Hi @Mary Santos. I don’t think you should worry about one type of technique being inherently superior to another. Working with line only is neither more nor less professional than using other techniques, even in the gaming industry. What matters is the quality of your work (cheesy, but true). Also, remember that it is easy to forget that professional illustrators work differently than those starting out. Just because we don’t see lines in the end result doesn’t mean these artists 1) don’t use lines in their process or 2) that they don’t apply the understanding of form and perspective that comes with knowing how to make good lines. Whether your line art is meant to be the entire illustration, a part of it, or not show at all is mostly a matter of style. You’ll find plenty of professional artists that do any or all of these. There are some wonderful digital illustrations used for game art, but that doesn’t leave out line art entirely – just take a look at Hollow Knight, the Tell Tale games, Borderlands, etc. I’m not sure if this is part of your question, but here it goes: Your drawing is of a similar style to what a friend of mine used to do. In her case, whenever she made her drawings neater by erasing the sketch underneath, it became flatter and much less interesting, so she left the sketch in but was never happy because her drawings were never as neat as she wanted. It turned out that her final lines –the ones that were not meant as sketches– did not show what they were meant to show: shape, light, a change of material, movement, etc. The sketch lines carried most of the weight, so erasing them erased the drawing’s most important information. Shape, light, etc. are things shown in the illustration examples you shared, but they are solved in a painterly-language, not in a line-language. Line art can show these things as well, but you have to solve them differently with line than you would with brushes and color. If you are interested in improving your line art, I recommend taking a look at what fine artists or comic artists do. Their lines aren’t always meant to do the same things, but the crucial idea is that they know what they are doing with their lines and why. It’s great to have digital paintings as your end goal, but don’t underestimate line work!

Okay, just because your favorite artist does it a certain way, doesn’t mean that’s why their art is good. There are plenty of amazing artist in the game industry that use line art. Do yourself a favor and look at an artist named John Grello, very few people can draw or paint like that guy. if you do you really great, then your stuff will look professional, line or not.

Hi @Mariana Santos well ... maybe ask just one question at a time? Concerning your silhouettes: I like time and do not see a problem. Just go on...

I really like that you are doing silhouette iterations of the character, but I think you are being a bit too held back with the iterations. Meaning you are not really exploring a lot of designs. I would highly recommend a video by Scott Flanders Titled 'This Exercise Will Change How You Sketch' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cacOlKgZNQ Take a blank sheet of paper of in this case Digital Canvas and go crazy with the designs. NEVER EVER rush through the concepting stage. It is the most important step in the process of character design. I have made this mistake in the past and I really regret it. Trust me you don't want to end up in a situation where you finalize a bad design and realize it after you are done with the project. Also, your left arm doesn't look like a mechanical arm. Consider using some bold shapes for the metal and gear parts. I am noticing that you are not using any references or if you are using then you are not utilizing them properly. I have attached some references for the Mech arm but if you don't like them then it's totally fine but consider finding them on your own. Anyway, I would love to see more of this character, I think his description is pretty cool, lol. Keep up the Great work and have a wonderful day.

Hey Mariana, These are cool, especially your silhouette sketches, they have a lot of personality. My only comment would be the left arm and hand. The arm is tucked behind the body, and the hand just peeks out at the hip. It would make for a more clear silhouette if you move that arm out so that everyone knows what it is. Hope that helps :)

Hey @Mariana Santos! Nice work- and happy to see you want to move forward with concept art :) Developing your own technique is a lot of exploring what look you want and how to go about it. That's a lot of personal application so I focused more on practical things you can improve in your given designs. (As you continue to hone your craft your own style will develop anyway as long as you produce art that you enjoy making). I did a paintover with some notes. For character artists I believe the most important skill to hone is silhouette and shape design (but then again I feel that for any concept artist). And of course, relating all this to a story! *I notice your work uses more linework whereas my style is closer to painterly- but the feedback is applicable either way. I definitely recommend looking into Overwatch or League concept art for a nice mix of 2D graphic style and 3D render!

