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Chop Logic

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JCM

Quite good, just need to work a bit on the thumb lenght (I suck at drawing hands, its a common complaint ofmy art too)

Malesherbez

I think you need to work with structure and value more. It would help to think of the hand as geometric blocks. You should also be a little more bold with your values. It may help to cover the whole paper with a value and work over it...get really dark darks, light lights and everything in between.
Right now your hands look pretty accurate proportionally, but they're flat and pretty stiff

Godfather

Just want to point out that pinkie fingers should never ever be that long.

Penguino

They look pretty real. Although I'd like to see shorter fingers, and perhaps plumpier, especially the thumbs Perhaps you could try that out and see how it looks...

Chop Logic

New stuff, I'm actually trying to learn anatomy now, I printed out Loomises 'Figure Drawing For All It's Worth' the other day, and I'm up to the frames of people. Crits on how they're looking would be good, if theres any glaring mistakes or anything because my art teacher really doesn't do anything and I have no outside instruction. And of course, some letters. I'll mix it up.















Crits, mostly on the frames, would be great. I'm really trying to get them down so if theres anything very obviously wrong or something else I should be doing, let me know.

Fibretip

the proportions look a bit out of whack to me, the heads are too small. it's a pretty good start though... i found the hips a real shit to learn, you seem to be doing pretty well with them ....

to return to the head for a second... if you look at the loomis... (http://www.irananimation.com/images/education/Loomis3.jpg)the balloony shape for the head is fairly wide (and larger at the top than you're going at the moment), and as he lays the "cape" over the chest area...it creats the musculature of the neck and surrounding areas... the majority of your frames at the moment pretty much just have a tube neck jutting into their chest.... it could be that your chest area is not round enough at the top, or the shoulders are a little too high or something similar, or you're just not curving the "cape" enough... i'm not good enough to really work that one out.. maybe someone else can pick up from there

Chop Logic

This started out as a doodle but I decided to see what I could do with it:



Any crits/comments much appreciated. I've never really done anything like this before.

Thanks.

DeeLock

You definetly have to work on your hand anatomy, especially the thumbs.

Other than that, love it.

NeoRedXIII

I definetly dig it.

Chop Logic

What I've been up to latley, I've actually done all of these in the past 3 or 4 days, been really digging experimenting with markers and watercolors. And as usual, still drawing hands. Most of these I didnt spend TOO much time on, 2 days max. The flash kind of messed some parts up (like you can see the watercolor above or underneath some of them where you cant see it irl) but whatever. I've just been trying to draw a lot and crank a lot of stuff out rather than spend ages on one thing, to find out what works/doesnt work. I have a bunch of anatomy studies from loomis and some pencil sketches but those are in my other book, I'll upload those later. Crits/comments please.













Thanks. Crits/comments/concerns are all appreciated.

DeeLock

Love the second from the bottom and the writing one.

your thumbs are still really long and slender...otherwise good job.

Inzigna

I love such threads.

I can actually see the artist grow and improve right before my very eyes.

Good work, your hands are starting to improve too.

NeoRedXIII

Some good work. Terrific to see drawings, that seem to be your(?) hands, at larger than life size. The only things that I don't like is, again, when small snippets of fingers and such are cut off. It's one thing to effectively crop something to make it visually appealing and another to run out of room.

JCM

Th newer hands are looking better, and more stylized. Keep it up!

Chop Logic

Dee - Thanks a lot, yeah I always notice how long my thumbs are once I finish the picture and look at it.

Inzigna - Thanks, I've been pracitcing a lot and really trying to get better. Keep checking back here I'm gonna keep updating.

NeoRed - Thanks, yeah, they're all my hands. About the cropping and cutting off thing, my art teacher said I have a very 'big' style, as in, she always gets the feeling that I wished the paper were bigger. It makes sense though, I mean I got into art through graffiti (long story), and when you're doing stuff like that, you never really have to worry about 'going over the edges' or making something too big, you're just trying to do it as big as you can. But yeah, I do have to work on that, I'm just not sure how.

