Symptom's Arts

Symptom

Longtime lurker, first time poster, you know how it is.

Here's some art. Critiques would be much appreciated good sirs.

















Whatcha think?

Kamikaze Purple

Your art has a lot of character. I particularly like the octopus piece. My only real pseudo-complaint is in the Mario one, even though he's cartooned-out there, there's still anatomy "rules" in place-- and maybe it's not anatomy, but perspective... but something about the right (his left) foot seems off, and the pointer finger on his right hand seems big (if you imagine it stretched open, it'd be huge!) Tiny nitpicks, but I like the stuff otherwise.

Chris W

Looks good to me. A little twisted, but good.

Mykonos

Jesus that Mario one is twisted. Kamikaze's right, your art has a ton of character.

The_Glad_Hatter

Looks great! lots of character both in the actual drawings as in the linework itself.

the anatomy (upper arms) on some of the zombies strike me as a bit weird, but all in all it's very nice!

Hopper

I really like the Link drawing. Looks like he could be in a Nintendo version of Clone High.

Symptom

Thank you for the kind words good sirs. Yeah. the anatomy on some of the zombies is a bit wonky. Here's some new stuff.

supabeast

Enough has been said about your lines, but your colors are killer. Do more color.

Sublimus

This one is badass
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i22/Cyy88/graf.png

And I noticed you seem to be cutting off the feet of a lot of these characters. Either you're avoiding drawing feet, or you aren't paying enough attention to the composition. Draw the whole character.

Hopper

I know it's some kind of stylistic thing, but you draw a lot of hands/fists with the pinky finger sticking out and it looks kinda weird when it's so frequent.

Symptom

Behold FEET

Prospicience

psychonauts art = win. Big win.

Symptom

Samus watercolor

Symptom

Here have some 80's

Rankenphile

I like your stuff, dude, but that last piece really needs some variation in line weight, especially along the outsides of the characters, to help differentiate the borders between them. You've got a great sense for dramatic distortion, though, so don't take this like I'm trying to knock your shit. Just a thought.

DeeLock

On the last one, the airbrush effect has got to go.

Use a hard brush with it set to opacity defined by pen pressure

Symptom

DeeLock wrote: »

On the last one, the airbrush effect has got to go.

Use a hard brush with it set to opacity defined by pen pressure

Really? Don't like the effect?

I used the burn tool and a couple gradient effects under someone else's recommendation so this was an experimental piece anyways.

I like the end result mostly, aside from wishing I'd put a bit more detail into the blonde chick.

DeeLock

Well...that's even worse...i thought you were experienced enough to know NOT to use the burn tool and gradients.

It just looks amateur and realy flat...

Symptom

Naw, I have very little photoshop experience. I'm still learning the ropes.

RubberAC

Well in that case, Gradients and Burn tool = bad
They really just make your work seem flat and amateur

not that it is, of course.

DeeLock

lol way to say EXACTLY what i said rubberac :P

CyberMonkeytron3000

DeeLock and RubberAC wrote:

Gradients and Burn tool = bad

Not to complicate things- but this is not true. Its not the tools that are bad, it's how they are used by an artist that can be bad.

Symptom

Okay so, how should I be shading instead?

Rankenphile

with your art style, soft-edge brushes aren't doing you any favors in your shading. Learn to select your colors for shading and primary areas by hand, then experiment with methods of laying them in to see what you feel works best for you.

RubberAC

CyberMonkeytron3000 wrote: »

DeeLock and RubberAC wrote:

Gradients and Burn tool = bad

Not to complicate things- but this is not true. Its not the tools that are bad, it's how they are used by an artist that can be bad.

Yeah, I suppose that makes sense.
Also Deelock I said it way different
WAY
different

Symptom

K, what about this one guys? I think the line weight is better.

beavotron

too many tangents, i am too lazy to circle them, but basically where a line from something in the foreground overlaps a line from something in the background, without overlapping it enough (so it just sort of grazes it or sits on it) it creates what's called a tangent. tangents flatten out the image completely. destroying any foreshortening.

Also it sort of looks like you kind of haphazardly threw in line width variation. It looks like you're trying to make the spider sort of coming out at the viewer? That means line widths should be thicker on the arms closest to us than those at the back. You made a pretty good choice making the ass end have thicker lines, as the ass is the biggest part of her, but what's with the weird musculature on her back having thick lines?

The word "arachnid" is really detracting from the entire piece... again, tangents

As for your work as a whole, I feel that you've stylized too heavily too early on. You're masking a lack of anatomical knowledge with heavy stylization.
The thing is, you can't effectively alter what you don't know.
It pains me when people think they can skip right into a heavy stylized cartoon style without learning the basics first. I'm not saying master them, and I'm not saying stop with this style, as it seems to be the one you're comfortable with. What I'm saying is don't think you can get away with not learning how to properly draw hands and feet by using your style as a crutch.

Hands and feet are definitely your biggest weak point.
The few pieces that you did draw feet, they look awkward. Your hands are always in sort of contorted, strange uber-stylized positions, if they're showing at all.
Draw some hands and feet from life, I promise it will completely affect your stylized work in a positive way.

One of your other weaknesses is composition and structure as a whole, You're sort of just laying details onto characters who have no sort of structure. Again, a common retort to this is "it's my style"
A good cartoonist with a really unique style works because even though they've sort of tweaked the anatomy, a basic knowledge of underlying structure is still present. Things still work, it all still fits.
I'll say it again, you can't alter what you don't understand.

I think that's my favorite piece of advice to offer up people doing stylized cartoon work.

You do have a very interesting style, so keep with it as you seem to enjoy it, but if you start really doing some life drawing and stuff, you'll really notice a positive outcome

here's the part where most people i crit say 'i DO do life drawing' ...wait for it.....

Symptom

Dayyyyum son. That was a long read.


No, I don't do life drawing, never really tried. I'll take a stab at it though seems to be where you think most of my works flaws are sprouting from.

"you can't effectively alter what you don't know"

That'll actually stick with me. Thanks for the honesty Beavotron. By the by, I like your 'Cephalopods need Love too' piece.

Symptom

melting_doll

omg the triforce isn't black in the middle, it's hollow!!


i like the samus painting though (: