Alright, well it's 4 in the morning here in my part of the world, and I'm just going to be done with this piece. To all who have helped me hone this piece into what it is, thank you for walking with me as I've learned through this project.

I present, "Kindred Spirits:"

Svs has helped me realize that one of the biggest problems within my college's struggling student community isn't that the professors are awful (though they need to work on their teaching methods) but that the students hardly interact. Through the forums I've seen that artists/illustrators of wildly different skill levels can interact witch each other and, choosing to be humble and engaging, be mutually beneficial as long as they are competent with reading visual language.

Also learned through my experience with SVS thusfar: Leadership does not have to be charismatic. I mean, you want to be able to articulate your points well as a leader, but if you are motivated to share the joys of being a creative, that is something that naturally attracts other creatives. That is a quality I have observed in much of this forum so far, and it's been enough to convince me to try and nurse the creative community back to health here at my college. We're having an Inktober meeting tomorrow at 2!

I guess Im trying to say that this community is inspiring others, and the knowledge from the educational videos has emboldened me personally to both grow in skill and in competence, to the point that I'm able to lead a small community. So thank you!

Just finished up a little game for next week at the studio I work at. We've got this thing called, "Pirate Day," where kids go from small business to small business and do activities for stamps, and my place is doing, "Pin the Cannonball to the Hull." Hopefully the kids don't get too caught up in being the cannoneers

Alright y'all, I've taken the critique and tried to implement most of it. Not set on this being the final revision, but It's getting closer. Again, thanks so much!

Concepted the colors/materials for the Ocarina Spider in my free time between lunch and class today:

Hey y'all!

So I've decided to bank off of Inktober to try to foster a better creative community here at my college, and I was able to get a spot in our campus paper (incidentally, I happen to work for said paper as the layout editor... but we were running short on content so the Editor and chief decided to do my story!) Check it out!

To Jake Parker, thanks so much for putting content out for artists and illustrators to latch on to. I will be banking off of it intensely this October

http://gcsbnews.com/a-community-for-creatives-superstorm/ (I know internet links are sketch, but this one is safe)

Thanks for asking the forum, @Art-of-B!

I think my chiefmost improvement was in color, but there has been an overall elevation in my personal ability to do good work. Here's something from earlier in the year:

I labored over this one out of passion for a lovely lady I'm privileged enough to call Girlfriend, but while the passionate side of the work made things come together fairly well, I don't think this could be called much other than a study. At the time, this was the best I had ever done in terms of color, and with all the details involved (a lot for me at the time) I'd say that it was a breakthrough, but not phenomenal. Not to mention, I didn't really know a ton about painting or brushes, so I was at a disadvantage there as well.

This illustration kinda showcases how far I've come this year. I understand color way better, I've begun to understand painting and light, and my composition skills, while not particularly revolutionary in this one, are better, most likely due to Inktober training. It's messy in spots, but I've recently begun branching my skills out again, so, for a little while, I'm alright with that.

Also, lots of the help I've needed to improve has come from the SVS community, so thank you!

I know a lot of folks produce work regularly enough that they have a certain schedule of rest and work that they've developed, and I'm wondering how everyone here on the forum rests! Partially because I love seeing people's perspectives on life, but also partially because I'm going into a very busy quarter of college and I'm looking to see what I can draw out from observing other people's circumstances

I like graphic novels produced by people with a well-developed style. Artist Greg Tocchini's style, for instance, is amazing, and has already proved itself to be a phenomenal way to deposit into my personal creative piggy bank.

Hello SVS!

It has been a long time since I've posted here-- even just in the comments. I'm glad to be back!

I come looking for what's in the post's title: Crit and advice/guidance. Critique because I don't know how else to grow, and I could use more constructive feedback. Advice and guidance... because I need to figure out how to push the idea. A little background: For an Advanced Illustration Class in my college's program this past fall, us students were tasked with creating and bringing to print a publication. It could have been anything. I had one classmate do postcards themed around tea, and another talking about his own journey with depression. I chose to do a children's story about creatures that I've brought to the forum before: Luminyr. I hammered at the project and it came together as fast as I could get it done-- just over 100 hours over the course of 6 weeks. Since then I've held a kickstarter, distributed a small number of copies, and looked in to printing larger runs to distribute around the place I hope to live soon.

For now, that's enough of the background. Take a look-- let me know what you think!

Okay! Been a little while, but I've redone the illustration and fleshed out the idea behind the little creature a bit. Here's the rework for the Luminyr:

@Griffin Haha, I just listened to that episode of the podcast where they talk about the soft brushes!