JCM - Thanks. Everyones comments mean a lot, I used to lurk here for a LONG time, I've had about 4 or 5 different usernames and I've always been looking at the artists corner and thought 'Damn, I wish I could do that', whenever I'd look at peoples threads, even before I ever really got into drawing.

Well enough talk. Last night I was doodling with my girlfreind, and after I got frustrated trying to draw her ("Damn you for being so pretty!"), I drew my backpack that was leaning up against my door.



I've never had any formal instruction in drawing, ever. From anyone. Everything I know about art I've learned myself or from forums online (mostly this one) so anything you guys have to say would be extremley valuble. Thanks, I'll post more later.

Angel_of_Bacon

You're off to a good start when it comes to observing and putting down contours, but you're missing the understanding of form and construction that will help to give those contours a sense of three dimensionality. Right now, many of these piece come out flat, owing to not knowing to look for and emphasize certain elements of the true object that will help create foreshortening, and the illusion of form. For example, in many of your hands you have drawn a simple curved line to indicate the bend on the interior part of the knuckles, but line by itself doesn't serve to indicate the intesection of the two cylinders that are meeting there, and begins to seem more like merely a horizontal line spaced between two longer, vertical lines.

I'd recommend trying some of these tutorials by Glen Vilppu as a way of getting a feel for describing form through construction, which will give you much more flexibility in being able to use your observed contours in a way that serves the form, rather than hoping that copying every contour with equal weight and emphasis will result in a tangible volume.

http://mag.awn.com/index.php?&article_no=402
http://mag.awn.com/index.php?ltype=pageone&article_no=440&page=1
http://mag.awn.com/index.php?&article_no=764

Chop Logic

Wow, thanks a lot for taking the time to come and give me critisism, it means a lot, your one of the artists on here I really look up to.

I really agree with you on the misunderstanding of form, it REALLY shows up whenever I try and forshorten anything at all, expeisally fingers. My focusing mostly on contours is probobly from the fact that most of my backround and influence as an artist comes from street/urban art and thats mostly super stylized, flat colors/cel shaded, whatever. I'm going to try and do more just pencil studies instead of doing what I usually do, draw a sketch in pencil and then go over it with sharpies.

Thanks a lot, I'll look at those links after play practice tomarrow when I finally have some free time, and I'll try and do some just pencil stuff from life in the next few days and post it up here.

JCM

I'd say follow angel of Bacon.

Even though your long fingers give your art a sense of stylization, you'd better grasp the basics, and draw a anatomically correct hand, then start messing around/caricaturizing it.

Most artists with different syles are classicaly trained, take JRJR or Picasso, they draw highly stylized art, yet if you look among their sketches, youll see they can draw the human form as well as any classic painter.

Chop Logic

Thanks a lot guys, I've been looking at those lessons, I'll post some stuff later.

I have a few questions though. Two about books I'm trying to use.

A)I'm assuming you guys are familiar with 'Figure Drawing For All It's Worth' I printed it out at staples and have it in a under upstairs, and I'm up to the part where you're building up the shapes on the fram (around p70 or so I think?) but I just dont feel like its helping. Are you supposed to use the book along with figure drawing from life? Because I'm not in a figure drawing class or anything, and I know its bad to draw from photos.

I also have 'Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain' . I got up to the part after contour drawing, where you have to use the drawing plane an viewfinder or whatever it's called. How bad would it be to skip over a part or two, would that come back and bite me in the ass later? I don't just have a big piece of plastic laying around, or any viewfinders (I think I could fake that though?) but I think I understand the point of the lesson.

C) How bad is it to draw from photos? I understand why it's bad and why its so much better to draw from life, so I've just been drawing from life mostly, but I was just wondering how bad it really is?

Thanks a lot.

Orikaeshigitae

Chop Logic wrote:

I also have 'Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain' . I got up to the part after contour drawing, where you have to use the drawing plane an viewfinder or whatever it's called. How bad would it be to skip over a part or two, would that come back and bite me in the ass later? I don't just have a big piece of plastic laying around, or any viewfinders (I think I could fake that though?) but I think I understand the point of the lesson.

