Pixel sketching

[Tremulant]

Some new stuff, most of which is unfinished and sloppy, and Dragonface is the only one that I put an acceptable effort into.
Ah well, crits and etcetera always appreciated.

---USED TO BE A PICTURE---

Just ignore the face in the lower right corner, as it makes me cry and feel ashamed.

Edit: Something happened to this pic and only this pic apparently, cause all my others are still working... huh.

[Xion]

Good lord, man I can't stand it when you awesome people get all like "It's not that good."

Give me more eye candy!

[sonic_reaper]

A true artist always hates his own work.

May I ask why the back of the girl's hair is fucked?

[Tremulant]

Xion Night: Heh Thanks muchly man, I won't lie and say the ego inflation's not appreciated. Didn't realize I was one of the awesome people tho

sonic_reaper: I'll have to take your word on that . As for the hair, I think it's cause the colored bits look to much like solid blocks or cones rather than hair (even cartoony hair). A big part of it's that it's just not finished though.

[sonic_reaper]

I would just slap a dark color over it and work it from scratch.  It's not fucked if you haven't even finished it yet 

[Helm]

finally, you're not wasting dark shades! Excellent. I strongly urge you (and this is out of line for such a forum but hey) to avoid generic-anime-style like the plague. If there's one internet art-trend that's overplayed it's that. I know, why should you listen to me if that's what you want to do? I wouldn't listen to me either, that's your choice to make, but just saying.

The dragonhead I see no problems with. The two others you'll have to work on before serious krittage might occur.

[sonic_reaper]

This feels a bit out of place for me say to say, but "Preach on brotha!".  The generic anime style seems to instill itself on new artists as ... that's what they imitate when they get started.  But I digress.

If you're referring to the Elf, it's not really generic by any means, it just has many sharp features.  I suppose an exaggeration on the typical looking elf?

[Tremulant]

Reaper: Yeah, I kinda like where the face is going with the front, so I probably will do just that. Starting from scracth on the hair is, I agree, is the best route given where it's at.

Helm; Hooray! I wondered about that, what with all the green shades. And yeah, I agree with you in a big way about the anime deal; I've been working pretty steadily to ditch it (a relic from the past that infects my style even now ). That's the style that naturally came out when I was sketching around tho, so I guess I haven't shaken it off yet.

New post popped up while I was typing--

Reaper: I had the very problem you just brought up (starting by imitating anime, that is). That was awhile ago now, but I think it still holds a heavy sway over my style. But yeah, mainly I think because it's so effeminite (it's actually a guy, believe it or not), the anime influence really takes hold of the image.

While we're on the topic, any advice, generally, about moving away from this?

[Helm]

More daring lines. Either study reality very much and emulate it for a while, or move quite away from that sort of interpretation and find methods of conveying the symbolistic qualities of faces that do not rest of the anime cliches. I'm not one for 'style', I don't really have one, but I've drawn so many faces of men and women some sort of coherency sort of sticks after a while. Practise a lot, start with intention (as in, "I will draw a face that conveys this and that emotion, and this and that background of the character') Anime faces have a lot of range too, but that ARE typeified in certain cliches. And human beings are anything but about cliches. Can you draw a tough guy that looks like a wimp? A sensitive brute? A very pretty girl that feels awful about her self-image? Try to capture these things just by expressions and faces and body language and breaking out of the naive anime style will occur as a byproduct of how hard this is to do.

[David]

I draw nothing but anime so it disheartens me to hear everyone has such a negative opinion of it. Sarcasm aside, I agree with Helm's latest post. Probably something I should be doing myself.