The same new things

Here’s where I explain why I didn’t update last week. Long story short, I was at Texas, on a trip to see my brand new nephews. While there I was actually quite busy. My birthday was on the Saturday before (feel free to give me any happy birthdays now.) I was quite pleased with my presents. Excluding Madame Mystery’s presents I got: a camera (used often), Pokémon Heart Gold (FINALLY, it’s as amazing as the original version, if not even a little better) which came with a pokewalker (Guess what? You can’t spam levels on that, I tried, ran two mile in one day, you only get one level per stroll. However, you can get a whole bunch of cool Pokémon a lot earlier than without the Pokewalker) and finally, a few more games. All in all, it was a good birthday.

Now, I bet you’re finally waiting for those pictures you’ve been waiting four weeks to see.
Well…
That sketch book is awfully hard to scan
So…
They may or may not be…
Of poor quality…
But they probably won’t…
So…
Here you go.

This will probably be the last week I do a blog in the style of all the other posts. I feel it becomes as redundant as those random battles in a lot of RPGs. I’m not sure exactly how I’ll do the rest of the posts, but I think I’ll focus less on exact pictures and more on drawing in general (I’ll probably still do some parts on some posts on a certain picture however.) So enjoy this last, specific picture focused, post (and this post itself won’t even be the same as last posts in ways):

I admit I haven’t been drawing much since summer started and what I have drawn has just been the same thing: faces. Unfortunately, I’m still too scared to venture past faces. It’s just a problem I have right now.
So pretty much me pictures I have for you today are:

Raccoon faces,

More Raccoon Faces,

Some kind of cat(?) face (I don’t know what this was meant to be),

And another Raccoon face (this one is my latest, and probably my best)

So…there you have it. I guess the only thing I want to mention is that I didn’t add hair for the same reason I drew only faces, I’m too nervous to. I’m also trying to make the snout seem more…3D, but it’s not in it’s furthest stage yet. It’s interesting that as I change styles, things that used to be easy are now difficult.
So…
Umm…
I guess until the next blog post, just have a great life, and be prepared for change, ‘cause it always comes when you least expect it.

Just be prepared to be surprised,
Pikachao

Totally not late...nope, not at all

Hehehe, let’s just pretend that I’m not late. Let’s picture a perfect world where I updated last week and this is my update for this week. Can you imagine that? Good, now whisper it to yourself for the rest of the day and you’ll believe it. I’ll give you a moment to do that

…

*checks watch*

…

Hey, welcome back, that was a great update last week. That picture I drew defied all awesomeness. And that picture of my wrestling a lion was just amazing. It’s too bad that an evil leprechaun stole my new found art powers through a convoluted game of tic tac toe (But you already know that because of those pictures you saw last weeks blog) So here I am, climbing out of the ravine known as “Art Block Crevice.” I must say, I’m quite surprised by my progress, but instead of showing you where I am art wise, I’m going to show you my early birthday presents: (art related, I promise)

Madame Mystery Blogger got me these presents now because she won’t be here on my birthday (in other news Madame Mystery Blogger, or MMB for short, backed out of blogging in this, no need to fear, she will receive the coldest of shoulders tomorrow…now I feel like a jerk…) So what did I get that’s worth blogging about, easy:

A brand new sketchbook (I’d like to say it’s because my old one’s full, but I never had an old one…I’m a lot newer than you think)

 Unfortunately it’s not the most full, I haven’ had too much time to draw.

 A box full of erasers (which I really needed)

And a Ghiradelli (I expect my advertisement payment in the morning) Chocolate bar. Notice how gone it is, I ate that puppy in an hour (also notice it’s not there-ness. I put the wrapper on the table to take a picture of it, next thing I know it’s gone…trashed.)

Needless to say I was pleased with my early birthday bounty. I’ll thank MMB now instead of having to write one of those cheesy thank-you cards you find next to the “for kids” section at the hallmark store.

Definitely might be some pictures on the next blog post,

Pikachao

Late wake up call

Yes, this is late, I realize that. I had not one minute of Saturday to write this blog, much less post it. And Friday…well, let’s just say that Nintendo and The internet does not keep me very focused. Oh well, I got it to you now, didn’t I. which should be, I hope, no later than Monday. I’m still going with my once a week plan, this counts for the week I didn’t update on. I’ll still update again on Saturday.


