Maedhros and Elros for xredriverx. eventually there’ll be a companion piece with Maglor and Elrond playing in the snow… eventually.
(also I shall use this opportunity to thank alackofghosts for making such incredible art and keeping me inspired during the past few weeks of artblock. thank you, seriously.)
HI! What I find really necessary in order to create feeling in my characters are these 5 points:
– Focus on the eyes! They convey an enormous amount of information and emotions. Where do they look? Are they big? small? Squinting? And the brow! Use the eyebrows! Exaggerate with them. Let them touch the eyes as well, it really creates a good feeling.
– And add high lights to the eyes, but not too much – maximum two dots when normal, many more when teary, and none for spooky/dim light)
– Wrinkles! The face is full of wrinkles! They add character and are emotional indicators. The areas to really focus on are the mouth, the eyes and the brow and sometimes at the nostrils. The face is full of flesh and muscles. When smiling then eyes will be pushed from underneath and the cheeks become fuller. When shouting or yawning the cheeks gets slimmer and the jaw drops so the face will be longer. The face never stays the same shape in any expression.
– When it comes to body language, try and sometimes exaggerate the pose. It gives more life to a a drawing. We sometimes tend to be careful when it comes to poses, but it only makes them stiff. Are they angry? Lift their shoulders very high. Are they sad? Drop their shoulders really low and lower their head. Feel the emotion in the drawing. A good trick is that if all you saw was the silhouette of your drawing, would you be able to read the emotion of the pose? If not, you need to exaggerate it more! Make it more obvious.
Croquis classes are the best to get to know the body better (drawing a naked model).
– Also create a flow. What direction does the eye go when looking at your drawing? Does it wander aimlessly or is there a “route” it takes to read the drawing? The drawing of Cirdan have this flow and; it centers at his face but the flow goes from the upper left corner to the bottom right corner. It makes a drawing easier to digest and more pleasant to look at. If there’s too much going on in a drawing, we loose sight of important details and get drowned in information. So keep the composition simple with a nice flow so one better can “read” it ;D
Maitimiel 