bRØk3n_sPiRiT's sketchbook

[brokk]

EDITED: Ugh... I realize I had to edit this first post because I'm such a fucking dumbass... You see, I have a tendency to repeat things several times when I speak, people have brought this to my attention :S
So heres for a less-repetitive rant:

Some rants first
Short and simple, I want to be able to be working. In order for that to happen, I'm focusing my efforts in learning what can I do to prepare portfolios that contain samples that are relevant and up to presentation standard. That means a lot of practice and a lot of studying, which means a lot of actually doing. Even if its bad, doesn't matter, I think the important thing is to do something, and then try to learn how to improve it. Critic is important here, but I can't critic what I don't know, so please take the time to help out!
As mentioned before, my main goal is to produce a decent portfolio. But of what? Well, I want to work in illustration and concept art mostly (surprise!) so I would like to prepare a portfolio that has relevant samples to both. I realize there are many subdivisions in each. Mostly, I want to do illustration for trading card games, but I want to be able to resolve different situations as well, like book interiors, covers, etc.
So the idea is to learn the craft at least enough to prepare a portfolio and start working.
Got a long road ahead of me! Lets get started.

P.S: Besides my main efforts geared towards producing images for a working portfolio, I'll probably include a lot of doodles and non relevant stuff to what I stated before here too, just for fun.

First some old stuff. I made this sketch and wanted to make a less sketchy version
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dragon_encounter_sketch.jpg

And this is how it turned out. I dont like it very much. I notice it has some anatomy issues. Also there is no tonal arrangement. Everything looks flat. I like the sketch better.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dragonencounter.jpg

A dragon head
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dragonhead.jpg

Some dinosaur skulls
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/duckbilled_dinoskulls.jpg

Two versions of a necromancer. Seeing what happens by being more loose or controling. That being said they have some errors I should work on. I need to study more anatomy, and use more reference for certain things. Note taken.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/nec2.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/nec1.jpg

A sketch for a big ape. Just a fan art/redesing of Blizzard from Primal Rage. I wanted to make the head smaller and the body more massive. Still working on it.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/blizzard.jpg

Here I made a very small painting, to see how it would fit on a trading card
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/card.jpg

I made a search on google for a red magic card, and pasted it on it and made this dummy to see how it would look. Don't mind the text, I just pasted the image before on an existing card:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/card_dummy.jpg

A dummy for a comic cover
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cover-sample.jpg

A creature of the week that I never finished
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/Archivo1.jpg

this one is older. I don't think the colors are working. I kinda like it though. Don't know why.
EDIT: The moon in the background is just a photo taken from google, thought I should clarify.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dragon-twig.jpg

some tribal designs. Trying to make themed pages.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/scorpions.jpg

wip
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/5.jpg

Ok. Need to make some new stuff now.

[Diego]

Hey, Martin glad you've started a sketchbook, nice to see i'm not alone showing my stuff.
I'm seeing diversity in your work, that's great, some characters and creatures. If you wanna get into concept design, that's the way to go.
As you said, some of your characters are loose, yes, but i think it should be the start of the concept, to get proportions and such,then refinement will come. Not just keeping the first lines.
Try some structure drawings first to feel confortable with the forms, maybe then you can start doodling loose.
Anyways, great start, keep it up, don't let this without update. Perhaps you can show me some of your loomis' studies.
Un abrazo, nos estamos viendo.

[winjer]

Find some other artists that do dragons and see how they handle the scales textures. The way you do it now looks like not so good. Its like a quilt or something. Its draws too much attention to itself and just screams HEY LOOK SCALES I MADE SOME SCALES CHECK IT OUT HERES SOME MORE SCALES THIS WHOLE THING HAS SCALES ALL OVER IT. Most people will just suggest sections of scale.

[brokk]

Diego, I've been thinking about what you said, about not keeping the first lines. I totally agree, though I didn't really think about it before. I usually start very chaotic and if looks very messy I copy the lines I like over to a clean page, but always trying to keep some of the originals or as much as I can. But I'm gonna try what you suggested.
Here's some things, some are from loomis, others are from other anatomy sources.

legs
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/l1.jpg

some bones
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/l2.jpg

lighting
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/l4.jpg

ams
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/a2.jpg

more arms
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/a1.jpg

more legs
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/a5.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/a6.jpg

and more arms
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/a3.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/a4.jpg

heads
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/l3.jpg

I have one of those art manikins, and I've been sketching some poses from it. I'll upload those later, but what I really wanna do is sketch the poses and try to build on the anatomy on it.

winjer, you're right, plus making those damn scales is killer. I have some old sketches of crocodiles and other reptiles where I tried not to get too caught up with the details, like this one:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/rep-anph_01.jpg
But it looks too sketchy. I'm still trying to find a good way to move from sketch to something more finished without overworking details, but at the same time trying to make something more consistent.
This is another head a bit old where I tried to keep the scales or texture more suggested:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/d1copy.jpg
Those white lines were made by the scanner I think.

And I started this today thinking about your crit, trying to suggest the scales rather than accentuate everything. Its still work in progress, I just started working on one side of the face/horn. As soon as I finish it I'll upload the finished version:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dghwip.jpg

A sketch of a dragon eye
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/d2.jpg

Here are some heads I attempted to build on simple geometric forms to see what would happen
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dg1.jpg

a small head doodle, but I kinda like it
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/hd2.jpg

some head doodles
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/hds.jpg

some perspective stuff
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/t2a.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/t2b.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/t1.jpg

some quick ideas on Cossacks, kids and a man. They look very sloppy and with tons of erros. I usually try to work the errors as I go but I'm thinking it may be better to try and resolve everything in the lines, before any sort of rendering. I'm gonna start trying that.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/c1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/c2.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/c3.jpg

I think studying anatomy from books and copying the examples is good because you start to remember the structures and the bones and muscles, but I think its important to put that into practice in your own images. Here is an attempt at that:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/untitled15.jpg

more cleaned up
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/untitled1.jpg

fixed a few things and starting to value
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dragonslayinggirlpaint.jpg

here are some works in progress. I'm gonna try to fix the errors and finish them in ps or painter, and see what happens.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/kn.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/merfolk_.jpg

Guys thanks for helping out! Till next update.

[slo-burn]

Good post, I especially like the anatomy studies

[Diego]

Good job on these loomis' studies.
Seriously, you've been working hard with loomis, now you have to start applying what you learned about anatomy, proportions, lightning, and perspective.
If you can, check some of Kevin Chen's demos, to see how he builds the human shapes with simple forms. It will help you a lot, i'm sure.
Cheers martin, keep this up.
Un abrazo

[brokk]

slo-burn, I dont like how some of them are looking... I tried adjusting the contrast but I dont like how they ended up looking like. I wanna make more anatomy studies too, and using the art manikin mostly. Thanks : P

Diego, I downloaded Kevin Chen's demos, they are totally awesome. I found it really cool how he plants the figure and establishes the perspective when placing the feet correctly on the ground plane. Also how he build the figure with simple shapes.

I've been using an art manikin to try and build figures using simple shapes and see how the feet are placed and the figure afected by perspective like Kevin Chen demonstrates in his demos, also it was good to use a directional light as well to study lighting on it too.

Here are my studies so far:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am1.jpg

I tried to think in terms of a mass of shadow as opposed to a mass of light at first, like suggested in the lighting chapter of Figure Drawing for All its Worth.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am1v.jpg

more
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am2.jpg

and the values
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am2v.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am3.jpg

This was a good exercise, trying to light it from another angle, I find it very hard to fake lighting and making it look believable if you don't have a certain understanding of how it works in principle, which I really don't, but I hope I'm beggining to learn.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am3v.jpg

An attempt to keep the lines more clean and less sketchy
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/am4.jpg

painting the manikin. It sucks... and I didn't finish it. But I want to make more of these exercises : P
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/amac.jpg

Another paintin excersise, and another wip, this time using Painter. Need to push the values more, maybe.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dapwip.jpg

A tree trunk doodle from life. I should have pushed the values more, especially on the shadows, an maybe put in some more pronounced reflected light.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/tree.jpg

Doodle from life again
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/car.jpg

Necromancer version 3. Here is an atempt to use of the manikin studies for a character. Still a work in progress, I dont know if I'm gonna finish this. I should fix the proportion/anatomy errors, but I'm at least happier about the lighting, at least more than the previous two.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/nec3.jpg

And here is my C.O.W. wip so far
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow.jpg

Yeah lighting from below really got to me this week : P
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cowv.jpg

Need to make more lighting studies and of... well, a lot of stuff.

work, work, work.

back to work! I hope to update this soon. I slack too much : S

[Diego]

Yo martin! it seems you're working pretty hard.
The manekin studies looks good so far, i never had the chance to draw from it so i can't give you a very detailed crit but keep at doing them, try fast gestures, sit it on an angle, be creative.
I really love how you render the wheel in the car sketch, very loose lines,
Buenisimo lo tuyo loco, segui asi, se nota que le pones garra.
Un saludo, and keep it up.

[brokk]

I got that art manikin for 25 pesos, I couldn't find any that were cheaper. You should really consider getting one, its one of the best investments you can make, and its a great tool for studying.

Some stuff I did last year as sample images for a logo for a butchers or meat restaurant or something.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/Diallos.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/diallos2.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/diallos-03.jpg

Just a silhouette
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/silhouette.jpg

Thanks for stopping by.

[joiton]

Hi man!!!
Good to see your last work; there are rally cool stuff !
And the improvement is notable; i love the manikin colors, the one painted on acrilics.

Keep posting!
Some day i'll give you a call :)

[brokk]

Joiton!! What a surprise beibe!! : P
Como andas Joan? When are you gonna update your sketchbook man?, come on, I know you have one ; P
Thanks for the comments, I really appreciate them : )

Hey Diego, thanks for the comments and taking the time to drop some suggestions, I've been trying to do some fast gestures and from angles. Its not much but its something at least. They have tons of errors but I'm working on it, here goes:

Without looking at the manikin
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/amq1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/amq2.jpg

Looking at the manikin
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/amq3.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/amq4.jpg

I plan on doing more and keep working on them, maybe adding new things, trying to make characters or something.

Finished my cow entry for this week.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow22.jpg
EDIT: I included the description
CC Evil Supply Creature
The basic supply unit for the Evil Faction is large and slow moving. The creature has four additional arms on its back, which it uses to grab and carry on its back trees, masonry, and other supplies. It can also carry prisoners.
These arms are also the primary melee weapon of the supply unit, it can strike multiple adjacent enemies at the same time.
I figured that at the start of the game, to protect against early rushes, some kind of defense mechanism is necessary. For the Evil Faction, a few supply units would be protection enough since they would be the only supply units to strike multiple targets (and also deal a moderate amount of damage). Since they are slow moving this prevents them from being used as regular troops, but for defence purposes, the main structure could give them a speed bonus for a short time, that way they can move quickly enough through the base to repel invaders. The speed bonus would have a cooldown time before it can be used again, and its effects last for a certain amount of time (enough time to defend the base).


Thanks for the comments guys, keep up the good work, I'll see you guys later!

[Zebz]

Nice stuff, man. I can see that you're puttin' in some real effort with those anatomy studies and such. Keep that crap up! It really comes in handy as you're already seein' I'm sure. If you want one thing that'll start taking your work to the next level it's that and drawing from life as often as possible. Loose accurate gestures are a must. Try and nail some of that down if you can. Then get back to rendering. A lot of the time your renders are as crisp as they could be. Tighten somethings up but still try to keep that loose quality of the line. You've got some great experiments goin' on and you're progressing. Just try and study artists you like and take aspects of their work that you're drawn to technically and try to figure out why you like it and what it is their doing. Apply to your own stuff as you like. ;)

AS for the latest COW effort, that's a nice concept, man! Although, I'd add a big like thing on his back like a holding area for supplies and crap that he can pull resources from. I think he looks like a fun creation to sketch around with! Maybe I'll see if I can push and pull with that design if that's ok! Keep that stuff comin', man!

[brokk]

ZebzFree, here I tried some loose sketches, some are from today, some are more older. I try to sketch quick but its pretty hard for me to get the proportions down correctly at the same time, so a lot of features end up looking off : S
Really need to practice more on that.

In front of a mirror
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/sn1.jpg

What the hell happened to my face here? I dont like these. I like the one before better.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/sn2.jpg

a quick value sketch, I had to cranck up the brightness and contrast in photoshop because I made them too difuse in the sketch. Its not finished, I got lazy, but still I really didn't like how it was turning out. I'm definatly going to do a potrait with a lot more hours and effort now.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/valuesketch.jpg

And these are kinda old, from life
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/s3.jpg

This one too
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/s4.jpg

These are from a magazine. If I keep the lines more sketchy and chaotic it takes less time, but if I try to keep them more clean and defined its more time consuming. I guess its trying to find a sort of a balance you feel kinda good about.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/s2.jpg

Some more chaotic sketching from life, trying to blend stuff together
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/t1a.jpg

And this one
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/t2.jpg

And this one too
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/t3.jpg

Some crazy stuff
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/w1.jpg

An quick painting sketch. I like the light part, but not too much, but I dont like the shadow. I wanna make more experiments like this one, I should take my time more for the next one.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/apsk.jpg

And my entry for this week's Creature of the Week. I thought I'd include the description as well. I edited the post before and included the description for the past c.o.w. too. Dam mouse, I want a tablet : S
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow23.jpg
Methacephalion
Swampland dwellers, these creatures have developed a unique digestive system, they feed on shit. For this they utilize their frontal appendages that resemble tentacles. They have no skeleton whatsoever and are very flexible, but sluggish in movement. These creatures absorb pretty much the same nutrients many plants and fungi do, presenting the dilema of wether these "animals" should be regarded as being more related to the other kingdomes. Once the "food" is consumed, they store it in their abdominal sacs, waiting to be digested. Once that process is complete, the nutrients are separated, and the rest is used to form methane, or natural gas, which they store in their expandable heads. Bloating up their heads with methane like a balloon allows these creatures to actually take off the ground and float around, reaching higher areas or escaping from predators. They can exhale the methane through their mouths to descend again. The fact that they store methane in their heads has given them their propper name Methacephalions, but in a less taxonomic jargon, they are comonly nicknamed as "Shit Heads".

Thanks for you comments man, I really need to put in the hours and practice more, you're suggestions are really helpful.
Hey, cool that you liked the last cow! : ) Yeah you're right, some straps and and a holding crate sort of thing could have been interesting, also some symbols and stuff. Thanks again.

Well, till next update!

