Here’s my entry for this month’s Critique Arena. I stepped outside of my comfort zone and tried something a little different on this one. It took me a while to get started as I wasn’t sure where to take it but I have to say that I’m more than happy with the outcome. Can’t wait to see what everyone else brings to the table this month.

This was hands down my favourite critique arena challenge yet! Right up my alley, speaking to my interests at least. I’ve never actually done a full character design sheet like this so I’m glad I’ve got one to add to my portfolio now:)

I really enjoyed the prompt this month. Here’s my entry of a clever little monkey scheming his way over to a tree full of ripe oranges.

As always, best of luck to everyone and I can’t wait to see what’s brought Into the arena!

MAY CONTEST: ISOLATION

First contest entry for me. I’ve been dying to join the fun for a while now but have been too busy (aka busy making excuses) to get my stuff together and submit. I guess one of the upsides to these strange times we’re experiencing now is that I was able to find (make) time to put something together.

I just watched the critique arena for April’s contest and I LOVE the new format with 16 short list entries being whittled down to winners by SVS member votes! Great improvement and I hope to make the cut next month to see what kind of feedback I might receive.

I haven’t been as active in here as I would like but plan to make a push to get in here more frequently. Everyone here is doing such great work and the level of positivity amongst artists is very refreshing. Grateful to be a part of the team. Good luck to everyone entering this month!

Hey guys, re-posting this one with some additions. I didn’t like how my first image was going to get hit with “This doesn’t really say ‘yeti’ to me. What kind of a yeti gets to chef up some solid meals in a kitchen as fancy and modern as that?” so I made some minor alterations.

I’m not sure if the grey backdrop counts against the ‘spot illustration’ I’m going after but I wanted the outline of the daydream bubble to stand out and liked the look of the white font. We’ll see how she does.

Best of luck, as always, to everyone competing. Hopefully there are a bunch of solid portfolio pieces to come out of this one:)

Day 1 - Ring
Francisco the Ring Traveller

Here’s my entry for this month’s critique arena contest. I’m not sure how I feel about it as it’s the first time I’ve tried to create anything without line work (just to try something different and venture outside of my comfort zone) but I’m submitting anyway.

Looking forward to seeing what everyone else is bringing to the table. For some reason this prompt stumped me more than expected so I’m curious how others tackled this one.

Oh, I also decided to throw some text in there for fun. It could be a big misstep but I figured I’d give it a shot anyway and see how it fared.

Good luck everyone:)

Hey guys/gals, meet Fidget Hare. I haven’t had much luck in these contests as of late but call me stubborn because here I am again. I haven’t even had a chance to check out everyone’s entries yet so I’m looking forward to going over all of the goodies right now:) Best of luck to everyone!

![Hey everyone, I haven’t been frequenting the forums as much as I should be as of late (partially because I get overwhelmed navigating and knowing where to start?) but I would like to make more of an effort to hopefully build more of a support group so to speak. I’ve been feverishly working daily for the past couple years to build my craft up to where I want it to be (and will probably be doing this the rest of my life lol) but I don’t have any local connections to people in the art community so I think I need to make this SVS forum more of my family.

Anyway, my wife just turned 34 the other day and I thought I would try my hand at a portrait of her done in watercolour. It didn’t turn out great but it was a fun start. I’d love any feedback you can provide (both good and constructive please as I would like to improve). Let me know what you think! Thanks:)

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@DaveLeekArt and I just realized the challenge called for an ‘Inn’... not necessarily our traveller’s home - whoops! Guess it pays to not rush and submit last minute after glancing at the rules.

Bummed out I couldn’t give this one a proper go this month, simply had too much else on the go. This is the best I could come up with in a couple hours but wanted to get something out there for completion sake.

Looking forward to seeing everyone else’s entries now (I don’t like to look until I’m done and submitted haha).

Catch you all in the arena:)

@Braden-Hallett haha I guess there’s nothing new under the sun “It’s never what you do but how it’s done”.

@Braden-Hallett very well done sir! I love the blueprint background. Consider that idea stolen at the next opportunity I have haha

Hey guys/gals, meet Fidget Hare. I haven’t had much luck in these contests as of late but call me stubborn because here I am again. I haven’t even had a chance to check out everyone’s entries yet so I’m looking forward to going over all of the goodies right now:) Best of luck to everyone!

@LisaF thank you!

Hey @Chip-Valecek I missed the Critique Arena Wednesday due to work and I don’t have a Facebook account - is there any way for me to watch the recording or do I just have to sit and wait patiently to see who made the top 16 and finalists when it’s shared on IG?

@Jeremiahbrown I see we are both serving up ripe skunk rump for dinner tonight haha

@Tiffany-Thomas haha hopefully you’re not living on as much squirrel as yeti over here!

@Joe-Koz me likey. Great use of the harsh shadows in the background. It makes the image more fun and brings out the colours too. Nice work.