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..or rather, to clarify, I hate CGing grass.

Random art threads seem to be popping up here and there, so I thought I'd contribute. Just finished this and in the process of colouring it I've learned to my expense that drawing grass in Photoshop with a mouse is really not a very good idea at all.



And the original sketch:



Pencil + Photoshop 6 + squeaky mouse.

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Very very nice.

I like what you did in the first place with the drawing, but the coloring and adding of grass is just plain awesome.

Aora, that is ridiculously good. I don't even know what to say. Yet another masterpiece.

I love it when you make topics because I know there's going to be something incredible in it. I love your style...keep up the great work!

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Is PJ

Lovely
There isn't much to say taht is actually bad, and it doesn't really matter if you correct yourself or not, you still have an immense talent.

- If I compare the two pictures, the girl on the original sketch seems to be sleeping & on the couloured one, she look like dead... So I guess you should change a little the eyes and the mouth. I don,t really know how to say how you could change it, because I don't even draw myself...

Beside that like I said, Excellent

Yeah... must say that the grass deceives me a bit too, a least you will know for your next drawing

This post has been edited by Zodiac on 12th June 2005 18:04

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Sayonara

Thanks for the replies, all.

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If I compare the two pictures, the girl on the original sketch seems to be sleeping & on the couloured one, she look like dead... So I guess you should change a little the eyes and the mouth. I don,t really know how to say how you could change it, because I don't even draw myself...

Well, to clear things up a little, this is an illustration for a comic I've been planning for a while. The script is still...in the preliminary stages, to say the least, but that's not stopping me doing random doodles from it. I was intending to to leave it a bit ambiguous, but she isn't sleeping, nor is she dead - merely unconscious...so..in a way, the coloured version is an improvement?

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Yeah... must say that the grass deceives me a bit too, a least you will know for your next drawing

I'm not sure whether that means the grass is good or bad...but hey, at least you can tell it's grass, that's good enough for me! Thanks for the comment.

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Cook it til it smokes and then
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Of course the couloured version is an improvement because you touched much more details (such as shadows) and about the grass,... good or bad? Erm, let's just say it could have been better okay?

What I meant with the eyes and the mouth is that the shadow/dark/whatever is too extended(it covers too much area on her face) which makes her "more" than then any other state. Well that's in my point of you, feedback of other members would be appreciated. Also maybe another color than brown/black for her lips would help, only that would make a huge improvement.

Like I said, that's a lot talent you got there.

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Sayonara

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about the grass,... good or bad? Erm, let's just say it could have been better okay? 

Eh heh, very diplomatic. It was a learning experience, at least. Thanks for being honest. I'm not sure I can bring myself to redo it though, I spent about three hours working on that grass. I'm still not entirely sure how I would fix it anyway. Damn you, grass! *shakes fist*

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What I meant with the eyes and the mouth is that the shadow/dark/whatever is too extended(it covers too much area on her face) which makes her "more" than then any other state.

The shadows above her eye and below her nose? If so..yeah, I think you might be right. Probably a good call on the lips too, I might go back and edit that. Thanks!

Edit:



Yeah, you were right. Changing the lip colour was a good idea.

This post has been edited by Aora on 12th June 2005 20:08

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Holy crap, that CGing is excellect. Not a whole lot I can say; I"m not very good at criticizing art, but I know what I like (which is criticizing, I guess...)



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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

Now I don't have anything bad to say about your drawing, it's SUPERB!!! ^^

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Sayonara

I bow down before your greatness. It takes a lotta hubris to attempt grass, from the top down no less, and the fact that you pulled it off to boot. Well, if you aint a god, ya damb close.

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Arts

Farts

Twarts

Agreed. That is ridiculously good. Detail is done very well on this and I think the grass looks great.


Question. How large is the colored version? Before you sized it down of course. Not in file size but resolution.

This post has been edited by Rujuken on 13th June 2005 00:46

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-- You're Gonna Carry That Weight --

That is impressive. Quite impressive. What I particularly like is the way you've colored and shaded it: very, very nice. A much-welcomed change of pace from all the anime-style drawing people have been pumping out.