[Zebz]

Kudos again on that new COW effort. You really come up with some interesting creatures, man! Keep that crap up, for real! The life drawings are nice and whether you see it or not, they have much more life than the others. My only suggestion would be "no grass." And what I mean by that is don't draw your lines like you're drawing grass with a crayon. Be confident in your line. Think about where you want to put it and put it. Maybe do a few long lines lightly until you find the exact one you want. Look around at other people's gestures on the board and you'll see what I mean. Right now it just looks like your scratchin' the image there. Which could work if you continued to delve deeper into it by creating tones and such. Nice work thus far. I'll be lookin' fer more! :teeth:

[Diego]

Hey martin, how is it going?
You're getting more control over your line, i can see that. The fast gestures are very cool, it will help you to loose your hand more, and get more relaxed sketches.
I see your picture in another thread, so i see some of you in these SP, but it seems you were pretty rushed to reach to rendering. I can see very general shapes, like the oval shapes, but not planes, to describe form. Try looking at loomis and then look it into your face.
Very sweet and creative COW entries, i never tried to do it, so i will in the next round.
The best luck and keep the hard work.
CHeers

-Diego

[brokk]

Thank you guys, really.
Zebz, you hit the nail on the head, making a confident line is my most problematic... mm.. problem. Its sincerely the hardest thing for me to do, thats why I tend to sketch very chaotic and "scratch" the image in like you said. I have actually thought about and tried to include tones and model the forms, after I scratch in something I gently erase it so it looks very light, and then I go over the lines I like, and then try to model.
EDIT: Here is an example, the drawing for the last cow:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow23values.jpg

For practical purposes, its a methond that I feel it can be pulled of if you clean the chaotic lines a lot and render in a clean way, but you are definatly right, I need more confident line practice, its one of my biggest issues, and its something that I'm definatly going to practice for the next update. Cheers man, thanks for responding and for the help!
Diego, things are good, working but should be working harder : )
Honestly... I dont know what kind of line I want, and I dont really worry about it in those terms... making controled and defined lines like I was saying to Zebz is something that I find pretty dificult, maybe because I've never really given it propper study and atention. I kind of like the way of sketching that I have, but I would like to lay down the proportions/perspective/anatomy better, and all that stuff. Also sometimes it looks too messy and I wish I could resolve things with less lines or more simply, stating and accenting the important aspects. Its something I'm definatly going to practice, lets see how it turns out.
You are totally right on the portrait, I did rush to the rendering, and it looks flat. Next time I'll do more portraits or studies and try to consider the planes more, something which I find also hard, but worth studying. I will check back on Loomis.
Hey, glad you guys liked the cows, and I'm glad to hear Diego you're gonna try it out! :D :bounce: You too Zebz, check it out. Its a very fun activity : )

The best of luck to you guys back and keep up the work yourselves, and have fun! Thank you again for commenting and helping out.

Cheers.

[Diego]

very detailed reply martin.
The cow sketch looks very cool, very defined values.
Keep working hard.
Saludos

[masterpug]

Wow, you have gotten eons better! I have very few words...wow. I don't think I can CC at the moment, just to astounded by your progression. Maybe I'll drop by later when my tongue is firmly back in my mouth.

[Zebz]

Such a hard worker... how about an update?! BTW, did you notice I drew a COW the same week you did? Not as nice as yours but oh well. You did quite well tho! I'm lookin' for s'more updates tho. Give me somethin' to chew on.

[brokk]

Hey Diego, thanks. When are you going to join the COW? ; )

masterplug, you're crazy man, and you're too kind : ) I don't think I've progressed as much as you say... (otherwise I'd have a job at this, haha) I think I'm gradually learning more and more stuff, its just trying to put the stuff you learn into practice.. err.. or something like that. Thanks for the comments and stopping by, I'm checking your sketchbook right now.

Zebz, it feels like I'm slacking more than working lately : S The lack of more frequent updates is a testament of that. I've been doing some other stuff, going camping and hanging out, I've neglected studies a bit... but I've been trying to put into practice some things and I'm reading some chapters from Creative Illustration, I'm going to try and put into practice a lot of what it says later on. I did notice you're cow entry, I even commented in your sketchbook : P but you gotta keep up the continuity! Where's your deep sea creature? ; P hehe. This week the topic is Artic Carnivore, everyone reading this, jump in and join the Creature of the Week activity!

Ok, update time.

I've been trying to put into practice mostly making less lines that look like grass made with a crayon. I find it harder when what I'm trying to draw is moving, but I'm trying to cut back on the grass still.

had to do this kinda fast, looks a bit sketchy though, I tried not to make it look -too- sketchy.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/musicsketch01.jpg

this was moving, I got the shapes wrong, but I tried not to make something too chaotic
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/musicsketch02.jpg

And here I lost it... not much of a controlled line, but he was moving a lot. Still I tried not to make it look like grass with a crayon that much.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/musicsketch03.jpg

An inanimate object. This one wasn't moving at least : P
I gotta do more of these.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/lampsketch.jpg

Trying to make a charachter from the manikin, altering the proportions somewhat, to practice some anatomy, pose, lighting, and character in one exercise.

altered manikin
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblinmanikin.jpg

anatomy
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblin_anatomy.jpg

Lines. Trying not to make it look like grass : P
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblin_line.jpg

Local tones, or whatever they are called.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblin_values_start.jpg

working on it
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblin_wip.jpg

And here's were I'm at right now
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblin_wipvalues.jpg

And the creature of the week. I tried doing a different approach than the last two previous cows, tried to focus more on colors and an illustration approach, two things I really need to work at. I don't like too much how it turned out, because I wanted to make something really detailed and rendered, but I ended up covering most of it in shadows : S
It got some positive feedback though, so I guess it kinda works in a way, just not how I originally intended or expected.

C.O.W. #24 - Huge Deep Sea Creature
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow24f2.jpg
Depth Titan
An enourmous deep-sea creature, the Depth Titans can be found on some of the most profound regions of the Pacific Ocean. They are slow swimming, and have relatively small mouths in relation to their huge bodies, which are spherically shaped and end in a long, thin tail. Near the mouth are dozens of bioluminiscent lights that are used to lure its prey for easy consumption. Many of the observed individuals present scars on their bodies in unusual markings that resemble jaw wounds, suggesting the posibility of even larger deep-sea predators, to which the Depth Titans would be basic food.

Thanks again guys for stopping by and commenting, till next update.

[Azeira]

i like that huge deep sea creature. really, i dont have anything to crit about. look forward to seeing more.

Woodruff

[Diego]

Good work martin, keep the spirit high and keep drawing, the character evolution is really cool, to see how you developed from the manekin to the finished character is very cool.
I really like The lamp drawing, very clean lines and perspective.
Keep drawing man. I'll join the cow this week or the next. :)
Cheers

[brokk]

Thanks Azeira, I'll try to update soon and not slack too much.

Diego, while I was doing the lamp I remembered your life studies and how you keep clean lines, and I tried to do it too : P
I think the perspective is a bit off now that I look at it, the ellipse of the base looks a bit wrong, and the vertical thing looks a bit tilted to the left.

You know, at first it was a really frustrating exercise to do, I tried to get every line right and it took me forever, and I didnt get them exactly either. But then I tried to look for the general shapes, sketch those lightly, erase them a little, and make the lines on top. It was faster and much less frustrating, though I'm not sure its the way I'm supposed to be doing it. I really hate jumping in to the lines without any drawing or sketch beneath, but maybe its necessary for study. Any thoughts?

[joiton]

Copaaaado!!!!!
Estas dando saltos che!!
The orc character is really great, cool details. I MUST to see it finished :)
I love the COW too dude; great colors and lighting. Would be nice to see some more definition on it, mostly on the tail that is missing a bit.

Congratulations!!!!

[gibsini]

some really interestin characters on this thread, luv the six arm creature its wicked. Keep it up

[WARHEAD]

Hey br0ken, really like some stuff you got goin' on here, especially your creature stuff and the last COW
(I voted for your deep sea COW by the way ;)) let's see some more stuff !

[masterpug]

Still think you have amazing progression, but anyway, I think you might try messing with some more textures for skin. I think some of your characters look a little soft skinned when they might be better off with a leathery texture or the like. You have some really good lighting studies in here. I think when you do some of the anatomy drawings you might want to try drawing a character (out of mind) and then figureing out where the muscles should go. Or, get a photo of someone and do the same thing. It will help tons. Also should work on your digital coloring skills (which reminds me I should too). See you later!

[hurricane]

you have some awesome designs in here...cool stuff!


cheers

[brokk]

Hey guys, thanks for stopping by. Just a really small update this time... I'm working on some other stuff and reading up on Creative Illustration. Its been a while since I practiced traditional paint and I'm trying to do a little of that too. I hope to finish some stuff this week and update soon.

joiton: hey joan pau, thank you : ) but its a goblin, not an orc :D : P
Thanks for the comments on the cow, you're right, the tail / lower part of the picture is the part that fails to convince me the most, I'll try not to cover things up in shadows too much.

gibsini: thanks : ) you have a rocking sketchbook by the way!

WARHEAD: hey War, thank you, yeah I know you placed your vote on my sorry ass creature, and I had thanked you for it ; ) I'll try to update with more stuff soon, I really need to be practicing much more, more charachter stuff, more interactions...
Hey, didn't we participate in a mod proyect a few years back? Your nickname strikes me familiar, the black dragon mod if I remember. Well I didn't participate much... didnt really have the ability to produce the concepts they required, plus I was starting studies at another city at that time (if you are reading this and are thinking "huh?" forget what I said, I could have confused you for someone else : P )

masterpug: you hit the nail on the head! I hadn't really thought about it either... the soft skin and skin texture thing... but you are totally right! I'm gonna do some studies and upload them hopefully this week. I need more lighting studies also, and anatomy is a major thing I need to be focusing on as well, especially from memory and placing the anatomy on previously set up poses. Digital color too, speaking of which, I'm practicing that with the cow activities, and now with the new enviornment of the week activity, I hope I can finish it. But more than digital painting, I should and wanna be practicing traditional painting! Hopefully more of that later. Thanks for the comments and stopping by!

hurricane: Thank you, you know I really like your stuff!

So, small update, this weeks cow. Hope to update this with more stuff soon. I'd really love crits on this if anyone takes the time.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow25f.jpg

Polar Knifelimb Stabber
These huge arctic creatures are of the few carnivores who attack prey larger than themselves, usually King Mamoths and Megabisons. They have eight limbs, four of them are quadruped legs, and the other ones are specialized horned limbs with some degree of mobility. The frontal horned limbs possess little mobility, these are for ramming them into their prey when charging at full speed. The back horned limbs are more mobile, and once at close distance, they are used for repeated stabbing, from above. The thumbs on the front feet are large and razor like, these are also used for stabbing, but from below, aiming at the stomach and throat. The have horns at the sides of their heads, as well as on top and under the chin. These function as a means of defense as well as offense when fighting, but they are also used for eating by ripping into bone and tearing flesh. Heavy fur protects the creature from the weather, isolating the cold and keeping them warm underneath.

Till next update.

[joiton]

Martin,

(I'm feeling lazy, so i'll be writing en español)

Che esta bueno el COW, me gustan los colores, aunque tengo una critica, el backhorn, la base de el, donde se engancha en el cuerpo esta rara, parece como puesto, no parece haber una estructura muscular solida abajo. Estaria que hagas por lo menos un boceto del equeleto y la musculatura para ver las formas basicas, asi queda mas solido.

Postea mas!!

[brokk]

Hey Joan Pau, you're right, the anatomy on the last cow could (should) have been thought out more before jumping into the rendering. I'll try to plan muscular structures instead of just simple shapes beneath external things like hair from now on. Thank you for the crit and the comments, keep posting in your sketchbook!

Allright, I have slacked too damn much! I was supposed to keep this updated more frequently. God damn. Allright, I've been doing some new things and here are some, I realize I need to study much more and in shorter time spans. I'm very disperse... I try to do everything at once and if I study only a certain subject after a while I get bored and want to do something else. Well, if thats the way its going to be, then the least I can do is start doing more. And faster. Lets see if I can keep up.

A shoe sketch. I like where the rendering is going, even if its unfinished. Lines are too sketchy. Need to focus more on that.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/shoesk1.jpg

Trying out some lighting things
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/p1.jpg

sketching lines from life. The lines still look sketchy.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lf3.jpg

A charachter, snail warrior type dude. Not quite finished yet. Since he's a snail you would think he moves really slowly, which he does, though I think this design problem can be solved if the guy tucks himself within the shell and rolls around really fast, or something like that. Maybe I'll try to do some sketches of that.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chrsnlsk.jpg

Girl charachter wip
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/c1.jpg

I had to do this fast, I was waiting for the bus
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/stsk4.jpg

On the bus
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/stsk3.jpg

From the street. I notice serious perspective problems now that I didn't quite see before, though I knew there was something off with the perspective.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/stsk5.jpg

Inside a building, everything is unfinished because we were on the move. Its still quite dificult to sketch fast and still nail down the proportions/perspective correctly. Thats one thing to really focus on now that I think about it, nailing the proportions/perspective the best I can as fast as I can at the same time.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/stsk2.jpg

Street again.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/stsk1.jpg

Street thumbnails. The errors, mainly perspective/proportion are evident even in the thumbs. More reason to practice what I mentioned before:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/stthmbs1.jpg

cathedral from the street
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cth1.jpg

again
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cht01.jpg

Trying to organize daily objects into a composition and paint it, just started with the base colors, wip
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifepaintsketch01.jpg

Just letting loose, some chaos. It would be cool to do this kind of thing with a really incorporated knowledge of proportions/anatomy/lighting/perspective etc etc
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/sk1.jpg

Character wip
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/n5.jpg

the line sketch for this weeks cow, I'm not really convinced by it... but I can't really say what it is that I dont like about it. If you have any crits on this (and anything other for that matter), please share them with me.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow26lines.jpg

and this weeks cow painted. Again, I dont like it, but dont know really why... I suspect there is problems with the lighting and color choices, crits would be greatly appreciated.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow26f.jpg

some characther thumnails
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/thmb1.jpg

Focusing on daily objects and on the lines, making them less sketchy and more defined. For this, I started using a blue pencil today, for the sketch, and then using a 2B or a 3B pencil to mark the lines that I like. The blue hardly shows up when scanned so I can be more sketchy/messy with that, and do the clean lines with the 3B
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/l1.jpg

More
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/l2.jpg

Allright. I think I'm starting to focus in a study direction (I think, and hope). Your crits are appreciated greatly.

Until next update.

[Diego]

hola martin, lots of stuff, lots. Really cool, you've been slackin'? don't think so, i think if your head is in the right place, i mean, looking gestures in the street while you're walking, analysing the perspective of buildings, seeing the color of the sky in the afternoon, facial expressions, how the lips moves, etc. You're working, its hard to download all that to paper, but it think its good to the eye.
I really like the COW, very dark, hehe. Good stuff martin, you're doing more than great with you cows.
Cheers dude, and stop slacking. Somos pocos aca, y tenemos que poner huevo. jaja

[joiton]

Hey Martin!!
Greeeeat COW man!!!!!
Se re nota que es gigante, y me encantan los colores que usaste che!! muy copado.
Lo unico que no me gusta es que te comiste bocha del detalle del dibujo, estaria copado que le hicieras tipo una luz de rebote (sutil para que no pierda oscuridad) asi se nota todo el laburo de linea que le diste al bicho.
Keep the hard work man!!

[brokk]

Thanks Diego, for reminding me to keep sane. Yeah I know what you mean, I look a lot of what reality seems to me and try to analize that visually, but its when you try to represent that in a medium when the works starts from a different place. Or something like that.

Somos pocos aca, y tenemos que poner huevo.
Hell yeah.

I forgot to post this, its not really something great and it can be done in a few minutes, its just a ball in photoshop. I'm posting it anyways, because I'm doing a lot of these excersises to try and render things, a lot of them basic shapes, in photoshop and painter.

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cyanball.jpg

Good luck.

EDIT: Thanks joiton! You're right, a lot of detail is not there because of the shadowy parts, I'm reading a crit right now over at the cow activity that says use a light to define some stuff too, maybe moonlight. I'm gonna try, dont know if I will make it to the deadline or if it will give good results but at least as an excersise to see what happens. Thanks again.

[thief]

hey nice sketches, keep up! :] those leg studys look good.I like that ball monster :$
i think light from that house does not come that high on monsters surface,cause its round, lited area should be narrower.And if that light reaches the monster why it can not reach some bushes around or something else (more depth) Yeah, upper part could be lited by moon, also eyes could be shinin in the DARK :)..

[brokk]

Thanks thief, yeah I have to try the lighting on the cow.

Organizing life objects into a composition. Should be less sketchy.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomplines1.jpg

[BAKI]

love the COW designs, bad ass stuff

[Diego]

Really good martin, very good sense of perspective there, very good. Really like it. You can do these excercises 'til you feel confortable with lines and there start to use values, and makin some interestin' compostions based on lightinin' and stuff.
Try to do as much of these as you can, it's tedious at first, but you'll see some improvement in your lines, that's for sure.

