lovely gestures drawing :) ! they feel happy. And cool drawing from imagination, can feel the structure !
I think drawings models that aren't overmuscular might help you for the stiffness.
Sometime bodybuilder can give a wrong idea of anatomy, as most people don't have that kind of body. Abs are the last thing that ll get this ''drawn'' look, people have fat on arm, belly, thight, breast and many other area.
I remember a very interesting quote from Frank Frazetta that said that athlete mostly had back muscles developped generally, for propulsion, but not front muscle. (he was an athlete himself, a baseball one :p) . I'm a big big fan of his work.
I think that focusing on that type of people might make you think a bit too much about muscle, while the general movement and structure of the figure is mainly about bones .
Definitely an improvement on the second muscleman sketch. I really like this one a lot, and I love your gesture drawings. I don't have any criticism on the new sketch. I think this one is really solid.
I was doing some gestures recently and wanted to keep up a practice of doing it daily, but it's just too difficult to stick to it. Something has to be sacrificed, so one night it might be Loomis heads, another it could be doing a painting study, and another i might be doodling and drawing boxes. I've been drawing some heads this week, so I would like to get back to gesture and figure drawing next week, and I must get busy with the hands. I have avoided tackling that one for too long.
Were the gestures from imagination or reference, and were they a set time?
@Fedodika: Thanks mate, definitely better to start with gesture I think.
@Baldgate: Thanks, yeah I will work my way around the different body types, I'd like to get used to drawing all kinds of people. I love Frazetta too, might even do a study of one of his pieces at some point :).
@Shinkasuru: Thanks, yeah it's good to have a routine but it's even better to not burn out so try mix-up the boring stuff with fun stuff too. Maybe do gestures once a week or something?
Been itching to do some Marvel studies - I loved Infinity War, here's a line study of Thor:
“Today, give a stranger one of your smiles. It might be the only sunshine he sees all day.” -- H. Jackson Brown Jr.
id reccomend you find some really expressive gestures like karl gnass or someone and do studies of their gesturey lines, your stuff is so stiff, like some gritty expressive stuff would really do you a lot of good something really flowy like this
Marvel character studies = always awesomeness. (I'm kind of a Marvel fan girl. Shhh, don't tell anyone.)
I don't have much to say, just envying your gesture studies at the moment. I may steal/practice some of your ideas/methods at some point while going through my own 'learning gestures' journey. (Yours have a really nice fluidity that I like, while still nodding to construction. I can certainly pull helpful pointers from that.)
@Artloader: I second what Riley said. I like your gestures. They are fluid and graceful, and clearly define the action.
Great Thor study. I was doing what of Wolverine the other day (Hugh Jackman's Wolverine). Not even sure if that's Marvel or DC. I think it's Marvel. Always fun to draw superheroes.
@Fedodika: Thanks for taking the time mate :). Yeah I can see why you'd say my stuff is so stiff, I've had this thing about drawing with straight lines for a while now after reading this article:
I love this approach as it forces me to make definite decisions about what each line is doing and helps me with accuracy. I guess it can result in stiffness though, I will see f I can loosen up, I'll definitely check out this Karl Grass guy though, thanks for the info.
@Riley: Heheh Marvel fan girl hey? Then you're cool in my book :). Thanks, my gestures are learned from Michael Hampton, I actually copy some of his gestures first then go on and work from actual figure refs. Check out his blog:
I would say be careful with the desaturation in the shadow i am not an expert myself but i think you over did it.One other point i want to mention is reflectivity you separate a lot of value as if they where highly reflective material you should reserve highlight for the nose and the forehead and bridge of the face.I use the smudge tool and a soft brush and work where i find your value to be to separated and i blend them into one shape.There a phase where you have to stop mapping value and start blending but you don't seem to go fully into this stage yet.Good luck i hope it was instructive.
straight lines are great for design and drafstman ship but its so limiting, there is so much in art that are C and S curves, you can sure simplify them into straight lines, but do that after youve figured out a pose using every tool at your disposal, a finishing touch basically ;)
I like the line drawing of Thor. I like the painting as well; however, I think some of the forms were lost (like the blockiness of the chest, which I liked in the line drawing). I'm no great colorist here, I'll admit I have much to learn, but I have done a lot of 3D painting over the years with an airbrush, and one of the things I am very conscious about is painting with warm red colors. I think your Thor painting could use some more reds, especially in the face. I think it would also go well with the cooler background.
I think you did a good job with this one. I like the pose, the line art, and the painting. Nice study!
Hey ! I think the head really has a nice feeling to it because you feel the planes of light and the hightlight on the cheek and arms really makes its feel fleshy. I also like the bluish color moods!
I think your drawing was a bit stiff, and I can still feel it on the final painting. The framing feels a bit weird to me too, was it the same in the original image? There is a lot of space between the head and top of the canva.
I'm curious of the way you did the blending of the arm with the foreground. Was it smudge or mixer tool in wet mode?
@Darktiste: Thanks mate, I wasn't aware that I desaturated the shadows, I'll have to keep an eye on that - thanks. Also good point about the reflectivity of the arms, although I'm not a great fan of over blending a painting - I like to still see the brush strokes if you know what I mean.
