[WIP] Hipster Catgirl (partial nudity)

[Ixis]

Incredibly cute, I really like the hair mate

[Helm]

what does the mouth shape signify? Can you please enlighten me on the purpose of that?

[Ryumaru]

Dude. It's the cute cat mouth face. Come on. :3

[Jad]

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

[Helm]

Dude. It's the cute cat mouth face. Come on. :3

Sorry, not coming. People don't have little butts on their faces. If that smile is meant to connote demureness, there are better ways to go about it.

[tehwexxl0rz]

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...

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

It is meant to be more playful than demure. I'm not falling back on this mouth shape because it's easy, but rather because I want to utilize the visual language of anime.

[Helm]

What did you set out to do, artistically?

I've been witness to so much anime/manga culture and tropes you wouldn't believe it. I'm 27 on the internet.

I think 'catmouth' doesn't work with realistic rendering, yes. It makes the actual physics of it come much more into question than 'black line that clearly says 'this isn't a real mouth' as you suggest. Furthermore there are issues with piling on the anime signifiers that I've briefly touched on that are worth to consider. Usually it means 'I can't draw a real face/real emotion, so I'll use the manga shorthand conveniently in place by other, better artists'.



Just for the sake of discussion. How is this failing and your original succeeding? What does it connote that you can't capture without resorting to symbolizing?

You will not find any argument from me that cliches (what often people call 'tropes') convey information. You'll find argument to me about that information's value, however. As an artist, there's nothing you should fear more than cliche. Even subverting the most common tropes is cliche now.

[tehwexxl0rz]

[Original message deleted, 5 years later out of embarrassment]

I just wanted to draw a sexy catgirl! It was a mistake to try to convince anyone there was some deeper artistic meaning. Really, I was just insecure about drawing anything sexual back then, so I felt like I had to make excuses. The justifications I gave really make me cringe now.

[tehwexxl0rz]

Honestly I like this better than I expected I would, but I still think the other version has more of an artistic impact:

[Helm]

Please don't agree with me on that cliches in of themselves do not offer information, as I didn't say any such thing. I think any artistic choice carries information. But not all information is equal, there's things that are simply not worth drawing.

You seem to be confused as to what you wanted to do: do you want to buck the trend of objectifying women in the 'catgirl' cliche, or do you want to enhance it? It seems to me there's nothing that'd buck the trend more than

making her interaction with the viewer feel much more awkward and strained

by making her more humanlike, yet still naked and obviously catgirly. It'd make the viewer think "...gosh, go put on some clothes!" instead of "mmm, sexy catgirl we meet again only we'll never meet in real life".

If you want to support the trend, then you'd need to make her even less human and realistically rendered, sorry.

What is seems to me is that what you are doing is commenting on a community through your art. The information inherent in this piece is *about the Pixel Joint challenge, and those that will enter in it*. In my opinion, there's nothing more vapid and useless than using art as a method to discuss with art peers and the 'scene'. Absolutely worthless, of no lasting value to anyone but select proponents of said scene, and even then, only insofar that you remain part of their scene. The cheapest art there is.

That's my challenge to you, to put your artistic skills into making art with a higher purpose than at least that,  not to "draw a realistic mouth if you dare".