Heh, it actually started out as polished a black leather dress; I just never removed the artifacts. 

I tried to rework the original, but it was stubbornly stagnant. I tried a different approach with a clean slate, keeping your critique in mind:

Hmm...I really like this. It's got wonderful motion, pretty awesome curves, and you've got a good base sketch here.

• However!

The motion itself is great, but what it's conveying is a little bit ambiguous. Her legs are saying trim lady, daintily walking throw a garden of wonderful flowers. Her top, however, is saying "I'm a wizard, and I'm going to BLOW YOUR FRIGGIN' HEAD OFF WITH MY FIREBALL, and stay cool as a cucumber." The combination of this looks like a beautifully clumsy girl flailing to catch her balance. While all of these are absolutely awesome, it would be a good idea to unify your piece so that if you cover her top up, you could still tell she is a virile wizard or whatever persona you want to create.

• However!

Your pretty awesome curves are definitely pretty awesome, but I think that her boobs, tummy, and arms are too broad. Just slim those down a bit, and maaaaybe add a couple pixels length to her legs, and you'll be well on your way to an ultimatum of artistic success.

• However!

Yes, a wonderful base sketch, much better than what I can do, but I think that it would be a very good idea not to sketch as though you're using a pencil. Take advantage of highlights and maybe another color for her shadows to really help form a solid base. It'll save you from the myriads of tears waiting to erupt when you have to put a brand new pixel over your beautiful sketch to make room for highlights and stuff.


Not an amazing edit by any standards, but maybe it'll help somehow!

Also note that when you run, your leg only straightens at the kick off. Letting the leg go straight mid-stride would make it very hard to kick off because it would disperse the built up energy from the contact. That's how you would slow down from a really fast run, and it's also the source of your character's jitters. Your run is looking a hundred million times better though!

His legs move as though the guy is suspended and kicking his legs. Don't be afraid to squish, stretch, noodle, and skew the limbs early on; it's more important to get the right energy and movement than cohesiveness at this stage. The forum is littered with more in depth comments about making an effective run cycle right now, so do some shopping around if you need to learn just how to get that movement. Also try running yourself; it helped me while I was doing my edit!

Three points:

• Weight

His foot looks as though it's sliding along the ground for a bit in the instances right before and after the foot hits the ground. This gives it an almost zero gravity vibe, but it's an easy fix. Just make the contact with the ground more abrupt.

• Lift

His feet move almost like a pendulum would, but his upper legs should be the only parts of his lower body that follow that path of movement. In a run, the foreleg is kept at about the same height all the way from the kick off to the contact with the ground.

• Snap

Notice the little blue lines that I made below your character's feet in my edit. Notice a difference between the top image and the bottom one? I found that when I ran, my leg would anticipate my opposite leg's contact with the ground, and wait until that contact to spring forward really fast.

My really sloppy rough edit:

I hope some of this is useful!

Very sad avatar to clarify. Broken hearted even. He's sad because he still looks like crap. Got any ideas on how to help him?