The Artist Army

[Zephayer]

@dia :: i've been doing horse manipulations for a few years now,
so i guess you could say i have some experience ;

i'd say the painting of the mane and tail are very good, a lot of people
just use brushes to make them but you are obviously taking the harder/better route c:

maybe just make the ends of the strands fade more?
( especially in the tail)

as for the rest of the manip, i would just try to blend the horse into the background a bit more.
for example, a good way to do this is to pick an overall 'mood' —
blue for a depressing/sad mood, yellow or red for a high energy/happy mood, etc.
then you can paint over highlights or the entire picture with that color and put it on multiply or overlay ~

also, a good thing to do is to add the horse's shadow.
right now it looks a bit like the horse is floating, so adding a shadow helps make it more realistic.
( here is a very good tutorial on adding a shadow )

———

@wolf blood song :: i think wazzingator hit the biggest points —
the first thing that strikes me is that the torso is much too compact.
also, the head is a bit too large and the legs too long.
( this is a good reference for canine anatomy. )

you've got a really great grip on style, just make sure you study anatomy —
it's just as important as adding your own twist to things c:

———

OKAY. phew. my turn.
just a quick commission for now:
kinda iffy about it, but yeah ~

[Dia.]

Thanks Zeph! I can't go to dA, but I understand what you mean about the shadow. xD I just forgot that in my excitement that I was actually able to pull it off as well as I did. It was my first manip since I was still struggling with gimp. (so much easier with photoshop... I dont know why)

I love the commission and quite envy your skills. :3

[shibuki]

thank you all so much for the help, I really appreciate it <333

EDIT

here is the updated version, hope it looks better c:

http://i1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj5 ... g/LA-1.png

still will take a redline or crit for it x3

[Schuyler]

http://shadowolf0913.deviantart.com/ I was wondering if I could please get some critique on my artwork, specifically this one. It was my first time drawing a bird, so I'm sure there's a lot to improve. I'm not all that concerned with anatomy, since I'm not really going for a realistic look, but some general tips and advice would be greatly appreciated. If you could also take a quick look at some of my wolf drawings too, and maybe give me some critique on them, that would be great too. Again, not very worried about anatomy, just the overall quality and some basic things I could improve to make it look better. Thank you!

I think that the bird was amazing for a first try, but something that might help in the future is making the feathers on the wings smaller and more rounded toward the top, then have them get longer and a bit more pointy when you reach the bottom. And, even though you're not to concerned with anatomy, I would suggest looking at pics. of bird or bat wings so that you know where the wings bend. At least, that's what helped me when I was first learning how to do birds.

Hope that helped, =)

Ok, thank you! I'll keep that in mind next time I try doing a bird.

I'm asuming that photo manipulations can be considered art as well?
You'll see the manip is credited to Armitzu. I am Armitzu(or Mizi, Armitzu is my stable name) on Equidaem, where this picture was origionally posted. However, I want more people to see it rather than the few that they have there.
(image)
Horse Picture - Background

Even if manips aren't your forte, I'd love to hear how the mane and tail look(I redrew them), how the lighting works, and just if anything looks off. :3

I think it's very well done! I can't see anything that's obviously an edit. The blend is smoothly made and the lighting is edited quite nicely. I would say, though, that the horse seems to be a little too bright for the dark atmosphere of the background. Might I suggest toning down the highlights and color of its coat a bit so that its fits more smoothly with the background? Also, the part of the mane that's above the eyes seems a little long to me; I would recommend making it shorter.

[Muggafinn]

Wolf Blood Song: I haven't been checking these past few pages, since I've been busy, so sorry if I repeat advice. I take it you're not going for an extremely realistic style, but there are a few things you can add to a cartoony image to make it, I don't know, fit better. First of all, I'd lower the head and neck a bit. Most animals don't stick their heads up like that, at least not when they're standing still or on high alert. If you look at photos of most mammals, too, you'll see that the lines around the shoulder aren't always as clearly defined. On an anatomy model, yeah, you can see the exact location of the shoulder blade, but this wolf is covered in fur. Use more vague lines to show areas like these, maybe? I'd also suggest making the paws a bit smaller, and having the chest line up with the neck area there. Hope it helps, sorry, I'm a bit tired.


Whew, okay, animation. I got bored, and in doing so ended up messing around in photoshop. It is very choppy, but the trip towards the end is intentional, in case you're wondering. Going to be a little boy walking across a river or stream, and having him stumble a little bit lets me do some alarmed emotions. Tips would be awesome, might be hard to redline, though. I understand that the anatomy is very off, but I was just trying to get the movement down, I'll tackle that later.

[Soteria]

Thank you Calix and Bel ^^
When I get home I'll redo the sketch and post it up :3

@Mugga: Aah that animation is already super cute, though I am not the best
at humans but I could picture it well :'D

@Zeph: It all looks really nice! But I think the only thing that threw me off a
bit was the it's left hind leg, it looks kinda small? I'm not sure though it's an
observation owo (I am not that good at this xD)

[shibuki]

@Muggafin, thanks so much ^^

[Dia.]

Here's an edited version of my picture. I added a shadow, tweaked the mane and tail a little, and adjusted the horse's coloring slightly. I'm not happy with the shadow, but I played with it for a while and couldn't get it any better. -__-
Yeah, I hate that shadow.

[MoralChaos]

@Dai- What an absolutly gorgous picture! Everthing is blended, colored and shadowed so well it looks like a photograph. Keep it just the way it is as it need nothing changed to it. Very well done i love it!

[Dia.]

MoralChaos- Thanks! :3