…ummm yeah

Nothing

Much

To add…

Just go to the pictures already.



Amazingly enough, I don’t have much to show you during the two weeks that I promised you. I suppose it’s for a multiple amount of reasons. One is that I’m working on a project that I’d rather show you only when I actually finish it. The other is that I’m getting pickier of what I consider good art…so…I have exactly two pictures to show you…one I’m not the most happy with, but I digitized it, so I feel obliged to show it to you.

Alexandra DeMartin, revived from the character graveyards.

If you watch me on DeviantArt, then you have already seen this, and the next one as well. This is currently my Deviant ID at the moment, and I must say that I enjoy it very much. It’s probably the best digital work I’ve done…pretty much my whole art career. Admittedly, that is Huge or anything, but it’s enough for me to be proud of it. This picture also marked the first time (to be followed by all of my others) that I used basic shapes to form the head of a character. The only thing I don’t like about this picture at this moment are the ears. For some strange reason, the ears have been getting harder to do…meh, I’ll probably figure out why soon.

Penny “Pip” however, was not recently raised from the character graveyards. She’s actually relatively new. Also, for the information of all my friends who’ve seen this picture, it’s a Pokémon, a Pichu to be specific. Sure, it’s a rodent, but it ain’t no rabbit.

Meh, this one is a lot less balanced than the previous picture. There is some stuff I really like, and stuff I really don’t like.

First off, the stuff I like. The eyes, mostly with the color. I feel those eyes feel more realistic than my other eyes. Sure, they aren’t exactly the most realistic eyes in the world, but it’s good for now. The bandana was really nice too. I think my favorite part of it was the little tie-off on the back of it all. I was worried about it at first, but now I like it a lot. I guess the eyes are nice too. I feel the fur that stuck out didn’t look too bad either.

…

Now for the bad. First off, this has to be my worst shading I’ve done recently. It’s hard for the burn tool to appear on that yellow, so it’s not noticeable there, and everywhere it is noticeable, I think looks rather unpleasant. The face looks devoid of barely any emotion, she just looks…blank. The neck looks weird. My least favorite thing has to be, by far, the nose…well not so much the nose as the line thingy above the nose. The name of it escapes me, but so too seems to have been the confidence in my non snouted creations. That line bothers me greatly, I’ve already found a way to make that more flattering and I’ll show it to you when I actually apply it to a picture, but that doesn’t make this picture any less unappetizing for me.



Now I’m sure some may disagree with me, but I just have that need to point out all of my errors. It definitely has nothing, nothing at all to do with winning sympathy points…none at all…anyone who says otherwise is crazy.

Sorry if my post is short for two weeks (and two days) worth of pictures, but you’ll just have to deal with it, I’m writing this blog for myself just as much as I am for you, so…nyeh.



Look out, behind you, IT’S A TRAP,

Pikachao

5 fixable things

As it’s the end of the month, I’ve decided to show the ‘interwebz’ my monthly “What can I improve on” session (granted, I do it more that this, but Monthly is my bare minimum.) After days of studying my art, I’ve come up with five things that bother me about my artwork. I don’t hate my art, but I have many ways to improve, I figure that putting out there what I want to change is a smart thing to do (but don’t expect this every month, this won’t happen all that commonly.) These are ranked from least obnoxious to most obnoxious in my opinion, some are problems with my art, others are things that I don’t do in my art, but all are things I need to fix…so, on with the show.






5. I Want To Make More Styles Of Hair

Meh, this one’s minor, so I’ll keep the explanation short. Most of my hair is way similar, so I want to change that to make my characters look more unique (which I’ll talk more about on number three)…and that’s all…simple as that…not much else to say, so I’ll just go right on into number four.

