Illustration
3yr
Lyena
Hello guys! This is my personal piece. I wanted to make a painting with storytelling in a dark setting and make the character look like she is a rebel. What do you think about it?
Steve Lenze
10mo
Hey Joseph,
I agree with everything @Jesper Axelsson has already suggested to you. Organizing your values is very important, especially if you are going to integrate a background.
Since he covered values, I wanted to show you some things about drawing and composition. I'm going to throw a lot of stuff at you, so try not to be too overwhelmed, if you have questions, just ask.
As far as the figure goes, it is very off balance, it feels like he is going to fall over backwards. This is because his feet are in front of his line of balance.
The gesture of the pose is stiff also, try not to draw limbs at a perfect right angle and try not to draw an extended arm so straight.
Also, the left arm is very flat and needs some perspective.
Okay, composition, it's always wise to draw a perspective grid first so you can make sure everything makes sense in the picture frame. The other thing that helps is if you have foreground, middle ground and background elements in your composition, this gives it depth.
So I did a quick sketch to show you some of the things that I hope will help :)
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10mo
Hi @Joseph Hernandez, cool illustration! I'd love to hear more about it; what's it for? Is it a piece for a story project? Or maybe it's just a stand alone illustration, showing a boy catching fish by hand? Is there anything specific you struggled with? What are you most happy with? What's the inspiration? Did you have any specific artist in mind? (That you were trying to draw like Frank Frazetta, for example).
I'll do my best to help you further :)
- Have you tried doing a value study before?
Values are a great tool when making images, and being good at value organization and having good value control will allow you to do a lot of cool stuff. If this sounds interesting, check out this video How to Organize Values (you can get it for free in the Proko Course Sampler).
For me it helped to start by first practicing doing 2-value studies. Once I felt like I had a grip on that, I moved into 3-value studies, then after that 4 & 5.
- Speaking of values, I think you would appreciate checking out this episode of Draftsmen How to Learn Composition - Draftsmen S2E15. At timestamp 27:22 Marshall Vandruff recommends an exercise, in which you simplify works of art into 2 values. Through it you'll learn a lot about composing with values and as a bonus you'll get to enjoy the work of great artists.
Btw, I think it's worthwhile to watch the entire episode. There are some great advice in it.
- The values in your illustration, feel a bit scattered and unorganized. One thing I think you'll discover as you do the composition exercise Marshall recommends in the video above, is that the value groups in master artworks often are simple and have a clear purpose. Try to use large value groups to make the image read clearly, to lead the viewer through the work and to emphasize where you want the viewer to be looking. I did a paintover of your work where I attempted a 2-value composition like that.
Next time, before you move on to making the final piece, do a bunch of thumbnails (=small sketches) where you figure out the value composition. Doing thumbnails will help you to focus on the overall composition and allow you to try a variety of options
I hope this helps :)
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3yr
Hey @Lyena! Nice work!
I took the opportunity to do a paint over because I like the mood you established- but I wanted to see if I could enhance the lighting. I also thought it'd be cool to stylize the image with more brushwork showing throughout the image.
I have notes on the image attached but the main thing was bringing in more of the subtle forms of the face and allowing the highlights to pop. I also added more colors but I wanted to also keep that desaturated feel you had. But as long as you have a solid value structure in your image, any colors you choose will most likely work.
Hope some of this is helpful- and thanks for sharing!
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3yr
Thank you so much! I really like your version. I will definitely use your tips. Thanks for helping me!
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