Drawings from the starving artist!!! [NEW UPDATE!!!]

[Klingeth]

i just realised i hadn't responded to your comment aku. but yay for being the same age <3

and hehe :3 i'm very piratey-looking, but thats all good. but i had a question to ask. more of a pointer.

D: how do i get my posing to look less-stiff?

[Lunasumerin]

very great 3nodding

[aku_tenshi-san]

Kimmi & Luna: thanks i'm glad you like it! ^_^ i'm actually pretty happy with how it turned out too...

Kling: lol...that's fine... ^_^ and dido! >_<

well, as far as making your figures less stiff i recomend just sitting around and observing people for a little while. or even just paying attention to the little things that you do...observation is always a key part to being able to draw something well...also, it's always a good idea to use refferences. whether it's photos, just people around or just you moving into the position that you're drawing, that's up to you, but refferences are the best source to observe how the body moves/rests. normally what i do is set the 10 second timer on my camera then take a reference photo of myself to get the general idea of a pose...(for instance, i took a reference photo of myself for the last pic i posted (though i am not in that good a shape, so i definately took some *ahem* "artistic lenience"...) and another photo of my hand to pose for Vaeru's hand...) it normally turns out better when i can ask a freind to pose for me just because i can get the exact angle and such that i want...lol...

also, as helpful as a reference picture is, it's sometimes not available, so i will also make do by playing with the angles, perspectives and zooms that i'm drawing a figure with/from while utilizing things i have already learned from previous experiences. for instance, keeping in mind that when people are sitting, they don't tend to stay up straight (they tend to sag/hunch over a little) while conversely, when standing they tend to be up straighter, but their hip will sometimes be cocked because normally, one holds most of their weight on one foot, then shifts it to the other, this causes the body to bend in a different manner as well so that it can maintain balance. and if you take these ideas and combine them with a perspective so that you can kind of hide your weaknesses, it helps it seem like you know what you're doing...lol...you could also try drawing non-static poses and that may help you figure out how to make the body move/seem like it's moving in a natural way.

i know i'm not one to talk (especially since i still have a lot to learn/improve upon), but i think that observation and copying is kinda key to gaining an understanding of any one form. once you have a general idea of the rules that apply, you can get away from the copying and create pieces that still look/feel natural, but aren't taken from any reality. even within my portfolio, you can definately tell which images i have or haven't used a ref. for... (honestly, i started out by copying my brother/grandfather while growing up, then once anime started getting popular, i would re-draw images from DBZ, Saikano, Miyazaki, and others which really helped me learn some things about posing/the basics (i can still do a fairly decent hand in a particular pose that i learned from the pic of Goku from Saikano that i did...lol...) i also found the tutorials from polykarbon.com to be really useful too...)

anyway, sorry for making this post much longer than necessary, but i hope that helped at least a little... ^_^'

[Klingeth]

@ Aku: Mhmm @_@ I just kept forgetting about it and then I realised I still hadn't made a response when I saw Kimmi post recently.

But that was some helpful key points. I asked Luna the same question and she said to use photo references as well. I like to use fashion magazines at times for poses, so I may have to sit down and thoroughly go through one.

Sometimes I only look at it and then just draw. But I think getting a friend to pose or me pose myself will help me out. Dx JUST NEED TO DO SO SOON!

[aku_tenshi-san]

Kling: i see, i see...

i'm glad i could help! and though fashion magazines are useful references, you have to remember that they tend to be "dramatic," exadurated, and posed. so sometimes, the possitions models have will end up looking stiff because it's supposed to/they aren't being natural...also, they have the magic of photoshop on thier side so sometimes things aren't the way they are supposed to be...(for instance faces...(you should take a look at the dove comercial from about 3 years ago that showed the process for going from a make-up-less person on the street to what you see on the front page of a magazine/in an add...) so that's why i sometimes prefer using photos that i take myself/that are stock photos from offline... ^_^

looking at an image and drawing what you see is good practice too though! ^_^ and why do you need to do it soon? do you have a project that needs to be done?

[Lunasumerin]

interesting video

[aku_tenshi-san]

Luna: yeah, i thought so too...i think it's always really cool to see the process that something goes through, and for this, it really shows how much work is done to make things look like they do in a magazine...she was actually very pretty from the get-go too! >_<

[Lunasumerin]

yeah I didn't think all the photo-shopping was needed.
but I just looked at a bunch of stuff that was linked from there.. really interesting videos that guy has made

[aku_tenshi-san]

i was looking around at related videos too...it's really interesting what people can do with the power of photoshop, but at the same time, there are ones where after they finished with thier manipulation, you could tell that it was definately photoshoped...

[Lunasumerin]

ah yes.. those campaigns were interesting too though since they were very reflective of society's obsession with fake beauty.

and now I'm watching videos of talking cats lol

[aku_tenshi-san]

yeah...

lol...that's quite a transition! >_<

well, i've been up since 5/6-ish, so i'm going to head to bed early...i'll talk to you later!

[Lunasumerin]

its interesting though about the perception of what is beautiful and what we start to believe is beautiful.

haha yeah I'm pretty random.

okay laters

[Klingeth]

@ Aku: Mhm. And interesting ad indeed. Ah yes, the wonders of photoshop and editing etc. to make things look perfect.

I think for the most part I use the fashion magazines for an idea of how an OC should look and their clothing choices, but sometimes I do use the poses as well. But I think I will try to umm.. do photo work for refs.

And lol no not really a project, more so I wanted to get workin on some pics. Been a while @_@

[Feaky Snucker]

how much for a black and white full body?

[aku_tenshi-san]

Feaky Snucker: that can be negotiated...i'm pretty laid back with pricing and such, so depending on what you want in your full-body pic, we can negotiate a price. (normally my customers throw a price that they are willing to pay at me and i can either tell them yay or nay...) sorry if that's not too helpful! >_<

Luna: yeah it is...also the difference between what we consider beautiful/the expectations for men v.s. women and things of that nature. but it's also interesting to see the evolution of "beauty" because at one point it was attractive for women to be overweight because only nobles could really afford to be as such due to their free time and the availability of food...lol...

Kling: yeah, fashion magazines are awesome for getting design ideas for what you want your characters to wear...my favorite is to look at those crazy "high fashion" magazines...(i've started trying to collect them wherever i go/get my friends who travel to pick one up for me...lol...)

ah, i see, i see...that's a good reason! ^_^ lol...

Luna/Kling: since we've been on the subject of photoshop and manipulating pics to see how "perfect" we can get a person...i tried my hand at it on a pic that i had on my computer...so i'm just curious as to how photoshoped this looks to you guys...