WIP - study, zulu warrior

[frog]

Hiya,

I've posted this in a couple of places, bizarrely have had no replies, which tells me it's either bad or dull :( So I thought I would try here...

This is a sketch towards my next painting. It is a purely technical study drawn from reference, I'm looking to try and do some digital figure drawing and painting and refine my skills generally.

This is hand drawn straight into Photoshop with a Wacom 6x8, I created a rough outline first and then rendered it on a layer on top in a "pencil" style. I wanted to see how well I could emulate traditional pencils in photoshop, I think it looks quite convincing although a close up would give it away.

I see a problem with his left shoulder, and I've also made the whole of the shoulders wider than they should be, but if there are any other problems feel free to point them out :)

Any comments or crits would be great before I launch into the painting itself :)

http://www.btinternet.com/~frog01/zulu-sketch.jpg


PS: original ref can be found here (http://www.racism.org.za/gallery/closing/Zulu%20dancer_JPG_view.htm) .

And for the curious, my intial rough is here (http://www.btinternet.com/~frog01/zulu-rough.jpg) and a detail view of his face is here (http://www.btinternet.com/~frog01/zulu-detail.jpg) .

[Fozzybar]

Hmmmm...his foot looks a little bit odd, but you managed to make it look like a real pencil drawing!

The reason, why you've got no replies is maybe the image isn't exciting that much :)

A man sitting in the place of nowhere...hmmm...give him a chainsaw in his head...errr....hand :D

[frog]

Which foot looks odd? Left or right? There are no feet on the ref so I had to draw them from my imagination, looks like it shows!!!

As for chainsaws, no chance :) It's just meant as a life study, and to be honest I find chainsaws, guns, spaceships, big breasted chicks etc unbelievably boring, tiresome and predictable. No offence meant there, and to be fair it seems that what I find to be interesting subject matter doesn't do it for others either ;)

Once I paint him he will be in an environment though, different to the ref, but at the moment I just want to get the figure right.

[Fozzybar]

At the first look the right one looked odd, but then i saw that the other foot is wrong too.

I hope my english is good enough to describe, what i think...

The left foot (zulu's right foot) is drawn too much from the top view...the other's got some problems with the proportions.

There is another something odd in the proportions overall...i don't know if it's the size of the head or what...sorry i couldn't help you that much...

...but think of it: Only 1 chainsaw - and you will be swamped with replies :p

just kidding...

[Oblio]

I realy like the hands.
Yep.. the head sizie is smaller - both feet are wrong. :(
The hat looks flat too :eek:
No chainsaw needed (just big breasts :p)
I hope it helps - you have very nice pencil render - if you made it from reference why you did more then in the photo?
You could compare it easyer - helps more in your study!

Oblio

[frog]

Thanks very much for the input, I'm going to rework the head, hands and feet tonight. I'll post an update.

[frog]

I've made a few changes as suggested: made the head & hands a little larger and reworked both the feet.

This is much easier in photoshop than on paper :D

Any further comments welcome :)

http://www.big-animal.demon.co.uk/images/zulu-sketch2.jpg