If you are serious about your drawing and if you feel that what you have created is on the very limits of your skills, and need honest opinions on where you seem to be lacking and how to further improve - this is the place for you.

If you are only drawing for fun and feel like you just have accomplished something "above" your skills, this is not the place for getting encouragement. You will most likely get feedback on those things that are lacking.
Instead, you will get the most out of this section when you are honestly not completely happy with what you have achieved, and strive to go one step further.

The people giving critique here are often very experienced themselves and could have professional careers in art, so please have in mind that these people will give you their honest opinions about the art. There is rarely any point for you in explaining that you are just a beginner in some area - the critique is given on the art, not you.

Don't look for "mildening" circumstances, because again, it's about the art, not you. Nothing needs to be taken personally.

If you just want to show off your latest drawings that you are quite happy with to all the friends at Drawspace and get their opinions, do so in the "General"-section.


This new Critique thread was created as the previous one was getting a little long and cumbersome to search through.

It will still be available in the General Discussion forum for anyone who wants to search through it for ideas and tips.

Ok I drew this and I am not sure if I like it ... its John Wayne .. now I am not a big fan but a friend of mine is and I decided to give it a try ... so what do you think ? lol

Kim you know I am no expert by any means so take whatever I say as the remarks of a casual observer.

On the whole I like it very much. I'm not too sure about the shading on the forehead... it seems a little loose. Also, the shading on the left side of the upper lip (what appears on the right side in the drawing). For some reason the shading is giving me the impression that the lip is concave rather than convex.

But really - it's an excellent likeness and a very nice drawing.

he was really hard to do as I am not a big fan of John Wayne .... I will try to fix the lip I see what you are saying .. and the shading on the forehead i can see that too .. it was a large area and I used a thin lead mechanical pencil .

Kim,

I have to agree with miss Rose on all points here!!!! Fantastic likeness!!!! In order to achieve darker values and a smoother transition with a mechanical pencil I have found that I have to layer the graphite using only the pressure created by the weight of the pencil....in other words very light pressure...building from light to dark. How did you like the mech pencil?

Laura

kim i agree with the shading on the forehead but i think its a beautiful portrait of john wayne. it really does look like him. you did a fantastic job on him.
Lori

I agree with everyone, great likeness of the man (I'm not a fan either )

The thing that throws it is that you're using two techniques in one drawing. The face is rendered smoothly as if you blended sections, then the upper section of the forehead and hat are hatched and looser. While this method can work well, it has to be subtle. I always think of John Wayne as rather weather beaten so unless this is a youthful version of him, he may be a little too smooth.

Using mechanical pencil takes a little getting used to and covering larger sections of paper you do need to do an initial laydown of graphite then build your values up from there to acheive a dark tone.

I love the mech. pencil .. I will not want to use a reg. pencil again .. I get my shades even with mech. I think you are right I did losen up on the forehead .. more room to work on so I must have changed the way i was doing it without even thinking ....8x10 is perfect for me for a portrait this was much bigger and just seem to take forever .

I'm working on proportion and portraits. Here is some more practice work. Sorry Jeanette
P.S. Anyone who is laughing at poor Jeanette, I plan to use you too. Let me know what you think I'm not seeing.
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paulette .. I think your portrait of Jeanette is good ... I think it looks like her and that is the hardest thing to produce when doing a portrait .. getting the lines right ... the shading is just a matter of practice ... I think it looks great

Thats a very good likeness, instantly recognizable. If you just worked from her avatar image I'm even more impressed.

Still, there's something not quite right about the drawing. To my eye her head looks skewed. Kinda squished diagonally.
I think you've drawn her head tilted slightly to the viewers right, but her facial features are tilted slightly the opposite direction.

Does anyone else see that, or is it just me?
Maybe its an optical delusion because of the diagonal hatching.