@Fedodika: Point taken, thanks man, sticking to straight lines is very limiting, although I love the way guys like Richard Schmid and Daniel Keys do their straight line block-ins and you can still see the angular shapes in their final paintings - a stylistic thing I guess.
@Shinkasuru: Thanks dude, nice point about using warmer colours in his face, I reckon that would have worked well :).
@Baldgate: Thanks for stopping by my friend, yeah I cropped the screen capture myself so that explains why the framing is a bit off :). Also the blending of the forearms was with a smudge tool.
Anyway I have suddenly come to realise that after doing so many studies where I've copied from reference, I am now terrified of drawing from imagination!
So how to tackle this?
I think the best thing is to tackle it head on and try to draw from imagination every day.
One thing I've discovered about myself is that I can produce a better drawing from imagination if I start with a clear image in my mind's eye.
Anyway here are some sketches from imagination, some of which make me cringe but I will post anyway:
If anyone has any tips on drawing from imagination then I'd love to hear them please :).
“Today, give a stranger one of your smiles. It might be the only sunshine he sees all day.” -- H. Jackson Brown Jr.
well imagination is tough because 2 things, it takes visual library, and it takes fundamental knowledge. So in essence its double the difficulty of reference. The best thing that helped me was drawing references from memory, that way i pay attention to what i get wrong by correcting things, i appreciate the reference and retain more since i have to recall it.
Say you want to draw lizards, tanks, hot women etc. All those things have design elements you need to add to your visual library to be able to create them. Be it anatomy, shape language etc. basically, pick a subject matter and OBSERVE it a lot and take a lot of notes in anyway that works for you, then recreate it from memory, and if you can do that well, youll be able to twist, turn and combine those fragments into new things. Thats the secret.
Nice sketches, Artloader. Personally, I think drawing from imagination takes one of two things, and the latter is the approach for most people if they want to do it well. First, you either have an innate ability to retain shapes and values and proportions from what you have observed throughout your life. You are mentally recording everything and can summon those mental images whenever needed. This is, at least to me, more a gift than a skill. Then there are the rest of us who have to do tons of studies for years on end to build our visual library. I think that is the key. Just keep drawing what you are most interested in. If you like comic style art, then you should be doing lots of studies from references of that particular style of art. I think drawing from imagination is mostly calling up those images in your mind from all the studies you have complete over time. It also helps to view a lot of art that inspires you (the kind of art you want to draw).
Here's a method I'm sure others have employed, that I use sometimes to build my visual library. Let's say I'm really bad at drawing jackets. I might then do a bunch of studies of characters wearing jackets from all angles. I employ a three-phase approach: (1) draw first image from reference (2) draw second image from another angle, also from reference (3) draw image from imagination - either angle you drew earlier, as best as you can recall. You can then leave it at that, or refer back to your reference and see how close you got. If you identify problems with your study, redraw your image and correct the problem. Eventually from repetition this stuff sticks in your brain and you can invent more easily.
Mostly I think it comes down to a lot of practice from reference and doing a lot of studies. Inventing and drawing from imagination is nothing more than being able to draw what you see in your mind. And the more you do varied studies, the more of a visual library you will have to draw from.
@Fedodika: Fundamentals and Visual Library - thanks my friend - I was thinking along the same lines but always good to have another artist's point of view.
@Shinkasuru: Interesting 3 step process dude - particularly the bit about studying two references but from different angles - thanks.
@Baldgate: Tell at story? Hmmm I meditate upon this I will ... Yep my necks were too short and eyes too big, thanks for the crit mate.
OK so another thing I've been trying to boost my invention skills is to work on my own personal project. Something that engages my heart and soul. I have been trying to invent a face for the protagonist from my comicbook project. He is a Captain of the Guard, a moody guy who is in love with a woman who loves someone else. A bit of a loner also.
Here are my first 10 attempts, crits most welcome as always:
“Today, give a stranger one of your smiles. It might be the only sunshine he sees all day.” -- H. Jackson Brown Jr.
Had a really strong urge to paint some blossom so I just went with it as it made me happy :)
I love that I start to notice how a subject is actually constructed when I really study it. I thought I knew what blossom looked like but I couldn't have painted a realistic bit of blossom until now. Visual Library.
“Today, give a stranger one of your smiles. It might be the only sunshine he sees all day.” -- H. Jackson Brown Jr.
for your head sketches i think 8 is the strongest;
I like the blossoms, the edges towards the right are very good, but the flowers have these hard edges for the shadows that break the realism, that and the sky behind him have these visible strokes that just ruin the illusion of the sky, go for smooth as possible, or intelligently designed as blocky, but for a smaller subject like matter, youll want it as diffused and blurry as possible
Really liking the style of line work you've got going on man! it'll be fun to see how it develops, personally looking forward to when you start playing around with exaggerated shapes/ proportions (thinking because it's quite a blocky style it can get a bit stiff looking, so you might be able to get a little more flow/ rhythm playing around with those ratios).
Little side note on those head designs, I think the main facial features stretch too wide across the face on most of them, and then you end up overcompensation by pulling the jaw out wider too (nose tends to be a little flat too). I think the heavier construction method is working for you when it come to the figures but might be holding you back a little when it comes to heads. Could be worth trying out a new looser method for drawing heads to get a more instinctual sense of the proportions, maybe something like sinix's draw heads from any angle paper boi method.
