Finishing Drills for a Chronic Dabbler.

[MichaelaH]

@animatosoor It looks beautiful, love this "highlighted" lady in picture, now you see their communication much better. also the feet, great work as usual...I think I have to start this also, week or 2 for one picture and my portfolio

[animatosoor]

@Darian That's true, and I've got to try and keep that in mind. Thank you so much for the encouragement.

Yes, I can show you the work I was referring to. They were a collection of portrait paintings for a local history book. In my opinion, some of the portraits turned out better than the others, and I cringe at some of the bad ones. Some of the paintings I did for this book last year are over here: link.

[animatosoor]

@MichaelaH Thank you! Both the "gloss" on the lady in the picture and the ghost girl's stance were your ideas - you really helped with your feedback (as always).

Yeah, I didn't know at the start whether this goal of completing at least one finished painting a week was going to work out, but it's been really helpful to do this. If you end up doing it as well, you'll have my full support and encouragement! It'd be awesome to see what you come up with.

[animatosoor]

Yay, it's Monday here!

There was previously a tangent where the ghost's head was touching the oval ornament on the wall. I've fixed that.

Final:

Note to self on pain points to learn from in the next piece.:

-I don't understand cast shadows.
-Some areas still look muddy.
-Floor could be designed better.
-Explore gesture further.

[Heather Boyd]

@animatosoor

Pain points to learn good good.

[Darian]

It's Monday here too! Where you from @animatosoor

[animatosoor]

@Darian I'm from Singapore - a very sunny island (for the most part).

[Darian]

@animatosoor that's cool! how are you figuring out your colors after you decide the values? do your values stay the same after the color stage?

[animatosoor]

@Darian I'm still at the stage where I'm learning a lot of the basics about assigning the right values and colours to the various elements in each painting I do. I find that I'd sometimes get to the colour stage and push some of the values further if necessary, even if those decisions weren't previously made in the value studies. I think I'd be able to learn to make better decisions with these once I've gotten a lot more mileage in finishing my work.

As for colour palettes, I'd first think of what I'd like in my painting that would best fit the mood I'm shooting for, and then gather references (photos and other paintings) to draw from.

How about you - what are your approaches when it comes to value and colour?

[animatosoor]

Week 5!

This is a sketch I'm working on for my next painting in the series, "Our Little Ghost."

[Heather Boyd]

@animatosoor

Your third sketch reminds me of walking through the hobbits home, it’s very quaint. You rolling these out inspired me to pump out my Godzilla so thank you so much, keep going!

[MichaelaH]

@animatosoor Really lovely room illu. Like the many toys. I am missing some toy which the girl is holding or what is the story to this picture? And other picture, I so offen commenting, do You mind to tell me what your first name is or how I can call you? soo or rya or J?

[animatosoor]

@Heather-Boyd Thank you for the kind words; I love that you've been inspired in this way! Your entry for Godzilla looks really good.

[animatosoor]

@MichaelaH Thank you, Michaela!

As far as the story goes, it is my interpretation of a line in the poem that speaks of the bed being like a kingdom. While I've placed many toys in the room, I also wanted to show the foundation of the bed itself being built of magical things: mythical creatures, legendary kings and queens, treasure chests, etc.

Right now many of those are still represented by spheres. My idea is to also give them almost the same rendering as the ghost girl when I get to that stage, so that they are clearly shown as "dream-like" images, and not real objects attached to her bed frame. XD

If there are ways you (or anyone else) can think of to better represent this idea, I'd love to hear them!

And other picture, I so offen commenting, do You mind to tell me what your first name is or how I can call you? soo or rya or J?

You can address me as Soorya. Your comments are always deeply appreciated.

[MichaelaH]

@animatosoor wow sounds like good story, till now I don't have anything to add .) It looks great Soorya

[animatosoor]

@MichaelaH Aww, thank you.

Here's an updated version of my drawing. I'll be moving on to values, but if there's anything problematic with the composition I'd be willing to go back and make changes.:

[animatosoor]

Value studies for the previous drawing:

I've been developing the next illustration in the series simultaneously.

Thumbnails for the next illustration in the series:

If anyone is able to provide their input on this: does the ghost girl still look like the same ghost girl from before (even with her crazed expression?)

[MichaelaH]

@animatosoor I like the left value illustration and for the crazy girl, I think the head is ok, but the original girl has very short legs, like the knee till feet should be much smaller.

[animatosoor]

@MichaelaH You're right - I didn't notice her legs were so long. She'd be very tall if she stood up from that log, haha.

I have her legs dangling over the log now, so the feet no longer touch the ground. I think I will have to explore the gesture some more, if this is still not working.

[animatosoor]

New sketch for the campfire illustration. There's very little going on in this image, and I don't really know how to arrange the elements in a pleasing way. I'm also not happy with the foreground just yet,:

Colour studies for the bedroom illustration. I didn't want to do another blue painting (I'd recently done one), and wanted to explore showing night-time in cool reds/purples.