I was going through the shit in my Photobucket account today, probably the first time I've looked at any of it in years. It's like a time capsule that when you open it, a fist flies out and punches you right in the face. Seriously though, it was kind of nostalgic, and a little surreal. I don't do ANYTHING the same way any more. I used to work mainly in pencil and Micron, whereas nowadays I do a quick sketch in a red animators lead at best, and then do most of the work in the computer. Previously, I favored straight lines and sharp angles, now I try to keep things as soft and round as possible. I put thick black outlines on everything, until I eventually wised up to the fact that doing so flattens everything out and kills any sense of depth. My coloring is still atrocious, but a few years ago, I handled everything with the airbrush tool in Photoshop, giving all my stuff a smudgy, dirty look. Today, I mostly stick to big blocks of color, and while I admit that coloring is one of my biggest weaknesses (still, I can't resist doing it), I think my current technique is at least cleaner. I used to hide the things I couldn't draw, or leave them out completely, as is clearly demonstrated in the following image. All of my figures wore big, baggy pants because I had no clue how to draw legs. I was influenced by anime and manga. I shied away from women even more than I do in real life. Unless I was feeling particularly adventurous, I drew strictly head on, or in profile, with hardly any action at all. I mean, I was a disaster. Shit, back then I used to sign my name to my drawings, instead of the little "diamond" symbol I made that I use now. SO MUCH CHANGE.
It's really inspired me to go back and redraw some of that garbage. Hopefully to see some improvement (I could wipe my ass with most of this stuff and improve it tenfold), but also as an experiment to see how I'd approach the same subject the way I draw now. First up...
I remember how unusually proud I was of this when I first did it. I drew a girl! I drew a girl in 3/4 view! This was also one of the first things I ever colored in Photoshop. As soon as it was done I went flying off to conceptart.org to post it... WHERE. I. GOT. KILLED. "Her nose is too big. Her head is too big. What's up with her lips? She has the neck of a giraffe. You call that a coloring job? Motherfucker, she has an ADAM'S APPLE!" It was one of the first (soon to be many) times I was evicerated on a public art forum. The feeble minds of these godless savages were too infantile to recognize the greatness I had lain before them! I probably made the most progress I've ever made during my early days on conceptart, PencilJack and The Drawingboard, simply because I had my ass handed to me so often, and I was so embarrassed, that I HAD to practice to avoid further flogging. It was awesome.
I'm well aware I'll never be known as a pin up artist. I'm just not very good at drawing women. But at least now I'm not scared of them, and the fact that you can (usually) tell when I'm trying to depict the fairer sex is a MARKED improvement from past efforts. The 2009 version is far, far from great, but I do think it's at least better. I got pretty lazy on the pigtails and feathers, my coloring is wack, I wish I hadn't overshadowed under the jaw, and I'm not sure my proportions are accurate. All that said, no adams apple=WIN! Progress has been made! The composition sucks, but I wanted to keep this as close to the O.G. as possible. My main goal was just to draw less of a circus freak, not to make a print or anything.
Anyway, I'm rambling, but I needed to exercise the heebie jeebies I got browsing through those old drawings. I'm not trying to imply I'm king shit now or anything, or even that I'm any good at all, but I did need to prove to myself that I've made some strides, however small.
I labled this post with a #1 hoping that it will motivate me to do more. Unfortunately, one old habit I've never broken is my incredible, contemptuously disgusting laziness.
Sorry for the long post.
3 comments:
This was really great to see how far you've come. I used to think you were a great artist. Now I've come to realize you used to suck, and now you are a great artist.
Hey thanks broseph. That's awfully nice of you to say.
This is one of the more interesting posts I've seen on sketchoslovakia, not necessarily because of the art, but because I too like to look at the old stuff and compare it to the new stuff. It's one of the only ways there is to notice that any time has passed. Even if a person doesn't make improvements in what he or she does, you can still see a change in the process (and often subject/theme), which I think is really interesting. There is something I miss about the old pen lines, despite how awesome the illustrator brush tool looks.
To be fair, to get a full comparative view of your personal progression, we need to get a '96 scan of a muscle-dude with a chicken head (which I'm reasonably sure I could supply...), and see how Aught-Niner Diamond handles it.
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