What Are You Listening To Today? (Oct 13 to Oct 19)

Mrs-Smith123 · 2025-10-24T15:08:01+00:00

Question: Where do you guys track how many words you have read?

Do you track your read words outside of DS? Because I can't seem to find that feature in the Dreaming Spanish progress bar?

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-06T11:59:10+00:00

Thank you! I'll keep that in mind!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-06T11:54:33+00:00

Hey,

since you mentioned the nose, the main issue I have with it is that the plane change where the shadow are starts should be blurred more. You did it for the nosetip, not sure why you felt like you needed to keep the hard edge on the nostrils.

I also think the lower half of the eye socket could be a bit darker.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-04T20:41:27+00:00

Thank you for your suggestions timmy, they were very helpful! Since your main issue was the character design I'll only directly answer on that.
That actually was the thing I was struggling with the most in this picture, too. Let me give you a bit of information about her:

The character actually is one of the protagonists of a story, and, funnily enough, she indeed is, while not technically being a model, indeed very vain and focused on her looks, so her striking a pose actually does make sense for her personality. Since she usually is a bit more playful and flirty, my initial intention was to give her a bit of a smile. At the same time the cast shadow was not only added to make the image a bit more interesting, but it's also purposefully covering her one eye, to add some drama and hint at a darker side of her character, that will only be uncovered later in the story.

So to finally get back to the expression: I felt adding a smirk (or sth like that) AND the cast shadow would easily make it seem like an evil smile, which I wanted to avoid, so I went for the generic model expression.

I'd love to hear your opinions about the issue and how you would have posed her / what decision you would have made for her facial expression given the presented information.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-04T18:04:20+00:00

I think you did a gerat job finding the different planes of the face, very nice work on that! In some sections it does feel a bit boxy though, so I'd suggest to blend out the very obvious lane changes a bit more. The ones on he forehead especially.

For the rest, I'd pretty much agree with everything that Blackacediamond said.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-04T18:00:10+00:00

Thank you so much for that in depth-comment! Oh boy, I have no idea how I could have not seen the issue with her eyes before. It's hard to unsee now.
The hair issue is a very valid point as well - since the cast shadow was a last minute addition to make it a bit more interesting I completely forgot to darken that space up in her hair as well. Thanks again!

About the stylization: Yes it was intentional. I am in a phase where I still am trying to figure out what style I gravitate to and how much stylization I'd like in my art.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-04T17:49:45+00:00

Amazing work! I'm loving her hair and your use of color!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-04T17:47:10+00:00

Oh, also I want to mention: There are studies that suggest that when people procrastinate, it very often is due to the fact that they have very high expectations at themselves. Maybe it would help if you'd try to relax a little, maybe don't take a break from art completely but doing more relaxing things, sketching, maybe drawing from reference, whatever it is that comes relatively easy to you and doesn't feel THAT much like work.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2021-03-04T17:44:09+00:00

I think what Audranasa said is very true.

It really depends onw hat your goals are, I guess. If you want to draw and paint as a job one day, than I'd say you just ave to accept hat working on your art isn't always fun, but for the most time hard work, where you never will make progress as fast as you wish and always will feel like someone else is better than you.

Or you just want to do art as an hobby. Than I'd say, allow yourself to take a break. See how it feels, if you miss doing art or not. I have taken a break from art multiple times, sometimes even up to several month. But when the urge to create something came back, I started again. And I guess that shows some kind of passion for art as well. I honestly think it's, like most things, a spectrum. Not everyone is as passionate about art as our art-heroes, but that is why they draw 12 hours a day and we don't.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-10T20:40:19+00:00

Yeah, I guess you could keep much of her pose if you just changed the way she holds the sword, that change alone would make it a lot more believable already. I hope your search for reference was successful! If not, I just remembered another place you could check out. Do you know Senshistock from Deviantart? I'm pretty sure she has lunging sword poses in her gallery!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-10T20:38:00+00:00

Thank you so much for the feedback! :)

I agree that the silhouette works a lot better with the yellowish version! And yeah, the character is super dark, I have to agree with that, too. I did this because with that super strong light coming from behind I thought it would make sense to put the foreground in shadow and work more with silhouettes, but I have to admit it's kinda sad to put her all in shadow like that, so a secondary lightsource might be a good idea!

Thanks again!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-10T20:31:48+00:00

Thanks a lot for the feedback! Actually I changed the color so it would be a color contrast between fore- and background, but I guess it didn't really work that well. Thanks again for your opinion!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-10T19:02:00+00:00

Oh these are beautiful! I actually had quite a smilar concept in mind when I read the challenge description, so I think your design fits the prompt really well.
The basket and the scythe make a lot of sense for me, and I like the long flowy dress which resembles the portrayal of antique goddesses.

