Creative Corner

@Miyouri

I understand! There are a lot of really helpful videos and guides out there about understanding facial proportions and how to draw different angles of the head. Start with practicing front-on facial views that way you know where everything sits on the face. Try doing it realistically and then you can start doing stylized. You have to understand the rules first in order to break them.

And don't worry! I understand the explanation. You're in the trap of really feeling the need for everything to be very clean. Ultimately you are the one who determines when a drawing reaches a certain level, be it sketch or finished piece or anywhere in between. My ultimate recommendation is just to take a bit of time and relax. Sketching is a very loose practice where you're working out where the lines should go. Don't stress too much about messy sketches. If it is for a commission you can clean it up a bit, but sketches are just that. Sketches! Don't stress yourself out about making them just textured lineart. :)

I'm really happy to see that the feedback helped you out! Feel free to come back and post again if you need or DM me if that's easier as well! I'm rooting for you and everyone's artistic journey.

@Snowcelot

Actually you're not getting a bonk, I think you've priced pretty fairly. I'd possibly say you can lower your prices just a smidge but currently I think the examples you gave with the prices are absolutely fine. You're like the first person in this thread I'm not gonna give a bonk for one way or the other.

I will bonk you with some anatomy practice tho. It seems like you draw humans or humanoid characters most often so I'll recommend practicing human proportions, especially facial proportions. There are some great cheat sheets and reference videos online. Definitely look them up and do some basic practices! It'll help you out a lot when you know where everything should line up. Practice front-on views first so you can learn proportion, then move to side views so on and so forth!

You've got some nice lineart styles, your coloring looks nice and it looks like you're experimenting with lineless and painted styles, awesome! Keep at it! Your dragons and animal examples also look good, just general anatomy practice recommendation for ya. You're already trying out some nice poses and different angles which is awesome, keep that up. You'll learn the 3D shapes much faster like that!

I'll give you some quick prices for the other types of work I see. For the first human example since it is lineless I'd price you at around 450kt for a headshot. Add on as you introduce more of the character. For your more sketchy headshots/busts I'd go around 200kt to 250kt. The more detail you add, the more you charge. Charge for color and the like. For just a linework piece around 260kt to 300kt.

Overall, good prices, good work. Keep practicing. :)

@AShockOfCrimson

I've had a couple pieces so far I can tell were closely referenced so no worries there. I will say since it is super close I wouldn't charge for it. Your top one is more original work, meaning it took more effort. Replication is easier than originality at this level since you're working off something that already exists, the hard part got done for you. This is a good way to learn some aspects of art but you can't charge for work that you didn't put in. Not to say that what you did is bad at all, most beginner artist will replicate from popular artwork such as manga or artists they admire. This is fine as long as you're not trying to take complete credit for it or sell the work!

That being said I'm only going to price your top one and I'll give you some critique on both. For the top one I'd say you're looking at around 100g to 130g. The pose is nice, I like the expression, you've got some good linework and some nice foundational anatomy. Right now the issues that I'm seeing are your background and shading. The perspective on your background is a little off, so it doesn't look like he's on the wall but floating on top of it. Practicing some basic perspective aspects such as vanishing points will help you out here. Your shading is also a bit dark. Value is important but you've got a lot of dark on dark on dark here. The character is mostly dark colors, the background is dark, and the shadow colors are dark. You'll want to add highlights to help ease up on the flat value going on there.

Alright the second one I'm not going to comment on the main body anatomy. It looks like you were starting to play around with highlighting here, which is awesome! Especially in instances where there's a lot of implied lightsources you're going to want to use bright highlighting and dark, bold shadowing. It looks like you tried to keep your highlighting consistent so I'm going to talk to you about trying to envision 3D shapes. The necklaces here are a good example of this. The highlights are all on one side, but not necessarily where they should be on a 3D shape. Think about the shape of a sphere and where a highlight hits it! It's usually a round, bright highlight that fades over the whole sphere. (Think stereotypical shading a ball practice.) The tooth shapes are another good one. These types of shapes are rounded, so the highlight would be hitting the highest point as well as the area in the most direct light. Just some things to think about when you're working on shading!

@Viscere Thank you very much! Yeaaah I kinda fell through anatomy practice since I had a big art block c': but now I feel that I can do that without giving up halfway through it lol. And taking the critique.
Is it fine if I come back here or elsewhere to get other estimates for progression?