Anyways, nos vemos martin, segui dandole duro.
Saludos

[brokk]

Thanks BAKI, I'm working on it :^^;:

EDIT: Thank you Diego, yeah I plan on making many more, they are tedious at first but they get less tedious the more I do. I want to make some with the lighting as well.

Here is an illustration excersize half way... I feel a bit stuck on this one. Its inspired by the deep sea c.o.w.
I posted it in Sketches and Works in Progress to get crits, if you can spare the time please crit it there (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=54944) or here.

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/dpsskwip6a.jpg

[bumskee]

Hey! some nice stuff here, your COW entries are very nice. solid studies, all looking good from here. keep it going!

[brokk]

bumskee, thank you : ) C.O.W. is a great activity, and a great learning experience. I'm going to try and join the other two community activites as well.

Organizing daily objects into a composition again
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomp3lines.jpg

And now, instead of organizing them, looking for compositions around:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomp2lines.jpg

More
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomp4lines.jpg

If anybody has any tips, pointers, suggestions or comments to improve on this kind of studies, please share your thoughts. Your insight and your crits are appreciated.

[brokk]

Ok, I tried to follow the crits on this weeks c.o.w. entry, added a secondary moonlight kind of thing, a little color to the sky and brighten up the stars a bit. I don't know if this is working better, or is worse. What do you think?

C.O.W #26 - Massive Black
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow26wip2.jpg

Starhide Nightjaws
The countryside of the lands of Arathza are a beautiful and tranquile place to spend vacations. Forests, rivers and lakes, mountains... nature. A popular activity is star gazing on warm summer nights.
Though there is only one danger in this peaceful paradise. Sometimes its not the stars the visitors are gazing, but the shinning, scaly hide of an enourmous, triple-jawed monster! Indeed, the Starhide Nightjaws, as the local bestiarists have named it, creeps around with its worm like body through the night, feeding on dozens of the largest animals it can find. Ocasionally, the visitors who come to rest make for a good snack.

[scumgrinder]

ha i never noticed your location and i saw that other dude writing in spanish and i was like wtf. I like your character designs, lots of detail in them.

About the cow, i noticed you added highlights at the back, just one comment. The candle looks pretty dim but it's somehow making big areas of the creature visible. However, little or no texture of the creature is revealed by it. So i'd try to fix those two things. Making the highlighted areas at the front coherent with the size of your lightsource, and the creature's skin's texture at the front., you don't have to show a lot but it has to be coherent with the other areas that are highlighted (gums, teeth).

[Zebz]

Lovely line drawings and gestures! Everything just keeps getting beter and better with you! You're gonna be a ConceptArt.Org Star in no time at all, man! You work so freakin' hard it's ridiculous! You make me feel like such a slacker!! Keep it up! Man, I love those lines a lot. So clean! Are you usually hitting that line you want right away or is it a struggle? Great, updates. The COW entries are top notch as well. The last one is pretty dark tho. Maybe define areas with hint of light? Nice tho.

[brokk]

lol scumgrinder : P Yeah I'm from Argentina, I lived in Seattle when I was younger though, and picked up some english on the way.
I'm really pleased you like the charachter designs, its something I wanted to do for a long time, and now I feel I have the confidence to start doing : )

You're totally right on the crits for the c.o.w. entry. I made some corrections (hopefully) and posted them below. The thing is, I exaggerated the light on the front area on purpose, because otherwise it looks too dark. But, this gives an unrealistic effect. So I'm puzzled. Maybe I should through this damn thing in the trash haha.

Ok, this is what I think the light would look if it wasn't exaggerated. The problem is just that, a lot of the creature gets lost in the shadows.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow26wip10d.jpg

Here I tried lowering a little the opacity on those shadows, so the texture shows a bit. Its still dark, but its the best middle ground I could manage to reach between realistic lighting, and showing the creature.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow26wip10d3.jpg

Ok, this is going to be the final version I think, because the deadline is tomorrow and I need some sleep right now (real bad, but first... nocturnal snack. Like my cow. Muahaha. Dam I should be sleeping :nohope: )
Still feel like throwing this to the trash.. but what the hell. Its a learning experience (plus you wont see me posting the same image over and over again ; P )

Hey Zebz, how's it going? I'm looking at your sketchbook right now and commenting there. I work hard? I was going to say the same thing about you! Every time I look at your sketchbook I feel like gearing up and start doing stuff, no shit. You have a very broad production and you're fast, even if you say you're slow. Keep that stuff up.
Lol, conceptart star? haha, thats crazy talk. I'll be a star when I see some greens baby! $$!! (I really should be sleeping...)

Well, on the lines I'm cheating actually. I'm making a quick sketch with a blue pencil first, and then going over the lines with a 3B trying to keep those clean. The blue pencil hardly shows when scanned, so I can be more sketchy with that. Still, I try to make more defined lines from the start, its a struggle, but I get more used to it the more I do (I hope). You're right on the cow entry, I tried to correct the lighting problems, it has destroyed my brain : P

Thank you guys for stopping by and commenting, as well as taking the time to crit. Take care!

[Nutter]

good to see you trooping on with the COW activity, this one has a similar bearing to your deep sea COW. They are both massive so I guess that's understandable. Great sketchbook.

cheers.

[Danomight]

That last one is so cool, I feel like something like that is always gonna come outta the trees whenever I'm driving in the country late at night. Greak work man.

[brokk]

Thanks guys.

Nutter, yeah... I'm addicted... I hope to be addicted to c.h.o.w. and e.o.w. too, and learning more : ) You keep posting as well.

Danomight, thanks! Thats the effect I was going for, so your comment was really flattering! : )

Cheers.

[brokk]

Just a small update for now. I finally got a tablet and I've been messing around with it, but its made me realize just how much I should be practicing traditional media and the basics (perspective, proportions, anatomy, lifedrawings, comp, design, etc). Call me an idiot, but if anything, its a mouse with pressure sensitivity and a different way of holding it. Its faster and much more versatile, but its another tool, not some magic aid. I need to put more focus on the basics.

life
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomp5.jpg

life
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomp6.jpg

charachter of the week lines
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow1.jpg

and the values. Looks too blurry... its pretty unifinished... I didn't manage my times well : S
Well, a lesson learned.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow1v.jpg

Enviornment of the week round 2 image. Again, same case as the charachter of the week, its unfinished. I need to learn to manage my times better, and not wait for the last moment to do everything.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow2wip.jpg

Hopefully more soon. Again, your crits are more than welcome.

[Diego]

hey martin, really cool update, i see a lot of things happening.
Love the stairs and perspective, in my building i have the same kind, thought about drawing it but never did it.
Glad you have a wacom, as you said it's just a tool, so keep drawing and drawing.

[brokk]

Hey Diego, thanks man. I'm trying.
Well... I guess I can just say one thing about the stairs of your building: go draw them :)
You're going to have a wacom soon too my friend, just don't loose sight of what you want. Steal it if you have to. But I don't think the tool is what matters most...

Just a small update, manekin sketch
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/amcsketch.jpg

Thanks for stopping by.

[joiton]

Hey Martin!
Congratulations for your wacom!
Cool update, great manekin study, it's all wacom?
Ohh, and from breast critic to brest critic :) :
The chow breasts are too close to the neck, and look more like big pectorals, remember that breasts usually are a little lower than the pects.

Well, i better go back to my chow #2 sketches...

Saludos, keep posting!!

[JTumburus]

Estuve viendo el thread y realmente se nota un progreso interesante del primero al último post, seguí así!!
Por cierto, veo que se armó una pequeña congregación de argentinos :D

[Diego]

very good painting, keep doing studies with your wacom...don't be lazy. :)
Nos vemos.

[brokk]

Thanks guys : )

joiton: you are right! I'm looking at the image right now. I hope to be doing some anatomy studies this week.

JTumburus: gracias, si, creo q somos los unicos que vi hasta ahora, junto con alguien mas q se llama Carlos Cabrera, se pone Negrotuerto de nick. Creo q somos los unicos 4 argentinos que vi hasta ahora : P

Diego: thank you. I appreciate your encouragement a lot man, really. I'm keeping track of your sketchbook too : )

Ok, just a few things for now, trying to get a grip on the wacom, and practice some drawings trying to keep the lines clean, but this time imaginative subjects.

C.O.W entry for this week, Messenger of Death. I really don't like how it turned out:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow27wipcolortest8.jpg

So I tried changing it a little, it ended up worse :nohope:
Oh well... I'll try something different next time.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow27f.jpg

Lines for the Enviornment of the Week, the Tavern in the Trees
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow3lines.jpg

And the final version. Again, I don't like how it turned out.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow3f.jpg

DSG 918 - Animal version of the terminator skeleton
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/dsg918.jpg

Lines for the Charachter of the Week, Human Merchant.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow2lines.jpg

Starting with the values
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow2v1.jpg

More
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow2v2.jpg

And the final version. I think its lacking something, but I'm happier with this one than with the other things I've been doing.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow2f2.jpg

Need to study and practice more.
Again, your crits and insight are appreciated. Thanks again!
Cheers.

[brokk]

OK, I corrected a few things in the charachter above, thanks to Madster in the Critique Center for pointing out the anatomy issues.

Some changes done, with the measurements
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow2c.jpg

Without them
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow2c2.jpg

I wanna do more anatomy/proportions studies. Especially in perspective, and then trying to incorporate them into compositions. And after that character interactions. Whew, going way over my head here! Its gonna take some time, but its on schedule ;P

For now, I've started the hands chapter of Drawing the Head and Hands by Andrew Loomis. I plan on doing the rest of the chapter before the weekend (hopefully).

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands1.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands2.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands3.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands4.jpg

Here, after finishing the construction page, I attempted some hand construction from my mind, and then looking at my own hands as reference. I want to do more of that too.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/ha1.jpg

Ok. Need to gear up. Hope to see you soon (which means, update) : P

[brokk]

Super quicky
DSG 923 - Horror Fun: Girl possessed by demons plays teatime with exorcist and friends
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/dsg923.jpg

[brokk]

I looked out my window and the light was comming from behind some bushes... so I decided to paint it quickly. Dam, natural light changes really fast at some parts of the day, I could see it change and light up the sky as I was painting

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/morningquick.jpg

Oh well morning's here and I haven't slept. Hmm... big breakfast, and more Loomis. I'll sleep when I'm dead (which is around lunch time, usually : P )

[Diego]

hey martin, really nice update, a lot of studies.
The loomis' studies are coming along really nicely, i wanna do some loomis' as well, but i wanna get them printed before.
Really like how clean your drawings are, and these hands are looking sweet. Try to do more looking your own hand and looking for the simple form that loomis describes or look them for your own, also look where the line gets darker and add more weight to the line to indicate deep or volume.
Anyways keep up the good work.
Nos vemos. :)

[brokk]

Thanks Diego. Printing the Loomis books killed my ink supply. Twice. But its worth it... Besides, you only need to print them once, and if you take care of them, they'll last you hopefully for a lifetime (cd backups can't hurt either : P )
Yes, you know, lately its like I'm trying to understand how forms are... how they occupy space in 3D, and drawing the part that is visible to me, but keeping in mind the 3D nature of the form. It sounds more coherent in my head, I assure you :)
Yes, well just now I arrived at the part in the chapter where it says to draw your own hands, so I'll be doing that in the next update hopefully, and I'm going to try to vary the line weight as well. Thanks for stopping by and for the comments and crits Diego, I really appreciate them, as I do with your encouragement :)

So, up to the drawing your own hands, haven't started on that yet.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands5.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands6.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands7.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hands8.jpg

[Diego]

wow, waht a bunch of studies martin, you really went one after another, it woild be very difficult for me, beacuse a always look what's in the next page and get carried away very easy, and end up doing just a few.
You check the Hogarth's dynamic hands, there's a lot of hands to study.
Anyways, very cool work man, keep up with the studies.
Cheers

[brokk]

Yes, I always check the next pages too! Actually pretty often! But the thing is, if I only do some excersizes and move on... I'm cheating no one but myself, so there's no point.

You know, I haven't sleeped yet... its kinda cool, I feel like I'm using my hours well. The only side effect is that I feel really tired, I get dizy, and if I spent too much time without sleeping, I feel like throwing up. But I counter that by eating a lot... which... may not be that all good of an idea... now that I think about it. : P

The loomis stuff I have nearly at the beggining of the sketchbook are only some samples. I've got tons of them lying around, but since I did them a few years back, it feels like I have forgotten everything, or that I didn't really learn how to apply it... just coppied the excersizes...
So now with this hands stuff I'm going to try and incorporate this into doing hand studies from life, for charachters, etc, something I didn't do with the other stuff. And, I will get back to general anatomy and proportions as well!

I haven't checked out the Hogarth stuff but I see it mentioned a lot, so I'm really curious. I'll see if I can get something.

Cheers.

[Atmo-X]

Wow.......... Amazing sketches.... your very good at drawing humans and hands.... Those are my weakness.... i hate drawing arms.... :(
Where did you get the reference pics? or did you took somekinda lessons where they teach that sorta stuff??

[brokk]

Atmo-X, they're from the book "Drawing the Head and Hands" by Andrew Loomis. You can get that book and the others at www.saveloomis.org

Cheers.

[Diego]

che martin, yo tmb hay veces que hago eso de no dormir, vi que posteaste como a eso de las 5:30 de la matina, the only sideeffect is that you inverse your sleepin' rhytm.
But i always have more energy when i didn't sleep, it's weird but always happens that to me.
You did those loomis' studies a year ago? keep at it, and keep doing from life. the hogarth book has a lot of hands, a lot, maybe i'll start to do some of them.
Anyways good stuff man, and kick ass progress in every new post.
Cheers

[max1975]

You've got some really imaginitive stuff here. I hink the merchant is my favorite so far, good concept, good detail, good characterization, well executed.

Those hands are pretty sweet too.

[brokk]

Hey Diego, yeah I want to reverse my sleep cycle to something more normal, but I can never really get it.
I think I know what you mean, I feel like I have more energy when I don't sleep as well... its strange... maybe you sense that in a few hours you will need to sleep, so you manage you energy for some last efforts before going to bed? Or something like that, I dunno.

The loomis stuff is from a few years back, when I was 18 or 19, except for the hands, I did those yesterday and the day before : P

max1975, thank you! I posted the merchant at the critiques forum and I'm getting really insightfull replies, the guys there are really nice. I'll try to make some changes and updates to it based on the last critiques.

Here is some old Loomis stuff. Its only a selection of 10 pages. I'm not going to post everything I've done, because I have, literally, piles of this stuff. I'm just posting a selection of the anatomy/proportions stuff because I'm going to apply this stuff again, now. You see, the problem is, I feel like I haven't learned how to apply this stuff, even if I did do the exercises. Its like there is a lot that I haven't internalized...

So I will be trying to draw from life and imagination, using this stuff as a guide, re-doing the excersises whenever I have to as well. I'm aiming for internalization of the basic construction of the human form, in 3D, so I can sketch quick rough figures for compositions whenever I have to (pretentious, huh? ;P )

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al4.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al5.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al6.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al3.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al2.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al10.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al9.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al7.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al8.jpg

These are some heads I did with a mouse about two years ago with loomis as a guide. It starts from the top left, and goes down and then to the next colums
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/hdolds.jpg

And here is an old portrait of me, a work in progress that I never finished.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/spoldwip.jpg

More soon, I'm finishing scanning the newer stuff now. Its not much though.
Cheers.

