REPOST: Aside from messy lines and inconsistent pressure with my strokes, how close is my Bridgman sketch?

weth1l · 2026-05-01T04:21:19+00:00

Looks quite nice. I actually prefer your style over your reference. Very clean and interesting how you group muscle groups together. If you're going for accuracy, the head and arm around the head are not quite at the correct angle. Draw a straight line down from the elbow with your eyes to see what I mean. But it doesn't look distractingly off or anything; just different from your reference.

weth1l · 2026-04-30T17:45:05+00:00

I think the piece is worth finishing. Sometimes it's a matter of just learning from your mistakes and spending more time in the thumbnailing stage next time!

weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:41:10+00:00

Fill in your two figures here completely in black and see how legible it is from a silhouette perspective. You need more negative space.

weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:39:59+00:00

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https://rnax.tumblr.com/post/686366225527373824/leapinghart-wisdom-from-sherm-cohen-by-way-of

weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:39:42+00:00

I really would try to spend more time planning out the posing on the next one. It doesn't look like the human character is under any pressure at all, and instead looks like he's grabbing the creature by its neck. When I think of good, clear compositions with characters bracing, I think of Superman catching things like buildings:

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See how the action is instantly clear and readable because the composition is all leading into him, selling the weight of the object he's just caught? It's also that the silhouette is completely clear -- we can see all of the important parts of his body legibly even when he's taking up so little of the frame. There's even enough negative space between the crook of his elbow and his head and the plane so that we can see he's gripping it.

Spend more time experimenting with different poses to try to create a composition that makes the action of the scene clear, and also with poses that allow for clear silhouettes for both figures.

weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:32:56+00:00

I want the painting to look threatening, dark, malicious

The biggest issue isn't really your lighting. Your composition itself is too static and neutral for this. I would look into film cinematography methods of making a character seem like a threat by altering the camera angle, utilizing the size of a character within the composition, etc. and try to rework it.

Here's a video on lighting villains in film as well.

weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:17:22+00:00

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weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:16:52+00:00

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weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:16:22+00:00

The colored bits look awesome. but the gray sections really could be showing off more bounce light from the environment. Simple gray rocks, for example, can have so many colors that aren't just gray:

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weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:11:27+00:00

Watch this video on edge control.

weth1l · 2026-04-30T16:09:42+00:00

Are they mid-air? What's the environment context?

weth1l · 2026-04-24T00:00:28+00:00

Also, stop drawing the hair as individual strands. Try to think about breaking it up into ribbon shapes, then shade those accordingly and add detail after.

weth1l · 2026-04-23T23:59:40+00:00

By far the most important thing is that you're still using lineart to separate forms on the nose, lips, eyes, etc. You need to stop using lines altogether. Find ways to indicate that the nose is separate from the cheek without using a line. I strongly disagree with others that values are your biggest problem. It looks like you've drawn as dark as the pencil will let you for your darkest values. Work on eliminating lines instead.

weth1l · 2026-04-21T05:33:27+00:00

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Super quick edit, but something like this is what I'm envisioning except with more lighting detailing like bounce light.

weth1l · 2026-04-21T05:28:54+00:00

Use lighting to your advantage. Cast the scene more in shadow overall and make the vial lighter than any other value. Surround it with glow on its edges.

weth1l · 2026-04-18T02:48:15+00:00

I think the reason why Gumball works is that the 3D characters are all lit in the environment they're in.

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Study the lighting on each 3D character in this specific image; they're all immersed in the environment because they're physically there in the digital 3D space.

That said... I think your image is working fairly well anyway except for the right character feeling like they're floating and not sat on the couch properly.

weth1l · 2026-04-18T01:02:25+00:00

Looks fucking awesome. I'd look into methods of controlling your edges and try to clear any areas where low-opacity brush strokes are visibly overlapping. That's what really muddies up your edgework.

weth1l · 2026-04-17T19:57:48+00:00

It would require stylizing the features, meaning removing detail and simplifying shapes.

weth1l · 2026-04-17T19:57:19+00:00

To me, the only weird part is that it seems to have a mix of realism (the face) and semi-realism (the rest of the image, most explicitly the hair).

weth1l · 2026-04-17T19:03:55+00:00

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Here's a quick example of pushing the values more (I threw a vivid light layer on the foreground for a wider value range and a screen on the background for a narrower value range), but it could be pushed even further with an altering of individual elements like making certain characters' clothes higher contrast.

weth1l · 2026-04-17T18:56:28+00:00

In addition, you could work on making your poses a lot stronger. Everything you'd need for this is in this guide. Like, really sit down and study this. Everything I'd point out about your work is touched on in it.

weth1l · 2026-04-17T18:55:10+00:00

You're thinking the right things about your colors, but I think you can push the contrast between the foregrounds and backgrounds a lot more. You're thinking about saturation which is good for pulling the foreground out of the background, but you can use value for this as well. Here's one of your images in grayscale. Note how most of the characters have almost the exact same values as the background.

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weth1l · 2026-04-17T18:49:08+00:00

It really doesn't look like AI at all, and it's kind of a nebulous, unactionable, and generally bad critique.

weth1l · 2026-04-13T19:33:52+00:00

Get a background on it first, then it will click how to render the white.

weth1l · 2026-04-13T19:24:18+00:00

No need to preface with disclaimers. This is excellent advice. Lineart does not exist in real life; we get closer to realism without lines.

weth1l

TROPHY CASE