#trying to figure out proportions and this is the one sketch that turned out good ^^

[moca-draws]

Sketch of the coolest ranger mom!

[herrscherofmagic]

i've spent nearly 47 hours over the last ten days drawing nothing but kiana (and hov)

yeah.

anyways, since I've had about enough of drawing Kiana for the rest of my life (/hj) I'm gonna put a pause on this project; but I'll turn it from a sprint into a marathon and try and work on it occasionally instead of all at once

I want to draw other things again x-x

Close-ups of the drawings below, as well as the reference image set, and some other misc. thoughts

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Portraits drawn from imagination

Started the process by trying to draw Kiana's head from imagination; then after each drawing I'd pause, look at some references, see what mistakes I made, then put away the references and drew from imagination (and referring to previous drawings) again. I also took breaks at two points to practice drawing eyes & hair before going back to drawing Kiana

For the last 4 portraits, I'd draw a head from imagination as a warm-up to a drawing session, and then do another head much later on instead of doing it immediately. Around halfway through this "phase" I started the other phases at random points, and finished this portion of the process in the first ~10-15 hours of drawing time. The rest of the time was split across the other exercises

Also I gave her an angry expression because I felt it was the easiest for me to do from memory since I've drawn HoV more than just "Kiana" herself. I also used a boring level 3/4 view without much perspective because it forced me to really make sure I was doing everything accurately and with care.

Basically my thinking was that if I could make a boring level 3/4 portrait look good enough, then I'd have no trouble getting it to look good in other perspectives. That seemed to be true when I got to the stage where I was doing expression practice and had to deal with more head tilt and other perspectives, lol

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Studies of still images from screenshots of gameplay, character art, and stills from animated shorts

Did rough sketches first, then drew with solid color over the sketches on a separate layer. not much else to say here, lol

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Full-bodies

Started with an anatomy model loosely based on the proportions of Kiana's in-game model, and then two attempts at doing full-body drawings from imagination before realizing that it's bloody insane to try and do that much detail from imagination and I have much better things to do with my life than that x-x

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Color studies

yaaaay color! yippee!

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Action sketches/"gesture" drawings

"Gesture" is in quotes because I was way too slow with these for it to really count as proper gesture drawing, imo. But the intention was to start with gesture, and I got closer to that as I went on.

It's way too tempting to start adding detail so I had to metaphysically slap myself with a frying pan to keep myself from getting derailed by that >.>

To get references for this, I did screen recording of gameplay on the PC with OBS studios, then used DaVinci Resolve to play back the recordings.

On PC, when using the mouse controls you can hold the camera fairly still when doing an attack sequence, making it awesome for getting unique angles. For instance, when I recorded Void Drifter's attacks, I was able to get at least 4 different PoVs of her attacks: from the left, the right, behind & above, and in front & below.

Unfortunately, though, it was a bit of a hassle to get good recordings because I had to go into an actual combat stage to record it instead of being able to use an empty testing stage.

With DaVinci Resolve I could "split" clips to make cuts in the timeline that let me easily mark the spots where different attack sequences started, and I could also easily play it in .5x speed to help me figure out how the animations were going from one set of frames to another.

Plus if you close the program after saving, when you open it up again it remembers which frame you were last on and takes you straight there, making it easy to continue from one day to another.

I used White Comet, Herrscher of the Void, and Void Drifter attack animations here, but I also did recordings of Knight Moonbeam and Herrscher of Flamescion, and I might give those a try someday.

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Facial expressions practice

Started with the set of rough sketches (first image), then did some expression practice from imagination (second and third images) to try and get used to how the proportions of the face change slightly with movement of the eyebrows/eyelids/jaw, since the shape of the eyes and mouth is especially important when doing stylized faces (like the anime style that HI3rd uses)

Then this morning I started working through the original rough sketches and developing them one-by-one, getting through 8 before I decided to call it quits and wrap up the project for now

So the facial expression practice pretty much the culmination of all my practice. All the practice with proportions, the contours & forms of the hair, monochromatic shading, line quality, shape design, etc.

This was also one of the few times I've ever taken stylized references and actually adapted them to some extent instead of directly copying them!

This is especially noticeable in the hair, where I used a more standard style for the hair, in contrast with the variety of hairstyles and shapes used in the various manga references (i.e. black-and-white Escape from Nagazora Kiana's messy hair vs the neat and solid hair in the colored Gratitude Arc, AE Invasion, and Moon Shadow Kiana)

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Reference images

[zitrovee]

MH doodles and concepts

First just random fanart

I love sweet water lagoona im sorry shes so cute

Now then those are mostly designs i stopped working on for many reasons and i can barely find good images of them now cause theyre not even on my computer. Maybe i revisit them in the future but who knows

First something i tried together w the beach fan design- literally a gamer inspired line lol called gamer ghouls. i hate how drac turned out but the heart-shaped switch is something cool- i like frankie’s outfit and ghoulia is my fave here.  its funny cause something i always think when i make g3 designs is ‘’how can i include drac in this’’ cause realistically my line of thinking is ‘’would these sell’’ and drac sells. i also try to keep in mind materials and how well the items would perform as toys too. drac is hideous here tho.  the ghouls drinking monster was super funny in my head

drac in uniform sketch cause why not

this is a rough one. its for g1, i came up w the concept talking to an old friend, bonita and venus were her favorite dolls and i came up with the concept of a cybergoth inspired Bonita doll and a more slick also cyber inspired figure for venus (shes barely sketched there).

we had LOTS of creative differences (i came with a color pallete much, much different from that since i was inspired by cybergoth, focusing on neon and dark colors) and specially after some personal stuff i just gave up. i still like the concept but i cant really stand working with a concept in mind just to realize the other person isnt interested unless its their way. i wish i can revisit her in the future and apply the stuff i actually envisioned for her- but well, so far thats what we got. cant say im happy aside from the silhouette.

some other reaaally rough ideas for the beach line project for g3. i did most of those during my office work lol. those are for ghoulia. for her i wanted to keep in mind her 50s theme from g1 actually cause i love it so much. thats where the glam chill look came from. then i was like eh its nice but new ghoulia is way more rad and sporty so i tried to think of her doing surf (i also have sketches for deuce in surf attire so they would be fun) i have so many of those all over my house cause when g3 was barely launching i was so excited. and so bored at work. so i just got every paper note i could to sketch random ideas lol Also SILLY OC ALERT!!!

