Three Mentee Ladies

[LDiehl]

Welcome! This is the thread for the gals I've agreed to mentor to post their works in progress in.

Ashlee, Laura, Belle (should you accept the challenge):

I ask that you each give a little introductory post with your goals and your current "best" piece. Think of this as a kind of starting point that you are documenting. After that feel free to post your first step of your current project for critique (remember I'm not assigning projects, merely helping you with what you are already inspired to create).

I will do my best to comment on your paintings as they progress.

A couple of "guidelines":

-You are encouraged to lend your critiques to the other ladies, just make sure they follow the watch words specific and constructive.

-Do only post steps for one work at once (or else we are all going to get confused!)

-Each time you start a new piece, I ask that you give a short description of your aim for the piece.

-Images are best attached or embedded at a reasonable size.

Go for it! :)

[Senira]

Hello, all! My name's Ashlee. I've been lurking around this site for years now, and you'd think that with the near-daily oggling I do I'd have picked up some useful tips from the pros here-- apparently not. I'm not progressing nearly as quickly as I should be, and with school sucking away at my once-abundant free time, I fear that without external help I won't be anything near employable by the time I graduate. (Which is this summer.) So here I am, prepared to work my butt off in pursuit of excellent portfolio work. Wish me luck!

Hm. My best piece? That's a difficult one. I tend to turn from most of my pieces in horror a few days after completing them, once I realize all the mistakes I've made. However, if I'm going to pick one, I guess this one would be it.

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The face has stronger values than I usually assign to skin (or anything, really.) Which is why I liked it. Other than that, it looks very plastic. The weird void she's floating in doesn't help, either.

Here's my current WIP. It's a traveling conjurer summoning a spirit/spirits for the amusement of an upper class, Edwardian crowd. I've never attempted an image with a light source like this before. Originally I was going to gaslight the stage in addition to the light coming from the conjuring, then I decided that would make it too complicated and nixed the idea. I think the light coming off the spirit gives it the wondrous, enthralling feel I was aiming for, anyway.

I really want to get a feel for rendering materials with this piece-- no matter what I try, every surface in my pieces comes out looking the same. I included a lot of different things in this one-- a velvety curtain, wooden floors, satin pants, embroidered shirt-- so that I have several different materials to experiment with. I'm trying to hammer out as much of this stuff as I can in B&W before I even think about touching color, but even now I feel a bit stuck. The folds on her pants and shirt feel wrong, and I want to get a basic sense of them, at least, before I move on to other parts. Any tips?

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[Elvy]

Hey hey everyone! I'm Belle and its so nice to meet you all. I'm still a newbie to conceptart.org actually but I'm really excited about this golden opportunity for me to be able to learn from you guys and improve. I used to only draw (not counting random doodles) when I had some free time which was almost never. But now that I just graduated from University, I thought this is the best time for me return to something that I love doing and really get serious about it. I too, like Ashlee (GOOD LUCK! :D) , am looking to create a good portfolio so that there might be a chance for employment in the future.

I too had a hard time picking my 'best' piece so I decided to pick one that I sort of... like? :S This piece was one out of six entries for a local exhibition last year and surprisingly, it got put up as one of the advertisement posters.

http://i174.photobucket.com/albums/w117/theblackportfolio/hug.jpg

This is one of my latest piece which I did about 2 weeks ago, I thought I was done with it, but I came back to it and realised I didn't like how the girl turned out. I think I put too little effort in rendering her trees and roots and so now I plan on creating more organic items such as flowers to make her look more "earthy" and less boring. Also I don't like how the picture doesn't seem to have enough "flow". The idea was heaven and earth as a couple. I think I like how heaven turned out with him blending in with the sky although I think it could have been smoother, especially at the neck. So two main issues now is how to make earth more interesting and how to make "heaven" blend with "earth". Suggestions?

http://i174.photobucket.com/albums/w117/theblackportfolio/heavenearth.jpg

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Since we should encourage each other by providing some comments and critique, I do have one for you Ashlee, I really love the idea you have for your piece and its great that you're trying to render materials, which is hard! I'm not an expert on it, but when I look at your picture, the pants look fine, except for cloth around the knee of the standing leg. It looks as though the conjuror has too much cloth at that part and has no knee. Also for the shirt, there should be some folds under the breast stretching towards the armpits and the waist. However, I do see some faint grey lines when I look closely, so maybe it's just a problem with my computer's resolution.

