Bully Alien Kid

[roel]

My first impression is you should work on your composition, use of color, aesthetic vision, light, shading, texture, perspective, crosshatching, use of material, detail, realism, credibility, the character's personality, clothing, expression, anatomy and proportions, general atmosphere, and your selfperception.

[TheBaron]

That's a pretty long list, is it really that bad? Well since I've never really done any drawing on the computer before I should expect some problems. Hopefully I'll get better with time.

Composition: I have yet to decide on a background/location/situation for the character so I just centralised him and made some cliche stars.

Colour: It's cartoony, I've yet to learn to colour properly with photoshop.

aesthetic vision, light and shading: Will obviously improve with a location.

Texture: I wanted him smooth and simple, however I did consider a bumpy skin.

Perspective: His eye may not look right for his stance however, it's exagerated.

Crosshatching: None present I airbrushed the shading.

Material: Well, I made good use of pixels :p

Detail: He's meant to be simple and not overly detailed.

Realism: Obviously not the way I'm heading here.

Credibility: Of me or the character?

Personality: Cheeky, a bit of a thug.

Clothing: I haven't really decided yet, so a red jumper was a simple choice.

Expression: Looks like he's going to do something bad.

Anatomy and proportions: How can you tell what it should be like, he's an alien. I have also yet to finish the body as mentioned.

General Atmosphere: He's in space, there isn't any. Heh.

Self Perception: Well in relation to the image, I was hoping for a fun cartoony effect. I feel it's at most, not bad.

Hope this addresses your crits, Roel.
We all gotta start somewhere.

Your work is excellent buy the way.

[ndat]

LOL @ this thread you people are crazy :)

Yes drawing in photoshop is hard, like anything new, but youll get the hang of it...

[puddlefish]

My first advice would be to discard everything that Roel has said as a rude and inconsidered crit. The fact that he mentioned 'realism' and 'crosshatching' as relevant here shows that he doesn't think before he types. There are many valid ways to draw. Well done on not taking this to heart, by the way, it shows you have the attitude to take harsh criticism.

As regards crits, it depends entirely on what the character is to be used for. I know you said he is to be modelled in 3D, but for what use? Is he for a short? Just for practice?

If he is to be used for more than just practice, than I would try to develop his character a little beyond a bit of a thug. Try to think more about his situation, what makes him tick? Then try to bring these aspects accross in your drawing. A good character design should portray 90% of what you want the audience to know about your character without any explanation.

If he is to be used purely for practice, then I would suggest making him a little more complex. This really depends on your level of skill when it comes to 3D, but you know yourself if this will be a challange for you or not. There's not much point in doing something you'll find very easy.

Hope this helps!

[TheBaron]

Thank you very much Puddlefish, that's been very helpful indeed. The idea was to use this character just for practice, however I see exactly what you mean about developing the character if he was to be used for a proper animation.

I'll try and make him a bit more complex to give me more of a challenge when I start to model him in 3D. I'm not an excellent modeller but at present I could probably make him quite easily.

Thanks you've been very helpful. You've certainly got me thinking which is what I wanted from this forum. I'll be posting updates as soon as I can.

[roel]

Alright, alright, I admit that I may have added some less relevant items to my list of crits... Anyway, you took it remarkably well, so I guess the joke's on me.

Nonetheless, attempting to critique on your drawing does call for some cruel honesty. Now, since you're a real man, you can take it. Right? So here it is...

Your character has no personality. You say he's the thug type, but you might as well have crowned him king of the universe. If you want him to be a thug, think of what defines him as a thug. Surely, a single sharp tooth won't do.

The red shirt/sweater/pyjamas/whatever won't give us any hints either. Maybe you could at least write "THUG" on it, or add a legend at the bottom of the image explaining that all the guys with red shirts are thugs, and the ones with blue shirts are good guys. I'm being an arse again, aren't I? Oh well...

Now for some basic anatomy (if we can call it that). Since your character appears to be some sort of humanoid, I guess I can make the following assumptions:
- His ears should be sticking out the sides of his head, rather than the back. Also, his ear seems to have been rammed into the back of his head with excessive force, because there is a dent in his head at that location.
- His eyebrow/frown should be somewhat more parallel to his eye, and about as wide.
- His eye should not be curved in more than one direction.

Also, I would like to point out that the alien's forehead is square, while the back is round. And his chin lacks definition. You may have selected these facial features by choice, but if so, it was probably a bad one.

