Really new artist looking for help! [NSFW] - Back and Ready to Work!

surrealitycheck

OK. New computer has arrived, and the gap without the internet made me realise just how much time I waste watching stupid shit and playing games. There is a new thread rule:

If anybody suggests an exercise or practice method (that isn't completely mad >.>) then I will do it. One suggestion done a day. Posting the results may be irregular (I have no digicam or scanner atm), but I'm working on getting a cheapo camera to snap these.

I'll keep a record of anything suggested in the OP!

I'm also restarting my ca.org sketchbook too, my plan is to actually get the hours of practice a day I need to do in. I've also deleted WoW. Which stung, but there we are.

crawdaddio

Regarding the lines, I think there are two techniques that might help you: contour drawing, and gesture drawing. Contour forces you to draw a line very slowly and methodically, putting more deliberation into the placement, which might help, if nothing else, in slowing your mind down a bit so that you're not putting lines down utterly without thought. Gesture kind of does the opposite, though not in a contradictory way; it builds confidence in single lines by forcing you to define poses and gestures in a single stroke (or a greatly minimized series of them), rather than taking time to develop doubt about them, or trying to correct them. Ultimately, they're both about developing discipline, and have the advantage of improving your observational skills as well, and since they're studies and not meant to become finished drawings, you don't (or shouldn't, anyway) develop enough of an attachment to them to greatly resist the point of the exercises, which is to put a line down once, and leave it.

surrealitycheck

Contour forces you to draw a line very slowly and methodically, putting more deliberation into the placement, which might help, if nothing else, in slowing your mind down a bit so that you're not putting lines down utterly without thought.

That sounds exactly like the problem. I'll give it a go. Thank you for the suggestion!

Mustang

If you really picked up a pencil for the first time 2 months ago with zero prior experience, then you are learning at a rate of knots that completely pisses me off.

surrealitycheck

If you really picked up a pencil for the first time 2 months ago with zero prior experience, then you are learning at a rate of knots that completely pisses me off.

I'm a student so I've had a lot of free time!

It also goes without saying that if something looks good, then I've probably spent ages slavishly copying from a reference

For example, that armoured chicks head comes from another picture that took me some time, and I decided she needed some armour!

Tam

Man, what's with all the talented new people with good attitudes? Who will we mock?

As you're just starting out, don't worry about taking a really long time to do things- that's way it's going to be. Keep doing the anatomy practice, lots and lots and lots of it.

Also, about the background, you want to think up the entire basic composition beforehand. If you try to add a background without thinking about it and the character together, it tends to come out looking like an afterthought.

Anyway, you seem to take advice well, and have a good attitude. Keep on keepin' on, I hope you stay.

surrealitycheck

Also, about the background, you want to think up the entire basic composition beforehand. If you try to add a background without thinking about it and the character together, it tends to come out looking like an afterthought.

Yeah, that's what I thought would happen. I tried with some mountains and stuff but it was surprising how it just looked so amazingly wrong, despite no obvious massive pallette differences!

Keep on keepin' on, I hope you stay.

Thanks!

EdiT: Although, on the bright side, the mountains got me to learn sort of how to do mountains and I got this out of it

surrealitycheck

Aaron

More attention needed to be paid to the anatomy before the rendering started. Her left arm is gigantic and more importantly bigger than her right arm. It's also hard to tell which leg is in front of the other. The rendering is pretty good; on its way to being refined. However, no matter how realistically something is rendered if the drawing's not consistant the whole image becomes awkward.

surrealitycheck

Aaron, out of interest how would you indicate which leg is in front? Simply put the foot further back, or shorten the shin, or? I noticed the same thing about the legs and tried to make the knee guards a visual cue, but that didn't really work!

beavotron

for someone who just started, you are doing absolutely mind blowingly well.

Aaron

surrealitycheck wrote: »

Aaron, out of interest how would you indicate which leg is in front? Simply put the foot further back, or shorten the shin, or? I noticed the same thing about the legs and tried to make the knee guards a visual cue, but that didn't really work!

Since the left leg (her left) is already higher off the ground than the right and the angle of the pelvis indicates weight distributed to the right, it should be the left leg that's coming forward. If you imagine that the left calf and shin are in the shadow of the right leg, the thigh of the left would be catching more direct light and the highlight would need to go to the end of the knee and especially on the edge of the knee guard. Maybe a slightly, lighter tone on the left thigh and knee would help it come forward as well.

winter_combat_knight

Like others have said, if youve only just started drawing EVER, two months ago, you're learning freakin fast! I wouldnt worry about the troubles you're having with lines. With a lot of practice, you'll improve loads over the next few months. Just keep drawing from life, or at least, watch t.v and draw people you see on the screen. i do this all the time while watching jay leno and conan! Keep at it. freaking awesome.

surrealitycheck

winter_combat_knight wrote: »

Like others have said, if youve only just started drawing EVER, two months ago, you're learning freakin fast! I wouldnt worry about the troubles you're having with lines. With a lot of practice, you'll improve loads over the next few months. Just keep drawing from life, or at least, watch t.v and draw people you see on the screen. i do this all the time while watching jay leno and conan! Keep at it. freaking awesome.

