Help me please
I’m planning to make a pdf file style art advice book in the vein of bug fables.
However I do not know how to write advice books
thats probably bad
A Dark turty’s thoughts and advice on art-related stuff
DTTA-RS!
Introduction
-what programs I use/my equipment and workflow
-explain how tools can change your mindset and flow of your work
Chapters here
Illustration
1.How I think of ideas for art
3.How I think about how I finalise the art
3.How I finalise it
Characters and concepts
1.Start with a purpose and idea
2.Building the character with art
3.Shapes, colours, style and uniformity.
4.Explain how the look of your art doesn’t matter when conceptualising for yourself,
and that its for getting an idea down to see if it works or not, and you can still do
concept art even if you aren’t good at art.
Moving forward
1.EXplanation on how experimentation and stuff is important
2.if you cant do good art you can still have good ideas and that there are many forms of art not only just illustration like uhh da writings and museec!!
3.Progress is not instant or obvious, looking back on the old can make you appreciate the new.
Conclusion
1.you suck
2.you suck
3.i’m cool
This was the general guide I was going off of.
Introduction
Hello, I am THE darkturty, thats right. The only one.
I am a 2d illustrator and half-time animator, which I think is
quite impressive for a turtle.
I’ve done art since I was probably around 4, i’m saying that as I dont
remember anything before that.
I do a mix of digital and traditional illustrations.
The bulk of my experience comes just drawing and seeing what works and
what doesn’t and also referncing and taking from other medias.
As an artist I would say I’m around that sweet slightly above average spot.
I would say my strengths are with humanoid form, colour and perspective. My weakness
would probably be muscle, anatomy and dynamic poses and uniqueness. I try and work shapes
into everything I do, even backgrounds.
Simplicity and styilisation is a really important thing to me.
Now you kinda know my perspective and stance towards art, so take my advice with a very big singular grain of salt.
A lot of artists say that tools dont make your work better, as a person who is a live I would say yes it doesn’t make it better automatically,
but I think it can change the result. Look at my ms paint work compared to my krita work, I normally have small sorta pixely look with bright but also pastelly colours. While my krita work tends to have outlines and shadows.
With my traditional work I only use a byro pen to sketch and finalise my work, sometimes I use ink, highlighters or pencils for colour. This creates a much more messy look due to the sketch being right there, and there also tending to be the other sketches there as well. Though I try and redo lines and lines over again to make it look more bold.
Oh yeah also I use a XP-PEN 03, its a pretty decent tablet. I like the big Buttons but I dont get the line in the middle since all it does is glow. It doesn’t have tilt support but that doesn’t really matter to me.
My main art software is krita, a free art program. The rooms they have are pretty bare bones so you really got to customise it. They have a fairly robust brush engine. I mean I barely understand it but if you do get krita you access it by clicking your brush icon at the top bar.
I use ms paint occasionally when I dont feel like booting up krita.
I have my pressure sensitivty on ‘soft’.
Illustration
Ideas, art is nothing without them, but ideas are hard to come by, especially ones for art. So how do I fare?
Most of the time I dont have an idea or plan for art, that is how I ROLL. I just have this vague thing, why do you think most of my art is just
a character being happy looking at you?
When I want to do a full piece, background and all, I think of a situation and the characters, I think about the characters personalities and adjust it for that
situation. I let it fester and grow into its own thing, you cant have an idea for everything. You could basically say everything I do is a doodle, but that sounds wrong.
However if you’re really drained for ideas, you could try going on Wheel decide and inputting a bunch of stuff. I got a dragon forging a sword out of the blood of its enemies in a cafe.
If you’re a GAMER or perhaps a consumer of media, you could also draw characters from that, or draw your own SELF- INSERT fan character, trust me it works more than you expect it does.
Now that I have my cool idea, I have put pen on paper or pen on tablet or mouse on… mousepad. I dont trust people who use trackpads or phones ok. How do I polish off my piece?
Go with da flow!!!
I’m pretty bias towards outlines, I mean I am a cartoonist what do you expect. I dont like making my computer die.
