@ Bonchi

My main "issues", if you can call it that, is that the brushstrokes are a little static, and the skin looks very "plastic".

Personal preferences, I prefer paintings that have a little "looseness" to it, more painterly than photorealistic, but that's just me.

There's no such thing as doing things "right"; end result is ultimately the important part. How you get there is mostly a matter of your own preferences and what is the most "efficient" for you.

Me, I prefer painting hair in such a way that you go from "big blocks" of color using a basic round brush, and gradually moving to detailing the smaller strands of hair using a combination of speckled brushes and really small round hard-edged airbrush. This "Big and loose ---> small and tight" method is how I tackle EVERYTHING in my drawing because that's how I'm most efficient.

About the only thing I can advise you, considering your particular working method, is to add a little random texture to both the skin and hair, to make it less plastic.

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Added on October 13, 2011, 12:58 amRelated:

Here's what I usually get with my method (Excuse the noise, the painting is meant to look like a painting and therefore has a lot of texture). It's part of a beard instead of hair, but the general working method I use is the same, except that I use a chunkier brush for beards to get that "scruffy" look:



This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 13 2011, 12:58 AM

@ Bonchi

MIGHT be a settings problem. I mean, I use an Intuo4 so I'm not sure if the interface is the same, but Intuos4 IS very sensitive, so it registers strokes more accurately.

You might also want to look at the "Smoothing" settings of your brush. If it's turned off it CAN result in an angular brushstroke path. Also a good idea to check your image resolution, how many DPI it has. Lower DPI ( <150 DPI) will look very "blocky" and pixelated. My artwork is usually done at resolutions of up to 400 DPI, with the widest point of the painting reaching at least 4500 pixels, before I shrink it to the "final" size. My computer is quite fast so it can handle that sort of size, but if your computer isn't very high-end this method might result in a smoking hot PC (and not in a good way)

As for the texturing, it's mostly brushstrokes (for the figure/background), with a final filter pass for the "finishing".

I use a fair number of custom brushes, most of them of the speckled/bristled variety which I use for adding lots of texture to the painting, with some chalky/pastel brushes for blending.

For the finishing, what I do is make a new layer using pure neutral grey (RGB = 128, 128, 128) and put an Add Noise filter at 400% with Uniform distribution. I run this noisy layer through the Brushstrokes -> Splatter filter a few times, followed by several applications of the basic Blur filter, desaturate that layer slightly (around -40 to -70), and then turn the layer blending mode to Overlay at 3 - 10% opacity (Usually end up around 6 or 7 percent), before flattening the whole image for resizing.

@ Bonchi

It's not really all that noticeable, that "angularity" LOL. It MIGHT be a concern if you are, say, going to make a billboard-sized print, but at the average view resolution, it's not really a concern. That's why I prefer working on a large canvas, you see: when I resize it, all those itty-bitty problems won't really make a difference.

I like how you're progressing with the image. As Agito mentioned though, the eyelashes and eyes could use improvement. I will recommend to actually remove the lower highlight on the iris, and put some detailing into the iris itself, since no normal person has all true-black eyes. The eyelashes look a bit stiff and plastic-y, might want to use a smaller brush, and use the Blur tool to soften the tips a little.

Speaking of WIPs, here's one of mine that I'm working on for a Kink Big Bang collaboration:

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Added on October 13, 2011, 11:04 pmMale and female figures require QUITE different mindsets to tackle, really. It's not just a matter of form and shape, but also the rhythm and posture. Men tend to be stiff and "tough" in movement, ladies are softer and more graceful. Rather like comparing how a dog and a cat moves, where a dog = man, cat = woman.

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 13 2011, 11:05 PM

Uh.... maybe? IF I move in back with my parents, where they're the ones responsible for the rental and utility bills, and I live off instant noodles for the rest of my life.

Frankly, though, I'm what some artists may call "active" with regards to producing art, but...

1) my art takes time to produce, so I can't work on a lot of artwork;

2) I rely entirely on freelance work, which isn't reliable income.

As it is, its mostly a hobby, although it's at the moment a mostly paid-for hobby.