Thanks!

I'm actually going through this huge anatomy dvd set I found at the house I'm staying in, and although it's helpful I haven't been producing much actual... stuff o.o

So my output will be limited to skull and muscle drawings for a bit >.<

NotASenator

by the way, you should edit the first post so that the title of thread has NSFW in it.

I don't want to scan past those breasts at work today.

surrealitycheck

The boobs are hidden behind a barrier of NSFW!

surrealitycheck

Watched angel of bacon's speedpainting tutorial, and gave myself half an hour to produce something and this came out!

ended up doing lots of detail on a rock and a face and ignoring everything else, but it was enjoyable.

Mustang

I love that tutorial, bacon is so melancholy but still so fucking good that it's hillarious and informative. He really should be in TV or something.

Urantia

When doing a landscape at speed paint level, it might help to think of a color scheme right off the bat. You painted your mountains and rocks with some cooler, desaturated purples- but then also highlighted them with a similar color. It looks like this would make for a sunset scene, so using an orange or red as your rim light color may have helped add some visual interest.

Become great, artist!

surrealitycheck

Thank you very much for all the encouragement and advice!

Doing a less speed-painty landscape now in order to get how they work figured out, very much WIP atm.

Any suggestions on how to get the textured look of trees rendered without absurd quantities of work would be greatly appreciated

surrealitycheck

Here's a sketch from a photo, same size as the sketch on screen o.O

crawdaddio

Oh, it's only the same size to those who have the same pixel density as you. The landscape's got a good start, though I feel as though the sky ought to have a bit more blue around the edges (or at least purples). The Jolie portrait's also not bad; the proportions and angles are a bit off in a couple of places, but it's instantly recognizable, which can be tough to pull off, especially for a beginner. Remember to check and sight proportions and angles before going too far into the rendering, though. The bigger problem with it, though (and thankfully one that you can fix pretty easily) is the tonal range. I've got problems with it myself, as does...well, damn near anyone who uses pencils; you have to push them a little to get the best range of tones from them. I want to show you something here; these are histograms. They're basically graphs of the distribution of values in images. The left end is the dark tones, and the right end is the light ones. Here's the histogram for your source image:



As you can see, it's got a lot of lighter values, but also a fair deal of midtones and shadows. Here's your drawing's histogram:



Bit of a different picture. Now, it's pretty near impossible to get a full range of tones from a single pencil, especially the normal test-taking kinds. That's why artists' pencils come in a range of hardnesses, which run on scales of B (softer kinds) and H (harder kinds), with your standard HB being about in the middle. If you plan on doing tonal stuff with pencils, it's worth your while to get a good range of pencils; I've got a 6B (super soft), 4B, HB, and a 3H (pretty hard). It seems like it might be harder at first to push your values, but it really does make things easier, because when you can express more of the subtleties of value, you really enhance both your representation and your understanding of form, because you're looking more closely at how form and value interact in the picture. There's very subtle shading, for instance, along her right cheek following the cheekbone, and following the line from her nose to the outer corner of her lips; or under her eyes, tracing the shape of her eyeball under the skin; along her forehead, there's a gradient which follows the gentle curve of the forehead before it gets to the steeper curve of the temples. Of course, you want to double-check the proportions before getting into all that, though.

Also, I'd recommend neater hatching, even if you're going to smudge the graphite; personally, I'd recommend you try modelling the shading without smudging, but even if you do smudge, it only blends the pencil marks so much, so evidence of your lines remain, especially in the upper left corner, and along her left cheek (on the right side).

surrealitycheck

Thank you very much crawdadio. I'm going to quickly have a hash at tidying up the sketch with photoshop to see how it looks just with moved levels!

I was using an HB pencil simply because that's what I had to hand, but I always have a big problem with getting tone out of pencils even when I use darker pencils. I don't remember if I smudged the shading or not deliberately - I probably did it with my wrist, as I tend to forget that graphite can smudge

Be right back with the adjusted version!

surrealitycheck

This was just playing with the levels command on photoshop - never noticed it before, but it's pretty cool! Is this roughly what I should be aiming for, tone-wise?



And this one I did just because I liked how the extra darkness looked!

crawdaddio

You should probably go for something a little bit closer to that second one, though as I'm sure you know, you ought to be doing it in the pencils, if for no other reason than that that gives you a great deal more control over the tones than a post-drawing photoshop adjustment would.

surrealitycheck

Out of interest, how do you hold your pencil?

crawdaddio

Me, personally, I hold my pencil the way I suppose most people do:



Depending on how you set up your drawing space, though, there's also another way of holding a pencil, namely:



More or less, anyway; doesn't mean you should be doing sketches in a sketchbook on a tabletop that way, but that gets into more complicated stuff. Basically, it comes from the way your sketchbook should properly be positioned, namely, perpendicular to your line of sight (which it isn't if it's on a flat table, and that, I can tell you from personal experience, can wreak havoc on the proportions of your drawing), because that way there's minimal distortion due to perspective. That's why proper drawing tables are tilted. If you're standing, your drawing surface is going to be practically vertical, and the first way of holding your pencil is going to start to get mighty uncomfortable and tense. That's where the second way comes in. More or less. I'll leave that explanation open-ended so those with more know-how can tell it like it really is.

surrealitycheck

So if I can tilt my graphics tablet to be roughly equivalent to a drawing table that would be a good thing?