There are of course many different ways to outlines, sketchy, no pressure sensitivty, smooth vector looking lines or sharp and pointy. Think about the theme and emotions of your piece.
ok you have? NOW CHOOSE ONE i’m too lazy to explain. Sketchy can help with faster paces or more eratic stuff, no pressure sensitivty is good for outlining animations B). smooth vector looking lines can create a cuter and more comfortable look. Sharp and pointy is sharp and pointy, is very energetic or dangerous.
Are the lines Bold or thin? Bold can be used for more stronger pieces, and thin can give a much more appraochable look (need to confirm)
What about no outlines? You can do a paper-cut out style like south park. A clean shape filled style. Water colour, oil, guache, acryilic you know?
Let what you use guide you to your result.
I should word things better so then things dont sound like DA RULEZ or the facts
Character and concepts
A HUGE NOTE HERE!!!
I design humanoid characters, and sometimes trees and greenery. I’m not experienced in rocks, mountains or eldritch creatures.
First off, what is the character? What does it do on a regular day, for an example I will use my character Donovan Thonothan. The original idea was that he was a travelling merchant and an explorer. He sells the stuff he finds on his journeys.
So I gave him boots since I was planning to make him go to very humid areas, like mud and stuff. A long overcoat since it would also be drowsy, a scarf since it protects his neck from pesty fleas and also keeps him warm. He has long,tied up hair since you usually
tie up your hair when you plan to do very dexterous stuff, and since it made him look more feminine. He was originally going to be a caring single father for his adoptive son mark. :00. Lots of brown since it would give him that down to earth feeling since you know,
brown is earth. Plus its a warm colour.
Eventually I changed his long overcoat to a much shorter one, since it would be very inconvenient. Also long overcoats also have a connection to assassians since it could hide guns and stuff.
I thought about changing it to one of those tight ones as well but that would add a very triangular shape, which is not what I wanted. Lets talk about shape now. Shapes have connections to them to certain things, Shape is soft and friendly, Square is Hard and loyal, triangle is a cunt. Donovan’s shapes was and still is Square and circle, I must keep it that way.
Also remember to make the design register in your head as what the character is ( or isn’t if you’re being surversive) dont change things that make what hte character is trying to be messy or confusing for aesthetics! Remember to keep things unique, dont just have height and hair variation and call it a day.
Things that look good aren’t always good under the hood B) You can have good concept art even if it doesn’t look appealing. I mean have you seen Janet’s character concept design in the bug fables art-book? I mean have you seen most of the cocnept art there, if you just take it as just art. Then you would see it as bad, but there are ideas there that build to a great character design.
MOving forward
if it aint broke dont fix it right? Ha, if you stay on the same thing all the time you will be missing out on so many things. Experimantaiton is the key for growth, even if it doesn’t turn out good for public eyes, if it helps you that what counts.
Remember, there are so many different ways to express ideas other than illustrations, you dont have to be good at illustrations at all to express good ideas. You still have writing, music, modelling, and some sort of weird niche thing I haven’t found out about yet.
Progress isn’t obvious, its a slow burn. Like getting taller, sometimes you dont notice it until you compare it to your old height, and sometimes you just have a growth spurt out of nowhere.
If you feel like you aren’t improving, compare it to your old art, if you still feel like you’ve regressed, there are many things that you can be good at in a specific area. Maybe you’ve just temporarily change to be better at one of htose zones? I dont know I’m not good at making instagram qu otes what do I look like? Someone who owns an Iphone.
Conclusions
Alright so what did we learn? NOthing but… I am superior to you, my method and way of doing art is the correct and better one than what anyone else is doing, and I Am superiior to evyronei n eveyr way.
ok class dimsisedd.
This is the first draft. I think the part exlpaining character design spends a bit too much time examinign my own character instead of explaining. and I accidently missed the general guide on how I was going to form it.
The advice seems a bit overplayed and generic ‘I am a proffesional ’ advice.
Later on I’ll have to shorten this into paragraphs to fit in.
pls help yes