The Irregulars -- A Livestream Study Group

[Roran Hawkins]

I've started using GIMP today, since I actually don't like colouring with pencils. Even thought aside from pen (during lessons ) is the only way I can draw atm.

[Shon Harris]

Alright, so I have a question that's incredibly idiotic. But you said all skill levels are welcome, so... er... studies. What are they? >.>

Look up any of the Old Masters' works and you'll find dozens of sketches, often skewed, and yet similar. These are probably examples of studies. When any image-maker goes into creating something large and finished, they always practice. It works even works for more abstract or expressionist-minded people who might want something more organic. The idea isn't necessarily to know how the piece will go, because you never will, but it's to get yourself familiar. Get practiced and learn what obstacles might arise for you before you're working on your finished piece. It lets you experiment. You can take a piece in a dozen ways, so sketch it out, draw from reference -- do studies t figure out what you really want.

An image is really just a solution. You know you want to do something, and you know you can do a number of things that could be satisfying. By doing studies you are creating sketches with pencil, ink, watercolour, paint, charcoal, pastel-- whatever, you're feeling out your options by doing them. You might not make them polished and finished works, but they'll serve as a stairway to when you've identified what you truly want from a finished piece.

@Sherlock: I'd be willing to give critiques, but not until we set a standard. While we have a broad range of image-makers in our community, some very exposed to the histories and theories and others less, I don't necessarily think responding specifically to the technical is really complete. You're great at that though. Maybe we can set the expectation that when pieces are posted, people list what sort of feedback they're aiming for. Some people may really want responses on the content. Maybe a balanced critique of that and technical, or they may want to know very specifically what the composition is saying. I think having a really broad sheet for people to fill out (or not fill out) could help make this community more effective at serving our population.

[Brand]

Take an object, item, anything, and draw it.


The point is that I have no scanner, to get my stuff scanned I have to do it at school, where other people also scan, and I ofc have to work for school and whatnot. Being at school is also where I make most of my studies; usually medieval doodles. There's some on my DA already: http://roranhawkins.deviantart.com/

I'm going to upload some more detailed drwings as soon as I can, but I'm having ample time this week. I have to deliver end work for this grade next friday :s

I really like your drawings. They have a lot of personality, and the armor looks really intricate in most of the pieces.

[Sherlock Holmes]

Alright, so I have a question that's incredibly idiotic. But you said all skill levels are welcome, so... er... studies. What are they? >.>

Take an object, item, anything, and draw it.

Essentially this. Go through my gallery here or here and you'll see lots of examples. Still life (from life), photo studies, master studies, anatomy studies, etc. It's basically looking at something and trying to copy it as close as you can. Depending on what your study is, the focus of each lesson will be a bit different, but the essence is generally to get your drawing as close as you can to your reference.

For instance.. Let's say I decide to do a still life to try and improve my value work (because I'm just not getting enough contrast in my pieces). So, I set up an orange on my desk and look at it and try to answer the following questions:

Which direction is the main source of light coming from? How strong is it? Which part of the orange appears to be the darkest? Which area is the lightest? (And is there a big difference between the two or is it just a little bit of a difference?) Is there any bounce light occurring on the edges of the orange? (Depending on the material of the desk, the objects near it, and the strength of the light source, it's very likely there is, so how is that showing up value-wise compared to the main value shifts?) Etc.

If I was doing a master study, then I might try to figure out answers to questions like this:

How is this artist using color? Is their brushwork smooth or more loose? What is the composition of this piece and why does it work? What color is the light source the artist is trying to imply? What is the mood and how is the artist implying it. (i.e. use of a certain color scheme, specific type of lighting, gesture/poses of the figures and objects, etc.) What traits make this piece specific to this artist? Etc.

When you do studies, you start out copying.. (imitating others who have been successful in achieving what you're hoping to achieve). You learn by understanding why those people have become successful. (Because chances are they've done all the same exact types of studies you're doing to get to the point where you're now admiring their work because of awesomeness.) Once you understand why things work, you can start to do variations on those themes and find out how they apply to your own art. It's not to say that you can't work from imagination to supplement your studies (it's an excellent way of gauging areas that you're weak in, actually, so that you know what things you need to work on), but doing studies are what will help you develop your skills.. If you only ever work from imagination, without stocking your brain with the knowledge that studies will provide, you'll always be stunted in your artwork.. Limited by your own ignorance. (Thus, the important of doing studies -- they eventually give you all kinds of freedom to create, without any limitations.)