Your grass looks a little blurry, frankly. A bit too, how should I put this, smear-ish? It's a very nice effect, nevertheless, that could look outright fantastic with a little bit of practice and tweaking.

You obviously have a lot of talent. Keep up the good work!

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

Thanks all, I think my ego just grew exponentially. Not a good thing, but I'll beat it back down to size.

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Your grass looks a little blurry, frankly. A bit too, how should I put this, smear-ish? It's a very nice effect, nevertheless, that could look outright fantastic with a little bit of practice and tweaking.

Agreed wholeheartedly. This is the first time I've drawn grass in any media about..three years, I think. So yes, experimentation is the key. I used the smudge tool a lot to get a tapered look to the blades, though that technique isn't flawless in that well..it's the smudge tool, so it does look smeared, unfortunately.

This is the kind of thing that probably would have been much easier with a tablet, I think(being able to have the brush size alter with pressure and all that). As much as I love my mouse, it does have its limits, and I wasn't about to go and manually taper off each blade of grass. x_X I'd have been there for weeks.. I shouldn't bemoan my lack of a tablet any further though - I should either stop being lazy and get a job to pay for one, or shut up. XD

Though...in retrospect, perhaps a quick flick of the sharpen filter on the grass layer might have helped. >.> Hmmm...hang on, I think we're on to something here.

Howzat:



Maybe a rather subtle difference..but it's less blurry, at least.

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Question. How large is the colored version? Before you sized it down of course. Not in file size but resolution.

Ah, good question. The jpeg's at about 60%, I think, sooo...let me go check. 860x1314 pixels, 150 DPI. I scanned it at a bit of an odd size. I'm a bit limited by my computer in that respect, though. I think it might explode if I worked at too large a resolution.

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Look good, much clearer and sharper.

I would say the main problem with the grass is how blades seem to jut out from seemingly nowhere, as though they're flying over other blades of grass instead of sticking out from between them. For instance...



Of course, going over each and every blade of grass would be needlessly tedious, so you don't hear me complaining. The picture looks great as it is.

Have you considered trying to draw your grass in layers? Pick "stem" points where grass grows out (such as the outline of her rather shapely body) and build multiple layers with grass growing outwards, then reassemble them backwards so the "stem" layer's on top and the rest are underneath. Not sure what it'd look like though; I'm a programmer, not an artist.

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

Why, of course not! That would be much too sensible. Seriously though, that's a really good idea, I can't see why it wouldn't work. That's sort of what I was trying to do in my head, but separating it into layers would've streamlined the operation quite a bit..the inconsistent blades you pointed out were really just laziness on my part - no excuse.

I don't think I've been making very efficient use of layers, though.. too used to OpenCanvas where it was easier to basically just draw everything on one layer.

It might be rather tedious, but I am considering going over it and fixing some of the problematic areas of the grass now. The bit in the thumbnail you gave looks annoyingly sloppy, I'm a little irritated at myself.

Mayyyybe in the morning though. It's 3am already. Yikes.

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Rules For Cooking Toast
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Never try to guess
Cook it til it smokes and then
Twenty seconds less.

I like the grass the way it is actually. The whole picture has an artistic continuity to it that I think would change if the grass were sharper and crisp and the girl was not. Also, it would take emphasis away from the subject. I love the picture, The girl looks Edvard Munch-ish, and the grass reminds me of Van Gogh's backgrounds--active and swirly, very textured, yet still submissive to the focus of the picture. Superb.

My only artistic suggestion would be to crop it actually. My browser window is too short to view the whole picture, so I'm only seeing her from just below the belt up, and it seems better compositionally than the whole picture lengthwise. The lower part of her body lacks the detail and interest to justify including it. I'd say crop it off to make it closer to 4x6 or 5x7 proportions and ditch the very bottom.