[brokk]

And, here is the newest stuff

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lda2.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lda1.jpg

These are my own hands and arm, from life, and using a mirror. Practicing drawing (somewhat) clean lines, foreshortening, and arms/hands.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/handslife1.jpg

Basically I'm trying to understand how the form occupies space in 3D. I feel better about going at it this way instead of concentrating only on the visible surface... or something. It makes sense when I think it : P
For now, hands, and arms, next, upper torso. And next, hips legs and feet, and finally heads. I suspect that the basic feet configuration could be somewhat similar to those of hands. But I could be wrong. We'll just have to wait and see : P

[Diego]

hey martin, it seem you have done a lot of loomis. Really nice work.
I really like the newer stuff, simple but effective lines.
Sorry i haven't too much to say, i'm like a zombie right now. It's 6:00 am
So keep the hard work.
Cheer

[bumskee]

bRØk3n_sPiRiT, damn..that's lot of studies.. good on you for chasing them. It will pay off big time in a very short time. Very solid studies! You should definitely do heaps more of the mirror studies. Nicely structured and you learn heaps. Keep it going dude!!

[BlueMech]

Your loomis studies are a lot better than mine. Closer to the actual drawings. You even labeled everything! I suppose I should go and keep practicing those things... Keep up the good work!

[SirGreenSock]

Your linework looks really crisp and clean, I find that difficult to do in my sketchbook. The loomis studies look great (although some seems to favor leaning towards the right) , as do the recent hand studies. I think you did a great job at capturing the form in space.

[Zebz]

WTF!!? These studies are great! I'm half a sleep because I spent all night out and then came home at 2 AM to play Zelda: Wind Waker so I'm bad for critz right now. But dude, seriously, I'm impressed. You're really puttin' in some major effort and making me look so very much like a slacker. I guess I need to update my SB soon. And I need to be studying more. You're really going to learn a ton from all these, dude! Keep kickin' this stuff up. Seriously. I'm proud to be your SB support, bro. :) Too bad you prolly can't say the same for me! Ha! Have a great weekend.

[max1975]

Really like the arms on that full-body dude in #68. But his chest looks kinda 2-dimensional. If you figure out how to avoid this problem, let me know, because nearly every single dude i've ever drawn also looks like he has a 2-dimensional chest.

[brokk]

Diego, glad you like. I know that feeling, its 8:00 am here, hehe... another non-sleeper night. I'm gonna go fix me some fried eggs or something in a while.

bumskee, Min, thank you for the encouragement, I definatly want to do more studies and of other things too. No plans on stopping any time soon. I really like and admire your stuff, thank you again for your kindness : )

BlueMech, you know, I'm not sure I was studying the right way. I mean, whats the point of making your study look as closely as possible to the ones in the book? I concentrated in making them look as similar as possible, but I realize I didn't pay attention to understand or internalize how the muscles work, how they look from different angles in space, how to construct the human figure in space, so thats why I'm doing it now. Thanks for the kind words.

SirGreenSock, thank you man, that really cheered me up. Its one of my main goals right now, understanding the form in space. My lines are actually very chaotic... you can witness that at the first page of the sketchbook. I only started practicing cleaner lines because of the replies that I got here, so I'm really gratefull for that. And I'm actually "cheating" because I make a rough sketch in blue pencil first, which doesn't show much when scanned, and then I go over the lines I like with a 2B. What do you mean about favoring leaning towards the right? I didn't get that : P

Zebz, you have Wind Waker!? Cool! Ughh... I wanna play the new Zelda game so bad... the Twilight Princess one. But its for gamecube if I'm not mistaken, and I can't afford that right now. I did play The Ocarina of Time though, and man, that is my favorite game ever! Such a cool story, and I love the gameplay and the visuals. I haven't played Wind Waker, but the only thing that I kind of don't like is the new charachter designs... they look too cartoony for me :S But thats just personal taste.
Glad you like the studies, I have no plans on stopping :) Dude, I'm proud to be your sb support! Your new figure studies are really cool. Speaking of which, we could get more people into our sketchbook mafia : P Anyone interested?

max1975, thanks man, yeah I totally see what you mean and I agree. The trick I think is to think of the 3D construction, instead of concentrating only on what you see on the visible surface, or something. I don't know how to resolve the chest yet. Right now I'm focusing on arms, but upper torso and then waist/legs is comming after that. You know, for the limbs cylinders seem to work ok, and spheres for the joints. But the chest doesn't seem either spherical or really cylindrical... its like this oval, irregular shape... I dunno, I'll have more thoughts on this (hopefully) when I get to the upper torso studies. I'll keep you posted ; P

Allright, update time, I haven't got much to show in quantity. Maybe thats better, more frequent updates with less quantity. Oh well, I guess it depends on the day.

Creature of the Week #28 - Swamp Beast
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow28l3.jpg
Swamp Glider
These large creatures are insectivores. They fly above and across the swamp water, just out of the reach of bigger predators. With their multiple wing pairs they can manouver quickly through the air, despite their size. They can also hover suspended in mid air like a hummingbird, just above the water to drink through their circular needle-like facial appendage. The crests on their back and head are mating devices, used to call the attention of the opposite sex. Their main diet consists of small flying insects, which they catch with a muscular tongue-like organ that shoots out from a hole in their heads right below the middle of the eyes, which is sticky in the end, and can retrieve back just as quickly as they shoot.
(Many thanks to Fozzybar for the critiques in the cow forum and for showing me what he meant with a paintover!)

Chow #003 Transdimensional Dragon Hunter
This was the brief provided:
Serren, Transdimensional Dragon Hunter

Serran is human, but from an alternative dimension, so there’s some oddness about her that you can’t quite place.

She is controlled, manipulative, treacherous, vile, cunning, a murderer and a technophile, loving all sorts of technology with a special love for Jules Vernish mechanical aparati and gadgets. She views pretty much everyone else as a tool of some sort to be used or exploited for her own ends, including her employers.
Physically, she’s roughly about mid height (about 5 ½ feet), slight of build, with pale skin, though not albino. Her features are not ugly, but not unpleasant to look upon either. She typically wears an authentic WWII American Bombardier’s Jacket, and often wears a necklace or belt made from dragon teeth (small ones).

And here's what I came up with
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow3.jpg
I didnt include the jacket... I was lazy :S
I notice proportion/anatomy problems now that I look at it. Also, I had to really rush on the painting, I did it the same day as the deadline :S Need to manage my times better.
I included a dumb description just for fun but it didn't get included with the image for the poll:
"Hi! My name is Serran! I'm 26, female, and from another dimension. I enjoy doing crossword puzzles, long walks at the beach, interdimensional traveling and dragonslaying.
I'm really lonely killing these dragons all by myself, so you guys and gals out there willing to acompany me on my interdimensional journies are most welcome to! We can go for mai-tais or piña coladas later, whatever you preffer. Then you can maybe show me what the nightlife is like in your dimension, I'll wear my dragonslaying gear ; )
Here I'm sending you a portrait of me, done by a lazy artist. See how my facial tattoos make me look like I'm pouting? I'm actually angry if you look at my eyebrows, because the artist was taking too long. Thats my angry face. Grrrr.
Guys and gals interested in this add can reach me at serranthedragonslayer@crazydimension.com

Hope to hear from you and kill a few dragons. Buh bye!
Serran"

Oh well. And here are the lines. They look messy, I know :S
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow3lines.jpg
I wanted to paint those little details in the line version... but there just wasnt time. That was a good experience though, because I was forced to do the most important parts fast withouth getting caught up with the details. Maybe next time.

And here are some arm studies
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/aln01.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/aln02.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/aln03.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/aln04.jpg

Allright, now I'm gonna go make me some fried eggs. See you guys later : )

[mull77]

Hey, your studies are great! You look like you're getting a real three dimensional feel for the way the body is rendered.

The drawing of the girl (with blades) is also very nice, but i think that the coloured version lets it down somewhat. Just get some real skintone practice down and you could have some really great peices here.

[brokk]

mull, thanks : ) Yeah, I really need to do some painting studies of people, I'll try to get to that soon. Thanks for the comments :)

[SirGreenSock]

I like the creature and character of the day works. The creature has some really nice texture. The crit I have is on the character, maybe do some touch-ups to her outfit (the darker blue, the lights look good) to suggest the material. The character has impact, its just that one detail that makes me think its not quite finished.
The recent hands look good, too.

There is no such thing as "cheating" in art (unless you plagarize), using photo-blue pencils is actually a great way of getting lines cleaner.
Sorry I wasn't clear about the "leaning", what I mean is that the studies such as this (http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al5.jpg) and this (http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/al4.jpg) lean towards the right. I only saw this in the Loomis studies, so its not a problem, just a detail to look at.

[HEROIC]

woooh man, great loomies studies.

The hand poses are AWESOME< real soilid,
the cg character looks great too.
WOw , really liked ur studies.
awesome.

I really like that cow #23 of urs, great texxture .
hooooray, posr more studies

[Qxzi]

o man o man, hey broken,

i really love your studies, they just seem so smooth and 3d

#67, that first picture looks great, amazing detail and some good little notes. The ones below it look so realtisic, solid and excellent. And it looks so much like loomis drew it for you, or you actually got the page from the loomis book and put in on your sb. :D

Your hand/arm studies look great also, one quick question about them, did you teach yourself?

Picture Chow #003 Transdimensional Dragon Hunter, the light on her hand swords thing look great to me. And like you said, maybe there is some anatomy faults, but you actually cant really see them in the painting, another quick question, did you do the colour with photoshop?

[brokk]

SirGreenSock, thanks. Yeah, I agree that the charachter looks unfinished, I had planned painting it more... but the deadline was really close : S
I'll see if I can finish her sometime, but I'm kinda lazy... but I will try to manage my times better and finish up a next character more.
I see what you mean leaning towards the right now. Damn I didnt notice that on those... maybe I had the page a bit tilted when I was drawing. I'll keep an eye for it now, thanks.

HEROIC, thanks : ) I'm thinking about doing the new cows with pencil like I did with the old ones... but at the same time, I want to practice digital painting. Oh well :^^;:
I plan on making more studies : )

Qxzi, thank you. No, Loomis didn't draw it for me, and no, I didn't paste the page on my sketchbook, haha :) If you're skeptical about that, look at the feet of those leg studies, they are not aligned! Loomis has them all aligned. Why aren't mine on the same line? Well, because... I'm a stupid person :)
The arm/hands studies, well, I learned them this week actually! So yes, I taught them to myself a few days ago : P Actually, thats not entirely true, if it wasn't for the Andrew Loomis books I wouldn't have learned anything. The hands/arms without the notes are my own, and the ones with notes on page 1 of the sketchbook are from "Drawing the Head and Hands" by Andrew Loomis. You can get that book and the others at www.saveloomis.org
Actually, I think the anatomical errors are evident in the color version :nohope: mainly in the hips and legs area. I need to make more studies, I'm working on it :^^;:
No, I colored it in Painter, and then tweaked it a little in photoshop, just messed with the channel mixer and the hue saturation and contrast a little.

Ok, small update, some upper torso studies. They look a bit disproportionate and messy, I'm working on it, I assure you :^^;: :P
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/alnt05.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/alnt06.jpg

Next up, a few more upper torsos, some female ones, and then legs/feet/hips. After that, heads, and then full figures, yay! : P

Thanks again guys, c ya soon : )

[Azeira]

hey broken,

thanks for the sketchbook post. your works seems to be getting better with your practice, with your exercises desplaying wquite a good growth on anatomy handling. not much else to say, really. keep it up, and thanks again.

Woodruff

[DavidArt20]

Wow these are some extensive exercises! You can't go wrong with loomis. Where do you study?

[max1975]

Chests are looking better in the new torso studies. The fronts is still looking a little flat, try to get some more dimension on the pecs I guess. But there does seem to be more volume there than in the last one I commented on.

Arm structure's looking really good.

[brokk]

Azeira, thanks, I'm trying :^^;: Now go update your sketchbook :)

DavidArt20, Loomis is great. I do these excersizes on my own.

max1975, cool. Yeah I notice there is flatness still... I'm working on it :^^;: Thanks again man.

Some more male upper torso studies. Next up is females, then feet/legs/hips then heads & full figures (whew!)

From photos. Its hard to not try and copy the photo literally, but instead look for the 3d shapes.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/mt01.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/mt02.jpg

a bit more muscular
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/mt03.jpg

And these ones were without ref, just trying to recreate the shapes and muscles to really try and interiorize the basic structures at least.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/mtnr01.jpg

See you soon!

[Zebz]

Nice, nice, nice! Now I want to see you apply some of this new, cool knowledge, dude. Hit me up with something tasty! ;) Sorry I haven't been a very good sketch group buddy. I'm busy and then too lazy to scan. I'm gettin' there tho. Promise. ;)

One crit, or suggestion really, is to maybe research origins and insertions. If you know how the muscles connect to which bone and how each bone moves, I dunno. It's helping me quite a bit. Makes you think of the figure like a working machine rather than an abstract mass. It helps! Ok. More later. Keep it up!

[max1975]

Ah, now you're getting there...

[SirGreenSock]

Nice, the torsos look good. You said some are from photos, where do you get your refs from?
Some of the torsos seem to get too thin towards the waist, but otherwise look great. Try doing a variety of body types.

[armando]

Torsos look good, use your anatomy knowledge to explain the why of those forms. Take note of pectoralis minor when the arms are raised, and make sure the head of the humerus is beneath the acromion and clavicle to keep it from sticking out too far like on nov 14.

[brokk]

Zebz, yeah I definatly want to study up on where the muscles insert and how, what range of motion they can make, etc.
Hey no worries, its all good :) Just keep workin' (and having fun of course) : P

max1975, lol, I'm trying.

SirGreenSock, yeah, body type variation is on my to-do list, definatly want to get to that too. For refs I'm using mostly this (http://www.human-anatomy-for-artist.com/) and this (http://www.female-anatomy-for-artist.com/).

armando, I didn't quite get that, what do you mean with explaining the why of the forms? Good call on watching the bones, the collarbone area is tricky :^^;: I'll keep an eye for it.

Guys, thank you so much for taking the time to crit, and thank you for your kind words, really. Go update your sketchbooks! :)

So I'm working on my entry for the enviornment of the week, topic is Fungal Tunnel. Its pretty much done, but please feel free to crit it or speak your mind, I could make more changes to it, I have until Sunday to turn it in.

Enviornment of the Week 05
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow5.jpg
Fungal Tunnel
Game setting:
The Fungal Tunnel is a gateway-dungeon that connects the two main northeastern regions between the mountains. Besides being a conecting point, it is also a mini-dungeon by itself, with hostile monsters, treasures, and quest oportunities. There are also several entrances, some hidden, some not, to other underground areas, and to more extensive dungeons beneath the mountains.
Location description:
The Tunnel is abandoned. Several species of mushrooms of all sizes from enourmous to diminute can be found growing on the floor. On the walls, species of lichen crawl the Tunnel's upper surroundings.
Possible monsters: Kobolds, Trolls, Sentient Fungi
Other information: some mushrooms and fungi can be picked up. What you can do with them varies, they can be used in potion preparation, sold, cooked, or eaten raw (Flora Knowledge would be advisable, or be equiped with the Fungal Tome).

[max1975]

shrooms all seem to be clinging to the walls...maybe you could stick some in the middle of the floor? And something to make it look more dungeony...dunno what exactly...

[brokk]

Thanks max, yeah, I agree, I thought that there were too close to the walls and none on the floor...

I tried making an update, added a few little mushrooms to the path and fiddled with the contrast a little
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow5f.jpg

I didn't want to add mushrooms that were too big for the floor, but I didn't want to look bare at the same time, because I figgured the charachters would be walking around there. Oh well : S

[maxetormer]

DUUUUUUUUDEEEE the last anatomy studies!!! are so good!

