Can’t wait to notice all the changes I want to make the second after I post! Had a lot of fun with this. Also want to note that I am indeed a member but I’ve had wonky things happen to my membership before and not been considered a member for some reason. Just want to make sure I can count towards the final picks if I make it that far!
Here’s a piece from a series I just finished up! If you’d like to see the rest I’ll be continuing to post the rest on my Instagram
For the most part drawing a pose from your head is a very high tier skill I think. We are all so familiar with the human form that if it is the slightest bit off it can really stand out. Because of this it is very challenging to draw without reference. For a lot of people I think drawing without reference is a big dream goal but read into the work and processes of great illustrators and you will find that they almost never go without reference. Norman Rockwell was obsessive about his references. His work is so amazing because he always had such good reference!
So my advice is don’t push yourself to go without reference too much. It can be great practice but can build bad habits if not balanced with using references. I like to start by drawing very roughly without reference and then I will pose myself for reference and see how far off the mark I was. My first reference source is the internet, if it’s a really tricky pose I’ll try to do it myself or ask someone I live with to pose for me. There are also some action figure-like tools for reference that can be really helpful in a pinch.
Hope this helps, let me know if you have questions about any of this!
This is my first character design in a looong time. I’m pretty happy with it but with that happiness I think there can also be blindness sometimes so I want you to be my eyes!
In the first few seconds of looking at it what stands out as needing improvement?
After looking at it for a longer time what are some of the more secondary things that could be improved?
Also does anyone have tips for building a good color palette? Colors are TRICKY
@Laurasketches
Oh I probably should have been more clear. This batch of thumbnails is the second stage of my thumbnailing. I did 15 thumbnails to start and then picked 3 favorites to play around with more which is what you see here. That’s why they’re all so similar, I guess the Kansas setting with the oz foreshadowing is what appealed to me the most. In any case it’s still great advice, lots of thumbnailing is key! Maybe some day I’ll be able to do 50 like Lee White talks about 
Right now my eyes are drawn to the large, grey area below the jump and the trees in the background. What I do when I’m feeling really stuck is just go back to square one, as painful as that might be sometimes. Do some thumbnails, maybe 10 but you can ever do too many thumbnails. Then pick a couple to refine and keep it narrowing it down until you have the composition you like. Next block in just the values and finally move onto color.
More specifically for you’re piece I would suggest playing around with camera angles. What are the top three or maybe just two elements that you want the viewer to look at. From there you can create thumbnails with that in mind.
I’m not sure this entirely conveys the prompt. "Together" isn’t really one of the first things that comes to mind. What helped me figure out my idea is to imagine that "together" is typed over the image and that puts things into perspective a bit for me and helps to me to see wether or not the image actually fits the prompt.
Looks like others have already said a lot of what I would say. So in short, yes you should send it! I'd say this is a relatively low risk thing to do so go for it!
This is pretty near to completion, I feel like I’m in that last 10% and I want to hear what you’ve all got to say so I can incorporate as many changes as I need into this last bit. I feel like the sky and ground in Kansas are a tiny bit too bland and may need more texture or something. Same goes for the wall and the yellow brick road. Just feels like something is lacking. Let me know what you you think
It’s not the the background is uninteresting it’s that’s feel like it’s competing a little bit too much with more important parts of the image. After thinking about it some more I think just removing the bird in the tree might fix this unless the bird is an important part of the story
I think I’ll definitely try to make the hammers work. They’re just more interesting. I haven’t gotten into the character design much yet so maybe once I add some more details it will balance things out, we shall see. Also thank you for that archer reference! I was aware the archer isn’t currently holding the bow correctly but wasnt really worried about it for the more general composition. It’s something I’ll be tweaking soon. That reference seems to be at just the right angle too so that will be very helpful!
Your site looks great, Josh. The only thing I could think of to change is moving that picture of yourself to the top of your about page rather than have it at the bottom. Hardly a big issue though. Great job with the site.
The first thing I notice is that it doesn’t seem like the yo yo is lost it just seems like he has dropped it. Unfortunately this would probably require a total redesign.
I also noticed that the background is taking up too much of the image. The background is not important and doesn’t add much here and for that reason I think the house and Bobo should be more at the center of attention. Bring them into the composition more. But this may not be necessary if you do a redesign as I mentioned before. Hope this helps
Howdy folks!
So I’m just trying to figure out the right composition right now. I’m really struggling to see which works best so it would help to get some fresh eyes on it. I love the idea of the guy on the left having hammers but the shield makes the composition more balanced I thin. Maybe I can keep the hammers and find a way to add more weight on that side. Let me know your thoughts!
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Howdy, Folks!
So this topic is something I have personally struggled with a lot and I'm sure I am not alone in this. Having proficient artistic abilities is of course crucial but those skills won't matter much if you don't know how to direct them. I know many folks here know they want to work as children's book illustrators but I figured I'd start this discussion to see if there is enough interest in a 3PP episode.
Here are some starter points:
What market do you consider yourself to be in or would like to be in?
How did you find your market and/ or how are you working towards finding it?
Did finding your market come naturally or did you have to do some groundwork to figure it out?
Thank you, this is all very helpful!
I wish I could list my immediate goals but I can't confidently say what those are right now. I'm still not sure what market I fit into which has been very frustrating. But I do see what you're saying about how people might be turned off by seeing my goals as not being related to what they are looking for, maybe I should be more specific about those being long term goals.
I started with a shorter about page but made it longer because honestly I can't stand many artist's about pages. They usually hardly tell me anything about them at all and feel to me like people do it because "that's the way it's always been done". What I think I might do is have a more accessible bio at the top and then more info below if people would like to learn more.
A contact form definitely sounds like a good idea, I think I'll do that.
I had originally titled each category but my professor was helping me with the site and said he didn't think I needed them so I'm glad to have some more feedback on that. I'm not sure why you would have trouble opening the categories though . I haven't had any issues like that and neither has anyone else I know, very strange but I will look into it.
Thanks again for all of your feedback, I really appreciate it!
Here’s a piece from a series I just finished up! If you’d like to see the rest I’ll be continuing to post the rest on my Instagram
I would echo what a lot of others have said about it being too dark. Something else I’d like to point out though is the brush work you used on the characters. It looks like you used an airbrush tool and these tools are very easy to get sucked into because they can easily smooth out changes in value. This can be a bit of trap, it can cause you to over render and in this case it doesn’t with the rendering style of the rest of the image. On the podcast and in critiques they have talked about avoiding this airbrushed look because it often just causes problems and everything ends up looking too soft and doesn’t create much interest for the viewer.
I’ve finally got a website up and running that I’m happy with. https://www.griffincmcphersonillustration.com/
I’d love for some of you to be the first to check it out and although I’m calling it "complete" I would love any feedback you have (especially on the about page which took me a while)
One particular thing I’d like feedback on is if I should change the site name. I actually misspelled it. There isn’t supposed to be a "c" between my first and last name. So I’ll have to replace the domain anyways and I’m thinking it needs to be shorter. GMillustration is what I’m thinking right now but I’m wondering if I should at least have my last name in there so it is more clearly attached to me. Let me know your thoughts!