4. I Don’t Use Those Little Shapes And Lines When Starting New Art.

This bothers me to no end. Every other artist that I like use circles, lines, and other shapes as a skeleton of sorts to build there characters. I DON’T DO THAT. It makes me feel inadequate. I don’t mean tat I refuse to try it, I mean that when I do, it always looks bad (I’d show you, but I have no nerve whatsoever to do that. The only good that came out of those was it was a major stepping stone in my style, and by that I mean it made me like drawing furries.) My friend (The mystery, maybe, blogger) Claims that she doesn’t do it either. She thinks it’s too conformist, but I have to point out that EVERY Artist that I enjoy on DA uses this same system (I’m almost sure of it) and look at them, there art is pretty dang good. (This used to be first, but I’m getting better at this)



3. I Want To Make More Unique Looking Characters

This one really comes back to number five. I feel that my characters aren’t exactly the easiest to distinguish. I may be wrong on this considering how harsh I am on my own art (which is rule number one for being an artist, you have to hate your art…bloody terrible rule if you ask me, I can’t look at my art without thinking it’s horrible.) It’s not the character themselves; I know that for a fact, I try quite hard to make my characters look unique in planning. Like the other two below it, it’s both not a huge deal to me and I’ve been getting slowly better at making the characters look more unique.



2. I Feel Inadequate When It Comes To Inking, Paper or Digital.

Another one that drives me insane, after I finish drawing on I do the first logical thing I can think of, scan it into the computer. Now I prefer digital as opposed to inking, but that still has problems with it. I have a tablet that I’m not the best with yet, so it’s not yet the same quality lineart as with the paper. Mostly the main thing that bothers me about digital art is when I add color to it. I can’t ever seem to find a natural set of colors that look like real colors you’d see on what I’m drawing. After I find a somewhat good color scheme I usually end up messing it up when I shade. Shading is more of a problem because I don’t have a set way to do it. I’ve heard of many ways to do it, but most don’t work the best for me. Using the Burn/Dodge tools can look nice, but it’s way too easy to mess up. I’m still in the search for a good way to shade, but, for now, I’m going to have to work with what I can do.



1. I Can’t Make Working Bodies

Easily the most bothersome part of drawing for me. I want to be able to draw my characters…all of them…actually doing stuff. Currently I’m stuck on drawing shoulders and above only. It’s a mixture of a lot of things: I’m scared to start drawing more than I’m comfortable with. I am always worried about ruining a picture by adding something I’m not good at onto it. Another key reason probably has to do with how I learn. No matter how many classes I take, tutorials I read, or art books I buy, I only ever seem to get better when I’m drawing on my time. Sure I study a lot of people’s art and that comes in handy when I’m drawing by myself, but I can never seem to draw something new well unless it’s not completely on purpose. Almost all of the ways that I draw today started out as simple doodles I drew in class or while I was bored. If I was making an honest effort to draw something in some specific way, I wouldn’t like how it turned out. It’s some weird style of learning. I’m sure that eventually I’ll learn my way of drawing bodies, but I have no clue when I will start to do that. It could be tomorrow or five years from now. It’s a little worrisome I’d say. I hope it comes sooner than later.











I apologize for the lack of pictures on this one, but I promise to post two weeks worth of pictures next week. Sound good? I’m also sorry if I sound depressed, cause I’m not, I’m just putting out my goals for all to see. Heck, I’m working on improving it quite a bit as we speak. None of those artists that I like just started. They’ve gone through years (for the most part) of drawing, I started this year. I’ve got a lot of time to improve.



Dont’cha just love walls of text?

Pikachao

More than meets the eye

Well, whatd’ya know. My styles changed already. Not drastically or any of that, but enough to point out, Mostly with the eyes. Interestingly enough, Eyes are both the most integral part of my art, it’s also the part I change the most (I had to change my whole style completely when I changed my eyes for the first time.) I actually went through two styles of eyes over this week before settling on the ones I have now.




Not only that, but I also worked on shading via digitally. I had more success than I thought, but more on that when I get to that picture:

First of two side views, both were done back to back

I think I like the next one better, this ones snout bothers me too much. What you can see of the ear is nice, if only because of how it hides into the hair. Not too much to say on this one actually.