Muuuuuy buenos estudios de anatomia, mis respetos, ya me
inspirastes para que sigua aciendolos, demonios si te has
vuelto bueno!! acerca del utimo paisaje de cueva los hongos
tienen una textura muy similar a la de las paredes y eso aplana
la imagen, ademas todo esta renderisado con le mismo destalle lo
que hace que no tengas un buena lectura, y eso tambien tiende
a aplanar la imagen, porque no tratas de reducir un poco la textura
en la fondo y deajs solo dos de los hongos mas cercanos con el detalle
que tienes ahora? talvez ayude a generar mas profunidad, yo tambien
tengo millones de problemas con mis paisajes, solo estoy repitiendo
lo que me digo a mi mismo cuando algo no me esta funcionado,
espero te sirva de algo :P nos vemos luego!! :^^:

[Diego]

hey martin, long time no see your thread.
Lot of good stuff happening. These torsos are looking sweet, keep at it.
Sorry but the short reply, i'm in a ciber right now, i can't access to CA from home, i don't know why.
cheers

[vigostar]

hey, just wanted to stop by and how much I enjoyed seeing your improvement here.. espeically on that Nov.16th post.. great work.. like that mushroom enviro also.. keep up the good work

[Quicksilver]

Fantastic work here - the COWs are great! I especially love the anatomy studies.

~~QS

[brokk]

Fucking hell, I had written a long post answering you guys and then it said "you are not logged on" and it got erased :dead:

So I'll have to make it quick :(

maxetormer, como va! Really good call on the mushrooms image, I had thought that it looked flat but I didn't know what to do. I tried knocking down the textures on the wall, don't know if I succeded too well. But I get what you were saying, and its a good point to remember. Thanks man, and thank you for the really kind words, nos vemos luego : )
Por cierto, empezaste el thread de local artists que una vez habiamos hablado? Busque pero no encontre : S

Hey Diego, it sucks you cant access the site from your house : (
CA is being weird lately, they are changing servers I think, and adding new stuff. Thanks for the kind words, I really value your support. I'm waiting for your sketchbook update : )

vigostar, thanks! I have no plans on stopping any time soon, heh. Thanks again : )

Quicksilver, thank you! I really enjoy participating in C.O.W.

The update on the mushrooms enviornment of the week, I tried to correct what maxetormer pointed out about using the same texture for everything and thus making the image read as flat. I dont think I succeded too well because I used a blender in painter to do it, when maybe it would have been better to use a brush. But I wanted to do it quick. Next time I'll take my time : S
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/eow5fi.jpg

some female torsos
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/ft01.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/ft02.jpg

And some feet. I don't have much written material on feet, Figure Drawing for All its Worth dedicates only one page exclusively to them. The most complicated thing so far realizing the basic shape construction of them, which I admit I have not had a notion yet. I tried to approach them in a similar way to hands, but still have not realized the basic 3d configuration. Which means, I should do more studies.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/feet01.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/feet02.jpg

More feet commin' up.

Thanks again guys!

[HEROIC]

muSHRoOms, O_O great.
carefull with ur shadows on round and curvy things. u might wanna add more shadows on some areas again.
Like ur concept, and the texture of the one on left, the biggest one. :)

FOotS. woo big toe nails ;p
really like the way u show the colume of ur studies. great. do u use a ref to do diff view of foot??

[max1975]

On the mushrooms, I think toning down the texture on the walls was a good move. But in the process you seem to have lost some of the highlights on the inner edges, which makes the whole thing look a bit duller. Also, I think I might be seeing some compression artifacts--you might wanna turn up the jpeg quality a little for the final submission.

I really, really like those foot studies. The toes look extremely toe-like.

[Sickbrush]

congrats
i can see your upgrading and i really apreciate the quantity of your work. keep going that way cuz you'll be high.
i really like you cause you work alot.
think i'm gonna get your thread in my signature for support...

[BAKI]

hey thanks for stopping by my sketchbook, it should be working now
unless the image i added today screwd me up again....
anyways things are picking up for you
looks great, keep em comming
I really like the mushroom cave, yet the ground could still use some alge, more shrooms, tree vines, leafs, something to fill in the plain space
too bad you got rid of all the detail on the update
I say when you find some time go back and finish if you feel it

[Diego]

Hey martin, how is it going?
These studies are coming along really nice. Lots of good stuff. Are you using reference for the torso studies?
Cheers man, keep the hard work.

[brokk]

Hey guys, whats up

HEROIC, yeah I use my own feet as reference. You're totally right on the shadows of the mushrooms, but it was somewhat deliberate, I really wanted to show details or something like that. But I guess it could have been better to establish the shadows more properly. The round is now over though : P
Thanks, and I'm glad you liked it : )

max1975, yeah I noticed that too... it was a bit of a struggle, but hopefully I've learned something from it... next time I'll try to keep an eye for where I try to put textures and stuff. Hey your mushroom entry turned out nice by the way : ) Glad you liked the foot studies.

_^SlayeR^_, cheers man, it was my intention originally to post a lot of images every time I posted, but I realize it could take some time to download, so now I'm trying to distribute my posts more evenly... or something. Thanks for the support, I'm really flattered :)

BAKI, ah cool, I'll go check then : ) Yeah, I guess I should finish it sometime... the deadline is over, but it would be smart to work on it, too bad I'm lazy : S maybe some day. Thanks for the crits, and I agree on them.
Yeah, I kinda feel "ehh" about the detail loss on the walls, but I think it helps the image more on an overall level. Gotta keep an eye for these things I realize :)

Diego, hey man, good to see you again :) Things are ok. For the torsos, on some I use photo reference (from here (http://www.female-anatomy-for-artist.com/) and here (http://www.human-anatomy-for-artist.com/)) on others I use my own torso as reference, and others are without any reference. Thanks for the support man.

Creature of the Week #29 - Tentacles
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow29.jpg
Illness Eater
We may have just discovered the cure for every known illness. During our expedition to the uncharted regions of the newly colonized jungle world of Soen III, we have retrieved several specimens of a rather curious species. They dwell in murky pools ridden with diseases, as our terrain analysis demonstrated. Surely, through years of evolution, these creatures have adapted to living in the most hazardous conditions, and this developed a very adaptable and resiliant inmunological system. We have studied their cellular behavior when exposed to new illnesses, and they can manage to counter everything. This, applied to human matters, could lead to the development of the ultimate cure.
It should also be noted than the more they develop antibodies for countering illnesses, the more they grow in body size. They also become more agressive and keen. Since they are able to coexist with diseases without apparent harm to themselves, the military sector has shown interest in the possibility of military use of these specimens, using them either to research new bacteriological offensives, or using the specimens themelves as biological weapons.

More feet. I think I discovered how to divide them in proportions, I divide the foot by four.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/feet03.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/feet04.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/feet05.jpg

[Diego]

hey martin, really good studies, very clean and detailed.
Thanks for the links, very useful.
What books are you using for your anatomy studies?

[brokk]

"Drawing the Head and Hands" for the hands.

On these last things, no books.
I just use myself as reference, either looking directly or at a mirror.

On feet, I'm discovering pretty much everything on my own. I use my own feet, I haven't studied from photos yet (but I most likely will). I have no written material on feet. Those pages like feet03.jpg may seem taken from a book, but they're not, they are my own feet, and those texts were written by me. It says nothing tremendously important, just that I found out that divinding the foot in 4 gives you nice proportions to place the main features. I approached them somewhat similarly to hands, in the sense that the foot also has a heel, like the hand, and stuff like that. Also it is hollow on the bottom and curved on top, somewhat like hands.

For the foot bones, I searched for foot references online, mostly gimnastic/medical sites turned up, and there were some bone diagrams. I just copied them and payed attention to the divisions they mentioned, which are three, forefoot, midfoot, and hindfoot.

Figure Drawing for all its Worth only has one page dedicated to feet... and it doesn't really address the structural construction. So I have to resort to other things like medical sites and pretty much figure stuff out for myself.

[brokk]

Wip, rough sketch C.h.o.w. 5
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chow5wip.jpg

[dCepT]

good GAWD that's a lotta studies! I feel hella lazy right now..hehe.. I'm diggin on the lines for the transdimensional dragonhunter-CHoW! Hope you bring the colorversion to the same clean finish! Crit on the degenesis-CHoW.. the shinbone on the leg towards us is wonky.. it slants diagonally, looks like it connects to the side of the ankle. Also, he looks a bit like he's got two left feet...
Diggin' on the concept, though!

Keep 'em coming!

d-C

[max1975]

ChoW: Great design, wonderful detail. Very good hands, too, but you can do better on the feet. Legs look a little weird--take a look at the decorations on the shin, they're at very different angles and that's throwing things off. Also he doesn't look very well-balanced, but that might not be a bad thing in this case--he's not so off-balance that he's gonna fall over, and it creates a slightly disturbing effect that may actually be advantageous.

Didn't the brief say something about him being in a cold environment? Which would make things a little chilly, being nearly naked like that...but maybe he's just that tough.

[thief]

your studys look very nice and chow 5 looking good too but its so cold there in that degenesis world :S

[jtheanswer]

Dig in your studies, keep em going, dont ever give up.

[brokk]

dCepT, good call! I didn't see that. I tried fixing it, hope it looks better. Thanks man.

max, cool thanks. Tried to correct the foot a little. Yeah, its just that there's a lot of Degenesis charachters running around naked in the Degenesis setting it seems, but I'd guess they're more near the mediterrenean. I guess he's just a tough old bastard :P

thief, yeah, and a lot of them are half naked :P I guess they're the ones more near warmer climate... oh well.

jtheanswer, thanks man, that really encourages me. I'll try to keep pushing it.

Update on the chow 5, tried correcting the feet and shinbone a little, hope this is comming along better.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chow05.jpg

[shyamshriram]

WOW !! Great sb mate :) lots of good studies !! Thanx a lot for sharing...im inspired :D
KEEP POSTING !!
:yayca:

[brokk]

Lol, thank you shyamshriram! I will try to keep posting :)

update on the chow 5, maybe I should loose the text
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chow05f.jpg

[Qxzi]

hey broken,

woow woow woow, i cant express how much i love your studies. They look
so solid and excellent.

The torso studies, look great and you have really improved from the first ones, the first ones did look a bit flat, but then you got the important muscles in and now your getting the hang of it, do some more!

The mushroom picture, as a whole, looks great, but the right hand mushroom, needs much more shading around the back of the mushroom. Plz finish it!

The foot studies look super and look really professional with your own notes. The chow 5 picture does need a little bit of work around the neck/head area. Your guy(dont wanna be mean) looks like hes hasnt got a neck at all, try and wipe the excess hair away from the front of the neck and add a neck(if that makes sense)

keep it up man with the studies and ill be back!

[max1975]

I really like the presentation on the update. How did you do the paper texture?

The figure could maybe use a little color, but just a little. Maybe a 10-15% tint to make him pop out a little more, without obscuring the pencil work or the texture behind him.

That shin is still bothering me a little, for the same reason I described before. But it's not a big deal. This ChoW may have my vote, but maybe I should look at the others first :)

[brokk]

Qxzi, lol thanks. On the mushroom pic, you're right, it does need more shadow. But I've started on my e.o.w. #06 entry and I still need to tackle this week's c.o.w, on top of that I should be doing my studies which I have been neglecting :S
I'll try to finish it sometime in the future... but I don't know if I will... I'm kinda lazy : S But you are right on the crit, and I will keep an eye for overall shades now.
Lol, you are not being mean :P, on the chow 5, I actually think the head is misplaced, he actually has too much neck I think. But the beard/hair kinda hides it... If I can find the time before the deadline I will try to correct if, if not, I will keep an eye for it for next works.

max, the paper texture was done in this way: I grabbed a regular A4 computer paper and threw some ink, tempera, and water all over it, and smeared it all over the page. I threw some more water and stuff, then I let it dry in the sun. It got all crackly drying up, but you can crackle it into a ball if it doesn't I guess. Once it was dry, I scanned it, and on an new layer in photoshop I set the mode to "color" and chose a yellowish color, then I merged the two layers, and then adjusted the brightness/contrast. I think I had a white background and dropped the opacity too, but I can't remember.
Yeah, I did try to put in some color, just a yellowish tone in color mode, I think there is a slight difference between between these two last pics, but maybe it needs just a bit more. Its daytime here and things look different on my monitor during the day to how they look during night time.
I tried to correct the shin a little, on what dCepT was pointing out, but the balance thing is still there.
Lol, I'm really flattered... but yeah check the other entries first... hehe. I'm really liking solorpower's entry, but I want to wait to see all of them as well.

Sorry I'm not really implementing your crits guys, I feel like an asshole :S its just that I've got several things to tackle right now, and I'd rather correct these when I'm done with the stuff I'm doing right now (but to be honest, I dont know if I will... I'm lazy...).
But you are right in your crits, and I do value them, so please, don't take this as if I'm not listening. I am. :)

Cheers, hope to see you all again.

[brokk]

I found THIS (http://www.eye-ofthetiger.com/images/download/flaschen.jpg) online, I need this drink! I don't even know what it is, but now I'm super pumped!

Lol just kiddin' :P Though it was kinda funny finding it.

Decided to loose some of the text on the chow5
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chow05fnt.jpg

Starting with the leg studies
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs01.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs02.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs03.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs04.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs05.jpg

[max1975]

solorpower's is very good, an awesome rendering actually, but I like your concept best of the ones I've seen thus far. Lotta time left though.

Man, that texture sounds like a complicated process. Really works though.

[brokk]

No, its actually really simple, it sounds complicated but its the most thoughtless process really.
I mean, you're trying to achieve an aged paper look, dont try to do it in photoshop, just grab a paper and and try to recreate what would happen to it through out time (yeah I'm kinda crazy...) Like, wrinkle it, mess it up, through stuff on it like ink or whatever, hell through dirt on it if you like (I wouldn't recomend it, if you're gonna scan it afterwards).

After that just scan it and fiddle around with it in photoshop, adjust the brightness, give it some color (make a new layer, fill it with the bucket with some yellow color or whatever, set the layer mode to "color").

There isn't "one way", you just gotta experiment and see what works and what doesn't. Just go chaotic with a page, "traditionally", and then tweak it in ps :P

[Diego]

hey martin, really cool studies, i can see your very motivated, your dedication to study the forms is really admirable, and i'm sure it will pay off, or is it right now with your chow character, shows more confidende, balance.
Keep the good work dude.
sALUDOS

[Zebz]

Holy Crap... again. You wow me sketch bro. Dang. Talk about a hard workin' dude! You're seriously steppin' it up as of late! I'm so proud!! ;)

The mushroom env looks nice but too simple. Maybe if you had those walls not so uniform and nice lookin'. It just makes it look plane. Don't be afraid to really create some unique forms. I know you're trying for the perspective thing but throw some oddities in there for us.

The tentacles creature is really great as well. I have to say that I would like more work on the environment they're in tho. Maybe more lighting and color stuff goin' on. Great texture on the creatures tho. Their really nice.

The character is lookin' nice too. But you need to not be afraid of forms. Really exagerate some of those areas and such. Give us some fun stuff to look at, y'know what I mean? It just seems too bland right now. Vary the line width. Render it up with some value. Really FORM this thing out for us. Keep workin' on your characters. Your studies are improving but don't let them limit you either. Make mistakes, don't be afraid to branch out. Experiement. You're growing. Just don't get held back by anything!!

Wonderful updates, mate. I'll be lookin' for more. Keep it up!!!

[scumgrinder]

good stuff, dude. One comment about the chow dude. I know the whole degenesis stuff goes hand in hand with being scantily clad, but you have to remember that this character in particular lives in a cold area as said in the description. Also, he's old so he'd wear more clothes because of health issues.