Interesting!

I noticed the other day that I let my thumb slide way up the pencil, but so long as it's not too serious a problem then I'm not worried.

crawdaddio

Well, if you're using a graphics tablet, the picture's going to be on the screen, so it doesn't really matter what angle the tablet itself is at, save for ergonomic considerations. The reason for tilting it is so that you're not seeing your own drawing skewed by perspective. Something might look right from your vantagepoint, but then you pick up your sketchbook and find that you stretched everything accidentally to compensate for the perspective distortion.

surrealitycheck

Was doing some of those 30 second drawings from posemania, but the thought struck me that after reading loomy's thread that I might be using the wrong type of representation.

I'm linking to it as it's 2000x1500.

http://imageshack.dk/imagesfree/0Op13867.jpg

surrealitycheck

Here's another figure type study, albeit one with clothes! About 5 mins in.

Trying to do it by using blocks of tone rather than lines.

surrealitycheck

Iteration 2.

Sublimus

crawdaddio wrote: »

you ought to be doing it in the pencils, if for no other reason than you will end up with a drawing that is actually correct, rather than an image that is shopped to look correct

surrealitycheck

you ought to be doing it in the pencils, if for no other reason than you will end up with a drawing that is actually correct, rather than an image that is shopped to look correct

What's that in reference to? The posing stuff, or the thing I'm doing right now? Or just generally?

It is worth pointing out that I'm using photoshop basically as a canvas - I'm not using any of the image distortion or cut and pacing tools. It's all on one layer, so I have to correct mistakes by going over in the same colour etc.

Third iteration!

Sublimus

It was in reference to the pencil drawing that you posted on the last page, and crawdaddio informing you that it would be better to make the adjustments with the pencil rather than digitally.

He said because you would have more control over the tones, but was trying to point out better reasons to make your adjustments to the drawing rather than messing with it in post production.

But! So I can be more helpful rather than just playfully pointing things out - what is your intention with this latest study? What are you trying to get out of it?

I feel like you might be better off to work in pencil a bit more before you dive into straight digital work. At least draw it out in pencil before you gon in and render it out in PS.

Shit, I myself still sketch things out 90% of the time before scanning and coloring.

surrealitycheck

But! So I can be more helpful rather than just playfully pointing things out - what is your intention with this latest study? What are you trying to get out of it?

I'm trying to force myself not to use only outlines - so I start with a huge black brush on a grey background to get the tone in various areas, then shrink the brush and do it again, and again, and again! Turtles all the way down. I'm just trying to force myself to see what's actually in a picture, so I know what would roughly be involved if I were creating it a priori. Plus it's fun >_>

Leggraphics

Think you might find the way you are practicing to draw in photoshop easier with lower opacity brushes. Start with high opacity and then work your way down the closer you get to the desired tone. Thats what I'm finding anyway. Block in the shapes, then block in some of the basic shades, maybe 2 or 3 tones and then lower the opacity and do it again.

Photoshop is to hard to paint in without using the opacity (alpha) setting.

Really like your landscapes !

surrealitycheck

Think you might find the way you are practicing to draw in photoshop easier with lower opacity brushes. Start with high opacity and then work your way down the closer you get to the desired tone. Thats what I'm finding anyway. Block in the shapes, then block in some of the basic shades, maybe 2 or 3 tones and then lower the opacity and do it again.

I'm using the opacity linked to pen pressure thing at the moment just to start. It doesn't feel too bad!

Really like your landscapes !

Thanks!

Aaron

Surreality, do you own a scanner or have easy access to one?

surrealitycheck

Surreality, do you own a scanner or have easy access to one?

Not at the moment, unfortunately. I have just however picked up a sketchbook and 2 pencils of each colour ranging from B to 4B, and did some sketches today. When I can next get hold of a scanner I'll upload them! Unfortunately you're only really seeing the digital end of stuff at the moment >.<

Aaron

surrealitycheck wrote: »

Surreality, do you own a scanner or have easy access to one?

Not at the moment, unfortunately. I have just however picked up a sketchbook and 2 pencils of each colour ranging from B to 4B, and did some sketches today. When I can next get hold of a scanner I'll upload them! Unfortunately you're only really seeing the digital end of stuff at the moment >.<

I ask because it's a better idea to get the pencil drawing skill well under your belt before heading to digital. It isn't always the case, more personal preference, but I've found that digital sketching lacks the control that drawing with pencils, charcoal or other "physical" media has. You may want to invest in a scanner so you can eventually work digitally off of pencil sketches. Again, just my experiences and personal preference.