This ones snout looks much better if I ever said. The hair does look a little odd, but nothing too bad. If I keep working I could actually keep side views looking consistent (Side views used to be as daunting as drawing arms and legs are right now.) Notice in both of these pictures I used my old eyes (eyes number one.) I drew this on the same sheet of paper as the next one. The next picture was originally just an eye doodle, but I liked the eye, so I drew a head around it…see this is why my in-class doodles are always cut off.

Hehe, I just realized how much this looks like the Avatar movie Poster

Introduce eye number two (hi eye, nice to meet you.) The eyes are certainly more feline than the other ones, but looking back on it, I don’t think they’re my favorite. I did multiple other drawings with these eyes on them (which I refuse to show anyone) and they just don’t look…right on them.

I might as well point out that this face is suffering from being way too similar to a circle. I circle qualities in the face, but this one is way to…umm…circle-y.

Hey look, more stuff I haven’t ever showed you before

SNOUTS! This is a first for me. I studied up on how to draw them and attempted it. Lo and behold, it actually worked. It looks pretty nice; it was so nice that I digitized it (That’s a term on Digimon, right? I haven’t watched that show in ages.) The only major thing that bothers me is the hair. I’m not a master at hair, so I don’t know how real this looks. It’s a nice little style I think, but the presentation could use some work on it. This is also the only picture I did with eyes number two that I actually enjoy.

No, I’m not exactly sure what kind of canine it is. I guess it could be some coyote or fox or something. It doesn’t matter immensely, because if I make it into a character of mine I’ll figure it out then. I think she’s probably some desert dog thing.

I didn’t color the shirt for a reason

I have always been a little worried about digitally drawing for three reasons:

1) I recently got a tablet for Christmas, but I am not good at drawing with it yet. I think it has to do with hand eye coordination. Until I get good at it, I’ll always be a little worried about digitally drawing.

2) I never seem to pick natural colors for my characters.

3) I don’t have a system for shading.



Well, wow, I am honestly surprised by how this turned out, the shading especially. It was a mixture between using the burn/dodge tools and using a method that takes a while to explain, so I’ll just call it method purple (and that isn’t a random color by the way.) I fixed some of the hair so it looked more natural. I actually really like how this turned out. It’s easily my best digital work ever. I’m really quite proud of it. I’ve always preferred digitally drawing as opposed to inking my art, so if I get more consistent with this, I can finalize pictures via digital…Huzzah!







Why yes, I did draw this upside down…how’d you know?



Finally, eye number three, easily my favorite of all three. It’s more malleable, thus I can show more emotion with it and it’s the easiest to draw consistently (Plus I just love how they look like Dots…I love that candy <3)

It’s a little weird, how I advance in drawing I mean. Usually when it’s something that stays, I didn’t ever study it. It just kind of…came out of thin air. It was hints of inspiration. I guess it just comes from drawing almost 24/7. Hey, I don’t mind, whatever gets my art better I’ll probably do. I guess I’ll show you guys next week what strange thing I’ve done next, until then, so long.



Adieu, Adieu, to you and you and you-u-u,

Pikachao

It's all about Eileen isn''t it

Hey y’all, it’s me again (Of course it is, who else could it be, it’s still only me.) I have a lot more stuff to show you. Weirdly enough, it’s all Eileen. You know…the raccoon girl I talked about in the last two posts…ring a bell?


No?

Oh well, you’ll catch on soon enough. Well, I have a whopping four pictures to show you, that’s a new record. I’ll just show you them in chronological order, oldest to newest. So why wait, here they are:

What’re you talking about…of course I…pay attention…in German (In my defense, this was a time without any work to do.)



As with all of my doodles, some of it is cut off (Weird isn’t it.) I think it’s quite nice though. The face is a good shape and the ears look mighty fine on her. Overall, it’s rather nice. The hair was my proudest accomplishments with this though. After that sketch in the last blog I drew another picture with that hair that was hideous (No, I’m not showing it to you.) So this was a nice second attempt, even if the hair is cut off by the paper.

The second of the bunch

Unlike the previous one, I have a lot more problems with this one, mainly with the head shape. I don’t like it, it just seems off. My other ones are more like circles and look rather nice, but this one is more of an oval and I it bothers me. I don’t know, maybe I’m just paranoid (Or at least that’s what the man tells me…BUT I DON’T BELIEVE THEM.)



