did this drawing really evoke enough emotion?

#1

I posted this picture on gfxartist.com were it did quite well, 7 reactions and a score of 63. (13 votes)I also posted it here into the finished work and had 2 reactions, which isnt so much.
The people that reacted here and on gfxartist said it was cute, which was my intention. So it seems that the emotion i wanted to express got picked up by people seeing it. But even though people recognised it as being cute, i hardly got views and no rating here, where as artworks that people really like get a lot of views even when the artist is not well-known yet.

So my question is: Did i fail to evoke a real strong emotion? (maybe cute isnt enough?)
Or was it more a matter of lacking technique/theme not interesting for most people here?

I know it could just have been a matter of bad luck that not too many people reacted, but maybe my drawing is just not that strong. So please fire away with comments and critics :slight_smile:

#2

I like the color composition, and yes, the characters are “cute.” The one thing that could do more to evoke an emotional response, is to make the mouth and eyes more “life-like” on the central character; right now they look kinda pasted on. Also it might help if the “bear” was looking with his eyes AND head more towards his friend.

#3

I dont think the “line of action” is clear enough.
It might help if like matt said, you turned the heads of the chars…

Somehow i think that its the background that detracts the attention from the bear and the snake.

Maybe you should try to desaturate the bakground? or give it just a slight blur?

As it is now all the elements of the picture are on the same “level”
which makes it hard to determine the main focus of the piece.

on the other hand, some people succesfully use this as a technique. So its just my 2 cents. hope it helps some…

#4

the characters are “cute” but the environment isn’t… maybe this is just confusion. you need to exaggerate things more perhaps to get people to understand that emotion you are going for.

#5

Cute is OK … Adorably Cute is better if you push things along this line.

SO – how do you elevate Cute to Adorably Cute … well to start with you have to know what it is that triggers the human “Cute” response. Baby like is one – which means a certain proportionality to the face.

  • You need a large forehead – the bigger the cuter (to an extent). Your teadybear has a small forhead – as if its really old.
  • big eyes – think Disney character eyes.

thats just a starter.

try google eyes – different size pupils or cross eyed. Rember that Cute and Adorable are closley associated with amusment, laughing and delight. If you start with a basically cute character and then add some strangness to it (like differnt size pupils) then it is often interpreted as even more cute.

THe snake would vastly benifit from huge eyes – try seeing just how riduclously big you can make them – and google eyes too.

You could also really pump the saturation and variance (gamma type darken) a bit of the foliage and sky.

That should get you started.

#6

Hi,

thanks you all took the time to reply :slight_smile:
I give my reaction on your feedback and i’m going to make some scribbles and changes to the drawing based on what you said and post those in this thread.

mattbolton: that’s indeed a problem with the drawing. i made the poses and characters 2 months ago, before i started to really think about such things.

e.t: there’s indeed a problem with the line of action. you’re right that the elements of the drawing are very on the same level. i think this is the style that came with the creatures, i made one drawing before this one and that was also one were everything was on the same level. so i did not give much thought on this one. but maybe it fits together in my mind for this style and creature. in general it aint a good idea.

womanonfire: what is for you a cute environment? do you have some examples of artworks that have a cute environment?
Again i did not give this too much thought, because the initial plan for the creature (it is an avatar for a friend of mine) was a fantasy creature in a realistic background as you see in some old cartoons.

mark.snoswell: you’re absolutely right. i might need to express those things better. i’'m just a bit afraid it will make it look like a very standard cute creature, but i’m going to try anyway. it is certainly is a good tip for the young matibeesjes (that’s the name of the creature type) because i had trouble making them look young.

again, thanks for posting and if you’re interested you can see some scribble/changes based on your feedback. i’m going to post these today and tomorrow :slight_smile:

#7

a quick scribble of another pose. i think this one works a lot better :slight_smile:

okat that leaves the background and bigger eyes and so on ^0^

#8

The focus and the poses are much better this way. An open/smiling mouth and some eyebrows with expression might help bring out the snake’s personality some more.

#9

snake is way better … but the teddys head is way too small in relation to his body now. the head should be about 1/4 - 1/3 of the his height!!

#10

I made one last changed drawing and a scribble, and i want to close this thread by that, because i am not going to redo the drawing because i want to try something else and i would have to repaint it anyway to get it right. I hope that what i posted shows that i understood your feedback, i feel at least that i learned something from your comments :slight_smile:

I will have to re-think the characters based on your comments. I can’t promise i use all of the ideas you gave me, since there is a concept behind the characters and i made them together with someone else, which means i cant change everything. Ow and i can also be a bit stubborn now and then ^0^

I tried to distuingish the matibeesje more from the background, fixed the colors and blurred the background a little. I think it is better this way, but is remains an overall-emphasis drawing. I need to totally change the composition if i want to make the background less important, there is just too much detail in it.

Here is a scribble (please don’t mind proportions too much it was done really quickly) from a young matibeesje and an adult one. I hope this young one looks cute enough.

Thanks again for taking the time to post and if you need some feedback from me on something you made, just send me a message and i will be happy to help :slight_smile:

#11

IMHO, “cute” isn’t really an emotion.

The drawing is very good artistically, but I think of an advertisement for fabric softener, pediatric allergy medicine, or a cartoon when I see it.

To evoke a strong emotion, I’d try focusing more on the characters. I’d also give them more emotion themselves in their features. They seem to be surrounded by a distracting (albeit beautiful) environment.

Good work; just didn’t stir me. But then, that’s just me. :slight_smile:

#12

oh dear, an advertisement for fabric softener or pediatric allergy medine? :o
that was not what i intented :wink: but i can understand it, since you see cuddly bears in kids stuff/fabric softener ads.

cute isnt the best of definitions, i guess its better described as the feeling you get when you see a puppy or a kitten, this aaaaaaaaah feeling :wink:

the surrounding is indeed to distracting as the others already mentioned, i wanted a detailed surrounding but now it takes up too much attention.

it seems this character just doesnt stand out enough on its own. there’s a whole story behind it but that doesnt show in a single drawing. time for a short comic maybe :wink:

#13

“cute” is not an emotion and i am unsure of exactly what emotion is being portrayed here - what are you trying to say? what emotion are you trying to depict? put a name to these and you will be better able to clearly communicate what-ever-it-is that you wish to communicate

to me, drawings or paintings are niether good nor bad - i prefer to see them as either sucessful or unsucessful at at communicating a thought or emotion

#14

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