If I remember right you use that viewfinder for about a quarter of the exercises in that book. It's worth it.

Munacra

I actually am using right now drawing from the right side of the brain, and i too needed a viewfinder

so with a couple of doses of human ingenuity, I made one out of the plastic of a boxed set of toys (the see through flimsy one that is used to see what's inside the box) and for viewfinders I used pieces of paper, that I cut out the rectangles within.

my camera is in the shop, so I can't show you the viewfinders, plus they're very ghetto, and blugh and all.

but my point is, you can probably make the viewfinders and the all that with stuff lying around your house and it will serve the same purpose.

Chop Logic

Bacon, I still didnt get a chance to look at those links, I recently got a nice little shipment of art books, and I've been looking at those almost nonstop.

This is what I've been up to latley. I've been fopcusing more and just drawing and drawing than trying to make something look all perfect and polished. Nothing here took more than 30/45 minutes, max. I'm mainly looking for crits on the rose and the oil pastels one though, those are the ones I was trying the hardest on. First three are kind of doodles.

Finished a doodle, was just trying wierd colors:


Sketch of the view of my room from my bed, I did this before going to bed:


Work in progress of the kid that sits in front of me in my art class, again, just wanted to use some odd colors together, its going to be grey, red, brown, and tan in the end:


A box of oil pastels that were sitting on my floor:


A rose and branch thing in a metal vase, I was really trying on this one, still, it just took a little under and hour:



So yeah, I've just been drawing a lot from life and trying to draw alot rather than work hours on one thing. Crits/comments appreciated, I'm really trying to get better. Thanks.

Chop Logic

flower doodle from this afternoon:


any crits or comments on anything (expesially the 2 still lifes above) is greatly appreciated.

Kathemo

Oil pastels and Rose(s): They're looking good. The shadow and light variation seem to be coming along but you might want to try to add some contrast. Chiaroscuro makes for some great work. You might also want to try going lighter in pressure to prevent lines in shading, unless that's the look you're going for. [/b]

Chop Logic

I would just edit this in, but its not letting me edit for some reason (never does), and I have a question I have to ask art-related people, and ther are no really art minded people in my life.

Except you guys.

So, I want to give my girlfreind some form of artwork for Christmas. The most logical conclusion would be to do something on canvas, because giving her a sketch seems a little informal.

I've only painted a few times before, I was just okay at it.

What am I going to paint? I asked myself. Well one of her favorite artists (only one I know of) is Georgia O'Keefe, and I know what her favorite flowers/colors are, so I think I'm going to try that. I also figure a flower would be harder to mess up than say, a face, or a hand, or a person or something like that.

My next idea was to do it on four smaller canvases, except put them together. I've seen this done a lot before, putting canvases together, and once or twice with flowers and I thought it looked really good. This is also a bonus because I'll probobly be doing a majority of the work on this in school, and if its in four smaller pieces, I dont have to bring the whole thing in every day.

Like this:

[][]
[][]

So, is this really way too ambitious? Whenever I start a new progect, if its something realy new and different, in the begining I always think I'm being too ambitious, but in the end it always turns out at least okay. And I figure worst thing that happens is that it turns out bad, and then I'll just tell her on Christmas that I painted her something but it didn't turn out how I planned and I'll give her something else when I finish it (points for trying )

So, is there anything I should know before I try this? Things you wish you knew before you started painting (I've painted a few times before, but with no formal instruction)? Am I an idiot? I'm going to this art store by the mall in a few hours to pick up some canvases and then when I get back I'll probobly start fiddling around with ideas. Any advice or ideas?

Also, any crits on the sketches are still greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Edit: (Now it lets me edit!) Of course this gets put at the top of the page, I'll put some stuff in here because, well it's my thread.







NEW:

Just did this now, first time using actual drawing pencils or drawing anything cloth. It's two apples and a pomagranete resting in a black t-shirt. The fruit looks really flat I think because I used a normal #2 pencil for that, did the shirt and backround with the drawing pencil. I'm going to go back and fix that later.



