hi cgers, when my wacom broke I thought it’d be a good time to pratice some anatomy and shapes since I’d never really done so seriously… ever.
Starting of with male heads. I got the books by Loomis, so it’s his techniques I’m learning and using.:wise:
Some of them doesn’t feel quite right so any cc on how to improve isc as always, appreciated.
Edit1: Now that’s silly, forgot to link the images x_x
Heya wasker,
Nice to see you start a Sketchbook here, and a solid start to your studies! I look forward to seeing your improvement. 
Cheers,
-Rebeccak
Hi wasker, i’m going through the Loomis books too. You’re doing pretty good but keep on practicing with getting the placements of the features correct. I found the chapter on the planes of the face really helped me with that. Did you read that part yet?
Hi and thanks, Roja. I have just gone through the first pages, these heads are from plane 2 and 3. Just starting the 4th featuring the simplified skull. Just have to go grab myself a cup o’ tea first to get myself started. 
Hi
i’m looking at your loomis head constructions and argh now i realize I’ll have to do hundreds more omg
anywa, yours are pretty good, keep going 
Hi wasker!
These are great studies, I’ve done quite a few head studies from the loomis books myself. I had similar problems finding the features of the face (and still do).
Keep plugging away at those studies, things will fall into place more and more.
Thanks NR43 and Adien
I flipped a page and started looking at the skulls. However this part of lacks abit information and if you have extremly basic knowledge of anatomy and bones (as I) it’s abit hard to imagine how a skull looks from beneath or from any other angle not drawn by Loomis himself.
So now I have two of your threads to follow I think environments are your stronger side, but who knows what will happen after some time of studying human figure.
Good luck on this path 
Thanks Razz. I’ll try to get some anatomy skills for some character studies I want to do while my wacom is broken. Still got a week and a half before I get it back.
Tried some of this aswell. Both are from references found at the ref thread at CG. I read yesterday that it’s important to draw using all of your arm instead of your fingers/wrist. I feel my pictures end up quite gritty, anyone got any tips on pencil techniques to get smooth shadings?
Hi wasker,
Some very nice efforts here. For smooth shading, I might recommend keeping your pencil very sharp, and shading on the point of your pencil. Also, you might try shading from top left to bottom right of the paper, so that there is less smudging involved - try placing a sheet of clean paper under your hand to prevent smudging as well.
Slux has a nice tutorial on Shading here:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showpost.php?p=2705824&postcount=32
Hope it helps!
another technique is using the side of the tip. I sometimes don’t even hold the pencil but just lay it in my hand and let it slide on the paper without actually pushing it.
However, I think which ever technique you use… the more time you take for it - the more gradually building up the shading - the better it will look, but at a cost of time spent.
i think your shading isn’t that bad though
Thanks a lot, Rebeccak and NR43. Awesome tips. I’ve always been more of a person who hold on the tip of the pen.
Another study, a woman this time after I showed some of the pictures to my grrl, and she asked why I only drew men “perhaps you don’t like women?”
Edit1: Wierd looks as if she have freckles on her bottom after I scanned her.
Edit2: And some eyes by studying (more like copying x_x) Loomis work
Forgot to mention that I had a reference for the girl 1 post up.
Studying heads and the neck
Wasker, do you know an artist named Glenn Vilppu? He has lots of very great DVD’s about figure drawing, maybe you should check them out. Not much about all the bones and muscles, but about how to use your anatomy knowledge to draw figures. He’s one of my most favorite artists and I’ve done lots of his studies. Just thought it might be interesting for your. You can find him HERE.
It’s just that I don’t like Loomis’ anatomy books much, the way he draws the figure, that simplified skeleton…bah.
Maybe you’ll like Vilppu’s way better, just as I did :bounce:
Oh, I got interested in how you’ve learned to paint environments (my weak part)? I might just do a study or two
God tip, Razz. I’ll get some of his dvds. I’m also abit annoyed that Loomis simplifies. But by all means he is still a great teacher in my opinion. I managed to get my hands on a Bridgman book (original!) so you can expect some Bridgman studies from me soon. :bounce:
Concerning enviroments:
The reason I started doing enviros is that I suck at perspective aswell as anatomy and while nature have proportion aswell as anatomy, it’s harder to define. It’s generally harder to tell if a rock or a tree is ‘wrong’ than the face or the proportions of a human. Painting digitally in general involves alot of experimenting and in speed painters’ case, alot of custom brush making aswell. When you’re new you should check alot of photos to hammer those colors and small small variations into your head.
I spent alot of time in the speedpainting thread of cgtalk and conceptart.org (and soon Sijun ) doing alot of 30min -2h paintings. I read all I can find on the speedpainting matter and how to lay down colours and define form quickly. It’s alot about trial and error I guess. And it’s important to know what NOT to do, but that’s usually just common sense, for example don’t colour pick unless you really can’t tell what colour it is and don’t do photo overpaints/copies, nor should you depend too much on your custom brushes (they are tools and are meant to help you, not control you).
That’s pretty much it.
Hey wasker, some nice loomis head studies here. He’s a great teacher for getting the basics down, it’s usually his books I go back to when I need to refresh. The eyes are really nice, they look nicely shaded. As far as the gritty thing goes, you might want to try out different sketchbook papers, as it can make such a difference. I’m really finicky over how smooth mine are as I love smooth, light shading. But you seem to be coping well.
The girl seems to be missing some of the back of her head, beyond the hair, and is a litle on the skinny side, but if you’ve been using magazine reference, that might be how she was photographed! But good to see your perseverence with it all. Keep it up!