Right, with that settled, let's take a look at the use of light and shadow. First of all, the direction of the light is unclear. Judging from the top of his head, a lightsource must be located in front of him. The highlight and shadow on his mouth, however, suggests it is located below him, unless we look at the shadow under his tooth, which suggests it is above. But since the skin around his eye is highlighted all around, perhaps we should assume the light originates thence (from his eye).

Also, the highlights and shadows are nothing but thin bands. This makes your alien look flat. This is especially bad where his eye is concerned.

Right, this should do for now... It's half past twelve here, I should be in bed rather than wasting my eyes staring at a computer screen. I'll continue my rant tomorrow (if I'll still feel like it by then).

Good night,
Roel

[Kananga]

roel....getcha head outa your ass man!!!:scream:

[derelict]

GREAT FER KID'S BOOK!!

Not scary..but with lots of character there!

I LIKE IT!

[ndat]

Originally posted by farquar
roel....getcha head outa your ass man!!!:scream:

Call me crazy but he did give some good advice. Although a good character, I believe there is room for improvement, and following some of his advice might be just what your char needs :)

Anyway for some reason this thread seems really funny to me, great conversation :). Baron you replied perfectly to his comments, great job, made me laugh my ass off. Id also like to point out that Im not stoned, I'm just really prone to laugh today or something...

[roel]

Originally posted by farquar
roel....getcha head outa your ass man!!!:scream:


DO NOT TAUNT THE BUNNY!


Hey, he asked for comments! It's best we give people something to work with, rather than indiscriminately saying "hey, I like it" about every single pic that hops along! Especially if - and forgive me for being so rude - there is so much room for improvement. This IS the critiques section, after all.

[TheBaron]

Farquar: Roel redeemed himself with his second crit, he did leave some interesting comments that focusssed on problem areas and I thank him for that. The comments about the light and shadow are especially valid to my drawing as I have lit it in a very strange way. However hopefully I can rectify these problems and develop the character further.

ndat: Glad you liked my reply, I take things in my stride. I understood Roel meant no harm and after looking at his website could see he definately knew what he was talking about.

I just gotta keep on practicing with this tablet and learning new ways to draw. For some reason I find it so much harder than paper. Still we'll see.

[moshi]

Hey TheBaron,

He looks very childlike, and as someone mentioned before, great for a kids book. I like the green, and even though I think the clothing needs work, at least red and green are complimenty colours!

I think what roel has said has some good points. I do also think roal needs to learn how to give crit, and the best way to go about it, or he will go through life putting people off side.

Really think about who your character is, this can include so much more information than his looks, but things that you may never see. This is what gives your character depth, and it also is somthing which you can go back to for animaton or even just drawing poses - you can look at this and say "What would my character do in this situation based on this background".

It gives you a background, and it will give you a understanding of the motivations behind this character. This will all effect what he does, and action he does (animation) to do it.

This can include:

- his parents - who are they, where are they now?
- where does he live?
- what does he eat?
- where does he sleep? or does he?
- why is he a thug? how did he get this evil background?
- if he is a thug, who does he work for? and why?
- what language does he speak in?
- does he have a religion?
- what are his motivations? goals?
- where does he work?
- how does he walk? what is his internal rythem/drive?
- any other family? brothers, sisters? where are they? what is his relation
now? and why?

I could go on, bu this will get you thinking! Hope this helps, and I hope to see where this leads. :)

Michael
moshi
http://www.moshidesign.com

[Kananga]

yeah, I couldve been more constructive myself come to think of it.

I like the character, only I think he looks a bit flat. Maybe if you try roughing the characters shape out, sort of like this.....

http://picserver.student.utwente.nl/getpicture.php?id=10365

That way you might get some volume into the character. Anyway, I cleaned the rough up and got this....

http://picserver.student.utwente.nl/getpicture.php?id=10366

I added the smiley face onto the tshirt to bring a bit of irony to the character. Thats how I'd approach it anyway.

[BC1967]

I'm with the Bunny!
Some times the truth hurts.
Having taught art courses in commerical schools , I've found that the hardest thing to do is tear someone down to build them up.
As I've been reading this thread I'm thinking you guys are doing a GREAT job of "good cop, bad cop" in the your efforts to teach and raise the standards of those posting.
Hat's off to you!
portfolio (http://www.epilogue.net/cgi/database/art/list.pl?gallery=3126)

[CGTalk Moderation]

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.