[redehlert]

Hey Broken!
Sorry I couldn't dive in here yesterday. I'll give ya my thoughts on your ChOW during lunch today, okay?
Also - really diggin' your anatomy studies. The only thing I can suggest is regarding the circular cross sections - if you're studying an untoned bit of anatomy then I can see those cross sections as circular. However, if any bit of tone is present, then you will have variation in the circle to accommodate muscle as well as bone (below the knee - tibia is subcutaneous). But like I said, these are nice studies!
Cheers!
D

[redehlert]

And I agree with Scumgrinder on the weather and age department, unless this guy is beyond sensory feeling - eg. he's transcended to a higher plane and it's just his body that resides in the material realm.
Cheers!
D

[dCepT]

Nice update on the degenesis-ChoW! I see you're kickin in more studies as well... damn you keep busy!

Keep 'em coming!

hasta luego

d-C

[redehlert]

Hey Broken,

I did a super quick paint over of the ChOW 05 face shot since I thought this was an area you could really explore more in depth. Let me know if it is okay to post it in your SB thread.

Cheers!
D

[brokk]

Zebz, I will try to use more crazy shapes, even in perspective :) Thanks for the kind comments, glad you liked the tentacles cow. Yeah I was sensing it needed some more work in the surroundings. Yeah, good point on be limited by the studies as well. Its just that I don't feel like I've studied enough to start altering things... yet... but I'm trying to get to that too, really make more exaggerated forms. Also varying the linewidth, which Diego told me some time ago now and I haven't forgot. I will try to implement these things these next weeks.

scumgrinder, thanks man. I didn't pay much attention to the part on the bried that mentioned the cold enviornment... shoulda read the damn thing better, I was exited that it involved Degenesis and I got carried away. Good point on the health issues. Sadly, I was too lazy to make major changes in the drawing like adding clothes, but, maybe I can get away with it. I did add a frog belt though :P
I'll pay more attention now, and give more thought to the charachter design. Thanks again.

redehlert, ah yes you are totally right! I suspected that the circles looked to "circular". I was concentrating on the basic shapes like cylinders and forgot about how the muscles and bones affect the surface. I'm getting to full figures now, and I'm about to start making studies in tones as well. I'll add the "ellipses" again in the tone studies and see how the muscles affect the surface. Good call. Thanks : )

dCepT, heh. Thanks : ) Nos vemos.

red, cool, yeah sure thing. I made a really small update too, nothing really important, just some frogs : P
Thanks, and feel free to post : )

Ok yet another update, nothing major, just frog belt and hanging frogs from his cane
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chow5fin.jpg

Creature of the week, might still tweak this up.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow30fin.jpg
Odontopod
When the first explorers arrived at the small island, far on the hills they saw the silhouette of what they thought was a three legged animal. As they got closer, they discovered that it was not a third leg, but the creature's teeth that it used to aid in its movement. Because the creatures used three body parts to move, they were nicknamed "tripeds", but the natives simply reffer to them as "big teeth".
Odontopods's teeth, besides being a third walking extremity, are used in digging holes in the dirt, where they prepare a nest for their young. They are also used for cracking open coconuts and shelled crustaceans.

And the black and white version. I like this version a bit better
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow30.jpg

Ok, thanks again guys, I'm leaving in a few moments to catch the train, I'm gonna see Pearl Jam today :teeth:

Cheers.

[max1975]

Sweet CoW; your coloring seems to be improving since the fungal tunnel and tentacles.

[jtheanswer]

Hey man, hope enjoy Pearl Jam. I like the shaman guy, but what up with his mouth?

[mull77]

Wow. You sir, are prolific.

I love the tripod, but i'm not sure how he'd be able to get anything in his mouth with those huge nashers. The shaman is also v good. Reminds me of something out of Slaine from 2000 ad

[central]

nice work, like ur chow character. wat impressed me the most tho was on the 1st page. rite after arm muscle studies u drew a pic of a girl with a dragon in the background. wat i noticed most about the sketch was how ud got her arm muscles rite after all the muscle studies ud done, was good 2 c that .... the sun wont burn ur wings tonite so ........ onwards !!!!!!!!!!!!!

[bumskee]

bRØk3n_sPiRiT... how did you do those anatomy stuff?? damn.. they look very solid very accurate and spot on. Nice going with it, you should keep pushing it. ChOW is looking damn fine! I still can't get over those 3d anatomy drawings.. Very inspirational and thank you for sharing those. I am just thinking what you are going to pull out in few weeks time.. cheers man and keep it going!

[dCepT]

The CHoW is awesome! :D I like the touch with the frogs on the degenesis-char. as well! Good lookin'!

d-C

[Diego]

hey martin, how is it going?
really cool entry you have there...
The chow entry looks very cool, though i think the head position is a bit off, its like the head is placed over the shoulder.
Anyways, really like your new work...
Keep the hard work..
ps: how is it going with your wacom? do you have any color studies or something?

[hurricane]

great chows and cows!

keep on rocking !!

cheers!

[Zebz]

I like the creature, especially the pencils. There's a lot of texture to it. Nice rendering!! I still think the character lacks a bit. Probably as a result of you needing to do more figure studies/anatomy work. The face for example, keep it up.

[brokk]

Diego I forgot to reply to your comment on page 2! Sorry.

Diego (page 2): Thanks! (lol, what a reply, huh?) ; P

max, thanks, I'm working on it : )

jtheanswer, thanks a lot man. Pearl Jam was really awesome. The mouth? Err... *looks in other direction, whisteling*. Hey, I notice you're from Spain, no me habia dado cuenta : )

mull, haha you are too kind! :) yeah I got that a lot about the cow, I included he has a long tongue in the description :^^; Thanks

central, what a really nice comment... a keen observation like that. I don't think I realized it myself! Thank you :)

bumskee, Min, hehe you don't need anatomy advice from me, in any case its the other way around :) But for what its worth... I scanned a rough sketch version I usually do before doing the final cleaned up version. Thank you very much, you inspire me!

dCepT, hehe, thanks!

Diego, yeah, the heads off... I should be getting to head studies and then full figures this week or the next. No color studies with the wacom yet, only the things I do for the community activities. Will be getting to that too, its on schedule : )
By the way, I haven't forgotten what you told me about varying the line width, I want to practice that too, but I don't feel confident enough with the forms yet. But its on my mind too : P

hurricane: thanks hurri! Your stuff is great!

Zebz, yeah, head/face is the area with the most problems with, redehlert made a really good paintover of the face and I saw the proportions/anatomy problems. I'll be getting to head studies and then full figures this week or the next. Thanks again!

yo Red, if you're reading this, I forgot to thank you for that cool paintover you did! I'll be getting to heads/full figure studies like I was telling to ZebzFree, so I'll be putting those things into practice.

Min, if you're reading this, this is the rough sketch I make in blue pencil. I start with something like the leg on the right, and move on to something more like the one on the left. Good God man, I feel like I'm insulting you by even showing this to you... as if you needed any explanations from me... you are so much more experienced than me : S
(But you did asked :P )
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs06p.jpg

And then I just scan it in greyscale and adjust the contrast a little, and fix up any marks made by the scanner. Looks crappy :(
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs06.jpg

More legs stuff
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs07.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs08.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs09.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs10.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs11.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs12.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs13.jpg

And here is the creature of the week tweaked up, how I finally sent it, I also included that it has a long tongue in the description because I was getting a lot of question regarding how it eats :^^;
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow30fin3.jpg

And here is my enviornment of the week, work in progress as it is.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/eow7wip.jpg

Allright thats all for now.
Cheers all :)

[Odds]

wow, i'm amazed by those anatomy studies. the lines are so clean and curvy! :)
you should pick up some basic painting books etc... i think your drawing skills are much better than your painting ones. other than that, keep it up-

[max1975]

I love the clarity of the anatomy drawings. Starting to find the cross-section rings kind of distracting, but if you're learning from them, keep them. That's what studies are for.

EoW's looking a little eh right now...should be better after you give that tree some roots, and maybe something to break up the flatness of the horizon? The hand there is very, very cool.

[Diego]

hey man, really like what you are doing...
Lots of studies, hope you're learning a ton by doing them. I recognized the refs, you did a very clean job with the lineas, maybe you should do a full study of these figures.
I like the color you use in the COW entry, really cool.
Keep the hard work man.
Cheers

[Zebz]

Same ol' same ol', bro. You're lookin' good. Just keep dishin' it out. It'll be interesting to see how the enviroz turns out. I think you may be too close to call that an enviro tho. Maybe if that's a giant's body in the forest or something. lol ;)

[jtheanswer]

Hola, Great studies, I can recognize some of them cause they belong to the same website, isnt it?

Suerte y a seguir adelante! :P

[styler]

nice sketchbook, I liked pretty much all of it

[brokk]

Dammit! Again, I wrote a really long answer and addressed all you guys, and then it said "you are not logged on". I just spent over an hour! :[

Sorry guys, I dont feel like writting everything again right now... just the images without comments. I'll edit this with comments later :[
I was also goint to swing by people's sketchbooks as well, I'll do that later as well.

EDIT:
I haven't updated this in a long while, I don't have much to show considering the time I haven't updated : S
But I need to get back on track.

Odds, thank you :) I have painting study scheduled right after tones and lines : P Thanks again!

max, yeah I want to not draw the circles, but they are like training wheels, I still need them. Can't ride on my own just yet : P EOW I didn't make the deadline, only that work in progress. Good call on the crits though.

Diego, hi. Thanks for the kind words man, I'm trying to do full figures. Un bardo, cada vez es como que se complica mas. Voy a terminar con el cerebro licuado : P

Zebz, yeah the eow was a wip, didn't make it to the deadline. I'm trying to keep the production up... been slacking. Really sorry I haven't checked by your sketchbook man, that goes for max1975 as well. Time to get back on track.

jtheanswer, thanks man, really. Yeah they're from the same site. Un saludo. Por cierto, hay un thread para latinoamerica, no se si lo viste, bah creo que tambien hay uno para españa. Podriamos organizar un thunderdome en conjunto quizas, o alguna otra cosa.

styler, thanks man! Really really flattering that you actually took the time to view everything! Cheers to you!

Starting with heads, from Drawing the Head and Hands by Andrew Loomis. Just some seleccions.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dhh04.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dhh03.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dhh02.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dhh01.jpg

Figures from ref, I don't like how the first ones turned out, the others are just the sketches. Lazyness : S
I plan on doing more.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/ffp01.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/ffp02.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/ffp03.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/ffp04.jpg

no ref this one
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/fpnr.jpg

Self portrait, trying to vary the lines, and just mark where the shadows would be without really doing the tones.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/p.jpg

And a picture of one of the suicide girls, in this case, the lovely Fractal! I got lazy and didn't finish it : S
But I plan on doing more of these too.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/sg1.jpg

A sort of dragon sketch, maybe I'll try to paint it and see what happens.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dsk.jpg

quick creature thing sketch
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/crsk.jpg

old & unfinished
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/wipunf.jpg

cow sketch
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow31dwip.jpg

cow wip
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow31dwip800.jpg

[Bennett]

Those studies are looking nice, and I agree w/ other posters that recommend working on your painting skills.

A few of the woman w/ sword studies are way out of proportion (almost 10 heads tall). Yet the woman you did w/ no ref is better proportionally. It looks like you have a subscription to 3d.sk I use them for ref all of the time. Looks like you copied plates directly from Loomis dwg the head and hands, good idea, but don't forget to apply the methods to your own dwgs.

cheers!

[That fat kid]

hey spirit, excellent studies and very clean lines, you're really trying to learn your stuff...i find the skull studies particularly interesting, shows a commitment, very motivating....keep it up!

the fat kid

[brokk]

Bennet, I had intentions to study painting right after lines and tones. But I see a lot of people are saying I should be practicing painting more than anything, so maybe I should do it now :shrug:
Good call on the proportion problems of the studies, I didn't like those figures either. Plan on doing more.
Nope, I dont have a subscription to 3dsk, these are from anatomy for the artist. Yes, I'm studying from Loomis.

That fat kid, thanks man. You catch me on a blue day today. The motivation is there but my slackingness brings me down. Time to get back on track.

final image for the cow. Please feel free to crit and share your thoughs.

C.O.W #31 - Canyonmaker
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow31f.jpg
Canyon Bombardiers
These creatures are about the size of a dog, they live in colonies of thousands of millions of individuals. They undergo three main metamorphosis in their lives, the first is the larva/young-adult stage, shown in this picture. They burrow through the earth, feeding and also using their needle-like proboscis to literally, inject the earth at certain strategic areas. They release then a chemical compound like bombardier beetles, only millions of times stronger. After a short while, the liquid chemical will massively explode, destroying large seccions of earth. This is done by the entire colony, cooperating in their targeting areas, creating vast canyons.
They do this for reproductive reasons, because on their second metamorphosis, they loose their frontal digging claws and develop slimmer legs, and the ability to form webs like spider's webs. The entire canyon gets covered in these huge webs, where they make their nests. The young larvas that hatch from their eggs feed on the webs until they are somewhat more developed.
In their final metamorphosis, they will develop wings and fly away to create more canyons and perpetuate the reproductive cycle.

Thanks again for your comments guys. I will edit my post above.

[max1975]

Hey Broken, lotta cool things in this update. I'll give you some more indepth comments later this evening, think I need a nap right now.

[Odds]

your studies are so awesome, man! you're really nailing the form in those women figures. keep going, man... you're improving with every new page :)

[max1975]

Ok. Your girl with the sword--seems to me the form and balance were getting better just as you were getting too lazy to go beyond sketching :) On the no-ref figure, you need to study the head/neck/shoulders connections (so do I, I think that's the toughest part of the body to draw). Also her breasts look fake, but lots of real people do have fake breasts, so...

Wish you'd finish that picture of Fractal. Her mouth, while cute, is a little low and to the right, but I'm loving her eyes, breast, and arm. And her hair and her collar. Of course, I like collars lots, perhaps implying I have deeply rooted psychological problems.

Head studies: Some are kinda off, but that tends to happen when one does a few dozen head studies. When a bunch are off in the same way, that may reveal something, and these (and your self portrait) seem to be pointing to the same weakness I have, which is lining up the eyes when the head is at an angle. If I had a solution I'd tell you. What I've been doing, which I think is helping some (but not always) is drawing a pair of straight lines across the face to mark the top and bottom of both eyes. Not sure you aren't already doing that though, but it's better than drawing one line and trying to center the eyes on it.

Ground looks a little plain on the canyonmaker, but I like the way you faded its body from more to less detail.

I didn't finish the EoW either...oh well.

[styler]

the size of a dog!? That is a bigass bug. I like it.

[Qxzi]

Hey hey hey,

wowwow, all these studies, love them all like always :D

Firstly, your leg studies, look very solid and good. Theres also lots of them, which helps. All of your studies seem very clear which is great, keep them up.

The BIG ant(if its an ant) is a good painting overall. I only think that the right hand side of it lets it down. The sand and sea dont seem clear enough. You could also neaten that bush up a little.

Those loomis studies look great once again. It looks exactly the same as loomis, which is good. Your making good progress with them.

The figures and self portrait look good, i think the firgures legs are a little too long, or i might be wrong. Oh and please finsh that self portrait.