@Snowcelot

Absolutely! I'm always open to giving feedback on progression/more pricing help. You can also DM me at any point if you want. :)

Thank you so much!

I kinda figure I'm not ready for actual commission work lol. But you've been giving such in depth advice on this thread, so I figured I wanted some good critique.

My backgrounds are still pretty weak hahah, but that's mostly because they're the point where I lose motivation the most. Do you have any advice to avoid that? Even if I start with the background, it always comes out rushed.

I definitely wouldn't charge for heavily referenced art, don't worry. I probably wouldn't charge for fanart altogether unless someone specifically asked. I was definitely worried about the darkness of the shading. I tried a gradient overlay to help with the shading, but I think it may have turned out too dark. I can't believe I forgot highlights *facepalm*.

I've definitely always had trouble with shadows and highlights. I used to skip that part entirely... it was bad. Flat colors are fine, but not for the pieces I was attempting. I've been looking at more tutorials and whatnot, so I'm hoping I can get a better grasp on it soon.

Thank you so, so much for the advice! I actually hadn't noticed a lot of what you pointed out!

Tbh you should be charging for art critiques, you wouldn't want some passerby to bonk you with a newspaper.

@AShockOfCrimson

Man I'd feel bad about charging for these. There's so few people out there actually willing to sit you down and give honest to god advice about what you should be charging for your work. Most people, including other artists, get wishy-washy about it and don't give solid numbers. Plus in all honesty this is good practice for my critical analysis skills and writing skills! Learning how to give good critique where everyone is comfortable and understanding about what's going on is also a skill I want to build up. If people are getting defensive, I'm doing something wrong. Most people understand and give small explanations, like you have, which I'm absolutely open to hearing. Understanding the though processes going on when people work is a really in-depth skill needed for good critique, so I really appreciate follow-up posts like this!

As for your backgrounds, motivation is a fickle beast that can go rot because it never cooperates for anyone. That aside, backgrounds are some solid work that need to be put in. Most lower-level artists either shove out full backgrounds or avoid them to high hell. I am of the latter and having to face that fear right now. I'd recommend really really taking it slow and steady here. Don't feel pressured to rush yourself or stress yourself to put out 'perfect' work. Focus more on finding backgrounds that make the character look like part of the scene or provide a way to contrast and bring the character to the focal point. Backgrounds and scenes tend to be different, so focusing on what you want to be the center of attention needs to be priority!

Take some time and just doodle out background ideas! Be it simple shapes, patterns, or very basic scenes or elements like fire or trees or whatnot. Play around with colors and opacity. Once you've got some base ideas of what you like, the process you take, and what styles are easiest and most comfortable for you then you can start adding those into pieces. Art is a lot of tiny steps you need to learn, backgrounds being no exception. If you're using something like fire or a nature scene, references are your best friend. Find tutorials using different methods and learn different ways. You'll find what works for you and what doesn't. Don't be afraid to combine methods either! If you like half of one and half of another, mush 'em together!

I will note that fanart is a liiiitle tricky sometimes. Some artists flat-out refuse to do fanart of very popular characters, some don't mind, some are case-by-case. This is up to your comfort level in the end.

I've got a good shadow/highlight exercise listed on the front post under FAQ that I would recommend for you! It can be a really great starting exercise and you'll learn a lot of you practice using exercises like that regularly. Tackling the intimidating basics first sets you up for a really good creative path.

I'm sorry, I come slinking back because I reopened my art shop from 2014, but no one seems to buy stuff. I know the prices are on the extreme low-end compared to my IRL commission but I'm wondering if it's cause of the size of the thread or if prices are what are driving people away?

https://www1.flightrising.com/forums/art/1144506

@Blueblythe

I see nothing wrong with your shop as a whole (though that green text in the pickup area is kinda painful, might change that/axe the pickup entirely). I'd say make sure your examples are your most recent work and just keep bumping. The thread isn't too long, in fact it is one of the shorter threads I've seen (in a good way).

It also looks like you've got a contradiction, since your rules state you're pwyw but you have flat prices. I'd clear that up. Otherwise just keep up the bumping! Art sales are pretty low right now since a lot of people are saving up gems/money for when the new ancient drops so it's hard to get traction. Once the breed releases you'll probably have some more customers.

All in all, just keep bumping! It might take some time but you'll get customers. :)

Ah. Forgot to edit that PWYW part.
orz

Thanks for the info!