Kim and Darus,
Thank you for looking. I am not spending a lot of time on shading, mostly trying to get the likeness down. I have to agree when I brought the drawing back up it seemed off. Could be the shading, I don't know? Here is another drawing to look at as well. Maybe you'll recognize her?
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It looks good to me.
As I said before, doubly impressive considering the tiny reference image you have to work with.

Hey Paulette, neat drawing! Hats off to you for attempting drawings from those teeny weeny images. There are a few measurement/proportion issues that are throwing things off somewhat, but you do have likenesses in both mine and Rose's drawings.

You can get a better proportional scale if you drop lines from major facial features and ensure they line up. As well divide the head into sections as in Brenda's lesson on constructing a human head. This will make sure that the measurements are correct.

I've done a quick sketch from the same teeny avatar, enlarged a bit (boy that's difficult to draw from!) to show you how some features should line up. You can do similar lines on your drawing and your reference imageto check measurements and make adjustments from there. With time you will get a a feel for it and be able to do it on sight or by using your pencil as a measuring tool. When you begin a drawing, sketch in overall shapes first, then go back in to refine details. It will come with practice and you're doing great Paulette!

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Pauleet I think that is Rose ...
Jeanette I wish I knew how to do grid .. its always so hard for me .

Kim, if you've downloaded the file for the portrait class it explains how to do a grid on it. Its really pretty straight forward. If you need more help on it I'll try to provide it.

This sketch isn't gridded, just some reference lines to use to measure from to ensure proportion.

Oh Paulette! I recognised myself immediately too.

But you know this little chat between you and Jeanette really intrigued me. It sure is hard to try getting a likeness from such a tiny picture but I think using Jeanette's lines of reference you can get close.

Here's my quicky attempt at myself - gosh girl! you even got me to draw a hand and I can't do hands to save my life!

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Even though Drawspace isn't cooperating in showing me images up close this morning, I can see that you've gotten it right here Rose.

You don't have to grid out an entire drawing to get the proportion correct, just choose some major points and drop line, measure angles on your original reference and again on your drawing. It really does help to have some reference points to ensure a correct drawing,especially in a portrait.

Good job Rose, I hope you didn't mind me picking on you. We see each others pictures so often that I figured everybody would have a chance to recognize who I did. Assuming of course that I got the likeness down. I should tell you guys that I bring your avatar up bigger. It blurs out but makes getting proportions a little easier. I used a ruler for Jeanette and Roses drawing. I marked dots where the eyes started and the tip of the nose and the mouth. Practice, practice, practice.
Paulette

Well, I haven't been in these forums for ages anyways, here is my latest picture, what do you all think??

Jazzy, your drawing is interesting, but you need to increase the dark values to show your focal point and bring the foreground closer. The trees for instance, can be seen to fade into the distance by lightening them but keeping the ones around the unicorn darker.

The same principle applies to the girl watching the fairies and the rocks surrounding her. She is closer so detail should be stronger depending on the distance that you want to create visually between her and the fairies.

It really all depends on the amount of realism that you want to convey in a drawing as to how much detail you put in and how you render the images. I would like to see some shadows from the trees, the rocks, and the fairies to ground them. Otherwise they seem as if they are floating and not solidly on the ground.

Your drawing has lots of potential and with a little darkening of areas it will be wonderful.

Jazzy..I love your drawing!!! Its too cute. I think you should also after you are done with this graphite picture try it in color.

The unicorn doesn't raelly look like (s)he's behind the tree, you should shade the neck on either side (wherever your light source is) a little more to make it look further back. Also - the faeries don't look quite right...?

Sorry if I'm really critical, I can't help it I love your drawing, really I do! lol!

PS - I'm from Iowa, I'm not trying to fake being British, but I do spell Fairy like Faerie, attorney like attourney, and so on. I have absolutely no idea why

Stacia has a drawing of her own for critique!

Notes: Arms are off the body because I didn't want to do arms, and right boob (viewers persp.) is weird.... besides that, I like it. Critique?