[LDiehl]

Ashlee: I think your newest piece is off to a good start. You questioned the folds of her pants and shirt. I think they are bugging me because they feel a bit arbitrary, like they aren't quite following the movements so much as they were put there to be there (if that makes any sense?). The pants also seem a bit lumpy. Do you have a certain type of pants and shirt in mind? I find it always helps to have images of the sort of clothing I have in mind (or similar) sitting along side my canvas as I work ...that way I can sort of borrow the properties of that particular fabric.. the way it folds, drapes, stretches, the surface "look." Even if the pose of the person wearing said clothing is not anything like what I'm doing. What are you hoping to have as your focal point?

Belle: Nice idea for a painting. Ok, the biggest thing I'm picking up on in your earth and sky piece is that the light source is kind of nebulous... which could work except it is making your job of rendering the faces believably harder. If you decided on a definite spot for the sun, even if it were obscured behind a cloud partially, I think it could really help you with lighting. Likewise, digging up a few photos of male and female profiles lit from roughly the direction you want, could really help you with the forms of the faces. The trees on the ground are bugging me. I think it is the fact that they are all very uniform in shape and size. I think one way heaven and earth could blend is if something from the earth was blowing up into the air or something from the sky was coming down to meet the land. I think the roses are a little over saturated for the rest of the picture, as they really grab my eye. I do realize you aren't trying to be literal (or at least I think you aren't) but the scale of the roses and vines to the trees throws me off a bit... If she's earth and he's sky I almost want a better sense that each is a colossal entity in their own right. I wonder if there are somethings of a larger scale that could be her hair decorations or help form her hair (rivers, boulders, entire fields). Yikes! I'll stop here. I don't mean to overwhelm you :)

[noxartemus]

Aiyeee, sorry if I'm a few days late. For some reason your email was sent to my junk folder. ._. Hotmail is an odd email service sometimes.


Anways, Hi yall! I'm Laura, great to be working alongside some awesome talent here. About me, I'm 18, I just recently graduated from highschool and have been drawing since about 1, but gotten serious when I was 8. My biggest goal right now is to be a general concept artist and illustrator, primarily for the fantasy genre.

You'd assume that for the lifetime I've spent drawing, I'd be a master by now, but because of my lack of direction, I've lost alot of discipline and experience that I could have gained through a teacher. :/ This is an invaluable oppurtunity.

As for... greatest work? Mostly I've been sketching and going back to the basics for a long time to rebuild my foundation, so it's more like picking what I'm not too ashamed of showing right now. :bashful: First attachment is my best work, last two attachment are my projects. >.>

CRITS

Belle, loving that manatee, just had to say it. As for your latest project, the colors are very dynamic and nice. My only suggest right now is maybe making the girl's hair more smooth, then slowly make it more bark like, using some various texture brushes?

Ashlee, very good anatomy and painting skills. Especially the expression on that woman, hilarious. :) Looking at your latest project however, I don't think I could give much critique at that stage. The folds of the cloth seem a little contradictory to the movement of the body however. Good composition though. :)

[LDiehl]

Laura: No worries. My e-mail does strange things too. As for crits, I really feel that I need a little more information to help ya. The first WIP image with the water...What is supposed to be happening? Is the purple quilted looking object part of the monster or something else? The second one seems off to a good start... Where are you planning to go with it? You should pick a background color for him (I do hope it is a he >_< and I haven't guessed wrong) as that will help you with light and color values. Do you plan to expand the canvas into a scene or just keep it as a character study?

[noxartemus]

For the dragon, the quilted part is part of the dragon but a closeup, the farthest part of her being her head. This dragon is supposed to be a series I'm doing for posters on Deviantart, showing the last of the great wyrms for each element. This one's water, she lost her mate and is calling out to him- but it's going to be caught in the action where he heard is JUST bursting out of the water, giving a deafening cry.