C.O.W #31 - Canyonmaker - good little creature. Not as good as your creature before though. This time its the back. Its way too 2D, you gotta make it clearer, and add gotta add light/shade to it. If you do this it will improve the picture 10x more. I hope i wasnt to mean or anything :tihi:

Keep it up man! Still friends? ----> :D

[Farvus]

I love all those anatomy studies from loomis and photos. Hope to see more... :)

[Zebz]

Ah, the studies are really nice, bro. I hear you on the slacking thing. I spent my first week off from school mostly sleeping. lol Uh, terrible. I drew a lot the first couple days of the week but I'm slowin' down. I'd better get on it! ;) You're stuff is looking really nice though. I'm still not a big fan of the creatures. They just seem too blurry to me. I see the imagination and technique behind them and I respect you for that. But I just don't by 'em! Maybe if they were sharper? I dunno. I'm tired and I'm just throwing out random critz. lol Not good. Keep watching the proportions on your fig studies. But you're really challenging yourself and I dig that. I need to do more stuff like that. But I'm a slacker. You know that. ;) I'll even prove it when I update my SB again. Anyhow, keep fightin' the good fight. Take it easy, mate.

[Diego]

Hey martin, nice to see new stuff from you, really cool stuff. Really love your COW stuff and loomis'.
Some crits - I think the problem with your figure is that it looks like you use just circles and spheres to build the forms, i think you should try to add more complex structure in perspective, try to get the axis lines right in order to get the right movement and twisting of the body, maybe some straight lines will help, because I read your figures as multiple curves, no sense of structure, also it will help you with your shading.
Anyways, your progressing like mad, keep at it, draw everyday, and soon when i get my wacom we can do that OC thing.
Abrazos

[ATLAS2900]

Your Figure Studies are simply amazing. I Like how clean and detailed they are. Really great stuff

[timpaatkins]

WHoot! Good stuff man, Like the studies you got ther, reminds me that I have a few to do... Anyways one of my faves is the bearded forest dude, I love what you did to the S page, what is that like just water colors?

Anyways Its good stuff. what do you do btw?

Cheers Tim

[That fat kid]

hey spirit, nice creature, well thought out...it just seems a bit bland...maybe a few bolder colors or some intense light...I dunno, but keep working, you can make it thrilling!

tfk

[sve]

Hello, bRØk3n_sPiRiT! I read some of your thoughts in the lounge and was pleasantly surprised that I think the same about very many things. So great to find some other person coming to the same conclusions living such a different life. I read how one of the guys called for the harsher ways to give an opinion to anyone art, so I got very curious to see, how he is doing and taking this, if his word and a following action are both solid. So I went to his thread and :)... of course it's just a bravado, he is so happy and draws more when he is hearing words of encouragement. And I thought about this again.

I don't know, I'm just not very fond of the method of crits away until no one standing. I believe after some primal stage of accumulating knowledge and skills, an artist has to have a huge freedom to express himself. I believe that a viewer has to be careful and look attentively at art and try to understand that it might be a conscious decision of the artist to depict the object or an idea the way he does. I really appreciate the variety and difference of ideas and visions from different artists and I somehow think that I need to be careful not to destroy this variety.
I went through you book several times, I like so much how carefully and methodically you approach your art. You are building your skills step by step and all steps are very informative and interesting to observe. I really like how seriously you take art. I feel like you have clear vision what you want to achieve and how. And it works. Your have beautiful clean lines, your anatomy studies are great, I love how your one line figures have a weight and volume and beautiful elegant outline without any additional, not needed noise. That shows me your knowledge and well built skills and serious, smart attitude. Pretty soon you will be drawing very carelessly, loosely and your drawings still will be looking rich and truthful and smooth and beautiful.

My favorites:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/Archivo1.jpg
(I like this composition and colors and the pose, I would prefer a bit more contrast though)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/dragon-twig.jpg
( I like this twisted pose and the whole execution, I think colors are nice too)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/scorpions.jpg (a very nice design)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/d2.jpg
(this drawing is strange and has an emotion, I would love to see it in colors. It has "Danger" on it :).)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cowv.jpg ( a very interesting stylization)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow23values.jpg ( I like this snail, colored version looks kind of strange for me, because you use different media and they are not blending well, I think)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/goblin_wipvalues.jpg You know I just love the creation process, very, very interesting and exciting to observe :), I really like your scientific approach to art.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow24f2.jpg
That's a beautiful image and coloring.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow25f.jpg ( very funny creature, probably can sit at both ends :)

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chrsnlsk.jpg ( That's very beautiful sketch, very smooth, strange that it doesnt exist in nature, looks very believable)

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow26f.jpg (great lighting, coloring and I still find your creatures humorous somehow, because they smile, maybe :)

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/lifecomp6.jpg (I love this drawing, it effects me every time I look at it. These descending steps carry the mood. For me it's a hopping and jumping down the stairs, skipping some of the steps. But a color could add or change alot, I wish you colored it, added some textures, I personally see it done with some dry medium, pastel or pencils. The same goes to sketch of the bed)

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow3f.jpg ( very beautiful, looks stylizied, and it has a wonderful mood, weird one)

All your hands, feet, figure studies are really great! I will watch them again and again.

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/eow5f.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chow05f.jpg9 very good illustration and character is weird and wild

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cow31dwip.jpg ( I like this sketch more, coloring is a bit too saturated for my taste, looks heavy.)

So thank you very much, Merry Christmas to you and all the best.

Sveta

[masterpug]

Wow, this is a handy thread for us all with a list of links like that. I think your anatomy studies are great, a real sense of dimensionality to them. I think that some of the placement for your creatures suffers a bit because you didn't draw it out first. The backgrounds just look a bit empty and a tad forced. To make the critters look like they belong, I would use layer multiplication and merging to really give them the feel of being there. Excellent work, keep it up!

[Uziel]

Great CHOW's and COW's and also the anatomy work is great. Try to use also values in your human figure sketches it will help with your coloring too. I only see values in your drawings from the mind.

[brokk]

You guys are way to kind. Seriously :)

max, cook thanks

Odds, lol thanks mate, I don't think they are nailed very good, they have proportion problems. Need to do some more of them. Hehe, I love collars as well. I'll try to put into practice what you said about the head studies. Thank you tons for those good crits.

max, I see the neck and breasts problem now, I'll do some more of these and keep an eye for that.

styler, lol thanks

Qxzi, thank you, you are totally right, the legs are way too long. Gotta do more of these. You're also right on the crits on the cow. Color is still a major mind puzzle :^^;: Need more excersizes on that. Thanks again for dropping by.

Farvus, thank you very much for the encouraging words.

ZebzFree, oh man, you hit the nail on the head again. Figure proportions are off and I need to do more of that stuff, but your comments on the cow are spot on. I really don't know how to fix that blurryness, heh. Its a struggle :P Maybe after I do more tone and color studying I'll start getting a better grip on these things... I hope.

Diego, very good crit. I hadn't thought about that. I'm going to try and do some excersized with what you are saying, lets see how they turn out. OCing would be awesome : )

ATLAS2900, haha you are too kind, I have a long way to go :) thank you very much for your encouragement.

timpaatkins, thank you, the S page... I don't remember which one is the S page, lol. If its the one with that texture, I just threw some random crap at it, ink, water, tempera, waited for it to dry, scanned it and played around with it in PS. In response to the other question, I'm a student.

That fat kid, thanks man. That creature was (is) such a struggle! I agree, it looks flat. I think its time to schedule painting studies. I had wanted to get to color after tone, but, maybe I can do them both paralely. Lets see what happens.

sve, thank you for taking the time for such a detailed reply. Truth be told, I did not quite understand the first paragraph : S
Hmm about crits... I don't know. I guess I can only speak for myself, and I like recieving crits even if they are harsh, because maybe I can learn something or see something I wasn't seeing. Thats not going to make me stop drawing, because its just what I like doing. Maybe I'll convince myself that I suck, hehe, but in that case I'll just keep drawing sucky things because I like drawing :) (and I'll try to improve).
Thank you for the very kind words. I've been thinking yesterday about all this, weather or not I'm going to be able to support myself with this. I don't mind working other jobs as long as I have some time to draw, study and paint. Its summer over here and I live near the beach. I love going to the beach, but that means a day without drawing/studying. The summer only lasts a few months, so, maybe its not so bad to take a break. But then again, its a bit worrying to neglect studies for me. I dont know, I'm doing half and half right now. A few days beach, a few days drawing (I try to draw on the more cloudy days).
Wow thank you for selecting the images you liked... some of those are so old! Its a little embarassing, heh : P Yes, some of the creatures sometimes smile, hehe. I dont know why I do that, I guess I think its fun, but I didn't think anyone would notice it :)
I'm going to try and do more studies from life with tones, and then color now.
Thank you very much for stopping by and for your kind repy, this message is really late but I hoped you had a great christmas and new years as well.

masterpug, oh, cool idea! I actually did make the background and then put in the creature for the artic carnivore one, its the only one I like the background/creature relation ;) I'll keep your comments in mind, thank you.

Uziel, yeah you are totally right. Haven't seen you in the cow for some time, mate : P When are you gonna come back? I just want to do some more line studies for the figures and then its tones and then color. Thanks again!


Thanks again everyone, your insight and crits are really valuable, and thank you for your kind comments.


Ok here's some new stuff, I'll describe it a little more later.

cow
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow33finn.jpg

another cow
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow34.jpg

chow
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow11fin.jpg

some excersizes for the peer project
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/2project1.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/2project1b.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/Project-2.jpg

this was something new, trying to study rythm. I copied these from the Society of Figurative Arts website
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/6.jpg

And I tried to do my own versions without ref. The proportions look pretty off, but I kinda like the rythm (considering I make everything look pretty static, that is)
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/7.jpg

trying to put into practice another new thing, sillouhettes
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/5.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/2.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/1.jpg

and the small thumbnails. I like some more than others. Some are just horrible... ugh : S
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/thumbs.jpg

starting to make studies with tones. Need to do lots of these
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/stv.jpg

Ok thats it for now. Cheers everyone.

[Uziel]

Haven't seen you in the cow for some time, mate : P When are you gonna come back?

After my exams :(
3th february is my last and then i'll be wasted for some days and than i'll probably get back behind the drawing board for COW ChOW

Those human figure studies were pretty good man.

[Zebz]

I'm proud of you, mate! You're really kickin' some butt over break! Doing more work than I, that's for sure. Keep doing the life studies and really try to take some of the rendering practice you did on those spheres and apply it to the objects you're trying to render in real life. The siloz are really, really fun to look at too. It seems like a great way to get some ideas on the table. I feel my stuff comes out too stiff or just run of the mill these days. Nothing is very original. Your studies seem to give me some ideas on how I might go about changing that. Keep it up!! Lookin' for more! I'll try and get an update to ya'll soon.

[max1975]

The rhythm studies are cool, but remember to check the anatomy before you start with those darker lines. A good rhythm places things remarkably well, but not perfectly. When something looks wrong (like the abdomen on the figure on the right) refine the rhythm in that area until you get closer to the proper form.

Love the silhouettes and thumbnails. No, the thumbnails aren't perfect, but they don't have to be...after you get all those ideas out there you can pick the ones you like and set about crafting an image.

I should do some silhouettes and thumbnails. In my robot stuff, I've been getting too wrapped up in an individual idea and spending too much time working through it before realizing it wasn't the best idea...

Firework spewer is very cool, rendering is an improvement over your previous COWs, especially like the blue making the tail less distinct. The ChoW isn't doing it for me, though. The form is too cartoony for the rendering.

[timpaatkins]

I agree with Max, above here, about the thumbs and silhouettes.
GOod to see some shading practise with the pencil. Might I suggest that you use a soft 4 B lead to lay down the base dark areas with small CIRCULAR motions. That way you wont get that "striped" pattern that is almost inevitable with straight lines. Then when you have layed an even foundation, you can start with the linerendering, but lightly, and Ill promise those hard dark edges in the shadows will disappear. Takes a long time though...
Cheers Tim

[brokk]

Uziel, thanks : ) Have a beer for me after the test : P

Zebz, thanks! I'll try to keep things up. Cool, yeah I think making silouhettes is a good way to experiment with shapes and designs. I remember a crit by SirGreenSocks telling me to experiment with different body types, and a crit by you telling me to exaggerate some forms more. Better late than ever, heh. I think if you can make something work just in the silouhette alone, you can determine if its worth working further on it. You don't loose too much time struggling with the major shapes/design in the larger sketch this way, I think.

max, that is a very good crit about the rythms, refine them until they resemble the form... I had not thought about that. I was trying to get them down at once, so I hadn't really thought about that. I'll try it, thanks. Glad you liked the sillouhs/thumbns, I'm going to choose one of them and work it larger and see what happens. I can relate to what your are saying about spending too much time on an idea. Like I was saying to Zebz, I think you can economize a lot of time by breaking down the procedure into several steps, the first being making a sillhouette only. If things work in the sillhoute, you can them make a thumnail. That way you don't have to struggle with multiple stuff in the larger sketch. Yeah, I don't like the chow either. I tried making something kinda cartoony but its the way its painted that I don't like. The cow I'm still switching back and forth with making something pencil + photoshop or photoshop alone with tablet. The later gives the worst results, but I guess its necessary practice.

timpaatkins, awesome advice for shading, I'm gonna try that. Actually I've tried it a bit today, but I have a 6b instead of a 4. One of the things I've been thinking alot lately is how to economize the time it takes for me to add values to something in pencil. In photoshop you can do it fairly quickly, as you can change brush sizes and all that stuff. But in pencil its like you must make line after line, mark after mark, even if you place the pencil sideways. Building up the values takes some time... maybe I just need more practice at it, and more studying.

Got bored with this, so I left it unfinished
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/st.jpg

From ref. The rough sketch
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/girl.jpg

Cleaning the sketch up a bit. I'm trying to make sketches like the ones I've seen by Douglas Flynt. Not that I'm gonna get any where near his level, but I'm trying to make things like I see him do, leaving a lot of white areas and marking where the cast shadows are going to be, or something like that.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/girlsketch.jpg

Values. Hmm... I think it looks scribbly. And maybe needs more contrast. The black areas of her hair, I don't know if it looks like that because of my scanner, which I blame partially. The original doesn't look that much better actually. I tried timpa's advice on shading with circular motions. The stripped pattern didn't show, but it has a lot of white spots still. Should practice more.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/girlvalues.jpg

Ok, thats all for now. For the next update I'll try to paint this. Thank you guys so much again! Cheers.

[max1975]

Really liking that profile, great job on the ear especially, but it's all working very well. Hair should be brighter in the highlights I think. It also had great contours in the middle stage but some of that was lost in the rendering. I think the circular motions are a good idea in general but not necessarily for hair, which should be on the streaky side.

[brokk]

max, I had forgotten to answer more on a previous post, collars are great. Maybe we have the same problem, heh. I agree with the crits on the figures and the canyonmaker cow. Fractal is the cutest SG girl, but other pictures I've seen of her I dont like as much as I like that one.
Now, on the newer post, the hair could have stronger highlights. About the contours of the middle stage... I sort of lost them half-deliberatly, I thought it would be better for trying to do something realistic... but maybe I could still keep them, in a subtle way. I'll have to experiment and see. Yeah I guess linear shading for hair could be more appropiate than circular, which is maybe for more flat or round surfaces.

And here's my painting attempt. Pleaseee crit the hell out of this if anyone feels like taking the time, it would be great. I painted on the value version before, one layer set to color, one layer set to normal, and some additional layers on normal for some minor stuff. I'm planning on doing studies without a previous sketch though. I'm not really pleased with it but then again I have to do tons of these.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/girlpaintgris.jpg

Cheers

[max1975]

Mmm, collars.

Really like the painting. Still want brighter highlights on the hair, and if you could get rid of the lines around the lips and blend the colors there instead, that would be a big improvement. Still loving the ear, and the eye. Pic as a whole could use some more contrast I think, but that's subjective. There's some graininess, especially in the hair, that I've noticed in some of your other pics, and I have no idea what's causing it, but I find it kind of distracting.