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Hello everyone Im back I have been poorly over the xmas period with some sort of virus but Im not feeling to bad at the moment so I have been back drawing this is my latest drawing of mick jagger its done with some circulism which is my first time and some blending hope you like it




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So sorry to hear that you're not feeling well David. Seems like its really going around right now. Hope you're back in the swing of things really soon.

I really like your pic of Mick Jagger. He has a very unique look about him. I always thought he was so hot when I was a teenager but now I just see him as a wrinkled old man. LOL hahahahaha

You seem to do a lot of celebraties - where do you get your reference pics? Online?

I love you Mick Jagger David... it has a luminosity about it which is very attractive. Glad you're feeling better.

Here's something I did this evening. I think the only reason I did it was to try my hand at some really wild hair!

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Can't say I did too well on the shading of the hair, though in truth it looks a little better in real life than the scanning of it... any advice?

David sorry to hear that but I am glad you are back and feeling better you have micks eyes right on .. I am and have been a huge rolling stones fan .. I seen them when I was a teen
rose i think your portrait is comming along great ...you have her expresion very good .

Jazzy,

I took the liberty of playing around with your piece in psp8 just to demonstrait what Jeanette said to you. I'm still new with this program so bare with me. I only tried to adjust the values in the background midground and foreground...so I basically adjusted the top, middle and bottom sections to show how it could look. I made the focal point the girl peeking throught the rocks at the fairies...this may not be the focal point you had in mind. During the course of making adjustments I notices fairies I hadn't even seen in the original because they blended in to the background...I did try to make them pop out a wee bit. I would have liked to make the background fade out a wee bit more than it is...but I just couldn't figure out how.

Hope you don't mind,
Laura

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Rose,

Crazy hair is a real challenge. Your eyes just want to skim right over it because there's just to much information to process...so our eyes skim and our brain fills in the gaps if you know what I mean.

My suggestion for the future is isolate areas and break down into shapes and then shadow and highlights...I believe Brenda has a lesson for mapping hair.

Laura

Hi again Folks,
Trying for the second time - please excuse my "posting illiteracy"!
Attached is my attempt at sketching my grandson Connor. I am having difficulty capturing the youth in his eyes and getting the amusement into his smile!

Hi David, sorry you haven't been well, I hope you're on the mend now. A youthful Mick Jagger. Great stuff! My critique would be that it lacks values and looks a little flat as a result. I don't know the reference you're using but I imagine that its a publicity shot with flash, so it reduces the shadows on the face. Use a bit of artistic license and define the features more with darker values to make this image pop.

How about a current senior citizen one of him as he is now? hehehehe Actually a friend of mine did a series of 60's/70's rock stars in derwent drawing pencils as they are now rather than in their heyday. It was quite interesting to see. Some have aged more gracefully than others.

Rose, I agree with Laura's comments about rendering mussy hair. Its a challenge in patience. I think I'd prefer all my portrait people to be bald....lol Break it down into manageable sections and do a little at a time, strand by strand. Yes I know, it does take forever...

Mandevu, you've got a great likeness of your grandson here, what a sweet face. I have a couple of comments which may help you capture the expression more.

I think you have his irises too small. In young children the irises tend to be larger and cover more of the sclera (the white). This may be why you're not quite catching the expression there.

While you want to blend or do some very fine hatching to get that smooth young skin, you don't want to blend too much and lose any texture at all. As well you need to strengthen the values here too. If you greyscale your image and compare it to your drawing you'll find that the reference is much darker and so should your drawing as well.

The ear is bothering me a little and I'm trying to figure out why. THe shape is there, so it must be the value that's throwing it off. It is in shadow and your drawing has it more highlighted, which draws my eye there. Adding more value to the ear should fix that problem.

Finally, close up the gaps between the teeth and reduce the shading around the teeth. You don't want to define them and make them a focal point of the portrait.