What I recommend is to create a nice library where you can look for inspiration and elements you can use in your concepts. If you want to make a profession out of it, you will be required to create characters and creatures of many different types, with particular cultural backgrounds, that tell something about themselves at a glance. If you have the chance, visit costume or ethnographic museums, but also learn to observe how people dress in the street, what you can guess about a person by looking at how he/she dresses. For things like this, Pinterest is very useful, where you can follow a lot of galleries dedicated to this theme (but also others about natural elements that you could put in a costume or a character, I don't know, a dress that reminds of a particular animal, or maybe an underground civilisation that learned to make fabrics from mushroom cultures - there is a kind of artificial skin made from mushrooms! The ideas are endless!) You can also go to Art station and follow some professional cartoonists to see how they organise the presentation of their characters or how they develop their ideas. In short, let yourself be inspired by everything that already exists, both in nature and in existing costumes, jewellery, various cultures, etc.). Recently, for example, a client gave me a collection of files on ethnic jewellery that she had bought in the 1990s. She was very nice, she found it when she was tidying up her bookcase and thought I might need it, so she sent it to me. When I was a kid, I used to empty out the attics and cellars of people who wanted to get rid of old stuff, to collect picture books and encyclopaedias. Fortunately, now with the Internet, everything is much easier and more convenient. Also watch films and TV series with interesting costumes and make notes on what catches your eye and what you think would be a good solution to adopt. I for example loved the costumes of the TV series The Musketeers: the TV series was not too much up my alley but the costumes (not historically accurate, very fantasy) were beautiful with some very interesting and original details. Also get some video game art books with interesting designs (a very nice one is Orizon Zero Dawn, in my opinion).

I think these are great. If you are looking to change your look though, maybe you need to study specific examples that you are looking to emulate.

I agree with everything you said, that's why I hate social media, because people there always devalue the artist! (In the last paragraph I felt a hint of indirection by my latest sketches -u-)~

Hi Mariana, I assume you are trying to draw the Japanese anime style. I would suggest you try to learn the shape language of your art parent. The loomis head not always fit for thoes styles. Artist has different proportions etc. You can also start learning some pespective and anatomy.

Hey Mariana, I'm glad you found the great Loomis head, it really is a very helpful tool especially when working from imagination. Your front view drawing is actually pretty good. I did a quick drawing to show you how it works, I hope it helps :)

Hi @Mariana Santos ! Loomis method is a great tool to learn. It just takes time practicing it and then it will be automatic for you soon. Are you having questions on where to place the features after sketching in the thirds of the face? If there is no tilt then bottom of nose is on same horizontal line as the bottom of the ears and brow is at the same line horizontal line as the top of the ears for example. If head tilts up then the ears will move down in relationship to brow line. Is that what you are asking about?

Hi Marianna, good practice studies, keep it up! Great to hear that you love doing this, since it proves to be the very foundation of drawing... well, everything. One advice, following the suggestion from Steve Lenze. Perspective grid exists independently of the frame you draw in, sort of speak. General rule of thumb is: don't put 2 vanishing points on 1 piece of paper. There can be 1, or 0, but never two. This is due to how human eye works. If you put 2 of them, there will appear places which are impossible for us to see (assuming the perspective grid being the representation of a 90-degree XY grid). You can easily see that in real life if you take your checkered notebook and move it around, look at it from various angles. The maximum angle you will see will be the 90 degree from the top view. In practice it looks like this: - choose position of vanishing points in your imagination (since at least 1 of them will land on your table next to your sketchbook) and draw the grid originating from their position (ghostline their way to your paper) This way not only you avoid the "impossible areas", but also you don't have to shrink your drawing :) Image: I hope it speaks for itself, but go ahead if you have questions. I drew the red frame first, to show you the position of vanishing points. But later I added 2 blue frames, to show you that perspective depends only on your choice. The grid exists, and we choose our frame depending on what we want to show (human perspective, bird eye view etc.)