Yes, that is a guy. :P He's supposed to be a little adrogynous though. This is a character face study I'm doing for preperation of a graphic novel. He's the court jester and a vampire, but he was punished and placed as a jester without his consent, so he somewhat hates his job. He acts like the Jetser from one of the Shakespear plays where people go up to him for advice, but the difference is, he's manipulating everyone from the background. I have another rough sketch of his full body and costume, but this one I wanted to finish up first. There is a chance of using this one though as one of the book covers in the future though.

[LDiehl]

Laura: Like the series idea. For the dragon piece I feel like something isn't quite working for me composition-wise. Did you do a bunch of tiny thumbnails before beginning? Can I see them? If you didn't, you might want to step back and do some now, as they are a great way to get a feeling for the main shapes within an image and thieir arrangement. The serpentine nature of the wyrm could potentially lend itself to a number of eye pleasing visual paths. Sounds like you probably want to make her head the focal point. For this you should consider the things that make a focal point "pop" a few are: size, contrast, saturation (think about how these might be used to bring the most attention to that one area). You might also want to give some more thought to colors. If you're doing a wyrm for each element, it might really help if the predominant color for each was the "iconic" one (ie: blue for water). This doesn't mean the color scheme needs to be cliche or boring, you can have many variations within such a scheme as well as good uses of that color's compliment. I just feel like it might give a bit more of a framework for your series as a whole...

[Senira]

Here's my latest WIP. I re-did the main character's clothing after finding better reference for them-- The top is a Chinese-style shirt, and the bottoms are harem pants. I also started on the stage curtains and tried to define the audience's chair backs. I think I might have to pull them down, though, because they don't allow enough room for shoulders.

I want the focal point to be the spirit she's conjuring, but I haven't decided what it is yet. I kind of liked the idea of the spirit being in mid-formation as a mush of limbs and faces, but I want the overall feel to be sinister more than horrifying. My idea is that the audience is full of spoiled rich folks who can't appreciate the terrible things lurking behind the conjurer's glitz and glamor-- kind of like the audience at the end of King Kong, who thought it was all fun and games until the gorilla broke out and started destroying them.

I wish I was further along with this one, but it was just announced that a portfolio is needed for a class I want to get into next quarter, so I'm scrambling to get one together by next week. O_O

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Noxartemus, that lion is crazy! I love the texture of the fur around the muzzle, and the highlights on it. I think that the highlights on its mane should either be a little smoother or toned down a little; they're in such sharp contrast with the orange that it distracts from the light ball it's spitting. Other than that, the overall effect is very cool. I like it!

As for the guy with the spades tattoo (a neat idea, by the way.) I think his chin a little lopsided. The rest of the facial structure is nice, particularly the lips and eyes. You've chosen an arresting shade of green; it stands out well against the other green in the image. I can't wait to see this one when it's further along!

Elvy Maybe you could have Earth's hair be treetops, and there are leaves blowing from them into the sky? You could disguise the leaves as flyaway strands of hair, or something of that nature. Kind of like the scene in Pocahontas where her hair is flipping around and the "colors of the wind" are swirling through it.

[Elvy]

Hey guys! Thanks so much for the tips and encouragement. I've been taking your advice on how to improve the picture, but everytime I draw over the image, it turns out crappy and too messy. I think I'm too distracted by the old lines and colouring. Also I got a PM which suggested tilting the face of the female more, which I thought it was a good suggestion :)

So I decided to just draw a new sketch of it and play around with it more. And speaking about trees and leaves, I get distracted easily and tend to work on more than one piece at a time, so I'm working on a new piece that I have in my sketchbook. But I won't post it here because it'll confuse everyone. (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?p=1492344#post1492344)

Have to run now, so I'll post the new sketch of Heaven and Earth tommorrow.

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On the side,

Laura, I think your work is great! Especially the lion. And I love how you rendered your guy's lips!

Ashlee, great improvements on the clothes!

Mentor Laura, no don't worry about overwhelming me! Your advice is great! And I'm really glad to be under your mentorship!

[LDiehl]

Ashlee: The clothes look much more natural now. I'm very curious to see what you come up with as far as the spirit she's conjuring. What are your thoughts on the color palette? Will this be a grayscale painting or do you plan to add color?

