Thanks guys.

Jad, I don't understand your criticism of my "subtle shading" of the mouth. It seems like you're suggesting if I am to render an unrealistic mouth shape, I should make a bold dark line to signal "this not a real mouth; it's stylized!" But the entire image is extremely stylized! I don't see how rendering the mouth with less cohesive shading would strengthen the piece.

The eyes are heavily magnified by the glasses. Here's an image from google image search that illustrates the effect I'm going for: http://farm1.static.flickr.com/25/96077601_c999314868.jpg

I get the sense that you and Helm do not watch much if any anime. Am I wrong? The mouth is an allusion to a visual trope that's fairly specific to that medium. I wouldn't expect someone who's unfamiliar with it to understand it intuitively...

Quote from: Helm on March 22, 2011, 09:26:54 am

If that smile is meant to connote demureness, there are better ways to go about it.

It is not. And I am not falling back on this mouth shape because it's easy. The cliché is the message. Some may consider that meta, postmodern bullshit, but just the fact that I'm getting polarized reactions of "D'aww!" and "wtf vagina/butt-mouth" makes me feel like I've accomplished exactly what I set out to do artistically.

Nah, you got me just right. I think a bold line would work better. But it's my personal idea of how I wanna stylize things, so it's just feedback, not trying to point out 'objective' faults in the picture.

Also I watch nothing but anime, and I sadly almost draw nothing but anime too, so you didn't get it completely right there ' U ' I'm a big fan of the :3-mouth even, but when you reach a certain point of ... construction .. in the face, I think it stops working. Again, it's my personal idea of how I want things to be. ' 3 '

... I'll read through Helm's posts now and try to see why you're so agitated. ' 0 ' please don't be. In the end we're all just guys with opinions on the internet.

... But I'll read through it all before I comment further on it.

EDIT: I meant the whole style of the piece would have to be changed for a 3-mouth to look nice. ' 3 ' not that you'd slap in a big black 3-mouth in a piece that's rendered in a different way. That would look bad, indeed

EDIT2: well, when it comes to critique, Helm's administrator status doesn't really mean anything, you know. He's allowed to call your art worthless if he wants to.

It's not correct that he labeled you a sexist. He's questioned whether you are supporting or going against the sexualization and pet-ification of 'the woman' that a cat girl signifies. Not saying that you have done either.

Any mental associations to pornography are happening inside of Helm's head, and in this case he is the pervert. So don't read those kind of sentences as an attack towards you, he's just describing his experience watching and thinking about your image. In the end he's out to encourage you, but encourage you to do the stuff he wants to see. You don't have to agree. Especially not cause he's an administrator or anything. That doesn't count when it comes to feedback. It's the quality of the feedback itself, and that only, that counts. Not the administrational power of the poster.

' ___ ' am sorry to see you being so upset over this, but I can understand it too. Harsh two-post wall of text tends to do that. I both agree and disagree with helm on certain points, so I dunno.

I, personally just see art as self-fulfillment and masturbation, and would gladly draw naked cat girls if I wanted to, only for masturbational purposes, so I don't have any problem with what you're doing, although I like to draw women more empowered and less as sexualized pets.

But when I'm in that mood I like to draw such things too. So what the hell.

Edit3: short thing about stylization: when you render a 3-mouth with shading and such, it looks like a buttagina to me. When you render it boldly without shading, it reads instantly like a cat-mouth to me, and I can't even see the buttagina. So I'm very polarized about that sorta thing. But I think it's a good rule of thumb ' 3 '

the way it's shaded subtly as though it was a natural shape makes it look less like a stylized feature and more like a horrible misshaped mouth. That reminds me of a hairless vagina or a butt. ' D '

All in all her face is a bit like a mask right now, with eyes a bit higher up than they ought to be and a back-head that's smaller than it ought to be. ' 3 '

Is a bit strange. It's cute too. Nice pixel tech. It looks smooth and pleasant, especially the hair. I'll do an edit if I find the time

malkolmk, I don't think anyone should be required to feel thankful that you take the time to type 'What? What? A neck? Where? My sprite doesn't have a neck.'

Stop feeling sniped at, and just go with the constructive feedback you get.

I generally get annoyed when the members of this forum try to moderate for me, yes, but giving some helpful advice on how to structure your posts and avoid unnecessary bumping doesn't quite enter the zone of 'heavy moderation', don't you think? It's too close to 'general advice', really. A moderator's job is foremost to clean stuff when things get out of bounds, and this is still within. I think the members should be allowed to tip eachother off slightly about forum conduct. But us moderators have the final word.

The style of my game has the black outlines, a lot, so that's why they're so many
Why does the vase need more contrast? then It'd look a bit gray, instead of white?

Naaaah, you can trick the brain more than that, bro. The power of contrast works on a bigger scale than that. Just cause something has gray shades in it won't make it look gray. And if it does, it's probabl because the bricks surrouding it are too bright. Which, incidentally, they probably are.

 ' 3 ' you should read up on this, and contrast between colors, et cetera, how it all works, this way you'll soon be able to paint a whole scene in orange and still make the human brain register a yellow-orangeish vase as 'white'. ' U ' the best artists have mastered this, so learn it, don't question it.