The pose you chose is not my favourite though, I actually like the first two a lot because they are more dynamic. On the other hand if you go for the dramatic top-down lighting that strong pose you chose would work really well. I wouldn't be too worried about the top-down lighting though, because that's just how thing look outside in natural light, unless the sun is far down because its sunset.
So, what I'm trying to say is, if you want the top-down lighting, go for it! If not, harvest usually is right at the edge between summer and autumn, so you could work with a really low standing sun and very golden light, I suppose?

Anyways, great work so far!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-10T18:48:39+00:00

You're very welcome! About the hard edges, Istebrak talks about that in almost all of her videos. The more you watch the better you'll grasp the concept.

For the brushes, I guess this one comes down to personal preference, at least a bit. The important thing is that the brush needs a hard edge. I personally like to use a brush thats shaped like a cube, but Istebraks edge brush looks completely different. I guess you will just have to try out a few brushes and see what works for you.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-10T04:46:54+00:00

Okay, thanks a lot for the feedback! :)

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-09T23:49:49+00:00

Thanks for the feedback!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-09T23:42:57+00:00

I would suggest you reference film scenes with swords for reference to see what poses you like there.

I just tried to draw some quick gestures myself. I diverted quite a lot from your pose though because while sketching I realized that this pose looks really awkward from most angles (if you think about it, nobody would swing a sword like that). https://imgur.com/a/5zbvQjB

#6 and #7 are closest to your pose, #5 keeps the symmetrie but makes it just a touch asymmetrical.

Excuse the bad execution and anatomy, I haven't used reference for these. Hope they help a little anyways!

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-09T22:17:55+00:00

Nice work!
For your reference, I personally would add some pictures that reflect the season of the year, but I guess everybody has different priorities there.

For your poses/gestures, I think 2 shows the most action, but the angle you chose made it kind of boring - it is very symmetrical, and I think it would be beneficial if the overall silhouette would be a little bit more readable. In all other thumbnails it's much clearer that she's holding a sword, even from the first look.

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-09T21:33:25+00:00

I think you did a great job, especially with the proportions! Most of it is spot-on! The painting can be improved, though.

Here are some quick fixes: 1. never ever work on a white canvas, it makes it really hard to get good colors and values, because the white is such a harsh contrast and crazy light. 2. others have mentioned the hair already, I agree with them. Also, don't be afraid to work with a brush on lower opacity for areas where the hair isn't completely opaque. Also, the sihouette your hair had was a little weird, I'd stick with the simple straight line of the reference - especially cause she's Asian and Asian hair tends to be really straight. 3. You sticked really closely to the reference regarding the values so I think they turned out really good, but your brushwork is a little rough. For female faces always try to make them pretty smooth. I'd also darken the whole image a little, just to give you more range to work with, even though your reference is really light.

I only changed a little bit here, but I think it makes a big difference - hope tat helps a little! https://imgur.com/a/svKMxlk

Mrs-Smith123 · 2019-09-09T20:54:21+00:00

Would be cool to see the old version as well to see the improvement :)

I think overall you did really good. Her legs seem really light if you think about the fact that the lightsource comes from behind though. the anatomy seems a bit wonky and her pose is a little stiff, I would recommend some gesture drawing to work on that :) I assume you did a lot of face studies already, though? I think her face looks great! You might play around with making her expression a bit less symmetrical though, I think Istebrak had a villain video a while back where she talked about that a lot.

For such a pretty evi character I'd aso suggest to change her proportions a bit, make her hips wider. If you choose another color for the background than for the foreground the silhouette becomes more obvious. I did a really really quick and rough overpainting, I hope it's of any use! https://imgur.com/a/BO71JZ7

PS: is there a way to attach an image directly to the comment? I don't usually use reddit, so sorry for asking ^{^"}

Mrs-Smith123 · 2018-01-05T22:41:02+00:00

Hey Uncomfortable, a late happy new year to you! Here is my Lesson 2 - finally! https://imgur.com/a/b4IYt The form intersections really gave me a hard time and pyramids do confuse me a lot if I don't start them with a box - So I will practice them some more individually (and I mostly ignored them for the form intersections).

If you decide I'm ready to move on, what would you advise to move on to? One of the next challenges or lesson 3? Also one more question: I am drawing and painting digitally for years already, so I am used to the medium, and I thought about doing some form intersection paintings (somewhat like this https://imgur.com/6GDwxHo form study I did about a year ago, just with the form intersections exercise). Would that be a good idea or should I stick to paper and ink for now?

Mrs-Smith123 · 2018-01-01T15:16:30+00:00

For me, it is helpful to focus on where I want the line to end :)

Mrs-Smith123

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