If you want to see examples of studies, you can go through my gallery here or my sketchbook here and you'll see quite a few.

[Shalashaska]

Ah, okay. I think I see. So, if I were to take an animated image of, say, Batman. I would look at it, determine (based on the shadows) where the light was coming from, note the differences in the shadows cast by smaller ridges between the larger ones... okay! I think I see. I drew, er, a pencil sharpener. I didn't realize until I was already done that, were my depiction to be accurate, there would have to be two light sources, and the G.E. Hicks guide said to only work with one (as did you) so... Learning, yay. XD Tomorrow I think I'm going to start a larger project, I have a pretty basic grasp on shadows/contrast but I think I can manage.

[Sherlock Holmes]

Ah, okay. I think I see. So, if I were to take an animated image of, say, Batman. I would look at it, determine (based on the shadows) where the light was coming from, note the differences in the shadows cast by smaller ridges between the larger ones... okay! I think I see. I drew, er, a pencil sharpener. I didn't realize until I was already done that, were my depiction to be accurate, there would have to be two light sources, and the G.E. Hicks guide said to only work with one (as did you) so... Learning, yay. XD Tomorrow I think I'm going to start a larger project, I have a pretty basic grasp on shadows/contrast but I think I can manage.

.. Do you have a link to this image? (So I can see the reference before I give my two cents? Because I don't think working from an animation is the best way to start off. If something's moving, it's going to be very hard to copy it successfully.. XD)

@Sherlock: I'd be willing to give critiques, but not until we set a standard. While we have a broad range of image-makers in our community, some very exposed to the histories and theories and others less, I don't necessarily think responding specifically to the technical is really complete. You're great at that though. Maybe we can set the expectation that when pieces are posted, people list what sort of feedback they're aiming for. Some people may really want responses on the content. Maybe a balanced critique of that and technical, or they may want to know very specifically what the composition is saying. I think having a really broad sheet for people to fill out (or not fill out) could help make this community more effective at serving our population.

I think all comments are valid - that's the fair standard. Everyone is allowed to have an opinion and give their two cents, as long as it's done from an intentionally helpful standpoint. Even people who aren't terribly proficient in art know when they see something wrong, though they may not have the knowledge to articulate why it's wrong.. (Their eyes will often pick up on it regardless; the brain knows when something's not necessarily 'correct' looking.) This is an open group and discussion is encouraged. If someone gives their opinion on a perceived flaw (or success) in a piece and I give mine, too, the artist can then have the benefit of both opinions and take from the information as they wish (or ignore it entirely). Just because I may be able to back my answer up by citing tried art methods (because I've maybe done more studying than they have), it doesn't mean that someone else who (technically) knows less wouldn't see something in the piece to comment on, as their tastes may differ from mine -- They might have a color suggestion I didn't think of or an idea that would help with the storytelling element of a piece.. Differing opinions and varying perspectives on our own individual tastes are helpful. (If someone wants feedback on something specific, they are, of course, allowed to ask for criticism relating specifically to that aspect. Or, if they say, 'hey - I'm not done with this area yet, so just ignore it for now', then we'd naturally respect that wish.)

Again, as long as the criticism is constructive -- Everyone's allowed to have a say.

I've started using GIMP today, since I actually don't like colouring with pencils. Even thought aside from pen (during lessons ) is the only way I can draw atm.

You can still get those tonal variations with traditional means. Digital/Traditional doesn't matter as far as values go -- at the end of the day, they're just tools. Add more pressure to your pencil (or pen) to get a darker value, lighten up on it to get the opposite contrast. (Just be mindful of your lighting and you're good to go. ^_^)

[Shalashaska]

.. Do you have a link to this image? (So I can see the reference before I give my two cents? Because I don't think working from an animation is the best way to start off. If something's moving, it's going to be very hard to copy it successfully.. XD)

You misunderstood. XD I didn't mean like a .gif, I meant animated as in an animated character. Like the Link you drew; not a human.

[Sherlock Holmes]

You misunderstood. XD I didn't mean like a .gif, I meant animated as in an animated character. Like the Link you drew; not a human.

