Art Critics Thread

Working on doing both color and digital painting at the same time and would greatly appreciate some guidance and tips on shading. Characters are my primary focus
(Also the filename is a bit of a joke) Dragon_Elf_Fin.webp
 
The shading for this one is a WIP, as are the finer details, but I mainly need help with the facial features! I really don't like them but I can't tell what's wrong with them. I also don't know how to make slitted blue eyes look good. Any general notes too would be great, though again it's a WIP!

View attachment 154475
From what I can see on the facial features, the problem may lie within your character's left eye and nose. The head itself is pointing to the right given the overall shape of the head but the grooves at the bottom of the nose are placed as if the head is forward facing, alongside this, the bridge of the nose seems to be illustrated as if it was being looked at dead on, making the nose look flat.

Try moving the bridge of the nose on further to the character's right.

The character's left eye seems to dip out in the wrong direction(the ball shape of the eye would jut forward and therefore in the direction the character is facing). Alongside this, that same eye does not line up with the other one making it look a little out of place

Try addressing the nose and what would be the right eye from your perspective and you might get the result you want
 
It's been a while since I posted any art on this forum - or anything, for that matter - but I've improved a bunch since I last did! Can anyone help me with the darker shading? I know that below the nose/above the eyes needs to be much darker (and below the hair), but I'm really struggling picking the right colour and blending it. I don't know when to blend smoothly and when to leave a crisp 'line' of a shadow. I also really don't want to make her skin look dirty or ruin her complexion!

upload_2019-7-5_21-21-46.webp
 
It's been a while since I posted any art on this forum - or anything, for that matter - but I've improved a bunch since I last did! Can anyone help me with the darker shading? I know that below the nose/above the eyes needs to be much darker (and below the hair), but I'm really struggling picking the right colour and blending it. I don't know when to blend smoothly and when to leave a crisp 'line' of a shadow. I also really don't want to make her skin look dirty or ruin her complexion!

View attachment 163074
A bit late, but try to make her shoulders and neck a bit wider. I adore the color scheme and shading, but the proportions of the face are a bit off as well- Forehead should be slightly larger (eyes are only at the midpoint of the human face, typically) and some of the features should be smaller (eye sockets, eyes, eyebrows.) Try making the bulb of the nose and mouth slightly larger to balance it out as well. I can't really tell if this is shaded or not, try to determine where a lightsource is and use that as a basis for any shading you might do. All in all, a solid piece with great colors and a nice 'feel' to it, just needs work on the proportions and on consistency.


hi i'm ann
the right side shoulder looks weird and i can't really get it to not look weird.
View attachment 156485

Again, really late for criticism but if you're still looking for some, the Deltoid (shoulder muscle) of his right arm would be flexed in that position. Even if he has small muscles/a lithe body shape, you'd still see a lump/bump where it's supposed to be. Try raising the arm in general as well, and see if that helps. Love the sketch though, DM me the finished product cause I'd love to see it!


does anyone know how to draw and shade hair?
pls help.
and how do you draw and shade
in general. cries.


Choose a lightsource. There can be multiple if you want to be fancy. Lights are often not plain white, so if you want to shade with colored lights (natural lighting tend to be orange/yellow or blue/purple depending on the time of day), go crazy. A nice stylized trend I've noticed is making the shadows the opposite tint of the light source.
These videos helped me a lot, hope they help you too! I love the art, btw.

Working on doing both color and digital painting at the same time and would greatly appreciate some guidance and tips on shading. Characters are my primary focus
(Also the filename is a bit of a joke)View attachment 156484
Similar issues to Sprongo's art, the colors and etc are all gorgeous but the shading and proportions need more work. The nose is bent too far in and the forehead/skull are a bit shrunken. Try making the right eye slanted and smaller to give it a sense of depth. Here's a reference to help ya out.

face-drawing.png
LOOMIS-HEAD-34.jpg
 
View attachment 167406
Drawing my boy Erwin, any helpful advice?
oh i love krita! i mainly use it for pixels these days, but there's something you just can't beat about having your colors organized as a triangle rather than a square.

when painting digitally, i suggest using a fully opaque base layer under your painting, and then building up your textures and colors from there. without that, you end up getting a very washed out image if you don't build up enough.
upload_2020-3-5_21-55-52.webp

Here are my flats, flat colors to block out the form i'm going to paint over




upload_2020-3-5_21-55-2.webp

in this specific case, i'm just building up the textures over the base. if you draw in your style, you can build up colors from a mismatched base to get a richer final product than mine.

IMG_0286.png

Kuso.png

these two are from Freddie Carrasco's GLEEM series. You can see he does his underdrawings in an orange, and it bleeds through the drawings, it creates a much richer picture than just the skintone might!

Other than that, the only thing i'd say is you should try pushing the values in your piece! you seem to be stuck in that little corner, there's so much more to that triangle!