doodles

doodley doo

New Year's Resolution: 2,011 in 2011

So, I'll start this by saying that by many standards I'm a pretty good artist. Compared to a lot of my friends, though, I suck. So, I came up with a New Year's Resolution that should help fix that.

In 2011 I will do 2,011 pages of drawing, and I'll be keeping myself honest on my blog!

'HOLY SHIT, THAT'S A LOT," you may say. That's what I said, that's what my girlfriend said. It's really not though. If I do 6 pages each day, I'll be more than fine. The one "catch" is that half of the 2,011 pages must be studies. The idea is that not only will I force myself to draw more often, but I'll force myself to study and learn from the masters.

Anyway, here are the rules I've set forth:

1. I must do at least 1,005 pages of drawings from my head or from real life.

2. I must do at least 1,006 pages of studies.

3. Since I do a lot of storyboards for my portfolio, those count. They will be added to the 2,011 once the board is finished.

1 page of 3 panels = 1 page of the 2,011

So follow along on my blog, and I encourage you all to take on a 2,011 in 2011 challenge!

Oh, one last note. Since the studies are not my own work, I wont be posting each individual page of them. I dont want ANY confusion as to what's my work and what's not, and I dont want anybody thinking that I'm taking credit for the master's work. Instead I'll probably post a photo of all the pages and list who I was looking at that particular day.

Anyway, here are my first 6 pages. I went people watching in Santa Monica today.










So this fellow was interesting. He was Middle Eastern, and he had one leg and a three legged dog. He also does not like being drawn. See how the paper is dirty and wrinkled? That's from when he yelled at me and tore the page out of my sketch book!

Rule 4. of 2,011 in 2011: be more sly.


These aren't from Santa Monica. I was watching "Magnum Force" with my dad. Clint Eastwood's a badass. Oh, and those are Tharks at the bottom.

Anyhoo, I'll try to update my blog with this daily, but I might not be able to. I WILL be keeping up on the pages, and I WILL post everything, if not every day.

999/1,005 drawings left
1,006/1,006 studies left

-JJ

PS: Anybody have suggestions on who to do master copies from?

So I got lazy and didn't color it yet, so....

Decided to go with the "safe option" for now a throw up the version with the reworked lineart. Still working out the colors. I'm leaning towards and bright orange and yellow and a deep blue and purple, like a fire during nighttime. For now, I've opted be to get some feedback on the piece at this level before moving on.

I took much of JJ's suggestions about "wrapping" the lines. It's not my usual method for conveying form, but I figured it was a method worth exploring.

Here is "Migornic Lineart V2"!

The most useful site I've ever seen for the artist

I personally have not signed up for this site, but I can vouch for its use.

http://www.conceptart.org/

If you doubt, I will direct you here

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=41

(Critiques by excellent artists the world over...mostly)

here

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=152626

(The best art books that anyone can find use for)

here

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=42

(Comprehensive, massive, FREE tutorial section)

here

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=12

(Jobs.)

and here

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=15

(Things I learned through experience that could've been learned for free)

I found these sections extremely informative. This site has a lot of depth. If nothing else, check the stickies from the sketchbook and art school section (ESPECIALLY THE E-BOOKS). If you're a braver soul, go ahead and register and get critiqued into perfection.

just gonna throw this up here for reference

Drawing from the imagination by Glenn Vilppu

Draw-Over for Sketch

This is a really badass design! I love the cyborg monster idea you have going here, and I think I know what's really hurting the 3-dimensionality of the piece, and it's NOT a lack of color and shading.

All of my teachers say, "If a drawing isnt solid to start with, no amount of rendering will save it." So throwing color and rendering on top wont fix your problems!

I think the need to draw through and around is your biggest problem in terms of dimensionality.



If I recall, you tend to draw just contours, right? You dont really use any under-structure? There is a lot of value to drawing an under-structure. If you draw solid shapes first then your line work can wrap around those solid volumes. That's what's missing from your piece and what is flattening it out. Lines are just lines; they don't define volumes.

Let's look at the eyeballs. Right now, you just have lines. I can tell what you're going for, but the lines dont actually describe the volume of the eye because they are not wrapping around a volume. I drew some eyeballs next to your to show what I mean, and to show how drawing around a volume can make them really solid.

Now let's look at the point where the arms connect to the eye tentacles. What you've drawn does not describe anything with volume because we dont see the arm wrapping around and behind the tentacles; the arms is on the same plane as the tentacles and it's certainly never behind it.

I've drawing some ellipses with a lip, defining the arm hole that those tentacles are sliding into. That lip indicates to the viewer "this arm is both in front and behind the tentacles, because they are sliding INTO it."

Same thing with the connection point between the chest armor and the midsection. The armor is on top of the mid section, but it certainly does not wrap around it. Maybe it's not supposed to, but the drawing would be a lot more solid and it would have a lot more depth and dimension if it did.

Again, I drew an ellipse with a lip to define the hole that the midsection fits into.

There are a few areas where you did a great job using overlaps to show exactly that. The shoulder armor definitely feels like it rests on top of the arms. That's because we see the lines wrapping around the arm; the lines are both in front and move behind it. The tentacle segments on the right side of the drawing have good, descriptive overlap.

To top it off, a nice fine detail that will push your perspective is the use of line weight. You have an eye-tentacle coming toward camera, so I thickened up the lines on it. See how it pops a little more? This is kind of like atmospheric perspective, but for lines. The closer the object, the thicker the line should be (relative to the lines behind it). Do this throughout the drawing and it will look really badass.

I hope this makes sense and is helpful. These are all ideas that I never heard at LMU. I personally struggle with these ideas now, and I'm CONSTANTLY called out at CDA when my work lacks them.

What do you think guys? Anybody disagree or have anything to add?

-JJ

Honorary Member Clause

I asked Matt if I could start posting here. One part to keep in contact with everybody and also to keep my skills sharp.

I present you with the "Migornic"! So named because I slipped on saying organic while thinking of "mechanic". Critique however you please.

I will do a more colored, rendered and cleaned version next time, as it lacks dimensionality in my opinion.