Drawing and Digital Paintings

Talzun

I've been lurking for a while and thought I'd put some of my stuff up. I could really use the critique and I'm always trying to get better. I've been drawing from the womb, but I'm mostly self taught... So tear my stuff up if you see something wrong, or have suggestions... I'm all ears.

Oh and the stuff on the top of the list is older stuff. I don't scan in my stuff much.


Joker, of course.


Mac Gargan version of Venom... With a slightly more realistic touch.


Protoss guy with an unintentionally crooked foot, heh.


Just a face I painted really quickly.


Rorschach from Watchmen.


A Clint Eastwood-like gunman. I actually drew this up last night, but I liked it enough to post it.

I'm most likely going to scan more stuff in here as time goes on. Also, anyone who wants to add me on deviant art - thegreatseanzy.deviantart.com.

beavotron

the paintings are very muddy
which is probably due to using multiple, small strokes, instead of big, long flowing strokes

especially on roxx's forehead
you've used way too many small strokes there.

also your color choices aren't great
what you've done is basically grabbed a color, then grabbed increasingly darker tones of that same color
you should try using different colors for shading, complimentary colors for example

a good website to quickly find nice compliments and even a good compliment with the tone you're looking for is http://kuler.adobe.com

next thing i notice is with the drawings themselves
you need to work on body construction.
right now, it looks like you're just starting with the head and drawing the thing piece for piece.
the end result is poorly thought-out, amateurish construction.

particularly with number 2, where he's cut off at the knees
this would be avoided if you had done some proper planning of the drawing.
same thing happened in the last one

i do like the hands on number 3, but they look much different from all your other hands
all the other hands on these drawings look very rough, blobby and amateurish. which means you either lucked out on that one or copied them from something else.
not really a bad thing, lots of people learn from copying.
i did.
just be careful about posting it.

Talzun

Thanks, Beavotron. It seems like it's hard to pinpoint good painting material.

Yeah you pretty much hit the nail on the head about the planning thing, too.
As for the protoss's hands, that was actually very experimental drawing for me. I tried to put so much detail in it I think I just burnt out. I spent a lot of time drawing on it, and I used a lot of stuff from Blizzard's artists to see if I could capture the style... But none of these are direct copies off of anything. All my own poses too, which is probably why they turned out so poor due to the lack of planning.

crawdaddio

To be honest, I like the first (oldest?) one the best; on closer inspection, there are a couple things off about it, like the teeth (they don't look like they curve, and there's no distinction between the different kinds of teeth) and and the hair (it seems, at least to me, a bit too...patterned), but overall, I like it.

The second and third ones have some problems with anatomy and shading; Venom's left (our right) bicep looks like it's been deflated, and he's got no wrist on that arm. Additionally, the muscles are shaded with no real sense of light source or muscle form, and, especially without cast shadows, the shading in general is too soft, and doesn't really help to define form in general. The third one has the same problems as the second with regards to shading and general musculature, and the legs are improbably twisted; they're hard to read, to be honest, but it seems the problem starts with their positioning in relation to the pelvis.

The fourth one is a bit harder to critique since it's a fictional creature, and just a head at that, but assuming a certain amount of anthropomorphism, the eyes ought to be deeper set in the skull, with resulting deeper shadows. The diagonal stroke on the forehead are also a bit distracting, since they don't follow or help define its form.

The fifth one has got a better sense of lighting, but the dynamics of the upper part of the trench coat don't seem convincing; I'm not sure the cloth would fold quite that way, or at least not with they way they're being rendered. Same goes for the pants and shirt of the last one, which has also got problems with the shading of the hand, and the form that it implies (the thumb ought to receive more light, and the middle finger less). The heavy outline also flattens the image, especially without any line weight variation.

I don't mean to be hard on you or anything; overall, you're a lot better than I was only a few years ago, so I think you've got a lot of potential, especially with the dedication to drawing you seem to have. Have you looked at any drawing (anatomy) books? And how much time do you spend drawing from life? In the long term, I would recommend some anatomy books (and figure drawing, if you can find any places that have open model sessions), and drawing from life with particular attention paid both to drapery (both on and off people, to work out the dynamics of cloth folds), and to light and shadow (especially if you've got a desk lamp or other form of spot lighting). Welcome to non-lurkery.

Talzun

Well, I attended Full Sail for a while so I got broke out of the "don't be too hard on me" thing. As long as someone says why it's bad, it's not a bad critique.

And as for Venom's bicep, do you think it's more of a shading issue or a shape issue?

Anatomy books... Somewhat, most of what I've used have been sources all over the web... Also what I learned in college, pictures of myself and others... etc.
I haven't drawn from life much, most of which was done in school. But just from the little bit I did it changed what I knew about shading.
As for drapery, my friend recommended Burne Hogarth's Wrinkles and Drapery... Sound good?

And thanks crawdaddio.

beavotron

Talzun wrote: »

Thanks, Beavotron. It seems like it's hard to pinpoint good painting material.

Yeah you pretty much hit the nail on the head about the planning thing, too.
As for the protoss's hands, that was actually very experimental drawing for me. I tried to put so much detail in it I think I just burnt out. I spent a lot of time drawing on it, and I used a lot of stuff from Blizzard's artists to see if I could capture the style... But none of these are direct copies off of anything. All my own poses too, which is probably why they turned out so poor due to the lack of planning.

ahh yes, blizzard's artists are awesome
i've done my share of blizzard mimicry