This was mostly a joke but i made her thinking of ET Bilu from a brazilian urban legend lol. thinking of her as a scary skinny legend w stereotypical and hilarious proportions common to old MH dolls was what inspired me at first but then also the whole 2012 pop diva look. Shes just a funny little gal. busquem conhecimento!

[excali8ur]

How did you get so good at drawing? And do you have any tips??? (Pls I'm a beginner help)

Honestly dude you never get good at art. It's sweet that people like my stuff but I still feel like most of it sucks and I think that's sort of an inherent part of drawing lmao. You've just gotta decide to keep doing it anyway because it matters to you

I do have a few tips for improving your technical drawing though:

Do figure sketching. If you can go to in-person life drawing classes that's great, and there'll usually be at least a few running if you live in a city/big town, but you can do it online too. Here are some websites I use: Line of Action / SketchDaily / Quick Poses. Try drawing with different lengths of time (so start with poses appearing for 30 seconds, then move up to 1 minute, then 2, then 5, then 10). Also don't feel too bad if the first few times you try it and the sketches don't turn out quite right or the proportions get messed up or you run out of time. It's part of the process & you'll improve the longer you keep at it. Just try to use longer & messier lines and don't focus on the details until you have basic shapes blocked out. (This is literally what I tell anyone who asks me for art advice because it's about the only drawing exercise I ever deliberately do lmao)

Draw real life subjects and not just from photos- it's more challenging but helps you develop your observation & sketching skills. This includes still life and landscapes/architecture as well as living things btw

Use references as much as you can. I suck at this but it'll genuinely make you improve faster if you do lmao. You can find loads of references on Google or DeviantArt but I also have some specific places I get them from: JookpubStock / Fat Photo Ref (requires registering but I can verify they're legit) / AdorkaStock / Teamwarchicken (actually my blog that I use for collecting images)

When you're learning to shade remember that you're shading a 3 dimensional object, and try to avoid just doing shading around the very edges of things. Same goes for highlights.

Try drawing in different styles and subjects you don't usually draw. If you can afford it try out different physical art materials too. It helps keep the art block at bay if nothing else lmao

Don't be a perfectionist. Learn to just say "good enough" and not obsess over mistakes. It's better to draw lots of slightly wonky things than one thing that you freaked out about getting perfect.

If anyone else has any other advice/resources then please add them! I do not know as much about art as people think I do hjfgjkhdf

[polarisdelphi]

Back on posting old art I never posted, Frau Schneider, my beloved 🖤

I'm seriously considering turning her into a sticker and slapping it everywhere I need to remember something to do. Drinking water? Frau is there judging me. Writing? Frau is waiting. Sleeping at a decent time? She's at the clock, looking at me with hatred in her eyes.

Jokes aside, this was more of a try on stylized drawing, which I completely suck. Since I studied Schneider's face thoroughly once for another drawing, I figured stylizing him would be easier for me as a first try.

I love his nose HAHAHAHA that's my anchor on his likeness xD

Sketches, breakdowns on how I got here, what I thought on shapes and more on his features - and just general artist blabbering, down below!

It was born from these loose sketches:

And I do like the ~proper~ one too. Took a lot of screenshots of the video's making of to understand his mannerisms when ~in Frau~, and there's a big change between the video and the live versions.

Video is a proper, collected, older woman with a dark side from repressed unfulfilled desires, live one is a brute, angry, harshly dominant one. 100% angry all the time, taking her dogs for a walk 🖤

Keeping some harsh shapes on the first one 'cause we all know she's evil, and some more organic ones on the second one 'cause she's UNHINGED.

(Also, Frau's coat are a thousand little Edelweiss 'cause you know. Schneider, Austria, his wife hahahaha aaaaand I have roots from there too, so I decided to shamelessly slap Edelweiss everywhere xD)

Another interesting thing to note, was trying to keep the male proportions on a female presenting appearance. Because we all learn about better shapes for women, how they usually are ~smaller, softer and more delicate~ than males (please read with sarcasm) but Schneider is still a man in woman's clothing, acting like a woman. So I had to keep in mind what I'd draw if it was just him as himself - big hands, big feet, tall as a fucking tree, very large shoulders, toned arms and muscles, all that. No ~delicate~ features 'cause he's still a man, but in here he's a woman.

I'm not saying I succedeed. But it was a good first try :)

Given I have so many drag queen original characters, it's something I think it was nice to study and have in mind T-T

About his features, like I said, I studied him once 'cause I was trying to go for stylized Live aus Berlin Schneider illustration once, but all I got is: I can draw his likeness from memory now, that's it *cries in incompetence*

I said before, I'm not good at stylizing.

So, his key features are: very slim and small mouth, big nose (gods I love his nose, I'll always say that), kinda small eyes and there's almost no distance to his eyebrows (on the video they paint his brows to make a LOT more arched, almost like original Maleficent), longer face, big and square chin, sharp and high cheekbones. I figured if I kept all that in mind, I'd have his likeness.

That's what I used to go figuring out how to draw Frau like that :)

And why am I blabbering all this?

