[WIP] face. pretty proud of it so far, but something feels weird going forward.

[Gizmonicgamer]

any C+C? i'm looking to have some light green Terra/Rydia/Yoshitaka Amano-like hair, but i can't find any styles that feel like they match with the proportions quite right, and the proportions themselves are starting to look strange to me.

update:

[MysteryMeat]

Try color blocking in hair groups and refine from there. As for anatomy goofs, jawline don't look square enough and the brow line needs revisiting I'd say. Nothing egregious though, just poke at it a bit on a second file or new layer.

[Gizmonicgamer]

I took that to heart, I think, and made some additions along with a lot of progress on the hair.


still work in progress. I'm a little concerned about the structure of the hair only because it's kind of gone through a lot of minute revisions (as with the face) and I want to make sure I didn't lose sight of it.

[Tensur]

Looks beautiful, but i'm not convinced with the hair, dont fits her face (seems more like a wig)
I would love to see something based in Sadie Pinn hair (but it is just a personal preference).

[MysteryMeat]

The man above hits on good points (apart from the bizarre girlmullet), draw some guidelines for the skull under there to work the hair out from. The hair seems to start a good way back from where it should, even on a stylized character! And remember that the tops of heads are (mostly) kind of flat. Look at some skulls, mang! It's always in the skulls!

[eishiya]

I think the problem with the hair is actually just that the face is too large for the head (or alternatively, the head is too small for the face), and it's throwing everything else off. The hairline is fine relative to the face (on the high side, but not unrealistically so), but on such a small head, it looks misplaced because the rest of the hair is too small.

A redline showing where the head should probably be:

So, the only things that could use changes are the back of the head, and the jaw. In my redline I gave the character more cheekflesh, but that's not necessary. The jaw as-is, however, suggests the ear is much closer to the face than it should be.

[Gizmonicgamer]

thank you, that's some excellent advice!


this is still super heavy-wip, but i tried pushing the hair back some and rounding out/fixing up the shape on the left side (will still be refined as i work through it) and some other fairly minor alterations like making the neck less straight. is this an improvement/a more workable base, or should i push out more?

[eishiya]

You should sketch in more of the body. Drawing necks in isolation never ends well.
If you look at ref closely, you'll likely find that necks aren't a simple shape. In the front, they actually get narrower towards the bottom. In the back near the spine, they also go "in" a bit. But then they have the narrow muscles that come out frontward a little from behind the ear, but come together at the collarbone, and there are the muscles that connect the neck to the shoulder, which also give the neck a wider base on the sides towards the back. I probably explained it weird, here's an image. I recommend looking at lots of ref, to build up a 3D mental image. 2D doesn't do necks justice. Remember, you probably also have your own neck you can look at.

Here's another sketch to give you a rough idea of what I mean, but I don't recommend following it, it's been a long time since I did a proper neck study. Do your own studies so that you can understand what you're doing and how to simplify it. You probably have your own ideas about how soft/muscular/tendony you want this character's neck to look.

[Gizmonicgamer]

hey! I just wanted to say thanks for all of that: that was kind-of the general plan going forward, but your insight has helped a lot in shaping what that process looks like. so thank you again, eishiya!



It's getting a lot closer to done, though there's still some stuff i'm tweaking. Things I might touch up that look done already:
-branch out the shape and flow of the hair on the top left side of the head. [probable]
-chin and jaw line
-neck
-might even redo the left eye?

i'm considering adding the impression of clothing -- maybe something kind of amano-esque, with some white clothe and jewels/ornament.

any thoughts thus far?

[Gizmonicgamer]

c+c?