This post has been edited by imperialstooge on 13th June 2005 03:36

It kind of annoys me when people tell an absolutely amazing artist ways that they think the drawing should have been done. Asking for you to add in their own personal tastes. No way this needs to be cropped down if anything make it bigger. Why would you want to minimize all the detail.

But anyways, this stuff is really outstanding especially when considering the media used.

What do you think we are doing?

If you lie on someone's talent saying his her drawing are all perfect, you willl either notice very slow or no improvement at all. And don't come and tell me taht the last version of the drawing is worse than the first one.

What I try to mean is that we are helping, that's all.

Besides, every artist has its own style,I think it is the best thing to do to push that talent at it's maximum potential.

Edit

Oops I forgot my main reason for posting, now the grass looks much bette, it's more fluid.

This post has been edited by Zodiac on 13th June 2005 12:51

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Sayonara

I think Phunbaba was commenting on the "Please crop it, my screen's too small and I think it would look better that way because it'd fit better" post. Not the constructive criticism others have been presenting. 'Course I'm not trying to put words in his mouth. >"<

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

Oh my, controversy.

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My only artistic suggestion would be to crop it actually. My browser window is too short to view the whole picture, so I'm only seeing her from just below the belt up, and it seems better compositionally than the whole picture lengthwise. The lower part of her body lacks the detail and interest to justify including it. I'd say crop it off to make it closer to 4x6 or 5x7 proportions and ditch the very bottom.

I can see the full thing on my screen, but probably only because I use a stupidly high resolution.. At any rate, I won't be cropping this. I mentioned before that this was an illustration for a comic I intend on making - I actually plan to possibly use this(in the veryyy distant future mind you, but the point still stands) as a cover. So I'm trying to stick to roughly cover-sized proportions, which are(don't quote me on this) in the region of 550x825 I believe.

Then again, I'd need room for the title anyway. >_> Maybe I should crop it down and add some space to the top. Er...I'll decide later. Thanks for the input.

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It kind of annoys me when people tell an absolutely amazing artist ways that they think the drawing should have been done. Asking for you to add in their own personal tastes. No way this needs to be cropped down if anything make it bigger. Why would you want to minimize all the detail.

I appreciate the back-up and praise, but I have to agree with Zodiac here - if everyone flounced about telling me how fabulous I am then I'd never improve. I've already had several good suggestions from this thread which I think have improved the drawing, and I'm always open to more even if I ultimately decide to reject them.

As long as no one's going "u r crap, give up drawing losar lol" or "GIVE HER DRAGON WINGS AND A TAIL rofl" I'm fine with people giving me criticism.

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I like the grass the way it is actually. The whole picture has an artistic continuity to it that I think would change if the grass were sharper and crisp and the girl was not.

Mind you, contrasting opinions from different people is always a bit tough. I should start a survey. Fuzzy grass or sharp grass?

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Rules For Cooking Toast
Be accurate when cooking toast
Never try to guess
Cook it til it smokes and then
Twenty seconds less.

Quote (Aora @ 13th June 2005 10:07)

I mentioned before that this was an illustration for a comic I intend on making - I actually plan to possibly use this(in the veryyy distant future mind you, but the point still stands) as a cover. So I'm trying to stick to roughly cover-sized proportions, which are(don't quote me on this) in the region of 550x825 I believe.

The dimensions of a printed piece are contingent upon the dpi you plan to print in. Take the size of the cover you want to create, multiply each dimension by the dpi you want to use, and that will give you the pixel size for use in Photoshop.

I'll comment more at DA later if I get a tick to do so.

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

I actually don't intend to print at all, this'll probably end up being a webcomic(though that does offer the possibility of an unlimited canvas, I'd like to stick with the established size of a regular comic page). That's useful information though, I didn't know that - I'll definitely keep it in mind. Thanks.

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Cook it til it smokes and then
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This is absolutely beautiful. I'm sorry I don't have anything more intelligent to contribute, but I thought a random compliment was better than nothing. I love your work.

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Veni, vidi, dormivi.

