Art by Freela

[on:]

Hi! Welcome to Art by Freela. I can also do requests!
 Please tell me what you think of this, and please, tell the truth. I need some consructive criticism so I can know what to fix. And now a word from our sponsors (sorry about quality, my scanner sucks.)

[Reply #1 on:]

Haha, he's dressed as a bear? Cute   

Constructive criticism you'd like? Not sure really... never received any myself. Only advice I can offer to aspiring artists is to never stop looking at other works and never stop experimenting. Judging by your photo in the 'cartoon me' thread, you're still quite young, so I'd say from what I see here you have a wealth of potential with a lot of time to develop it. I'm 23 years old and the stuff I do has been honed by a life spent in a darkened room hunched over a sketch book spurning all social interaction... not to be recommended.
But the good thing about art is that it's not qualifiable or quantifiable. What you do is what you do, and it's always gonna be good.

Have some fun playing around with shadows, that's an idea. Pick an angle for the light to be coming from and then do shading along the opposite edge of the figures and objects. You can take some cure by what you see around you in the real world - for eg: shine a torch on your arm and take note of how the light/shadow falls.

Peace!

[Reply #2 on:]

Thanks for the post coldangel. He's supposed to be dressed in a polar bear costume, ya know, like Coca Cola ads? And I did forget shading. I made it before I went to bed, that's probably why I forgot it. And what I usually do is find some pictures online and grid it. It really helps if you're trying to get thinks right. It's good because you can tell where let's say, fry's face ends by looking to see how close it is from the line. And on another note, why do I feel I have given myself advice?

[Reply #3 on:]

That's pretty good Freela. Also cute. ^__^ Well, if you want constructive criticism then I'll give a little. His nose looks a little small to me, and his top lip looks a little longer than I think it should be. But other than that, it's good. And I agree with coldangel_1, it needs some shading. Maybe some coloring too. 

[Reply #4 on:]

What's "grid it" mean?

As I've never been taught, I kinda developed my own approach. One thing I've always found helpful is to start at the eyes. No matter what the rest of the pic is - I always start at the eyes of the character(s) and radiate outward from there. The eyes are the window to the soul and should always be a focal point. You can pin everything else on them in a way.

[Reply #5 on:]

@Bender'sFan: Thanks for your comments! I'll color it as soon as I can! And I'll work a little shading into it too.
@ColdAngel:I'll post an example of what I mean. You see the face of my pic up there? I just gridded his face by drawing a few guidlines on the picture I'm drawing and the reference pic. Here's what I mean.