Imo there is nothing wrong with tracing the lines for learning's purpose, but whats way more effective(at least in my experience), is actually trying to copy the lines by looking at them the error might be going to be grave at first, but you'll gradually get closer to no significant error at all, whats even more effective in the long run( and most fun imo) is trying to understand the underlying structure in the process and maybe later on even drawing the reference from another perspective or with another pose or both.

I'm in,

To whomever gets to pick me, draw whatever you feel like drawing, if possible draw something you haven't drawn before or attempt an approach you haven't attempted before, just make sure its not isometric, as I have an unfounded repulsion against that. On the other hand if you were to draw something isometric precisely for that reason, I would probably just look at it and smile or downright laugh wholeheartedly .So I guess that means anything goes. It is mandatory to have fun in the process though!

Maybe I went a little overboard dunno, either way it was a lot of fun and this is a great activity

That's some massive improvement , looks more organic and interesting, studying this(and hopefully applying some of it) will keep me busy for a while.

As for anti-aliasing I try to avoid having to resort to use it, partly the reason I'm trying to keep the contrast low.I try to practice cluster conservation, what I'm trying to achieve ideally is having giant expressive clusters with perfect-lined borders, I use single pixels only when absolutely necessary(reason why I try to avoid AA) I try to rework affected areas or recolor them instead and in worst cases rather put up with some degree of jaggedness.

The version above is an older one here is the current.


Maybe its my monitor but the contrast, because of the brown used on the fish, looks ok to me, the right one has slightly increased contrast, I like the left one more cause very little light reaches the bottom of the lake, so I think it makes more sense.

Yep the viewer is supposed to be under the fish looking up that's why stuff closer the surface is lighter , is it hard to read because of the contrast?