woman in lake

[bellas]

well, my last job ^^ crits and comments please.
http://www.iespana.es/bellasart/dibujos/castillo_del_lago.jpg

[Joachim]

It's a nice start, but I have a few comments, if you don't mind.
To me it seems like you've painted each part finished without planning out the painting as a whole. I mean, what colors should shine through, how should you separate things to make focal points, etc. Since everything is painted with high detail and every part has their local color only, with hardly any shadow and light that separate things to give depth, the picture becomes a bit flat and messy.
I think you should try to think more about how the whole painting should look like before you start paint it, and start simple without making a lot of detail but focus more on the overall look, light and feeling. You can work with big brushes just to force yourself to stay away from detailing and little things. then you might get a picture that looks a lot more "real" and detailed without doing all the boring detailing work. ALso, I think the woman has a bit of anatomy issues that could be improved, the bigger shapes of her. If you look at the edges, the sihouette of her, it's maybe easier to see.
I hope I didn't sound harsch, not my intention, just giving you my opinion on what I think could make the picture look better. Here's a quick overpaint, trying to illustrate my point.
http://www.joachimart.com/forum/castillo_po.jpg

[chukw]

Now THAT'S a crit! Well done, Joachim! Lucky you, Bellas....:)

[reeves]

WAW! now THAT's some feed back.

Joachim! I love you man.
That's gotta be the best two paragraph tutorial I have ever seen. and like chukw said, Bellas...you've been graced.

[I.was.ink]

Now thats what Im talking about Joachim. We should all crit like this, try and help eachother out. :D

bellas: Another thing that would help out is if you did small value studies (prior to jumping into the painting) of what the lighting situation might look like. This way you get an overall feel and mood of the piece before you even begin.

iwasink

[Matt Elder]

You've got the basis for some really cool stuff. Joachim's reply is amazing concise and loaded with good info!

[bellas]

thanks for the Joachim class, really have taught to see to me like improving my works, thank you very much and sorry for my english i from spain ^^!