Crits/comments/ anything else I should look at?

Any crits or comments on anything is really really appreciated, the only real feedback I get for anything is here.

Chop Logic

So, again, its not letting me edit.

I'm a junior in high school and have decided that I want to go to art school.

Arts really the only thing that I'm interested in. Well, thats not true, I'm also interested in music and literature, but art is the most interesting for me. All my free time I spend drawing, and for the past few months all of the extra money has gone to art books, before this, I thought I was going to go to school for english with the goal of teaching, but after looking at some art schools, I'm much more interested in that. I looked at SVA's Illustration Major Courses, and it sounds like the most interesting courses any college could offer, ever. I would jump out of bed every morning and race to class. They all looked insanley interesting.

I just don't know what I would do after school, career wise. Is this too risky of a decision? What do most people who major in graphic design or illustration do after school? Can anyone who's done this tell me about it, or give me any advice?

Thanks.

misosoup

imo, don't worry about career do it because you want to do it, not because you want a career out of it. listen to joseph beuys

Godfather

You're not in a bad predicament at all here; I didn't start drawing till halfway through my junior year, and now it's exactly what I want to go to school for. I would say that your strongest asset right now is the fact that you are practicing every day just for the sake of practicing (something that I still have trouble grasping up to this point), and in the long run it simply comes down to how much time you dedicate yourself into practicing and how badly you want the good jobs out there.

Is it risky? Definitely; it's definitely not the safe career choice to pick, but if you know the right people and present a strong enough portfolio, you'll land yourself a job that will always trumph a regular 9 to 5 desk job. I will however recommend that you sign up for a college-level drawing I course at your local community college (during the second semester of your senior year of course) just to know full well of what you're getting in to. This is exactly what i'm doing, and even though you've got the jump on me in just about every category, i'm still gonna try it out just to make sure there's enough of an interest in my part before taking the plunge.

Plan it out is what i'm saying here.

Sublimus

If your going to enroll in a course at the ol' CC, it may benefit you to do it before you send off you portfolio to colleges.

A lot of the time you can learn very much from one class, and your work reflects that.

In terms of jobs, there are plenty. But the money isn't good unless you are at the top. Which isn't so bad because there is a ladder just like other jobs. So if you get a crap entry level job, you can still study and improve your portfolio and move on up.

Godfather

One other thing; SAVE YOUR WORK!

Seriously, it shows a lot on your potential to colleges. If you show them your origins compared to how far you've gotten in one year's time, that might me all they need to see to accept you.

Absolutely crucial.

Chop Logic

So, I've never really painted anything before, and I only started this yesterday. Its four 8 x 10 canvases, thats my cellphone on the side for scale.

I figured for the flower I'd just lay down the general colors and then go back and detail it later.



I'm kind of lost for the flower, I havent done any detail at all on it though, i just did a rough layout. im going to go back with a smaller harder brush and do the detail. Any ideas or things I should know first, or crits or anything? I've never really done this before so anything is appreciated. Thanks.

Greatnation

"One other thing; SAVE YOUR WORK!

Seriously, it shows a lot on your potential to colleges. If you show them your origins compared to how far you've gotten in one year's time, that might me all they need to see to accept you.

Absolutely crucial."

Ive heard just the opposite from alot of schools that Ive done reviews/interveiws with. Like Mass Art, SVA, AIB, SCAD, Pratt, that chicago one, and RISD. All say that they want to see the best of the most current work possible and dont want to see old stuff (though in an interview they may look at your sketchbook)

World as Myth

Greatnation wrote:

"One other thing; SAVE YOUR WORK!

Seriously, it shows a lot on your potential to colleges. If you show them your origins compared to how far you've gotten in one year's time, that might me all they need to see to accept you.

Absolutely crucial."

