Sketchbook Thread of Whiteshade

#1

Well, after some advice from NR43, I thought I’d start my own humble thread here.

A little background about me:
I used to enjoy drawing since I was a kid, mainly robots. I regularly got a B or C for art in class though, and I always envied those kids who could draw so well. I didn’t really do anything about it back then though, especially after I discovered my love for writing.

Fast forward to the end of high school, about a year ago. I was bored, and had a long break till college started for me. At the influence of my best friend ( who’s quite the talented artist I might add), I got into drawing again, manga-style mostly. From there, I tried my hand at portraits, learning photoshop, fractal art (does anyone here do those btw? lol) and a little photography as well.

Sadly, my current skills are not adequate to secure a career in the field. Still, even while pursuing my studies now, I can’t help but go back to drawing. To me, nothing can match the sense of accomplishment you get from being able to project your ideas and perceptions visually on to a simple piece of paper - not even solving a terribly difficult math equation or physics problem can make me feel that way!

Well, enough rambling from me for now. I’ll update this thread as often as I can with any sketches I come up with. Here’s my latest: a master copy of Head of ‘Water’ from the Anatomy Lesson Series: Part 1 - The Head.


Completion time: 2.5 hours

#2

Hi Ariff, Whiteshade

glad you decided to start a sb thread.
The reactions you get here from other people will motivate you to keep pushing yourself to do better with each drawing. (at least that’s the effect it has on me)

Looking forward to see your progress!

#3

I tried doing two quick sketches of heads (roughly 15 mins each). I don’t really find them satisfactory. Admittedly, this is the first time I tried doing any quick sketches. I tend to take my time in observing and drawing what I see. So yeah…I’m not really used to pushing myself to finishing a sketch that fast lol.


#18


#02

#4

Hi…Ariff…:slight_smile:

Good to see you opening a thread…:thumbsup:
I wouldn’t worry about the time factor on these pieces at this point in time…:slight_smile: …You might try to just take a section of a face at a time…eyes, lips, nose, ect. and really enlarge it and see how much information you can capture about it…this exercise will really force you to SEE in a way that you normally don’t SEE…:slight_smile:
The SKULL exercise is also a great place to start…Johan can tell you about that exercise, and where it is at in this forum…Getting the bones of the face right and from the start, is the best way to learn, and end up with great portraits…the same goes for the rest of the body…bones are the underlying foundation, that will give your struture and form it’s strength…Just a friendly suggestion and opion…:slight_smile:
About those fractals…I would really like to know more about them, and how to do them…I haven’t seen anyone in this forum using them, I don’t know why,…I think they look great myself,…so any information from you on how to do them, would be GREAT I think,…for me anyway.:slight_smile:
REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO SEEING YOUR THREAD, AND YOUR WORK IN IT DEVELOPE…:thumbsup:
TAKE CARE
Glenn

#5

I won’t pretend to understand fractal art very well myself lol. You basically use fractal programs that uses mathematical equations to calculate the placement of colours, pixel by pixel. There are several types of programs out there, some are simple and some are more complex. The ones I use are Ultra Fractal and Apophysis. I like Ultra Fractal because it incorporates the ‘layers’ method you usually find in photoshop along with the blending modes, so you could achieve some really cool effects that otherwise can’t be done using a normal fractal program.

The best thing about fractals though is that you never know what you’re gonna get. You can start off with a basic fractal set and from there, mess around with the parameters and adjust the gradients, often getting different results each time. If you understood the math behind it, then you could probably have a better control over the results…otherwise, it’s more or less trial and error. Some days, I can’t find anything interesting, other days I find something that really looks neat. Another thing about fractals is the fact that you can zoom in, zoom out, and pan in all directions as much as you like. The program will just recalculate the patterns each time, invariably giving you the impression that you’re exploring an endless fabric of patterns.

Here’s a piece I made sometime ago that I particularly like.

#6

[left]A little update. I’ve been doing some portraits lately, and thought I’d post them here.


Goto Maki


Michishige Sayumi

Both were done with graphite pencils. I didn’t have a scanner with me, so I was forced to use my digital camera to take pictures of the original drawings - hence, they might be skewed a little due to the angle the pictures were taken from. The first portrait was colourized using Photoshop. I gave up on colourizing the second portrait as the fine hair strands made it near impossible with a mouse.

Edit: Ok, for some reason, the image links aren’t working. I’ll try fix them later.

It’s times like this that I wish I had a tablet.><

In any case, I’m currently working on another portrait, though this time completely in Photoshop…using a mouse. Haha. XD
[/left]

#7

Whiteshade,

Welcome! :slight_smile: I somehow missed your thread earlier. I really like that first drawing / from the ALS Workshop, and think that that is the right direction in which to go. I have to say that I discourage beginners in particular from doing manga, as I really believe that drawing / painting realistically will teach you much more.

Would love to see you do more studies like the first! :slight_smile:

Cheers,

-Rebeccak

#8

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