Quote (Aora @ 13th June 2005 09:07)

As long as no one's going "u r crap, give up drawing losar lol" or "GIVE HER DRAGON WINGS AND A TAIL rofl"

omgz so ur NOT guna maek her a dragon!?/??/ ): ): ): ):

...then phew! heheh

I think it's lovely. The shading on her face looks great, and the 2nd posting with the lips brightened definitely made it look even better

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omgz so ur NOT guna maek her a dragon!?/??/ ): ): ): ):

no imm not!!1one11 stop crushng mai cr3ativivity!1!!111eleventybillionandone!1 roffle. D:<

Ok, enough of that.

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Cook it til it smokes and then
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Make her into a catgirl! Make her into a catgirl! (It would be... uh... hrm... more artistically correct! Yeah! )

I'm surprised at how well you've managed to maintain proportions. Her body looks great. My one hangup is her waist, which seems a tad elongated (which doesn't seem too apparant because the black skirt is covering the other part, but stands out if you consider the distance between the lower part of her breast and the junction where her (camera) right connects to her body.) But then again, I'm a programmer: not seeing people of the opposite sex is pretty much a given for this line of work, so my judgement may not be the most valid in the world.

All in all, impressive. Very much so.

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

Quote

Make her into a catgirl! Make her into a catgirl! (It would be... uh... hrm... more artistically correct! Yeah! )

*loads shotgun*

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I'm surprised at how well you've managed to maintain proportions. Her body looks great. My one hangup is her waist, which seems a tad elongated (which doesn't seem too apparant because the black skirt is covering the other part, but stands out if you consider the distance between the lower part of her breast and the junction where her (camera) right connects to her body.) But then again, I'm a programmer: not seeing people of the opposite sex is pretty much a given for this line of work, so my judgement may not be the most valid in the world.

That's actually been an ongoing problem I've had with my drawings...and subsequently forgot about when people stopped mentioning it. Shame on me. I'll keep it in mind for future drawings, though I think it'd be too much of a hassle to fix with this one. Well spotted.

Edit: Just realised my title-ma-jig changed. Whoo. *does a cactuar dance*

This post has been edited by Aora on 13th June 2005 23:13

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Quote (Silverlance @ 13th June 2005 08:37)

I think Phunbaba was commenting on the "Please crop it, my screen's too small and I think it would look better that way because it'd fit better" post.'Course I'm not trying to put words in his mouth. >"<

Well, since you completely missed the point of my post Silverlance and Phunbaba, I'll reiterate:

It's not an issue of screen size at all; I was using that as a reference point to describe where I thought it should be cropped compositionally, which I thought I made quite clear:

"My browser window is too short to view the whole picture, so I'm only seeing her from just below the belt up, and it seems better compositionally than the whole picture lengthwise. The lower part of her body lacks the detail and interest to justify including it. I'd say crop it off to make it closer to 4x6 or 5x7 proportions and ditch the very bottom."

In the same way that artists use a paper with a rectange cut out to "frame" the picture to look for better composition, I was saying that the view cut-off by my browser was better than the full view in Photoshop.

It wasn't a complaint about the size.

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Not the constructive criticism others have been presenting

So trying to help improve composition, perhaps the most part of successful art, isn't helpful?

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'Course I'm not trying to put words in his mouth. >"<

uhh, then, don't.. k?

It's a wonderful image either way Aora, congrats again! By the way, have you thought about a title? Doesn't matter really, I was just curious.

This post has been edited by imperialstooge on 14th June 2005 01:55

Quote (imperialstooge @ 13th June 2005 20:50)

uhh, then, don't.. k?

No offence intended, man.

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

Quote

It's a wonderful image either way Aora, congrats again! By the way, have you thought about a title? Doesn't matter really, I was just curious.

Thanks. And..nooo, I haven't, actually. I don't suppose you have any suggestions? Usually something just comes to me..but..not this time. Anyone with a good idea, I'm all ears.

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Rules For Cooking Toast
Be accurate when cooking toast
Never try to guess
Cook it til it smokes and then
Twenty seconds less.