I just hope it helps other self-taught artists out there who have a hard time finding resources and see other people's drawings and go "oooh man how do I get there?" and the artist always go "I dunno just draw a lot and you will get there :)"

Yes, yes, draw a lot. If you don't practice, you won't learn. But there ARE tools, observation studies, drawing studies and a WHOLE lot of things you can learn from other people to get where you want to faster and easier - but most of these resources are, nowadays, behind a paywall. So I just figured I'll share what I learned and hopefully it'll help someone struggling with the same things I did less than a year ago ;)

[quibbs126]

So this morning I finished the other two, so might as well show them all now

Just for reference for anyone who might not have seen the first one, these are supposed to be outfits for the characters, inspired by their Invocation Guardians, aka Iggrit, Pazu, and Skadi respectively

I do think Menos looks the worst now, but that’s mostly because he was the first one and I didn’t entirely know how I was gonna go about this

It probably also helps that I sketched out the girls yesterday at work before drawing this (ignore the Pazu and Sylph, I was just trying to think of other things to draw)

I also made an alternate Menos, which is basically just that the fur becomes his hair, like it is for Iggrit, but I also feel like it’s maybe too different? I’m not really sure

I feel like maybe I need to redo him, but also I don’t feel like doing that since I already finished

I think overall Fina is my favorite one, both in the sketch and final. She was probably also one of the most difficult in terms of concept since Pazu doesn’t wear much of anything, while Skadi and Iggrit at least wear a few things. In all honesty I kind of wanted to base her outfit on the first Pazu design, but it’s also not their final design, so I wanted to stick close to the canon one

I also like how I did her hair

I do think Velvet’s was pretty fun though. Admittedly I don’t think I got some of the placement of things right, like the sash thing, but it looks good enough. She’s probably wearing shorts under the sash also. She was originally going to have just long sleeves, but since I made the boots metal, I decided then that she has long sleeves and then some gauntlets on top of that

The hair was a bit of a struggle though, since I wasn’t sure how to change her curls into that one long strand that Skadi has. I suppose it looks alright, but I’m still not sure. I was also debating whether her second hair color should be green like Skadi’s ends, or blue like her normal, but I thought making it green would add a pop of contrast, so I went with that

I also admit that my proportions probably get in the way of these designs looking entirely how they should. Maybe if I were to draw them in something that requires more effort, then the outfits would look more realistic, I suppose is the word

But yeah, I think they turned out pretty good

I’m debating giving Kuro and/or Ceres outfits based on Tiki, since Tiki is the Guardian of Time (I think), which seems to be both of their powers, though I feel like it’d fit Ceres more. Only issue is that Tiki kind of doesn’t have any humanoid proportions at all. But I guess I could figure something out

But it also would be funny if only Ceres got the outfit, so everyone else gets cool new outfits, but with Kuro they’re like “sorry buddy, but you don’t really have a Guardian associated with you, so you can’t get cool outfits like us”

[fishy--friend]

a picture i drew like two days ago i forgot to post (yes all of those bandaids were from real accidents) and I tried out a new eye style! I don't like it as much as my current one because of the way it just seems to clash with everything else, but its whatever, yk? Also I used reference for one of the first times (i traced a stock image until i got a sketch similar to what i wanted)! I hope that counts as using reference hehehe...

Extra things under the cut for people following my art dev

Things about this i like:

The lighting!! It looks really good!!

The use of subtle line weight! (apparently having thinner lines on the inside is similar to line weight)

The wings!!! I really like drawing myself with them and they always turn out amazing!!!

I added a tail for once! I've mentioned it earlier but now I think I gotta made a reference for myself (i already made a shitty one for Fishy a bit ago, would anyone wanna see it?) so I can keep the proportions correct

Speaking of proportions, I love them!!!! They actually look like a human and one thing isn't thicker than the other!!!!

I love love love love love the elbows! Before you get all confused hear me out. I'm hypermobile, which is essentially a fancy term for being double joined, and I have some in my knees, my elbows and I think my back? Either way, when I do something like that pose my elbows sink under my skin, which looks similar to how I drew it!!!

I like the shading, it goes great with my color palate!!

Things about this I don't particularly care for:

The tail's thickness goes all over the place, I'll have to construct a solution here soon

The eyes. They look cute, but they don't really fit what I have going for me

The wing's anatomy could be better, especially when they're supposed to be pulled in tight. I might mess with some free wing 3D models to figure out how they work when they move around.

The trampoline (the thing Im sitting on) looks forced and out of place the more I look at it

I'd like to try drawing my own backgrounds and not using fancy brushes or ibis's free backgrounds. They're resources free for artists to use and share (which is why I don't feel guilty about using them), but I'd like to try taking a crack at a background or two.

overall, I really like this piece, and there's definitely more positives than negatives. Would I use that eye shape again? Probably not to be honest, its cute but its not what I'm going for because the angles go against my overall soft and flowy art style. Most of my edges are rounded, and the eyes clearly aren't. Also the scleras being exposed really makes me sick (in a not cool way). Someone contain those bastards. I will be building off of it though, trying to find middle grounds and stuff.

[steampaul]

i've started a little series of weekly posts documenting every MoC i made (digitally) over the last few years:

Week 9: 2022

some old MoCs returning, lego art, 90th anniversary toa team, video game stuff and more Rock Raiders (yay)

this one will be the penultimate week.

remember back in week 2 (2018) where i tested out the differences in rendering between stud.io 1 and 2? i tested out the mecabricks extention for Blender to render some digital bricks.

this took way too long to setup and render, so i decided to not use blender for rendering after that (escpecially after the win11 updated fucked with my graphics card)

another mandalorian s2 set MoC. din djarins N1 starfighter, based on the last N1 set we had back in 2015. i think these proportions aren't good, but a bit better than the official set. (its still too big though)

the Horizon: forbidden west set was also teased/revealed around that time, so i decided to make a diorama with just the watcher (and one with a corrupted one) that would be a bit more managable in both cost and size than the tallneck.

i still got the tallneck, becauce those robot dinos are cool as hell and i want to support video game based sets, even though i am a big supporter of the concept that LEGO should make more original themes instead of big and expensive licensed sets (like rivendell....)

some greebles inspired by the ones on the Icons (formerly master builder) "theme" of sets, also my header image for tumblr.

back in 2017 (week one) i made The Slugcat Portrait mosaic, and i decided in 2022 that i would remake it to be more in line with the way i would built with bricks at that time. i think i improved wuite a bit.