Doing studies from already stylized/cartooned work isn't the best way to go about things.. If you really want to improve, then you want to start with realism. (So you can understand why things are stylized certain ways and why they work.) Errors hide very easily in cartooned figures when people don't know what they're doing and then they go to try and draw something else and don't understand why they're having all kinds of trouble with it -- if you know how to actually construct something from simple shapes and how to realistically light them, then it's extremely easy to simplify something into a cartoon.. But trying to work the other way around is hard as hell. (If that all makes sense.) If you want to draw Batman, I'd suggest getting a screen cap and doing a study of that, rather than trying to gain snippets of information available from a cartoon. (Because lots of information has already been stripped away and you're left with whatever the artist chose to omit to facilitate the cartoon style. Now, if you want to do a study of something like that in conjunction with some more realistic studies, just to see how the two relate to one another, then that's fine.. But don't just do studies from cartoons and think you'll jump your skills ahead very much. Almost every successful cartoonist, even anime/manga industry professionals, have studied realism to start with and then they branched out.)

For my Link piece, it may be based off a cartoon (and a lot of the references I used were cartoon/stylized images.. because that's what is mainly available for Link refs), but I'm at a point where I can supplement animated references with what I already know (from doing previous studies) to come up with a lighting scheme that will allow me to render out my figure. If I hadn't studied realism first, I wouldn't know how to do any of that.

Consider this guy -- Here is the gallery of an artist that I follow on DeviantArt. He works for Pixar as an artist/lighting director. He essentially makes stylized cartoons for a living.. If you look through his gallery, you'll see tons of painting from life.. and then you can see how he takes and applies that knowledge to his more cartoony pieces. (His work is actually quite lovely.. You can definitely see the Pixar vibe in them.) Without that studying, those pieces would be so much less vibrant and tangible.. The colors wouldn't work as well, the textures would look wrong, the lighting would be off.. But by doing those studies, he's able to learn how to achieve the effects he wants to and then execute them again later on in different ways. That is the essence of doing studies.

[Shalashaska]

I understand, which is why I drew what I drew earlier (a pencil sharpener). I set up a thread in the gallery, and because you said you didn't want any pictures posted in here unless they weren't overly large, I'll just link the thread:

http://roleplayerguild.com/showthrea...67#post8215667

Before any critique/comments come in, if i understand correctly one of my major mistakes was that I shaded in both the top curve and the bottom curve; the light was intended to be coming from the top, so the top curve should have had either a much lighter shade or none at all. Also, the screw is really screwed up (pun), but keep in mind that this is a first draft.

- - - Updated - - -

By the way, Sherlock, you're really scaring me here. You seem to know, er, everything.

[Sherlock Holmes]

I understand, which is why I drew what I drew earlier (a pencil sharpener). I set up a thread in the gallery, and because you said you didn't want any pictures posted in here unless they weren't overly large, I'll just link the thread:

http://roleplayerguild.com/showthrea...67#post8215667

Before any critique/comments come in, if i understand correctly one of my major mistakes was that I shaded in both the top curve and the bottom curve; the light was intended to be coming from the top, so the top curve should have had either a much lighter shade or none at all. Also, the screw is really screwed up (pun), but keep in mind that this is a first draft.

- - - Updated - - -

By the way, Sherlock, you're really scaring me here. You seem to know, er, everything.

I'm far from knowing everything. I'd really only categorize myself as an intermediate level artist at present, if I was to be candid. It is my main source of income (so I can call myself a professional at this point), but there are others who easily outstrip my own knowledge and skill level. XD

First draft comment -- Your main mistake is that your lit sharpener and the surface of the paper (which should be the value of whatever it's sitting on for contrast) are the exact same, which blows out your sense of lighting. (Never leave anything white unless it's a really sharply focused highlight. You lose all sense of form otherwise.) I guarantee the sharpener and whatever surface it's sitting on are different values. Now, that's not to say you have to shade the entire paper, but you should at least indicate it around the sharpener (give it an inch or two of the surface value on all sides to help place it firmly). When you shade in the background, then that allows you to add in the cast shadow because, even if the item is lit from above), I can almost guarantee there'll be a secondary light source bouncing light from somewhere else, which will create a slight shadow in one direction or another.. Try to pay attention to the small things -- What makes the screw different from the surface material of the sharpener itself? (If it's one of those plastic ones like I have, then the plastic is more dull than the metal of the screw and blade - this presents you with an opportunity to try and understand how the light is working on them differently. Why does one look metal? What makes the plastic look different from the metal? Etc. It'll take practice to develop your eye for this, but it's good to keep things like this in mind while you work.)