*ahem* moving on.

I did like some stuff on this though. The tail looks nice; I like the shape of it all. The hair is another success, especially the part that flows between her head and shoulders (Does that even make any sense?) I’m still scared to move into either legs or arms in positions other than the ones in this picture. It scares me a little, walking off into the unknown.

My first good profile view

I probably wouldn’t be showing this one if it wasn’t a first for me. For the longest time I have been unable to draw side views of my characters, so even something semi good is amazing to me when doing this, Her snout might be a little long, but I think it’s good overall. It’s a step in the right direction (what is that song from…crap, that’s gonna drive me crazy now…I don’t even know how to find out)

Technically I made this before the last one, but that was in pencil. I digitized this last.

If you’re astute (Or I pester you about it over and over again) then you’d already know that this is my new avi. If you aren’t then bah ram you. Meh, some of the proportions on this are not as good as others, but that doesn’t worry me too much. This little picture was tiny, I don’t know why I drew it so small, but I did and that caused problems. The right ear looks a little messed (that’s both the errors of both pencil and computer.) The mouth also bothers me too, it looks weird. Before I get on to the big thing I liked from this, I noticed while coloring that, with color, she looked kind of like a Dalmatian. Am I the only one? Good.

As with all pictures I do, one thing always stands out to me over everything else. This one was the eyes. Yep those puppies could only be done on the computer (unless you can draw.) I really, really like how it turned out. It’s a happy moment for me.

One more thing to note before I sign off is that you can’t see it, but the stars behind Eileen are formed into Orion. Mandatory education level reached. Three new quests are opened. Would you like to save game?



Take this; it’s dangerous to go alone,

Pikachao

Cats And Dogs

Ah, the age old question: Are dogs better than cats? The answer, yes. A million times over yes. Dogs are amazing creatures that bond with you, but when I’m at a friends house who owns a cat, I never see the cat. They avoid me and hate any contact with their owners. Now I know exceptions can be made for each side of the argument (Some cats like attention, just none that I’ve seen of course) but no matter how you slice it, dogs will always be better (I realize that I will not survive the next time I see my friends after this blog post though, but I stand by what I say.)




Oddly enough however, my preferences seem to switch when I draw them. I prefer drawing cats over dogs. I don’t know exactly why, but that’s how it works. I know that because of my dog I drew over the weekend.

It’s not that I hate it, by no means is that true, it just feels a little un…doglike. I believe that mainly comes from the snout, I could not get the snout long enough, and that was bothering me quite a bit, so it’s shortened. I guess it could be some short snouted dog species, but you know…It still bothers me.’


I did draw a body that, I must say, I am actually quite happy about. Albeit it’s not all that expressive or anything, but it looks natural. It’s a good step for being able to make working bodies, a thing which I’m nervous about attempting (I believe it’s more of a “I don’t want to ruin a good picture by adding a bad body to it” than a “I don’t want to draw bodies” mentality.)







I did actually doodle out a cat during German and English (don’t worry, I was doing it during times that I was allowed to…yeah…definitely) I was doodling a nose and the rest of the head went with it. I did it at the top of the page, so some of it’s head is missing.

Well it is a sketch

It’s pretty similar to my other, newer, artwork, but the hair I really enjoy. Of course I didn’t get to try the whole thing, as the top of the head is missing, but from what I did do, it’s an improvement. I also had her mouth open, which was…well semi-new. I’ve drawn mouths open, but most were more done from the forward facing pictures and the ones that weren’t were a little less…umm…what’s the word…I don’t know…a little less…that way?




An interesting thing to bring up is that only one of the characters I’ve drawn lately actually has a name. All the other ones are just people that have no thing about them except on art improvement. The character in particular is the one in last posts picture. Her name is Eileen. Yeah…just…thought that’d be an interesting tidbit.





I stand by my beliefs, dogs are better than cats…Unless I’m drawing pictures. I will never change my mind on that opinion right there (not the first part at least.)





Fleeing from the angry mob of cat lovers,

Pikachao