i like the 90 years of play tahu, even if his design was considered to be controversial, so i decided to make the full 2001 set lineup for bionicle. i think they turned out pretty good, but i find it a bit annoying that the maccaroni piece does not exist in tan or medium blue (a dicontinued colour)

anyone remeber Valley? the momentum-based FPS platformer? no? it wasn't really mind-blowing, but i still enjoyed the movement and flow of the game. i also always wanted to try out the Legoland Miniland style of character building. this was the perfect opportunity to combine both of these things.

i think the proportions might be a bit off, but i still like this little desk friend

someone asked me on twitter to send them the instructions for my marble machine MoC (as seen in week 7), but i didn't want to give them such and outdated build, so i re-designed it to be more up to date.

they ended up giving me about 14 $ for these instructions, which made me pretty happy.

i tried to make a micro-scale version of the exo-force set 7701 Grand Titan. i really dislike the way this one turned out.

Lego Ideas had yet another contest. this one was about designing a poster for the then new 21334 Jazz Quartet. i called this one "Golden Sounds" and it is the first mosaic-type MoC that i made where i first sketched it out to kinda figure out how i wanted it to look.

i like the way this one turned out, but i think i should've built it in such a way that the colours in the background wouldn't be as dim.

remember last week when i said i wanted to make more Rock raiders MoCs? turns out i did. a lot too.

this VTOL-style transport vehicle was kinda inspired by those industrial transport helicopters and was supposed to be some sort of reimagining of 4980 tunnel transport. i think it's a bit too clunky and a bit too skinny at the same time. not my favourite.

also there's a modular open container (is that what they're called?) that can be fixed under the vehicle. (as well as the room container that you'll see next)

Modular bases are so cool you guys. this one is inspired by 4990 Rock Raiders HQ and those big old moving platforms Nasa uses. it could be controlled with a motor, has a removable cockpit (with an access hatch) and the platform has a lot of room for modules. like the crystal refinery, the room container, the high platforms, the crane and the crane attachment holder.

here are a few variants for the room container: an artifact storage with workbench, a small break room and a laboratory. i like those and i might do more in some time in the future. idk yet.

my take on the rock monsters. some crystal infested/energized Fauna.

first some bipedal designs (the left one is a modded version of a deviant form an eternals sets) that could be more agressive carnivore types.

in the middle are some quadrupedal guys that could be a bit less agressive and even friendly. Left is a modded version of my SCP 860 creature from week 4 (which was based on either an legendary beast from Chima or a dragon from elves) and the right one is a recolour from the fluffy-tailed Hog from my satisfactory series from week 3

and lastly, some insectoid designs, a kind of beetly creature and two ants, one of them with wings. these could be some sort of neutral (like in minecraft) swarm that might be a problem for buildings and cocky miners.

this is probably my favourite of my Rock Raiders Builds from 2022. it's 4920 rapid rider built with modern pieces that has been overtaken by the energy crytals. it can be fully freed from crystal and reassebled, which is nice.

we'll see another rapid rider next week...

first week last week final week

[ro-botany]

Bonus Content & Bloopers for the fake marlear screencaps

(I love behind the scenes stuff ok can you really blame me)

Ripping animations to help with some basic expression work was..... it was an adventure.

The first image above is an attempt to blend Marth's "surprise" and "smile" faces together but I uh...... Hit the wrong setting in the dropdown. I nearly died from laughing too hard pff.

The Alears there are what happens when you import the characters face rigs with different settings (still screaming at myself for that one) and then try to use a facial expression from one of them on the other one of them. That was supposed to be an :0 face.

The FEH players among you may have recognized the setting of that piece as the scenery for S supports in FEH! Figured if I'm setting the scene in Askr anyway I may as well go for the cheekiest spot. :P

While it probably would've looked great if I'd modelled all that out, after the effort that went into getting the character models looking good I really just did Not have it in me to do that, so this scenery is... A complete and utter lie made of layered image planes.

This was part of why I opted to crank the depth of field so much in the final piece. Helps hide that everything aside from the guys themselves are crusty PNGs. :P It does a half-decent job of looking like a 3D scene even in motion though, so long as you don't rotate the camera TOO far.

I REALLY liked how these close shots of Marth and Alear for the first pose turned out, but in the end I didn't think they fit with the other two poses. There was a timeline where I modified the expressions a bit and made fake dialogue boxes where they're talking about how surprised and happy they are they can actually touch each other in Askr, but I didn't feel confident enough to write in their voices for that.. So in the final shots that story just gets to be implied in their poses and expressions instead.

For the hug shot, I feel it is important to reveal that Alear's head is clipping halfway into Marth's shoulder and armour there. It's fine though. Animate for the camera, professionals always say! If it isn't gonna be viewed from every angle it doesn't have to look good from every angle. :P

Engage renders their characters' eyelashes and eyebrows ABOVE their hair, no matter what, in order to help the readability of facial expressions. I wanted to stay true to that look, so I had to render their eyebrows and eyelashes separately and then combine them in post. Enjoy eyelash-free Marth and Alear. :P

You can also see some areas there where I had to manually fix some shading and outlines in post, too. Blender has a bug with rigging right now that was affecting the face shading in odd ways, so I painted over that; and the inverse hull method I've been using for most of the outlines is very much imperfect and needed touching up in some areas, lips especially.

Since these character rigs were.......... We'll say not intended for use in Blender, they were fairly tedious to get posed right. No rotation or location constraints. These were joint-only rigs with no connections between bones so you couldn't use the auto-IK feature to, say move the whole arm at once. (Which made hand posing the WORST THING EVER AAAA EVERY FINGER JOINT MOVES INDIVIDUALLY why did i pick TWO poses where hands were a critical component)

Part of my process ended up being doing rough sketches of what the final shots were going to be first, so I could keep in my head what sort of poses and expressions and camera angles I was going for. And by rough I mean ROUGH. I kept laughing looking at these little egg head guys for reference as I worked.