Still, I keep my full time job, which is responsible for all my living expenses and savings; the art is what I use when I want pocket money to buy "nice" things, like going to the movies, video games, or "unnecessary" computer upgrades .

@ Adam:

Full-time job? Human resources clerk. Rather low pay, but has nice benefits.

Hmmm... I started by posting a price list on my deviantArt journal, showing what I'm capable of and the prices for the different complexities of art (simple portrait with plain background, all the way up to a full multiple-character action illustration). I then go around working on my own work and submitting them to the relevant groups to showcase my work, as a form of "advertising".

Eventually someone approaches me for a commission, where we work out the subject matter and therefore the price. Client pays the agreed price (paid in full for anything below $20 USD, more than that can be paid in instalments according to the work progression), usually through Paypal for international, or a bank transfer if the client is Malaysian. I then work on the art, submitting the necessary WIPs through e-mail for approval and to check with the client that the art is according to their specifications. I try to get as much detail about the work as possible before even starting, so I don't have to make corrections, but inevitably there are times where the client changes their mind or I simply deviate a little too much from the client's "vision", so I have to be ready to make changes if necessary.

Once the art is done, I send the signed, full-resolution copy to the client through e-mail, and then I submit the low-res, watermarked image to deviantArt, so I build up my portfolio of completed, commissioned works that way, and start the process of building exposure through groups again.

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@ acefreakz

Let's just say that I've been in a very, VERY dark, bleak place in life before. The sort of dark place that involves sitting on the edge of a very high bridge over a very deep river, and wondering about life expectancies. The art is pretty much the only thing keeping me from going back to that particular path over the bridge again, so I'm lucky to actually discover that I enjoy it. Otherwise you wouldn't be talking to me right now

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@ Agito

Can't say I'm very good yet. Just extremely stubborn about improvement, I suppose. Art is a necessary obsession for me; I pretty much eat, breathe, and make myself live for art. Not sure if you consider it a healthy thing, either; I'm practically a hermit. A happy hermit, but still.

@ Bonchi

Welcome! Painting looks great, and it's a good thing you decided to deviate from the photo reference a little An artist's main strength over photographers is the ability to take reality and make it "better", so don't be afraid to add stuff of your own that you think will help with the artistic value of the image. Good luck!

That is why I say "tend". I'm generalizing. There are, of course, exceptions to the rule, but for 70% of drawings you're going to be drawing womanly women and manly men. Posture and pose are by far and large a result of the physical differences between male and female. A woman's walk, for example, is not going to look like a man's walk, because the "idealized" woman is (usually) bottom heavy, with wide hips, while the "idealized" male is top-heavy, with narrow hips.

"Shojo-style" is also generalizing it a bit. Plenty of accomplished shojo mangaka draw men looking like men; VERY beautiful and sometimes androgynous men, but still. Their behaviour, movement, features etc are still noticeably male for the most part. From my mentoring experience, the question of unable to draw manly men tends to be a result of the artist spending far too much time drawing women. This is also often a problem encountered by beginner female artists, who are... well, FEMALE, and therefore it's easier for them to "express" femininity in their art, but since they're beginners and have not learnt observation well enough, they can't draw men that well. I'm a bit of an exception who finds men easier to draw, but then again, I am something of a specialist; specifically in beefcake art, where I'm actually supposed to EXAGGERATE masculinity, often in a sensual and/or sexual manner.

Sometimes that "goes with the flow" approach works best. Especially when doing concept work. Also works well for drawing organic forms like cliffs or mountains or trees, but of course SOME planning and fixing is needed to get a pleasing composition and image.

Bloody blasted chiselled faces and dramatic lighting. Hard to keep the features attractive and yet distinct.



This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 16 2011, 10:33 PM

Dreadlock's closer to the mark, actually. Not a big fan of the smudge tool, personally, difficult to control how the colours work, sometimes.

The actual resolution of this painting at the moment is around 8k pixels wide, 10k pixels tall.

I will say, however, the brush involved in the smoothing-out process is not at all your standard "smooth" soft airbrush, but a kind of rotating, splattery custom made brush that's specifically made for skin colour smoothing. The splattery shape adds some mild texturing that lightly implies skin pores and provides some nice colour variation, which helps with making realistic skin tones.

