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that one guy who never posts anymore or something

Phoenixsong

beep beep coming through
Pronoun
she/they/any
...hi.

uuuhhh so most of what I do these days is Sugimori-style fakemon for my silly fakedex site, though I guess at least some of you know that already; might post a few of those later, I guess? Right now I guess I'll start with some of my tablet practice stuff, primarily done using a program called MyPaint. (The sketches are usually done on paper, save for the most recent ones at the bottom which I did sketch in MyPaint itself.)

Will probably just link to most images in the future, but dammit I want attention and my last recollection of the art forums is that no one seems to click links. :|


practice4blazikenfinal.jpg


Originally done as a quick sketch for a Pokémon art challenge on Tumblr, then colored in later when I felt like using it to practice painting with my tablet. I screwed up halfway through and accidentally saved the image without layers, but it turned out all right even with that little hiccup, especially considering it was my first serious attempt at coloring with the tablet.

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innocuousbluelogsmall.jpg


Also done as a sketch for the Tumblr thing. I had actually originally colored it in Photoshop with a mouse, but then I redid it with the tablet for additional practice. Turned out even better, for the most part, though argleblargle the water is terrible I'm sure. I hate you water. Haaaaeeet.

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Just linking to this next one to comply with this particular forum's request to not eat into their bandwidth by hotlinking it (and also hey, if you've got a slow connection then at least this one won't contribute to the thread loading time!): go away Nihal

This un's from an RP forum with lots of really nifty fakemon (none of them my creations, before you ask). The large dragony fellow is a marake, a water/dragon-type I've been using for the better part of my current adventure over there; his name is Eridanus, and he's usually a pretty chill giant scary sea monster guy. I guess he's not feeling too chill at the moment, though, because apparently he is currently attacking my plusle, Nihal (whom you can kinda-sorta-see if you squint and turn your head). No, don't worry, my plusle is a jerk. I'm sure she deserves it.

The background is halfassed, but I wasn't trying to make it pretty, so.

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keldeospeedpaintsmall.png


A keldeo speedpaintish thing I did for an artist prompt challenge thing over at Studio-Revolution's forums; just finished it maybe an hour ago. I usually start adding the colors as soon as I've got the sketch down, but this time I tried a blue underpainting. Not entirely sure I'm doin' the whole underpainting thing right, but I like it. Well. Conflicted about the water. But I won't go into yet another mini-rant about that.


Comments and criticism more than welcome, by the way!

Yay?
 
God. How talented can someone be?

That's freaking ridiculous. In a good way. In an envious way.
 
I really like these! You've got a really great sense of movement and colour and things like that, but I feel like these could do with a little more contrast? Like I think out of these, the feraligatr seems the most accomplished because the colour difference really brings feraligatr to the forefront of the viewer's focus, particularly the parts that are above water. Generally you seem to shy away from very dark colours! And that's understandable because dark colours can be sort of unforgiving. Like with the blaziken and keldeo ones, they're both coloured really brilliantly but they seem to fade a little into the background? I think you could benefit from introducing maybe some darker outlines (not necessarily black) to really bring out the characters from the background. Even just in some areas, like around keldeo's nose or blaziken's claws, could really help to up the contrast a bit, and it'll also help define your shapes a little more clearly.
 
I like these! :D

Yeah, I agree with uv re: contrast, though I'd add that if you add darker outlines, don't use black. Actively avoid black. Use something else dark.

That keldeo's face is creepy; the jaw doesn't make sense. Neither does the closer eye, I think.

Otherwise :O anatomy and colouring, even if the contrast is low
 
I just realized this thread was yours yay I'm smart

here is super-helpful redline !!!

keldeospeedpaintsmall.jpg


uhm... I'm still unsure about the face, I think it just needs to be more horselike, but the legs need basically that extra digit by the toes. Because the hoof is basically just a toenail so you need to emphasize that digit yes otherwise, it can't move. u_u
 
DAT BLAZIKEN.
So yeah. Awesomeness.

That art is amazing and I wish I had the talent, time, and energy it took for you to make them.

these are so pretty and awesome :D
Great work!

God. How talented can someone be?

That's freaking ridiculous. In a good way. In an envious way.

Thank you all for the lovely complements! :D

I really like these! You've got a really great sense of movement and colour and things like that, but I feel like these could do with a little more contrast? Like I think out of these, the feraligatr seems the most accomplished because the colour difference really brings feraligatr to the forefront of the viewer's focus, particularly the parts that are above water. Generally you seem to shy away from very dark colours! And that's understandable because dark colours can be sort of unforgiving. Like with the blaziken and keldeo ones, they're both coloured really brilliantly but they seem to fade a little into the background? I think you could benefit from introducing maybe some darker outlines (not necessarily black) to really bring out the characters from the background. Even just in some areas, like around keldeo's nose or blaziken's claws, could really help to up the contrast a bit, and it'll also help define your shapes a little more clearly.

Thank yoooou~ agh all the detailed crits it's so lovely

I don't know that I'm actively trying to shy away from dark colors so much as I am just rushing and not thinking about the resulting lack of contrast (which is definitely there, thank you for pointing it out and helping me notice ugh). With keldeo, for example, I just thought a light sky would look pretty, not really considering how similar the colors and value were to, well, keldeo itself. Derp. A large part of it is probably that I'm still just trying to get the hang of the program and tablet themselves and feel an exaggerated sense of accomplishment when I can manage even this much (that and my hand starts hurting after just ~20 minutes of using the tablet, so I get kind of cranky and just want to be done with stuff by the time I've spent several hours on it), but I am legitimately not considering these things in general and I do need to be reminded so that I can be conscious of it when I finally slow the heck down and try for more polished stuff! So thank you very much for that!

I like these! :D

Yeah, I agree with uv re: contrast, though I'd add that if you add darker outlines, don't use black. Actively avoid black. Use something else dark.

That keldeo's face is creepy; the jaw doesn't make sense. Neither does the closer eye, I think.

Otherwise :O anatomy and colouring, even if the contrast is low

Heh, yeah, I've heard the "no black outlines" stuff before, so don't worry, I won't. :P

Noted in general about the eye and jaw; the top jaw's shape is deliberate, as mentioned in my comment to pathos below, but I do have more trouble with lower jaws and I'm sure they're misaligned more often than not. I will keep working on it!

Thank you!

I just realized this thread was yours yay I'm smart

here is super-helpful redline !!!

[redline was here]

uhm... I'm still unsure about the face, I think it just needs to be more horselike, but the legs need basically that extra digit by the toes. Because the hoof is basically just a toenail so you need to emphasize that digit yes otherwise, it can't move. u_u

Ooh, redlines. You know, I don't think anyone's ever redlined any of my art before; should see if I can pester people into doing that for me more often, haha.

The big pudgy nose and clunky hooves were technically deliberate, because, well, that's how keldeo looks. :B It was just a speedpaint, really, so I was going more for "quick make it look like keldeo" than "make sure it works like a real horse". I'll keep that in mind, though, and the redlines for the leg positions are definitely very helpful regardless, so thank you!

I will maybe post more later today but I really have to get back to some work stuff sooooo final blanket "thank you" to everyone, you're far too kind!
 
All of those are awesome. The second one made me laugh a bit at the Feraligator's expression.
 
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