Engage's models also come with some "extraneous" bones; "piv" bones that I can't figure out what they do, spots where weapons and shields can snap to, "vol" bones for changing the thickness of specific body parts as defined in the big XML file of character proportions buried in the game. Unfortunately these bones overlap the actual posing joints in many cases, so until you get fed up enough to find and hide them all, you'll try to move the character around and end up doing shit like this by accident

(Me too Marth, idk what the hell his skeleton is doing either)

And as you may have noticed - no particle effects in these behind the scenes shots so far! That's because I both A) couldn't for the life of me figure out how to do that smoke effect, and B) couldn't render a particle system with anywhere NEAR the number of objects I would need to get a similar look to the game. So, I drew those in post! Shoutouts to the random sparkle and smoke brushes in my collection, you're the real ones.

[dadplagg-mamatikki]

Bumblebees and comissions!

Eeeep!!! So glad someone picked that!!

So basically it's one of the final chapters of Eyes and Fanart fic I have.

I'm so excited and happy to share this snippit!!

"Yes! Her!! Her name is Pollen and she's a kwami." Chloe smiled brightly at Marinette. "Do you think you could incorporate her somewhere?" Chloe asked, her eyes pleading. "Yeah, I can." Marinette nodded, going to her sketchbook and pulling up a blank piece of paper. Taking out her sketching pencil, she began to sketch Pollen from memory. Meanwhile, Chloe looked at the patterns going and studying how each one looked next to a different button, before going to the next one. Marinette stopped her sketching, going and holding out the book to Chloe. "Is this close?" She asked. Chloe took the sketchbook in hand, going and looking at it. Her heart squeezed as she saw her Pollen. Some of the proportions were off but she could easily tell it was her kwami. "So, she has more fur around her neck. Her arms and legs aren't the same size, but other than that, yes." Marinette nodded, taking her notebook back, jotting down the changes. "Alright, have you-" Marinette's words were cut off as the lights flashed on, causing the girls to squint in the random light. Looking at the door, they saw Kim standing in the doorway. "Why are you guys in here with the lights off?" He asked, tilting his head as he was looking at the girls. "I wanted to make sure the patterns worked well in the darker time also." Chloe said, gesturing to what was before the girls. "Oh! That outfit that Marinette's making?" "Yes." They nodded, sharing a strange look as they spoke together. "Oh that's neat. Rose is right, you should really consider making it more of a thing." Kim said, peeking at the stuff before going up to his seat. The girls watched him before turning back to the materials infront of them. "Alright, so, these are the pairings I thought looked good in the dark." "Ok, which ones do you like in the light also?" Marinette asked, jotting down notes as Chloe began looking through the options. "Definitely not this one." She removed one that was a darker pastel yellow and a solid gold button with a diamond in the middle. She looked through more of the options, replacing options with other options. A light yellow against the black was considered before she shook her head, moving around to see a pale yellow but not quite pastel, resting a sapphire against it. Possibly, but she still wasn't satisfied. "Marinette, do you think I can take these with me and figure it out later?" "Sure, Chloe. That'll be fine. Just don't lose the samples." "Like I'll lose anything." Chloe rolled her eyes, beginning to place the items back in the respective bags and placing them into a safe holding spot. By the time they were done, students started filling in more. Marinette went to her seat besides Alya, opening her sketchbook to a page and started showing Alya something. Meanwhile, Chloe was trying to figure out if she could somehow get ahold of Ladybug to show Marinette Pollen so she could incorporate her sweet kwami into her outfit.

[nocek]

Hello, do you have a guide to drawing faces? I'm going through an artstyle revision to be more soft around the edges and less sharp and I've always struggled with faces...

oh my... that's a very broad question to ask and hard to give any usefull answer without actually seeing your work. But it's good that you have concrete goals and can pinpoint what exactly you want to change about your work. It's a very professional attitude.

Which is why I may be a bad choice of person to be asked for advice. Because I'm not a professional and I want very much for drawing to stay just my hobby to keep me sane. I never consciously thought about my artstyle beyond maybe making it less manga (but residue it's still there, art teachers were right lol XD). It's about having fun in the process for me.

That's why I can only give you some fun things to try out. Maybe one or two will work for you.

If you want to soften your faces in generally paintery way best way I tried is to gradually unblurr your picture. Like take the most basic round brush with soft edges and make it very big. Turn down the opacity a bit and try to sculpt basic shapes of the face using the main limited pallette colors of your reference. Then use slightly smaller big brush to add bit more details. Then gradually make the brush smaller and smaller. And gradually add new details and colors if necessary.

This actually does wonders because helps you stop being precious about some sketch details because there is no sketch. It helps you stop seeing face as face so you don't draw what you know but what you actually see.

Actually speaking of that. Another great trick is to put your reference upside down. Our brains are lazy and just extrapolate the information and our brains are great at face shapes so it's actually harder to draw them. But if you put them upside down you actually need to focus on proportions of this new unknown shape. It actually does wonders!

When it comes to lineart (because after all this rambling I figured that's most likely why you've written to me, sorry) i have 2 suggestions.

Try to figure out if you draw with only your wrist. It doesn't decide if you draw more in straight or in curved lines (I guess in that department we have opposite problems :D) but it's good idea to try consciously draw using more of your elbow. It works well with bigger canvases and actually taught me to draw really long straight lines (yay architecture, it was useful for that and learning how to do really tough boxes XD) but actually it's about stability which is crucial in doing curved lines too.

On smaller scale try using different media or have fun with new pens. It will help you get out of your used path and is an excuse to raid nearby cheap art store.

I guess many people would recommend doing lineart with brushes. The varying thickness will encourage you to use more round lines and so on buuuuut.... actually I think brushes are very discouraging when you don't have the muscle memory to control them properly. My advice here would be to use felt tip pens actually. They are more springy thus more forgiving. Try the ones that are soft and more spongy than actually felt. Idk how to describe them. If that's something you think may be interesting let me know and I'll try to dig up the ones I used.