Thanks for the crit! I'm having a hard time understanding why the space between the two is counter productive though. The top left creature (cyanoid) is meant to be leaping from behind the Luminyr. Thus the distance is somewhat appropriate, no? I feel, however, that I'm missing something.

This is all juicy feedback. I can't wait to come back to this piece and wrestle with it some more!

@Griffin My 20 cents: You have a style and I like it a lot. It's understandable that you're frustrated, though. Personally one of the problems I have is not understanding my style through other people's eyes, and thus not understanding what makes it unique. Your adherence to certain colors, textures, lines, mark making, and proportions make your style stand out.

Keep it up!

@TheArtBard Thanks so much for the feedback!

Now that I've gor your gut reaction I can explain a bit. The foreground creature is a little guy called a Luminyr. You can find photos of them at www.matthew-bliss.com under Light of Luminyr. The idea is that they hunt for lightbulbs. Their adversary is the creature above, which is made up of a bunch of materials. Namely electrical wire, mirrors, and a paper-covered inkwell. I've had some trouble making things work well together and be readable...

...but the feedback is immensely helpful! I will come back to it this evening and see what can be done for tweaks. Thanks again!

Heya SVS!

I'm looking for a bit of feedback on a digital piece I put together this year, namely whether you can tell what is going on/what is in the image. Any other feedback is more than welcome, but I do not wish to take up too much of your folk's time.

Wow, this is a really engaging illustration; you can really tell something horrible happened to the ship! Right away the lighting made a good impression.

Looking closer, I felt that a number of items lacked detail-- specifically those which are cast in the light. Nothing is reall missing, but i believe that certain items (the carpet, the inside of the chest lid, and the birdcage) would benefit from some very sparing details. Woodgrain, fabric lumpyness, consistent lines for the metal cage, etc.

Other than that I don't see that you would have much left before you could consider your work good to go! Kudos for illustrating 50 objects! You have a knack for balancing the weight of detail and value!

@Nyrryl-Cadiz Thank you for the feedback!

I'm glad to get a solid read on the sort of market the book should be marketed towards-- and also that the typeface just needs to change I'll try to get on that in the next few days and post about the typefaces I check out.

Thanks again for the guidance!

@Tracy-McCusker Thank you so much for your feedback. It means a lot that you've taken the time to put it together-- thank you, again

Let me give you some details, since it seems I posted to few of them:
The book has been printed at 18x10 per spread 9x10 per page) and has a ~24pt handwritten typeface for the majority of the book, but a cursive typeface for some of the key phrases. These were selected for the older and organic ethos that handwritten and cursive typefaces carry. Originally, the book was entirely set with the cursive, but I moved to the handwritten after getting this same feedback

As for the target range, I was a bit out of my depth from the start, as I'm not sure what to expect from different children of different ages. Let's say it's targeted at kids that can read well, but that also have begun to understand significant meaning in the text-- so maybe 3rd grade on up?

These things in mind, I'll look through my digital typekit again to see if I can drudge up something more legible. Thank you again for the feedback!

I think this might have gotten lost in the time of posting/hubbub of the forum (bump)

Hello SVS!

It has been a long time since I've posted here-- even just in the comments. I'm glad to be back!

I come looking for what's in the post's title: Crit and advice/guidance. Critique because I don't know how else to grow, and I could use more constructive feedback. Advice and guidance... because I need to figure out how to push the idea. A little background: For an Advanced Illustration Class in my college's program this past fall, us students were tasked with creating and bringing to print a publication. It could have been anything. I had one classmate do postcards themed around tea, and another talking about his own journey with depression. I chose to do a children's story about creatures that I've brought to the forum before: Luminyr. I hammered at the project and it came together as fast as I could get it done-- just over 100 hours over the course of 6 weeks. Since then I've held a kickstarter, distributed a small number of copies, and looked in to printing larger runs to distribute around the place I hope to live soon.

For now, that's enough of the background. Take a look-- let me know what you think!

@Nicholas-Brink Haha!!! I'm a wannabe Grand Rapidian myself; grew up everywhere from Lyon Street to Knapp's corner and now I'm an out-of-state student!

Have you been involved with the furniture industry? Seems like the thing an Industrial Designer in GR would be plugged in to-- but I could be wrong.

Your work is super clean and structural-- I get 80's vibes from the combination of the colors and linework. At what size do you illustrate these?