New to the forums, wanted to share one of my drawings :)

Thaticanyaks

Been reading PA since the first comic, and I adore Gabe/Mike's work. I think he's one of the best illustrator/cartoonist/artist around. Cherish my signed print of the last frame of "The Tithe." So I was really excited to see in his latest comic him and I kinda had the same concept for a character. I'd say great minds think alike but I'm no where near his greatness, regardless I wanted to share my pencil drawing of my character Treuce.



T-yaks

Iruka

Hey there, man. Welcome to the AC!

This forums main goal is criticism. Usually it helps when new users talk a little about their goals as an artist, how long they've been at it, and give us a few drawings to go on. If you were looking to get more directly at gabe or tycho, the best way would be to email or tweet at them, they don't look at the forums.

Thaticanyaks

Ah thanks for the advice Iruka I'll throw some stuff up then, I just draw for fun and such but I'd love some criticism. I like to do concept art stuff, mostly traditional media. Its not for anything imparticular, just like making up characters and such.

Iruka

Interesting. You're stuff reminds me of work you tend to see out of high school/college work, I don't mean that in terms of quality, but the materials and sort of playfulness of the subject matter is something you tend to see in student work. There's something kind of endearing about that.

Your rendering looks pretty meticulous, but things are turning up kind of flat. I assume that you've probably learned to draw by looking at and copying photographs. In doing so, you've learned some of the patterns of how light and shadow work, but haven't dug deeper into under standing form. Proko has a pretty good explanation on shading:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dqGkHWC5IU

Since you clearly aren't shying away from drawing realistically, you would probably really benefit from doing studies on anatomy and form, its a challenge in itself and easy to turn into drawings like the ones you have above.

tynic

Thaticanyaks wrote: »

Oh, I love this. Gorgeous colours.

Like Iruka said, your lighting is very ambient and non-directional, which is holding you back a bit because you've clearly got the control and attention to detail. I think if you pushed it a bit more, your sea-creatures would look spectacular.

MeGiant

the pieces are all really fun and strong illustrations! If you are looking to push your shading/values, maybe check out J.C. Leyendecker. He didn't do a lot of harsh form shadows, but described the form just enough so you knew the material indication and the forms. He's one of the greats!

Scosglen

I largely agree with what's been said.

You're obviously putting a lot of meticulous care into the shading and rendering, but you're not understanding the light very well and all that effort ends up a bit misguided and flat looking. Some personal study may be necessary on your part, but getting a better understanding of how light works and using that knowledge to create a consistent light source within your rendering will make them much more believable.

You seem to lean towards very intricate and careful work in general, so I would imagine that you'd have a good mindset for observational studies, supplemented with tutorial type material like that proko video. "Go do a still life" may seem a little rudimentary but it's a solid a place as any to start with when tackling light.