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Oh, and a quick sketch I made today. Under 30 mins, although I forgot the exact number of minutes taken. Probably around 20 or so...



This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 17 2011, 12:35 AM

You CAN turn on the grid, you know (Ctril + ' ). Might make things a little easier than just the plain old ruler.

Not a fan of the eyedropper, really. Too many colours in a photo, and sometimes there's noise so there might be weird, random colours in the photo itself.

You can create a simplified colour table/palette of the photo, however. Just load the original photo, going to Image -> Mode -> Indexed Colour. Make the number into something quite small, probably around 5-15, depending on what you want, and Save it as a .ACT file. You can load that .ACT file in your swatches panel by going to "Load Swatches" and going back to where you saved the .ACT file, and select the "Colour Table (.ACT)" option in the filetype so you can select the ACT file. Voila! Instant set of workable colours for you to pick and choose from. Might want to mix up some additional saturated colours for variety, but the indexed palette should have pretty much what you need to get a painting ready.

Sometimes I wish I have some live models to reference from.

It'll be hard to explain to my landlord why I'd have a constant stream of half-naked guys showing up at my house, though.



This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 17 2011, 11:35 PM

@ john

LOL yes, proportion is off, which is largely why I wanted a photographed model. It's hard to find images of muscular men with arms tied behind their back, facing forward. I fail at Google fu, really.

I am not looking forward to painting the guy sitting in the chair behind this one. He's wearing some Renaissance/Middle-Ages nobleman's clothing. Lots of embroidery, lots of fussy details. I'm going to die painting that LOL

@ Ace:

Was referring to that half naked guy that johnjohnny above just mentioned. You'll notice the reds and browns in the background is vaguely shaped like a guy sitting in a "kangkang-kaki" kinda way LOL

Which reminds me... Update,,,



Blanked out the background temporarily with a solid layer to get the "outline" right. >.> Leather breeches, Y U SO DIFFICULT?

Costume details. Y U SO DIFFICULT?!

@ Sai:

Well it IS a bit too desaturated and dark. I'm assuming it's supposed to be a wedding photo or something? It looks like the happy couple is waiting for the rain to fall O.o

Oooh, OOOH!

Here's a guy:



... well, he's male. Just not entirely human

This is one of my earlier works, so forgive the wonky anatomy.

... and the colouring and the horrible shading. Dear god, I feel ashamed now.

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 25 2011, 08:59 PM

An update on that art I'd been working on. This character is pretty much finished, in terms of appearance:

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Added on October 27, 2011, 12:18 amThis is very nice. A bit "soft" on the shading for my tastes... but nothing wrong with that, I just personally prefer some hard edges in art

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Oct 27 2011, 12:18 AM

@ Bonchi

Truth? Not as long as you might think. What I did was after laying down the basic "tube" shape for the piping (like what you see on the two gold lines at the lower half of the image), I drew the basic leaf pattern on a separate layer, duplicated and flipped it around so I get one very long string. This will be the base for the gold piping.

I then copy that layer (saving and hiding the original as backup), and using the Edit -> Transform tool, I shrunk and wrapped the pattern around to the necessary elements so it follows the shape of the form. After that, I handpainted in shading and the occasional highlights where I think it's necessary. Once I am satisfied with the patterning, I then drop some extra shading so it "curves" over the shape of the piping, erased/blurred some areas, and finally dropped all the layers down. As a finishing touch, I used the dodge/burn tools on some areas, to get hotspots where I want the eye to focus on.

It helps to work big, in this case. The painting is actually somewhat simple, but at this resolution, you don't really see it


@ Agito:

Stiff, yes. I haven't quite managed to put "life" into my characters yet >_>

As for Wolf's Rain... The first has more "punch" in terms of colour, but it didn't suit the mood I was going for. As for cheekbones... the original character looks like this:



The way they rendered it in-game, he doesn't actually have cheeks like people do.

I will, however, admit that I royally messed up his lower face and his eye, so the perspective is thrown off.

<--- still beginner.