Bookend's Sketchbook

[Bookend]

Keep up the hard work! I think what would help you improve most at the moment is basic construction skills. Being able to think of things in 3D form will improve the believability of your paintings. Start with constructing boxes, cylinders etc in 3D then move on to anatomy (Hampton's books are especially good for this) which will help improve all of your pieces. Your figures are lacking a real feel of anatomical form at the moment.

As for your colour studies, they're looking good but a bit murky - have you thought about using a hard brush to stop all those soft edges muddying up the colours?

Keep up the good work! c:

I agree so much with this, so thanks a lot for reminding me to get back on track. 

Right now I'm working on the CHOW...  Even though I don't really feel like my basic construction skills are on par with that, people have suggested that I do something from imagination because I've been doing all of these studies, so I thought I'd humour them, and maybe I'd get a little something out of it.  Even if it's incredibly painful to see what I actually know, haha.

What I really need to do is to get a good idea about perspective, and seeing/forming shapes (cubes, cylinders, spheres), and understanding how they work with perspective-- You're spot on with that. And, of course, applying them from memory so I know I can actually do it.

I agree that my figures are totally lacking anatomical construction...  Right now my goal is to do 88 arms from reference, and 88 from memory/imagination/application... Buuut, I made this goal before I realized that what I really need to do is work on perspective and basic forms.  Still, I'm going to reach this goal before I make a new one.

Also, will try to use a harder brush for those studies.

My new goal will probably have something to do with shapes/forms in perspective and 3d space, but I'm not sure how to translate that into something to reach for--  I can't exactly do the same thing as I did with the arms and say 88x88... Any ideas how I should construct my next goal/deathline?

Thanks again for your thoughts, very helpful.