Generally let me know if you want more details in certain direction because all above is kind of rambly stream of consciousness answer and idk how usefull it actually is but I prefer to post it that way otherwise I'll get stuck in perfecting the reply limbo >.<

[pnkrathian]

I love your art sm :] What's your process? Your characters always look so alive!!

thank u aaaa!!!!

hm… I dunno if I can say I have like. A concrete process. i am self taught and like by no means an expert on art and therefore I may not be able to provide the greatest advice but i can try to make sense of generally how I draw!

most of the time when I do digital I start out with a rough sketch and then go to lineart, but sometimes (esp cause I just don’t always enjoy doing lineart) I just skip that step and use my rough sketch and color that in. But usually when I am working on a bigger fullbody character for the rough sketch I will draw just their base body first on one layer and draw things like their hair/clothes/accessories/etc on other layers to kinda help me figure out where things are gonna go, so it’s less messy if I need to change something.

As for poses, I use CSP and it’s 3D model tool is super helpful for me, cause I struggle with proportions and posing if I don’t have a good reference. However the one catch is that sometimes if you rely too much on those models your posing can look stiff, so sometimes (if I have the spoons) I will draw a simple stick body like usual over the model, and then draw another stick body next to it but this time I’ll try to exaggerate the pose. Make it more interesting. sometimes I’ll do the same w facial expressions.

Tbh a way I’ve improved my expressiveness is just by studying/taking in art styles I really like. like for example I love the styles in some anime and also some 80s/90s cartoons, so sometimes I take the time to just look over how those art styles move and flow and sometimes I just practice trying to incorporate some of those style changes in my art. (ngl I think one of the biggest factors in my art becoming more expressive over the past year or two was watching one piece lmao)

For things like shading/coloring, I’m not as much of an expert and I still need to learn a lot in that department, but one thing that has helped me is shading the same piece two ways. Learning that there are hard shadows on an object and softer, ambient shadows as well. Usually when I am doing a nicer piece I will go in with a harder paintbrush to add in my hard, defined shadows, and then on another layer I will add soft shadows to the piece with an airbrush. I’ll do the same with lighting too. It adds a lot of depth.

Ok sorry this turned into kind of a ramble but I’m glad u like my art and I hope I could help at least a lil!

[celestialsun123]

I drew some TMNT sketches

These are all pictures that are taken at weird angles to avoid shadows getting on the drawings themselves.

Everything's under the read more cause it gets LONG 🥲

This was the first one. It was alright, although looking at it now, I wish I had not done the shadows 😅

I drew Mikey second and DANG this boy gave me trouble! He looks so PRECIOUS, so I forgive him.

This is when I realized that I could use a piece of scrap paper to test my colors. I think Raph turned out GREAT, and this is also when I figured out how to do the block shading (I added it to Donnie and Mikey after)

I did not do Leo next (mostly cause I couldn't find a good pic) so I did this sketch that I HATE because Donnie's face is bad. Like... it's just bad.

Then I finally found a good pic for Leo! His face is so pointy tho, and it REALLY bothers me cause I can't get it to look right for me. Other than that, the only problem was I have to use a highlighter for his mask and sash thingy and it gave me grief. He also looks too buff. Like I couldn't get the right proportions, so he just looks slightly strange. (I end up having this problem with Mikey and Donnie too 🥲)

Next I did 2012 Donnie. I'm not used to drawing 3D, so I did 2D. It was a nightmare and I wish I had used the crossover episode as a reference instead. Overall, Donnie turned out decent.

After Donnie, I did 2012 Raph. I did NOT learn from all my mistakes and I used another reference from a normal episode. I did know what to do differently drawing wise, and Raph looks way better than Donnie. (He does look like he's holding the camera. He isn't)

I was out of the house when I drew 2012 Leo (plus a Rise Leo), so I didn't have access to my colored pencils or normal paper. I really like 2012 Leo, but AGAIN Rise Leo has SUCH a pointy head!

(the text on Rise!Leo's drawing says "Rise Leo being responsible," and then the whole "Donnie, DAD'S on that thing." Quote.)

And then, finally, I made a collage/series thing. I am SO proud of this, although there are parts I despise. Leo's face? Hate it. Kinda made me want to cry drawing that. Mikey's whole self? (Not to mention the fact that I used the wrong color for one of his mask tails?) Hate it. Donnie's whole positioning with Raph? Also hate it. I got real lazy at the end (cause I'd been working on this for 2 days and couldn't find good poses for the other three)

In case my writing is both too small and too messy to read, here's the translations from left to right:

1st pic: on Donnie's right "I love my brother" is repeated all the way down, getting aggressive at the end. This is what Donnie is thinking. Above him the text says "has listened patiently for 1.5 hours and is having a mental breakdown."

Above Leo the text says "has been rambling for 2 hours." On Leo's left he is saying "And that's why when Usagi said to run, I decided to go and SAVE him instead- hey, and- [missing text going behind Leo] ever get- [missing text] cause I'd- [missing text] it and- [missing text] you live- [missing text] -igh? Oh! - [missing text] -ormally- [missing text] -nd you- [missing text] not that- [missing text] so- [missing text] but- [missing text] and I did- [missing text] even TRY! Are you listening to me?"

Additionally, there is text outside the box, above Leo, that says "combined type ADHD (possibly Autism)"

2nd pic: above Mikey the text says "rambled for 3 min, then got insecure and had the AUDACITY to ask if he was being ANNOYING."

The text above Donnie says "wants to kill whoever suggested that, cause there isn't anything in the UNIVERSE that could make Mikey annoying." The text in the thought bubble says "Is murder legal?"