Belle: Maybe try starting over in a new image for the same concept? It seems to me that you now have a better idea of where you are going with the image. I think the idea could benefit from being "played" around with in new ways. I bet you could come up with a sheet full of possible compositions and "camera" angles for the same image story... That is if you aren't sick of the image at this point (I know working on an image that has lost its thrill can be painful)... if you are I'd say shelve it with a neat little "done" label and put all of your energies into the new tree image. I really like the ink work on the tree sketch you posted most recently. What do you plan to do for the final? Will it be a painting?

[noxartemus]

Argh, sorry Laura if I haven't been drawing, I had a very bad emergency operation in my upper respiratory system that rendered me in bed unable to move or sit up straight. (It would have torn apart my stitches and cause internal bleeding.)

I'm finally strong enough now though to sit up at my computer now, so I'm going to get back on it! Thanks to you, and my peers here for the advice. :) I'm really itching to draw after being cooped up this whole time. >_O
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Ashlee: Thanks, and the image looks really great now. I'm not sure if it's because it's because you haven't finished it yet, but I suggest some brighter highlights here and there to bring out the picture more. Can't wait to see though what kind of creature is going to emerge from that magic cloud. :D

Belle: Thanks too! Cool sketchbook, a very neat images you have there. I must say you really have a great understanding of composition. For anatomy, try downloading the Andrew Loomis books, Figure Drawing will help you a great deal in learning even more secrets about the human body. :)

[LDiehl]

Laura: Oh my, that sounds awful >_< Good to hear that you are on the mend... Don't tax yourself too much with drawing before you're ready. *hugs*

[Elvy]

Laura: Yikes, hope you are feeling better now :) *huggles* And thanks for your compliments, and I will look into Loomis :) Figures are hard.

Mentor Laura: Sorry I haven't been active, but I could only manage to squeeze in a few small sketches a day during the week (Which can be found in my sketchbook on concept art)

Yes you're right, I am tired of the Heaven & Earth drawing and well, I won't shelve it away as done yet, but I will get back to it. Right now I'm looking into coloring the large tree. Its a drawing for a friend, who is currently writing a story. The tree is suppose to be Ygdrassil, the portal to the nine worlds. It's suppose to be daytime and the tree is sick, so obviously the main character is out to save it. I actually wanted to do a piece with inks or some form of traditional media, but I don't know how to go about doing it nor do I have the materials. Do you have any recommendations as to what I should get from the art shop? Something for a beginner?

I really want to do a black and white piece too with my black pen, but the pen is not really very good. I'm currently using a Pilot pen, but the ink breaks everytime I do larger strokes. Is there a particular brand for a pen that is good for drawing?

[LDiehl]

Belle: Quite alright. I too have been super busy. As for traditional media: Full-color wise, you could try a small set of Prismacolor colored pencils or markers... as both are relatively easy to control (and the color vibrancy is nice). If you want to mess with paint, I'd say go with the primary colors (plus black and white) of Liquitex acrylics... and maybe a couple of pre-made pre-gessoed canvases/painting boards. As for ink pens, I'm a huge fan of the German Staedtler pigment liners, as they make good unbroken lines and come in a variety of sizes, and they are lightfast and waterproof on paper. :)

[Elvy]

Thanks Laura, I will go look for them over the weekend :)

Here's what I've done so far with Ygdrassil, hoping to get more time during the weekend and add more details. As I mentioned earlier, its suppose to be morning, so I added a little yellow. My sister says the picture looks like its dusk, so I am wondering if I should add some reds as well to liven up the image. The mood I'm going for is tranquil yet foreboding.

I am having problems with the rendering of the background. Its suppose to be a mass of trees at the back, seeing that it is in a forest afterall, but how does one render them, especially leaves, "realistically"? I suppose it has to do with colour, but is there anywhere I could look at a tutorial on how to render those digitally? (this was one of the problems I faced when rendering the Heaven and Earth piece as well, how does one do trees?)

[LDiehl]

Belle: I feel a bit like a broken record, but do look up a few twisty tree references. For the focal point tree it seems like there may be too many branches shooting off on the left hand side (our left) at regular intervals. With trees you want to be fractal, ie have smaller and smaller sub branches shoot off of the main one and give a random feel. As for rendering the background trees, yes it is quite a challenge to hint at them realistically without overdoing it (I have problems with over-rendering >_<). Muted colors to simulate aerial perspective are good, you're doing a good job with that already. You basically want to hint at trees through mass, light and shadow. Try squinting at or blurring some forest photos and notice the types of shapes that occur. Don't worry about rendering specific trees as much as they shapes they make as a whole... Will this be a forest with foliage? If you are planning to add leaves and such, those tend to blend and obscure parts of the branches and trunks as well, making rendering the back trees even more of an endeavor in choice (what visual information to include and what not to). You want just enough to hint to the eye that these are trees, but not enough to draw the eye away from the focal point tree.

