First contest Fairy tale traveler WIP

Shelley James 0

Um, hi. I am really nervous about posting my stuff, but I gotta do stuff that scares me.

And here are the tons of things running through my mind:

Its 5 different drawings, do I do one to completion then move to next. Sketch them all, and develop them all equally over time?
I like my new software (Painter) but I am still not used to it.
Oooh, I really like that brush/texture
But Will said keep it simple just use a few brushes so you can get steady predictable results.
But someone else said they use a lot of brushes to get it real painter-y
Am I taking on too much? Maybe I should not enter and just learn my software
Put yourself out there!
I tend to do a lot of linework, maybe i should move away from that
Am I a horrible artist?
No, stop that negative self talk.
I got As in art school, but art school definitely didn't prepare me for ... being an artist in the "real world"
Maybe I should have more in my sketch stage before adding color.
But everyone has different processes!
I am definitely gonna lessen the intensity of that green.
Now everyone thinks I am crazy.

Thanks for listening to the inside of my brain. I want to make a living off my art. My current job is killing me slowly. I am not even sure why I am posting this. To get a feedback (that hopefully won't make me cry)? To know I am not alone?

Valerie Light

Posting is hard to do, but this is a friendly place. Welcome!

I'm about a year into learning digital painting, but I use Procreate. I generally stick to 2 or 3 brushes per image (usually a line brush, a fill in brush, and a texturey brush.) Working that way helps me be clear about which details to put on which layers, and I get less mixed up and muddy.

I think it would be good to arrange all 5 drawings into a single image and develop them together. As you work, you'll learn things about your character's proportions, physicality, outfit, and expression. You might want to look at old WIP threads from the Yeti character design challenge in December to see how some other people worked through a character design, and how they discuss feedback.

Asyas_illos

@Shelley-James-0 ok grab a paper bag inhale and exhale slowly. no really though I get it lol. I think this is a really great start! I love the Davey Crockett look he/she has got going on. I can’t tell you how to do your process but I can tell how I do mine and maybe that will help you? I start with sketch obviously, I do one full. Then I branch off from that one making sure my proportions match up and so on an so forth maybe tweaking little things here and there. Use different layers makes adjusting things easy. And I always save color for last coloring all 5at once to make sure They are all the same. Then some other little details like additional linework. I have a hard time getting away from it I love linework but I’ve learned to just tone it down and not be stark black and bold.hope some of that helps you and can’t wait to see your progress! You got this!

Shelley James 0

@Valerie-Light Thank you. I like the idea of drawing them all as a single image.

Shelley James 0

@Asyas_illos Thank you for the encouragement. I definitely lean towards line work because one of my sources of income (small, but its a start) is coloring sheets.