[guggemmaneuver]

brok3n - wow!
no crits.... only praise: http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/legs07.jpg all of these volumetric anatomy studies are really, really nice. loving all yr cow's too! keep it up; i'll be back!
-joel

[Diego]

Very good studies martin, really like the girl head, but i think you should push more the values, more constrast will make the image reads better.
I like the thumbs you did, really cool. The only thing is that they all look really flat, stiff poses, i know they're thumbs. but you're generatin' an idea, so it should be clear..
Love the life studies as well, you're doing really good.
Cheers

[brokk]

max, thank you for the crits and feedback, I'll try to get back to that head and see if I can correct those things. Yeah I noticed that grainyness too... its probably the pencil from the sketch. I'll work on minimizing that.

guggenmaneuver, hehe, thanks. I'm sure if you wanted to crit you'd find plenty :) Thank you for the very kind words.

Diego, hey man! Cool, I'll try to work on both the things you and max are mentioning. I agree with the thumbs, I want to do more of those too, and take some and make larger images. Thanks for your feedback and kind words.

I posted this over at the finished section... I hope it was allright. I wanted to experiment with different materials and find a quick way to value. Not much design or narrative, just a cthulhu head. The sketch, I used pencils, markers, alcohol and a pen
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/chthd.jpg

And then I added some acrylics to the sketch on the same page, an A4 copy paper. Tried not to tear it when painting it : P
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cthhdcl.jpg

And then painted it a little more with photoshop and called it done. Crits, advice, tips are very welcome and would be really great.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cthhdfs.jpg

Well till next update, going camping tomorrow and will be back in a few days.

Cheers.

[jtheanswer]

I like your painting man, the one of the girl. Maybe you should work a bit more the lights and shadows. Only a suggestion.

Asi se hace!

[Jokisalo]

Oooh magic man, so much hard work.
I've done those same heads of loomis on my earlier sketchbook :)
more please, and more often!

[max1975]

Nice job on Cthulhu. The middle stage is my favorite; I think the faded look of the distant eye on the final doesn't work so well this time.

[Zebz]

Whoa... I ain't dead. And it appears you ain't either! That portrait is really nice, man! I'd love to see you push your tones more and really render the crap outta that form tho! You know how I like to render the form. ;) I'm a nut. It probably had something to do with the photo tho. But if you light someone's face and take a shot of it you'll see the core shadows and stuff much better. You'll begin to understand the form and how it looks like a sphere. Your drawing looks ubber nice tho. Lovely, bro. You've got some other studies goin' on that look nice too. Keep developing! The latest concept is a bit lacking and I think you could push him even further. More colors would be nice.

I'll get an update this weekend. School starting and this being my final semester I'm getting my work in. lol This has been a fast paced year thus far. I'm hoping to start taking my work into the professional realm soon so I need to kick it up about 500 notches! lol Hope you're doin' well. Take it easy.

[Qxzi]

Hey,

love the updates. Starting with post #162, lovin the digi sketchs. Do more. Also like the life drawing. Post #162, good! Great skin tone, maybe you could of added a few more dark areas, but dont worry, if its only a sketch. Post #173, i like the concept. But i totally agree with max, the faded bit ruins it a bit.

Well keep on posting and drawing dude!

Qxzi

[brokk]

jtheanswer, gracias, and you are right! I need to do more of these excersizes.

Jokisalo, hehe, those are some great books, huh? :P

max1975, yeah, I kinda like the acrylics stage better too... just playing around and trying to get the best of both worlds, traditional and digital. I have an update on this.

ZebzFree, you are totally right, gotta push those values, I'll be doing more of these studies and see if I can really nail down these forms... I remember the studies in your sketchbook about rendering the values on heads... I'll see if I can do it like I've seen you do, with the core shadow and tones. Here is the photo I used for ref, from female-anatomy-for-artist.com. I should have posted this before http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/girlref.jpg
The tones look a bit flat on the photo... but I can't really hide behind that, because the truth is I haven't really grasped the concept of the rendering of the different planes. Gotta practice and study a bit more for that, hopefully : P
On the last cthulhu concept, I have an update!
Hey, great to hear you're gonna start to take it to the pro realm, I really want to go in the same direction. I wont be able to go to the Montreal workshop, but I'll keep on werking. Would love to see the pictures though! Thanks for the comments and support.

Qxzi, you are right on the crits, I have a few updates, and I gotta do more of those paint studies. Cheers!



Here's an update on cthulhu, I got some really great feedback in the finally finished section. I kinda like the version before.... its more moody... but maybe its better to have more color/contrast.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cthhdfsfinn.jpg

Here's a cow sketch in pencils, alcohol, ink and markers... still messing around experimenting stuff.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/cowwvalues.jpg

Now adding acrilycs. Same as cthulhu, it was an A4 copy paper page. Really not the best paper for this, but if you're careful, it holds up pretty good.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow35acsk.jpg

and the final
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow35finn.jpg

Some life sketches. Gotta do more of these.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/skt02.jpg

Some sort of charachter sketch I didn't finish (or come close to anything, really)
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/skt01.jpg

Just a really minor doodle... but I really like it for some reason : P
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/skteyes.jpg

Some movement / rythm studies, dance poses. Ref used. Again, something I wanna study more.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dance.jpg

Some thumbnail movement studies, they are a bit off I think. I used ref.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/movementthumbs01.jpg

And, the last cow
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow36finn.jpg
Sentient Fungal Behemoth
Found mostly in uncharted or unexplored areas, these travelling fungi feed on large carcasses of animals. The are frequently found in dragon cementaries, where plenty of food is available. When moving, they emmit a bright light from their sensorial eye-like organ, illuminating a short distance. Since gargatuan mushrooms are not uncommon in the regions that the Sentient Fungal Behemoths can be found, they can stay very still and mimick these large mushrooms. They do this to escape potentially dangerous situacions, though their tentacles can be used as melee weapons if hidding fails.
The light emmiting organ, if cut out, can be sold for quite a high price. Its tough as amber but fairly easy to cut out. Even if removed from the body, the amber-like organ still shines with bright light if moved around. Scholars argue that this is due to a chemical reaction, but for some the light is actually magic.

The last cow I did entirely digital, I think I'm gaining a bit more confidence with digital, and starting to grasp a few notions (or at least I hope thats the case!)

Guys, thank you for your kind encouragement, its a real motivation boost for sure. Your insight is really appreciated : )

Till next update!
Cheers

[HEROIC]

Heyyaa, lonG time no see :)
Hows it goin with drawing, from ur stuff , i can tell its goin pretty good, those last finished stuff were sweet.
I saw some still life in ur stuff, like the plate and two breads, DO MORE OF THAT. do more STILL LIFE. when u do more still llife, u can get more stuff, more shapes in ur head, then u draw them, then u change them, then u can creat stuff u want. When u do more life drawing, u add more poses to ur library. more figures. it all helps u to get ur lines, shadings, imaginations stronger and stronger.
newayz, ur stuff are great.
Keep pluggin ^^

AMir :er:
EDIT: THe last COW IS REALL COWY AND the desc u give everytime amaze me, :) kick ass
its been long u havent checked my sb :er:

[max1975]

Like the contrast in the new Cthulhu, i think it's an improvement (though the acrylic stage is still my favorite).

Final COW is really nice, I especially like what you did with the eyeballs.

Dance poses are cool, and SO much fun to draw.

[Qxzi]

Hey,

Like the update. Good acrylic painting, good end product. I like the detail with
the eyes. The life studies and movement sketchs would really help you! Do
more! The COW is great. The light shining is a good effect.

Keep on drawing and posting dude!

Qxzi

[Zebz]

The last two COW's are some of your best work yet, man!! Lovely stuff! you're nailin' some of those renders really well. I can't wait to see how things evolve and develop in the other side of your work. The creature stuff is pretty durn strong. Your figures are lacking but I know you're gonna get on top of that faster than me on a Chimichanga... mmmmm.... Chimiz.... lol

[brokk]

HEROIC, thanks mate, I'm checking your sketchbook now :) I'll be doing more life drawings and hopefully life paintings soon.

max, I'm really pleased you like the newer stuff. Still experimenting with the acrylic/digital combination, I guess my goal is to be versatile and proficient in both independantly but also combine them in interesting and effective ways. Gotta lot of practice to do. Dance poses are pretty fun : P

Qxzi, thanks for the kind words! I'll try to keep up, and do more movement studies : )

Zebz, hehe I think my creature stuff lacks a lot, maybe the problem is that the figures lack even more :P But yeah too many creature and little to no charachters, enviornments, props, machinery... gotta get on that quick. Really glad you approve the new stuff, I've been looking at the tutorial you posted in your sketchbook, thanks for that mate! Gotta take a better look at it and do some value excersizes. Man, I've never had a chimichanga, now I'd like to try one :)



Small update. Some sketches for a local magazine project we're trying to get together with a few friends. They're philosophy students for the most part, but the content is going to be about independant/alternative activities like music, theatre, street performace, visual arts, writting, and, philosophy.

Freud
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/freudsk.jpg

Nietzsche
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/nietzschesk.jpg

Kant
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/kantsk.jpg

Some dsg stuff
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dsg1012.jpg

I like the idea for this one. Mayble I'll paint it and work it more.
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dsg1013.jpg

http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dsg-1014.jpg

quick color
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dsg-1014paint.jpg

And this week's chow charachter.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/chow16.jpg

I'll have some more stuff soon hopefully, I'm working on a few projects as well as some really minor freelance stuff (but nothing in the realm of concept or illustration ;), just some design stuff to make a few bucks), so I'll update as soon as I can.


Cheers guys, be well.

[max1975]

Hey, nice job on Freud and Neitszche. Kant looks a little off, but I dunno, those wigs do tend to make people look goofy.

Really like the horned skullmonster dude.

The colors on the Chow and the 4-headed duckosaur are good, but I really think they need some stronger shadows.

[Qxzi]

hey,

funny update man :D like the little characters. I really like the Nietzsche character:D With the CHOW, i think its a good character. But i think the shoes should be touched up a bit. :)

Keep it up man!

Qxzi

[brokk]

max, thanks! I dont know if I'll have time to fix that on the chow before the deadline, but I'll try to experiment with it afterwards.

Qxzi, thanks, hehe, yeah I kinda hid them so I wouldn't have to deal with them much :P Will see what I can do.

Thanks again guys.

Lousy cow update, rushed as hell.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cow37.jpg

[max1975]

Better colors on the COW, and I like the presentation. My gripe with it would be that the front legs look too human...like it's shoulder-bicep-forearm-foot, when it should be thigh-shin-foot-toe. It's appropriately big and scary, though.

[HEROIC]

HALLOO . woo man, u are all makin great COWs. THey are awsum. Just a lil thing to make them more intresting. When u are finishin off, its nice to go over ur painting, in a separate layer , the Outline lines. and then u can add abit more lines to the muscle of the last guy for example, so it wouldnt look so much like a gelly nice cow, :^^: that makes me wanna Eat iT O___o
Great Updates. DIggin ur concept , like this one (http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/dsg-1014.jpg), like the coloured too. counts as one of ur best works. :) great stuff man.
Keep PluGIng :D

AMi :er: watchin ya

[Qxzi]

Hey,

good COW picture, aaaaahh, its too scary to look at :D Good detail at the
front of the dog, but whats happened to the back legs? :O I think it
needs much more detail, if you have time, touch it up a little :)

ill be back :D

Qxzi

[Zebz]

Yea, animal anatomy is tough stuff unless you know it. And I DON'T! lol It will become evident really quick. I really like the presentation of this one as well. And think it shows some improvment! The skull demon dude and the dino thing are great lines as well. Very clean and could really make some kickin' paintings, man. Great stuff! Hit us up with s'more updates! ;)

[jtheanswer]

Q paso, figure drawings are sweet. The chows are original and simplistic, nothing too much complicated or exaggerated. Regarding to your last cow, are you going to put some more work into it? Is a good idea, and really like the combination of colours you chose for the creature.

Buen trabajo, ya seguire echando un vistazo por aqui. :yayca:

[tensai]

that philosophers series is really nice man. they have good character and i like how you kept them unfinished..

[masterpug]

Those small sketches of people like Nische and Freud look like the small chibi versions of the Final Fantasy characters. I just got this image in my head of Freud and the others dancing and the winning music playing after they had killed some book monster. Da da da daaaa dum dum dat da daaaaa! Makes me smile. :)

[GriNGo]

They actually reminded my of Pocket Fighter. Kick ass game...
anyways... buen trabajo, buen progreso. Saludos!

GRiNGo

[brokk]

Argh, I've been busy with several things, nevertheless here's an update. This is only a fraction of what I've been doing, but I haven't made much finished stuff. Also photobucket is reaching its limit so I may erase a lot of the older images : S
Or start a new sketchbook.

max: you're right, it has a lot of anatomy issues now that I look at it again. On a side note, I'm having some trouble accesing the new sketchbook group page, but I'll get to it soon.

HEROIC: Thanks for the crits and comments! : )

Qxzi: Thanks, yeah, I slacked on it : S

Zebz: I don't know animal anatomy either! :teeth which is evident and I should really get to it. By the way, like I was saying to max, I'm having some trouble accesing the new group page but I'll get to it soon.

j: gracias, I'll try to work more on future images.

tensai: thanks man, I'm glad you like them. Cheers.

masterpug: hehe. I had thought of a fighting game for them called "Philosofight!" but I don't know if it would have much market potential :P

Gringo: ahh, I haven't played that one, heh. Gracias, intentare progresar.

weird head stuff
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/ahds2.jpg

for job
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/groundfairysketch2s.jpg

the colors. I had to change them though
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/groundfairycolor3.jpg

more sketches for the same job, but they didn't like any of them
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/sketchesfrs.jpg

sketches for ideas for another job, I didn't use these though
http://usera.imagecave.com/bk7600/daemolinsketh.jpg

old dragon wip I revisited but didnt finish it
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cloudswip.jpg

idw
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c399/bksketchb/cch2_idw_f.jpg

some pixel houses
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/houses.gif

a cow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cch_cow_f.jpg

a chow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cch_chow_f.jpg

another cow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cch2_cow_f.jpg

another cow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cownwest6.jpg

another cow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow40.jpg

another cow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow41f.jpg

This was all experimentation an it still is. I need to learn more : S
And the last cow
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/bk7600/cow43.jpg

Ok, time to work.

[rodrigo!]

the IDW looks really good man! good stuff! its also great to see the commitment to the weekly activities :D keep it up

[staylor]

Good to see the updates! I was getting worried for a moment.

I've heard that imageshack is a good host, you may want to check them out. I do all my hosting via my school, would yours have any hosting?

Cool new stuff, especially the fairy on the tiger!

[Inkfish]

Really good update man. I can literally see the progress you made scrolling down the post :) The last two COWs are my favourites. I'm really looking forward of the new update

[Kian]

You're really getting there dude. Practice painting and lighting spheres, cubes, and cylinders. This will help you understand your forms better, making your creatures read far better.

[Qxzi]

Hey,

good chows dude! Your doing alot ! keep that up. My favourite has to be the one with the eyes :)

Qxzi

[Dile_]

awsome stuff man, I love the activitys for the week stuff! :jawdrop:

[Zebz]

Wow! What more to say?! Those concepts are lookin' great! You're really levelin' up man! I'd say work on those figure/anatomy studies tho. Keep at that realistic stuff and it'll feed your more imaginative work, even if it isn't as fun at first. You'll enjoy it more as you get better. Man, lovin' the updates. Please post s'more!! Those creatures are GREAT!

[dhilipsomesh]

Good job mate


MY SKETCH BOOK (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=72098)

[Gobo]

Looks Amazing. Keep it up!

[Zebz]

Man those paints still look tight... are you still around, dead??? Hope you're doin' well, mate. Cheers.