Ive heard just the opposite from alot of schools that Ive done reviews/interveiws with. Like Mass Art, SVA, AIB, SCAD, Pratt, that chicago one, and RISD. All say that they want to see the best of the most current work possible and dont want to see old stuff (though in an interview they may look at your sketchbook)

Yeah, same here.

Orikaeshigitae

Save it anyway. I've tossed paintings that I still regret tossing.

Greatnation

Oh, for sure

Chop Logic

So, about that painting...

8)

Dont worry, I never really throw anything away.

Chop Logic

Did these all yesterday:

Cup of tea, about 45 minutes:


Angler fish, spent a little more time on this, its all in graphite though so it was really... shiny? I couldnt get a good picture of it, they all had light reflecting off them, I'll get a better one later but these will have to do for now. Look better in real life.





Another still life, just a bunch of graff stuff I had in my room. It's a miniture spray can (krylon short cuts ), a normal spray can, a bottle of shoe polish (kiwi ) and 3 markers:



This ones really just a doodle, my sister got this book with these letters in it, and each letter had something about it that was specific to the letter, like B was getting bitten, G was growing, F was flying, etc. and she had to do one of her own, so I did C cracking:




So yeah, I'm looking for crits, I've mostly just been doing still lives and stuff, trying to get better at shading and not having my drawings be so flat, really trying to improve. Thanks.

Chop Logic

So yeah, if anyone has any ideas about taking a picture of that drawing or any crits on anything I'd really appreciate it.

I'm pretty sure the policy here was you can bump something, but only once. If I'm wrong I'm really sorry.

I also changed the title of my thread to reflect how much N64 Gauntlet Legends I've been playing.

(A lot.)

paulwind

Chop Logic wrote:

So yeah, if anyone has any ideas about taking a picture of that drawing or any crits on anything I'd really appreciate it.

I generally try to scan stuff in if it's around the same size or less than the size of the panel on my scanner, so I end up photographing most of my work (and not very well, I might add). But make the best of what you have: tac your work up on a flat wall at eye level, make sure there's plenty of light bouncing off of it AT AN ANGLE (the reason your first fish looks like it's glowing is because the flash is bouncing DIRECTLY from the camera off of the page, and back into the lens--this means set up desk lamps, lightbulbs, anything, and turn off the camera's flash--me and flashes have a.... past, but that's a tirade for another time), and step away from it far enough that you'll be able to get your art framed within it so that you can put whatever kind of border you prefer (or not) around the finished photo. You may also want to use a higher quality camera. Mine is a 3.3 pixel Vivitar, and I do NOT recommend it, especially to someone who is looking to archive their work professionally. Try to find a 4-6 pixel camera. I always have to blast my stuff with light and turn the ISO down as low as possible, and generally just tweak a lot of options to get any kind of result I like, and that's what I get for using an inferior camera.

As far as your art itself, it's pretty clear that you're improving. The coffee mug is more fleshed out and "round" than any of the other projects you've shown us, however, I still want to see your contrast get bumped up. Everything you do is so grayish-whitish. Go buy some Char-Kole brand heavy charcoal/black pastel and friggin go nuts, man. As an old friend once told me about drawing with charcoal, "make those darks and shadows fucking bleed."

You should also spend more time on your projects, it seems like these are all half-done. Blend more, look at the objects more, and take more time to get the small details and imperfections of the objects down. You may also want to read about "drop lines" or "plum lines," which are essentially invisible horizontal and vertical lines you imagine along the object or real person you're drawing, but you physically draw them on the paper. They help make sure that everything is in the right place, as far as anatomy/visual truth to your models goes. In any given project that I actually want to finish completely, I'll have upwards of four or five plum lines going, and they REALLY help to guide you as to where things go.

Don't get discouraged. You're doing fine.

Chop Logic

Thanks a lot, about the detail thing, I always try and spend a lot of time on something, but I'm always 'done' in about 45 minutes or an hour. Should I just try sitting down and spending two or three hours on one thing, or just wait until it comes naturally? Like with the spraycans and the shoepolish one, I said I was going to spend as long as it takes on that one, sat down ready to be there as long as I needed, and in 45 minutes I was done .