As for colors, I'm getting a bit of a dusk feel too. I think the problem is that "tranquil yet foreboding" doesn't lend itself to bright streams of morning sunlight. If you were going for something more along the lines of happy and radiant, I'd say shift your palette to warm golden browns and spring greens with hints of cooler darker greens in the shadows and with yellows and oranges in the patches of light. In your case, I am getting a kind of ghostly feel... almost dreamlike. I think you could continue with the color palette you are using, working in greater contrast in the foreground as well as color variations (of the colors you already are using) that have a touch more saturation. Maybe brainstorm a little more about the feel you want?

[noxartemus]

Hi y'all. :)

Laura Mentor: Yes, you are right about the dragon drawing btw. I didn't do any thumbnails for the drawing, it was a rather spontaneous idea when I was looking at a landscape photo my friend took for me. However, I can't seem to be able to produce any good thumbnails, perhaps I should walk away and try doing one of my other projects temporarily before going back to it? I do have a commission I'm being paid $50 for I could work on temporarily if it's ok. >_>

Belle: Hmmm, liking the tree so far, it's going to a great start. I notice you used your sketch for a painting now eh? :) The colors kind of give me a dreamy like feeling, like I should sit under it with a good book. Lol. What I'd suggest to you other than what Laura has already told you is to maybe sharpen the image more with a custom hard edged brush a bit in some places to give it more definition and a feeling of depth? Also if you want to add a gnarled texture, try fiddling/make some brushes? It makes the job alot easier sometimes if you know how to use them.

[LDiehl]

Ladies: I want to apologize in advance if responses in the next month are spotty and/or brief ;) At the moment, I'm working on 3 confirmed book covers (ie contracts are signed) ... all due before December 10th. Not to mention the one due this Friday. And there are a couple others that are floating nebulously in the void as I type this. Yikes! So I am busy, busy, busy...

Laura: Not a problem. One at a time is more of a lose guideline (intended to keep you all from wanting to post your entire sketchbooks ;). Bring to the forefront whatever painting you feel the need to.

[noxartemus]

Whoo awesome. : ) Goodluck on those bookcovers btw! :3

This commission is from a friend who wanted something cool for her desktop. She said draw anything very large, powerful, scary, and fantasy... so I came up with an idea to make an "Ash Bear" since she loves bears.

The Ash Bear is a dusty colored bear birthed from particles of ash and hardened lava, that lurks about in Volcanic Areas, spewing out hot lava at any tresspassers who dare pass into it's territory.

[Senira]

A thousand apologies for my absence the last couple of weeks. We're in finals right now, and I've got several major projects (including the production book for my senior final--meep!) due next week. After that we're on break until January, so I should be a lot more active then.

I'll try and pop back in and offer some comments/suggestions to you guys this weekend. Again, sorry!

[LDiehl]

Laura: Good start! I like the concept. The first thing I would advise you to do is ditch the white. I did a paint-over for you below (I needed a break from my own stuff, I hope you don't mind!). Quick and messy style, I just kept adding new layers and messing with things here and there. This may not be the direction you want to go with it at all, but I do hope you find it helpful on some level. If you want to know how/why I did something in particular ask!

[noxartemus]

D: Dear God, you captured what I wanted exactly. XD I don't mind at all, this is perfect. I was trying to add some contrast between the reds and fur, yet I wasn't sure how much of the red lava from the atmosphere I should add, and how the lights emitting from the body would react around it so I was very meek at painting.

Also, I have to go to the States for about two weeks starting this Friday, I'll be back though, but I won't have access to a tablet. ><

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v465/Drakolordx/Bearshow.jpg

[LDiehl]

Laura: Glad I could help! I really like the fur you've started rendering on the left side of his face (our left), it has a nice silkiness to it. Enjoy your trip to the States. I look forward to more updates when you return.

