though, I was actually thinking of more of a Star Wars KOTOR/Mad Max kind of influence. Nothing really specific, but I can definitely see where you got the LMS influence.

Anyways, yay peer pressure! Everyone has suggested I focus on my perspective, so I did just that with today's still-life. I did a still-life of the dresser in my room and this time I focused a lot more on perspective and getting everything right compared to the painting aspect. I also included a process image, so lemme know what you guys think! I think it turned out pretty decent and I only have you guys to thank, so thanks a ton.

[Image: still_life_process_by_epoch_owen-dacexk2.jpg]
Only had an hour to work on yesterday's still-life, so I tried focusing on perspective. Thinking about making this a 30 day challenge. 

[Image: attachment.php?attachmentid=2204664&stc=1&d=1470280311]
Man, can't believe it's already been 5 days. Time flies in between moving and finishing the last days at my job. 

Here's a WIP of my Steve Lichman poster for the Draw or Die group.

[attachment=89356]
(08-09-2016, 10:38 AM)Nick Waldinger Wrote: [ -> ]Man, can't believe it's already been 5 days. Time flies in between moving and finishing the last days at my job. 

Here's a WIP of my Steve Lichman poster for the Draw or Die group.

haha looking sick dude!
@Ricky - Thanks man!

Here's the final poster. Really had a lot of fun with this and felt I learned quite a bit. 

[Image: steve_lichman__flay_gets_lung_cancer_by_...admrj0.jpg]
Gah, gotten a little lazy about posting lately but it's mostly because I'm working in the sketchbook. Looking to get back to mixing in some traditional studies and what better way than to get back to basics with anatomy?
Hi Nick!
Nice start you have here. Saw your soldier character and i see potential there, that´s why i´ve picked it to tackle some issues, hope you don´t mind.
I cannot emphasize enough the importance of values, they´re the spine of the colour of an illustration/ concept art piece.
Saw some anatomy issues, small compositional issues but overall is a good design. Not sure though if you intended to make of him a though veteral soldier. Tried to maintain it as faithful to the original piece as possible.
[attachment=89923]

Hope it helps! Don´t get discouraged. Cheers!!
@RickRichards - Thanks a ton for the paintover! I have strayed a bit when it comes to my values, so I'll start focusing on them more from here on out. There are some real basic yet very helpful things you mentioned in your paintover though, so thanks again man! I really appreciate it!
You´re welcome. Cheers mate.
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