Outside the box, above Mikey, there is text saying "combined type ADHD (possible autism)"

3rd pic: the text above Raph says "rambling 'bout wrestling (it's been 1 hr)"

The text above Donnie says "lovingly listening for the next half hour after this." The text beside him says "multitasking"

Under the text about Raph there is also text saying "inattentive ADHD"

4th pic: The text next to Donnie says "has been talking about tech for and/or science for *5* hours"

The text above the three spikey blobs says "they have zero clue what he's talking about, but they listen anyway"

Outside the box, above Donnie, the text says "Autism"

That's all for now. I haven't made 2012 Mikey yet, just cause 2012 intimidates me because of its 3D nature. I'll get to him eventually! (He and Leo are my favs in 2012)

[desperatehornet]

Animation Practise Week 1: Character Design (Home)

Our home task for the week was to create 2-3 A4 pages of observational people drawing. I wanted to experiment a bit more and develop my proportion skills, so I decided to make 6 pages. I used graphite pencils, charcoal and alcohol markers for my pages. I started off with graphite, a medium I've become quite used to over the past few months, using it in my personal sketchbook. I wasn't too concerned with creating much tone while using this, as I wanted to put focus on understanding the body and human anatomy first and foremost. I did still use a blending stump to add some dimension, but I now wish I had some time to include deeper tones as I feel like the figures look more flat compared to the other pages. That said, I am very proud of almost every figure I drew, and proud of how quickly I could draw the movement of some people. Granted, some of my references were standing still and allowed me to get a more detailed drawing in, but a good amount were also mid-walking, giving me the opportunity to capture some movement in my studies. One more criticism I have for myself is in the hands, which I really struggled with drawing quickly enough, and ended up making quite stylised, defeating the point of the exercise. Other than that, I'm happy with my pencil observational drawing.

Next, I decided to try and experiment with alcohol markers, a medium I hadn't used in years. I had seen some excellent observational drawings online using alcohol markers, but actually ended up struggling quite a lot while trying to use them myself. Even though they blended well, it was very difficult to make a blended drawing of a moving person. trying to put down shadows first made the art look far too stylized and smeared and bled when lighter colours were added over it. My solution was to make a somewhat 'wash' of my lightest colour as a general shape first, and then quickly refine it with the darker colours on top, making a more layered and dimensional look. I think that, while this technique ended up working well, it is a fine line as I believe some figures looked excellent and dynamic, while others seemed stiff and unrealistic. I do think this was helpful though, as I learned to better control where I place the darkest shadows and defining lines onto a figure.

This lesson was especially helpful in my last experiment, where I worked with charcoal. In all honesty, I was dreading this the most as I generally immensely hate working with charcoal. I think it's hard to work with, and hard to control. However, after learning techniques from my previous exercises (along with some online tutorials) These actually ended up being some of my favourite pages. I started out struggling, as I was trying to use a willow charcoal stick directly and make all of my tones using it, which didn't work out. After restarting, I tried using the willow charcoal stick to lightly sketch out the silhouette and basic shapes of people walking by or sitting near me, and then used a dense, round paintbrush to diffuse the lines, filling in the shapes with the excess charcoal, similar to the 'wash' I made with the alcohol markers. Then, after grinding part of my charcoal into a powder, I was able to use the brush to delicately apply deeper shadows onto my figures, making a much softer, more subtle tone. I built up the shadows with more powder until I was happy with the general shape, and finally went over some areas with a thin piece of charcoal stick to define anything I wanted to stand out. I think that this technique worked better with some figures than others, but I was still extremely impressed by how well this page was turning out. I tried to keep very dark areas and very bright areas to a minimum, instead focusing on having a range of mid-tones in each figure. Now that I've finished this assignment, I can say that I'm happy I experimented and developed my techniques, as I feel I now have a better grasp on some mediums I previously didn't enjoy, and also improved my observational drawing skills, in being able to capture a figure quickly and accurately.

[thedarkmistress16]

How did you learn to draw human figure?

as mentioned in a recent answer, an extensive amount of research and analysis helps before or while drawing them myself- looking at finished works, speed paints, animation, and tutorials- anything i could get my grubby little hands on. Have enough retained in my mind and a few warmups and a lot of hours to kill and rested eyes and im in business for decent drawings baby!

And I've never taken an anatomy class.

Being able to think visually or being able to imagine certain poses and movements in my head from said inspo/research also helps. And looking at various art styles doing one thing with the human body helps me narrow down the common, key features or rules in drawing them. I like to go a step further and figure out the mindset of the artists to understand their process a lot better and try to think in a similar way after being inspired, which I did a while ago after watching an artist youtuber's sketching process. Or I place it on the back burner of my mind for a later comparison.

This (the above last point) is fun to do for me as it makes me feel more competent than I actually think I am when it comes to drawing bodies, and I typically think about the dynamics of a pose + compared to the overall composition- provided I have a frame or sense of space somewhere like a scene and not floating in empty space that drawings in sketchbooks usually have. I never strive to make the poses in particular look bland and usually want to push myself the tiniest bit to try a new angle or limb placement. But I'm notoriously flip-floppy with it: Some days I properly plan out the spacing and proportions and do the pillow/bean body skeleton with basic lines and shapes. Other times I'll only want to draw the proportions from my idea like it's my first clean draft and feel how its coming along line by line instead of following a previously-mapped guide (gauging limb thickness, joint placement, general outline, etc. w/out references). If it looks nice and looks like it makes sense, then it stays.

It also helps that i like drawing fashion more than anything, so I had to end up learning a bit about the human body at some point, XD. For most of my life I've drawn faces and torsos. The lower body is still a learning curve that i hate doing sometimes but I'm more confident with how knees work and look like now, LOL.

I do the freehand expansive thing as a: hey I just drew this whole profile face free-handed just from expanding one eye I drew! kind of personal achievement. Sometimes it turns out good, but most often with this (lazy) method, I end up going back to basics and pathing the skeletal line on the dirtied page or sketch layer, mostly due to frustration in it taking so long and not looking right. Or I abandon it. So, in short, I make it hard for myself because I try to make it look good first try but I do resort to references like my hand sometimes XD.

