Little traveler - personal piece, need feedback :-)
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I love the concept and imagery! I would love to see a snippet of their story. Right now these are more like just a characters in a cool environment
️ so if they could be doing something, or something just happened or was about to happen. That would make it now engaging. -
@xin-li very cute
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@carolinedrawing thank you so much for your thoughtful questions. It gives me something to chew on.
@burvantill hehe, I will treat my sketches as character studies, and making new comps for the story :-). Maybe it is about small changes: for example in the last image, maybe leting the girl reaching for the wild straw berry, instead of just looking at it.
@Coley big hug back
it made me feel so much better to share a bit of my art process here. It really helps.@carlianne I really like the idea of doing "the moment before..." with the girl and the snail. I have to think a bit harder to get something interesting going.
@Marsha-Kay-Ottum-Owen thank you :-).
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I am back to thumbnails and rough sketches
A little descritpion:
Sketch 1: the little traveler is reaching out to touch a drop of dew.
Sketch 2: the little traveler stands on top of the snail to smell the spring flower
Sketch 3: the little traveler and the snail dresses up.With these sketches, I try to focus more on the interaction, and making the characters do stuff. What do you guys think? Are there any of these interesting enough for me to take it to finish yet, or should I keep going with thumbnailing?
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@xin-li Beautiful active drawings!
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@xin-li I like all 3. #2 is my favorite if you can capture the fact that the snail is moving while she smells the flower.
I could see this as a little board book. -
@Mara-Price thank you
@burvantill wow. a board book? That really got me to think. I will give a try. It is always good to have a product in mind I guess.
My goal so far was to make a serie of images with the same characters :-). It is for my portfolio - I kind of need some serie images. -
@xin-li said in Little traveler - personal piece, need feedback
:Sketch 2: the little traveler stands on top of the snail to smell the spring flower
I like the 2nd one most, the first one is a bit "normal". While I don't quite get what's going on in sketch #3. Could you make it in more details?
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@idid thanks for sharing your thoughts.
I guess I need to keep simplifying the #1. The comp is too complicated, which made it hard to read the main story.
#3 is very rough. I will do another pass as soon as I got some time to sit down to draw. -
Such a fun pair these two! This is going to be a great series! @xin-li
I actually like the first one. I can imagine a story were they might be a little too adventurous, almost at the point of falling down as the snail tries to reach out to a lower flower and the child looking at his/her own thing of interest. Then maybe the comp can be less static with the mushroom bending a lot? -
I love number three, number two is great I would love to see it zoomed in
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@marine interesting. I will keep in mind to make no.1 comp more dynamic when I do the next iteration.
@lmrush thank you. Do you think no.2 needs to be cropped in? hmmm. that made me think. But... I really want to show the snail character as well somehow. I will play around. I like no.3 as well, but I was not sure if the concept is working glad to hear that you like it. I will work out more details in the next iteration. -
At first I liked 2 the best because of the flower and stem curving down. But now that I look at it, I really like 3, because something about that snail's antennae and the dress up theme is really fanciful. Maybe it just needs a bit of refinement in the values? Or maybe it could be "zoomed in" just a tad?
I actually like all 3 of these, but agree that 1 is more "expected," while 2 and 3 are very dynamic.
Look forward to seeing how this goes! Hang in there! Your little one is important and these are rough times for everyone. If we could ignore that is going on, we wouldn't be human. And illustrators need to be very human!
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@xin-li Oh I meant from the first sketch, I now see you had zoomed in already in a later post
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@xin-li I love where you are going with these.
I think that the 3 thumbnails are much more powerful and energetic than the one in your original post. I think that is because you focusing on the characters doing something (other than just walking across the scene.)
Comments on each sketch
1: I think it might be more interesting if the snail was eating a strawberry too? Something to make it more active as a second read.
2: This one provides the best silhouettes by far. If you are going for a spot image I love this one for that.
- This one is the hardest to read as a thumb because it is the most complicated, in a book I think it would work later after the reader is familiar with the characters but as a stand-alone, I think you might struggle to convey what is going on. I really like the overall design and using the grasses to focus the viewer back into the center.
Just some thoughts, keep it up. I know it is hard right now. I am struggling to make any meaningful progress as well.
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It would deepen the bond and show us another side of the traveler if we saw her caring for her snail, perhaps the way one would care for a horse she loved. Grooming, feeding, scratching that itchy spot behind the tentacle. FYI - when you scratch that "itchy spot" on a a horse, it extends its neck, tilts its head and its upper lip will twist and elongate. That's horse heaven.
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@LauraA thank you so much for the feedback. I think I will focus on proceed with no.2 and 3 at this moment, and work on the idea no.1 a bit more later
@lmrush Thanks. I see what you mean now.
@theprairiefox really good point with silhouettes. I will keep in mind when I am working on no.1 and no.3. I agree no.2 seems to have the most clear silhouettes.
@Kim-Hunter I really love that you see the snail as her hourse. It was exactly what I had in mind. I wanted to draw one image where they curl up and sleeping togehter. But U like your idea of grooming, feeding and scratching. I will play with this idea.
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I really like them all to be honest and I see you've already decided to go with two and three. Can't wait to see the finished results. I understand what you mean, I feel like I'm in a bit of a creative slump but it seems that despite the difficult times, you're still making lovely art.
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@Rachel-Horne thank you so much. I try to keep going with art as much as I can to maintain some kind of normal life. Of course, it is impossile to work fulltime on art right now, as I also spend lots of family time which is really nice (if it was not for this crazy surreal time).
I love your recent instagram updates. They are bueatiful :-).
Stay safe and keep going -
@xin-li thank you
I've been loving your instagram pencil sketches. It's important to get some art in, even if it's just a small amount. It's definitely a strange time and even though it's great to spend some time with family, it's a little bittersweet too but art will see us through, I'm sure. xx