Thanks Jeanette - great observations and advice! I will try again. It is amazing how a small bit of shading, or a few strokes of the pencil can throw things off, or make them work. Hopefully I will do Connor more justice in my next attempt!

painter48 thanks for your comments yes I do get the pics online thats why I dont put them on to compare them I dont want to get in any trouble, I usually change something in the drawing so they are a little bit different than the photo.

Rose thank you very much.

Kim I saw most groups when I was younger but never saw the stones one of the best groups I ever saw was queen they sounded exactly the same live as they did on there records.

Mandevu very nice drawing

Jeanette in my original picture the values look a lot darker so it does stand out its just my scanner is rubish,
I have started the senior citizen pics allready if you check out my gallery I have one of keith richards in there.

Thanks Laura and Jeanette. Yes, my greatest weakness is impatience!

From my drawing you will see that starting out at the top of the head I did try to create strands. Then I guess I got overwhelmed and lost control. To be fair the woman's hair isn't just curly it's all over the place! In any case I have now erased most of the hair as best I could and fully intend to "attack" it again more methodically.... in reparation for all my sins!!

Man ...your grandson is awsome ..you did a beautiful job .
David ....QUEEN .. I love them also ...Freddy Mercury is one of the best singers ... his voice is so strong .. I was sorry he passed . matter of fact I think they were like untouchable and didnt really tour ALL over .. only selected places .. I dont remember them comming around here .

So here is version II. Still by no means perfect but I think it is a definite improvement.

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Rose - the first one was good but the second one was fantastic. What an improvement on the hair! You really did a good job on that one.

Thank you Joanie.

I have both pics opened on my computer and really Friday's hair looks like no more than a bunch of weird scribbles. The lady seems to have gone to the salon over the weekend.

So Farfallina - get it into your head - the key is PATIENCE and METHOD.

Thanks Davidb - I have to work on the mouth & eyes - they are not right.

Much more effective Rose! Wonderful work! You can spend as much or as little time on messy hair as you like to get an effect. It all depends on how detailed you want to be or if you want to give an overall impression instead.

[attachmentid=1865]Looking for some critique and suggestions. This dog is all hair and fur. I feel I need to soften it up more. Can anyone advise ways to do this?

Excellent drawing Sean. The face looks very well drawn. He is a very furry, hairy beast isn' t he? Drawing fur is no different than drawing hair on a person. Follow the contours of the body and indicate areas of shading and highlights.

In this I'd soften the hard lines that outline the strands of fur and try to indicate them with shading instead. With white fur or hair, you need to build layers and the drawing of the fur is actually where you put the shadow. Its a slow process and depends on how much detail you want to achieve as to how much time you wish to put into it.

Break it down into manageable sections and work on it a bit at a time and you'll get there.

brian- love mic jagger. you do excellent on these portrait of famous people. love to see them. hope you are feeling better too.
rose wow-- you are doing sooo good on your portraits. keep it up.
Lori

Thanks for your comments everyone, I'm still messing around with my picture, and you comments helped a lot.

this is an updated picture of Mick Jagger I've darkend it as jeanette advised I would like your comments on it now please








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he's got more OOOMPH to him now David Bringing out the values really does bring a drawing to life. Great job.

David he looks awesome! Nice drawing. Are you doing a series on great musical artists...or as the kids would say the oldies crowd.

Hi Gang

Need help again, I am finishing a drawing and would like to make quality copies to give to friends and keep the original for myself. Where can I get the copies made, what should I ask for and what is the estimated cost of doing this?

Thanks

John G

John, go to a reputable printer - NOT a photo copy shop. Have them do a digital scan and then produce prints from that. I just had some prints done to day and the cost is very reasonable, depending on size of the print and whether colour or black and white.

Thank you

John G

Hi Jeanette,
I have reworked my sketch following your advice with the attached result. Although I'm not entirely happy with it I think there is some improvement. Unfortunately I was lazy and reworked the original sketch whereas I should probably have started again from scratch! Nevertheless the experiential learning will be put towards my next attempt - thanks!