[that-one-weeb-buts-its-the-main]

Hello, I was wondering if you could do headcannons for a silco x female reader (romantic), where she is Vi and Jinx's older sister (20 y/o) and went with jinx when vander died and believes that Vi abandoned them, and her and silco are like Jinx's main parental figures.

Thank you and have a good day!

You becoming parent's to Jinx w/Silco + extra drabbles

Note: ya'll blew up my inbox with Silco and I love it

Reader: female

Arcane Masterlist ♤♤ "Here's the Dump"

You usually take the blame for everything for your sisters

Nah no one touches my sisters

But of course Vi likes to argue, saying that its your fault your parents are dead, because you left to try and make a better name for the family outside of Piltover and the Lanes

You stormed out in anger not wanting to esclate things with powder begging you to stay; you said you'd come back for her

Did come back for her but just a bit too late.

Found you near Vander, with a large shard of glass in your calf.

Powder ran into your arm so quickly, crying her eyes out

Vi only contuined to argue blaming you once again, Powder tried standing up to her, resulting in her getting slapped.

Angred you pulled the shard from your calf and threatened Vi with it holding it to her neck.

Tried to reason with her as well though.

"I did everything trying to help you two. To help our whole family"

Passing out from blood loss.

Vi leaving still

Powder begging for help and for Vi not to leave

Silco comes in, Powder crying into your barely rising chest, begging you to come back.

He helped both you and Powder now Jinx

Waking up in a bed and like: bitch Im t r i p p i n:

Meeting Drabble: With a groan Y/n woke up, trying to sit up.

"You'll be light headed," a voice spoke, "don't try and get up."

"P. Powder..." she called, trying to get out of bed but someone grabbed her arm.

"Lay down,"

Her eyes finally came into focus, and glared up at him, "do whatever you want to me just leave her alone."

Silco forced her onto the bed causing her to wince, "then go back to sleep."

Laid down but didnt go back to sleep

Eventually helped to sit up and brought food.

It was hard trusting any of them but then Powder rushed in you went fuck food and held her close.

Offered to stay and work for Silco, by the man himself

Yeah it went a totally diffrent way within like two weeks: there he was, putting you on his desk, ya'll making out.

Accepting of Jinx, and her chaos

He asking you to put injections into his eye even though you kinda hate it: seems painful

It was pretty early on you told Jinx that you and Silco ended up becoming a thing.

She was pretty happy for you actually, and made you both matching mugs.

She was pretty attached to the idea of you two being her parents.

As she got older she learned how to do more things, and made breakfast for both of you

"Is this ceral? Where did you get this?" "Oh! You know! I stole it! Didn't know how to cook it exactly." "Its wonderful thank you"

Both of you with eat burnt ceral to make her happy

Please hold them both together, like on the couch heads resting on your shoulder while you read

Good night kisses for Jinx 110%

Good night kisses for Silco too

Working with Sevika

Calming Jinx down turning her flashes of the past

"I've got you! I've got you! Jinx! Look at me!"

Pressing her forhead to yours helps her calm down

Holding Silco back from going to her when she needs to take a breath, "Let her breath."

You usually end up putting most before you, so Silco treats you once an a while even if its just a new book you've been eyeing

Took up sketching/drawing, you have pages filled with just him sitting at his desk and him smoking

He figures out your drawing him:

Y/n was silent, sat on the chair infront of Silco's desk he was busy doing paper work.

She lifted up the fancy pen Jinx had snatched for her while top side, using it as a sort of reference for proportions.

"Are you going to stab me with that pen?" Silco spoke drinking from the glass of brandy infront of him.

"Want me too?" Y/n questioned dropping her arm tilting her head with a small smile.

He held out a hand as she sighed handing over the hand made book.

"Don't smudge it." Y/n protested.

Silco set the book down on his papers, bringing his glass back to his lips taking another drink, he skimming through it. It must've been a family thing, both her and Jinx drew like crazy.

"Impressed?" Y/n spoke with a teasing smile the pen loosely swinging in her fingers.

"It's a family trait." Silco spoke.

"A common intrest." Y/n corrected softly, "unless you want to tell me your a secret artist and make it a family trait."

He stiffled a laugh, leaning back in his chair

"Imagine it now." Y/n teased, "the all mighty Silco shimmer dealer and industrialist, sits infront of a blank canvas wondering what will be carved out of the paints still in there tubes."

"You a writer too now?" Silco questioned Y/n smiling.

"The adventures of a gangster family. Nice title huh?" Y/n questioned, standing up from her seat and leaning over his desk, hands planted on the edge, "or...maybe something more...personal?"

On impulse he leaned forward she smiling but the door bursted open.

"Oh Y/n! It's me and you time!" Jinx cheered as Y/n chuckled.

"The next chapter later today then I suppose." Y/n teased pecking Silco on the lips and walking off to join a Hyper Jinx.

He loves seeing you with Jinx, especially if the young woman falls asleep in your arms you reading book peacefully

He often finds you gone from bed, just to find you in Jinx's room, barely able to keep awake as the girl sleeps in her arms.

If you fall asleep on the couch, Jinx will wait till you either wake up or Silco come gets you

Big titty identity crisis wine mom

Can drink Silco under the table

Family Chaos time atleast once a week

"Ha! 21 I win!" "We're playing monopoly" "wait we're not playing Yathzee?"

Y/n on the phone: no. I don't care! Just break there knee caps!

Y/n putting the phone down and looking back at Silco: so you say Jinx blew up a building

Figuring out how to cook and going to Pilltovee to steal actual ingredients: ta dah! Family meal time!

Surprisingly a decent cook

Taking care of Jinx and Silco when there sick, Jinx loves it but Silco hates it.

If your sick you just try and stick through it to the point of passing out

Jinx won't leave your side, culred up on a chair trying to read one of your books, she doesnt understand much of it

Silco often checks in on you if sick, and gets roped into silently reading with Jinx in his lap.

Honestly a wholesome yet dysfunctional family but you all love each other and are willing to do anything for each other.