[Senira]

School's out, woo! Which means I've got six weeks to work on personal projects. I've put aside my last piece for a while; I lost the inspiration for it during the frenzy of finals. My new piece is one I promised myself I'd pick up at a later date-- it was going to be my entry for E.O.W. #56, The Floating Bazaar.

I ran into some problems with it, got frustrated, and dropped it. I'm starting over again with the same concept, but a new composition and approach.

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The figure in the foreground is watching the approach of the world-famous traveling bazaar, an annual event put on by a country far across the sea. Design wise, the bazaar is essentially a bunch of glass lanterns made out of sheet metal; the architectural features on them will be archways, support beams, windows, etc. The lantern bases will disguise entryways and landing gear.

Here's a Flickr search with images of the lantern style I'm going for: http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=istanbul+market+lantern&m=text

I'm working it out in grayscales before I move onto color. I want to take a painterly approach with this one, but I'm finding it difficult.

[noxartemus]

Hey! My grandparent's have a computer here so I decided to wiggle on by here. Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving.

Ashlee: So far I like the concept and the composition of what you're doing, I can't really give much advice at this stage in time with my experience, the only thing I can see is that the character's boot-ay is quite big. X)

._O And I don't know if it's because I have a widescreen computer monitor, but looking at my drawing from my grandparent's computer... it looks a little more scrunched up and less sharper than what I usually see. Is there a way to solve this?

[Senira]

The scrunch problem seems to be associated with saving JPGs out of Painter. I noticed it when using the family computer this morning. The images seem all right on my laptop monitor, which is why I was a little thrown at first.

I exported this one out of Painter and re-saved it in Photoshop, so we'll see how it looks now. I haven't started work on the figure yet, so she remains booty-licious (and lit by the wrong source) for now. ;)

[noxartemus]

Hmm... but I don't use Painter. ._o I suppose I'll have to bop my computer ferociously when I get back to Korea and tinker it out.

So far with your image, I'm liking the color scheme and concept, it's sort of dreamy. :3

[LDiehl]

Thought I'd pop in...

Ashlee: A very neat concept. I love the Flickr search you linked. Talk about inspiration! I'm a bit puzzled why you don't seem to be making this a night scene though. I think the lanterns would be much more eye catching if they were not competing against a bright blue sky. I've actually been using Painter quite a lot lately.... but I always save as .psd. Like you I use Photoshop for saving web-ready .jpgs.

[Senira]

I was actually considering turning this into a night scene. As I looked for more pattern inspiration, I stumbled across images of chinese and taiwanese silk lanterns-- like paper lanterns, their light is diffuse, but it's especially eye catching because of the color saturation.

Here's a night version of the piece. It's not terribly refined, since I just took the day version I was working on and messed with the contrast and color variations. I re-started the balloons for the third time, going with my new silk inspiration. I haven't added the patterns onto it yet, but I threw in some rough indications of the windows and the engine, so there's a better idea of what the whole thing is going to look like.

I want to put the girl in the foreground into a more dynamic pose. I'm thinking of having her running towards the camera, pulling a kite or a small lantern, while more figures in the background do the same. They'd be mobile landing strip indicators for floating bazaars, I guess.

[noxartemus]

LET ME RESSURECT THIS THREAD!!!

Man, I miss you all, what happened to everyone? I've been busy working on my college portfolio. X_x Still am, decided to continue the bear, let me post it up, because I'm getting tired of looking at it and need another pair of eyes to take a poke at it.

I'm also working on this picture of a girl that's supposed to be a water elemental. Her hair is going to be made of glowing water, and she's summoning a stingray spell on top of a rock in the ocean area in moonlight. >_O

Hope you guys aren't dead! :P

-Laura

[Elvy]

*peeps in*

That's a terrifyingly great picture of the bear Laura. The outline around his nose makes it look like it's stuck onto him and not a part of him.
How is your portfolio coming along? I can't wait to see the finished one and is there a story behind him?

As for the water elemental girl I can't really tell what you're going to do with it still so I don't think I can make any comments on that.

I dont have a computer or a scanner at home anymore now so it's hard to come online or even share what I have. I am currently posting while at work but it's a good distraction :D Maybe I'll see you guys while at work again soon! :)