LF: Constructive Criticism (Amateur Artist)

Hi ! I'm not a professional or anything but I'd like to offer some advice!

First of all, your art is wonderful but I can definitely see some areas for improvement. For one, you could try practising anatomy a bit more as the heads look a little too big on the body (Although I'm not sure if this is a style choice tho ? I think that the full-body pieces look fine but you should focus on the bust drawings) 

The effects you use in your drawings are wonderfully well executed but I think that what's dragging down your work could be the brush you're using to draw! I would suggest looking for a different brush because so far your work looks too clean and smooth and it would def improve your work if you used a more rough or diverse brush for the hair rendering. I like the subtle and smoothness of how you render skin tho! I also like the line art but I feel like you could improve with a different brush that'll add weight and some thickness to darker areas to bring out shapes better. Colouring your line art would make the pieces look soft too (optional but I think it is a nice touch)

Anyways good luck with your art journey ! Your art is wonderful and my fav would be the pink-haired girl drawing, I love the colour choices 💗💗

Hello! I’d like to say first off your art is stunning. Your composition skills are fantastic, plus your coloring is beautiful. I find your art very charming! But like the others said, there’s a few things that I noticed when I was really studying your work!

I didn’t notice it right away, but I have a feeling that you struggle some with hands (which c’mon, what artist doesn’t?). The hands that you DO a draw are great and cute, but I feel that if you start studying hands (like just doodling them at different angles and poses) you’d feel much more confident in your art. I suggest dumbing down the shape of hands and focus on the joints. Study your own hand, open and close it and study the length of your fingers, the way your hand naturally rests, and how flexible your fingers are. 

Just like the others said, you should do anatomy studies. Your poses are great, and when you do full bodies with your style (like the character with the flower in the face) it looks good. But I do notice repeating patterns in your poses. I don’t think there’s ever an end to learning anatomy, and if you  keep doing practices there’ll be no end to what you can do. I notice that your art is more on the cartoony side, so of course the proportions are going to be a bit different, so I’d observe how other artists that you enjoy do their proportioning. Studies of real life people will be beneficial, but so will thinking outside of the box. If you think of studying real life people as a good solid base and then expanding on it to make it more dynamic then you’ll see how much more you will improve. 

I think something that could also help you is studying expressions. If I were to say what would help you the most with that, it would be either character memes or a character expression sheet. You could make a whole thing with it to where eventually all of your characters have their basic expressions down. How does this character react when happ, sad, scared? Do they look bashful, do they have a huge grin, do they get defensive?

The best thing you can do FOR YOURSELF in order to improve without it being stressful is to HAVE FUN! Whether it be doodling a ton, drawing your characters in popular art memes, joining in art contests or whatever it is that you’re interested in that’s the best way to improve. It will up your motivation, cause you to draw often, and get you drawing things that you usually don’t draw. Studying doesn’t always have to be agonizing and stressful, so find a way that works for you! I can see you improving a lot and going far with your tattooing and freelancing career! Best thing you can do is keep an open mind and not stick with one aesthetic, especially for tattooing! Keeping a style is good, but experimenting is the best thing you can do if you want to tattoo! Have fun with it! You’re definitely not an amateur and you have a lot going for you! I hope you the best and I hope my advice helped you even slightly!

The only advice I have for you is to maybe start branching out with perspective. Pretty much all of these examples have the same 3/4 face and the shoulders are all either straight on or slightly angled. That isn't to say you haven't executed this well but defaulting to one angle or perspective or pose with seriously stump your progress. You're definitely in a place where you can start working on those things. 

Challenge yourself to draw faces from different angles and more dynamic and perspective-heavy poses. I highly recommend The Pose Archives for pose references! If it's something you struggle with you can always trace over references to help develop your skills.

Sort of adjacent to that is that I noticed in your examples that the composition tends to be quite flat as well. Looking at other art is the best way to study composition for me personally. Getting a handle on perspective will be a massive help for improving composition, too.

I really like your art and I can see that you're experimenting with different styles/techniques which is great! Good luck with your aspirations ^^

Hey! Everyone’s given great advice, so I definitely stand by and agree with everything everyone else has said. I would like to add that as far as your poses go, they’re a bit stiff. Not as fluid as they could be, and some feel a bit forced. I’d suggest really quick gesture drawing to help practice more fluid, dynamic poses that feel natural!  

Keep up the amazing work, you’re super talented ♥️♥️

i would say that your work is already absolutely amazing!! the colours, composition and design are all really good and tell a story - which is exactly what art is about, so you've nailed the fundamentals and maybe more! you're far beyond an amateur artist in my opinion.

what I would advise you work on is posing/expressions and perspective. I know a lot have mentioned it already, but how do you actually improve?

perspective

boxes. it sounds boring... probably because it is- but boxes help, which is something i probably have to come to terms with too...

draw boxes in perspective - use references online! do it a couple times, then off a reference to get the general gist. then, transition to humanoids, and use references, references, REFERENCES!! draw headshots/busts in various perspectives, perhaps with different expressions too to figure out how they work from different angles.

posing

your art is very stylised, which is amazing! however, your poses seem a bit stiff. let's fix that!

the 'line of action' is a line that shows the main way a character is moving. it can help a lot in making actions seem more fluid. basically, you draw a line, and that's where you want to draw the piece's attention to! search up line of action on google and look at images, look at them and practice what you see. let yourself do it in your own style - how can you incorporate this? 

when everyone says to learn anatomy, don't fall into the realism trap if you don't want to. draw what you want! i'd say to take real-life photos and use them for posing and positioning, but don't worry about getting the details exactly right. imo, art is just about getting an idea across. don't worry if you don't get the results you want right away, either! this takes time.

i'd also suggest this site for both - you can practice expressions and poses from reference photos, and it can allow you to identify the line of action and draw from that, or can help you work on perspective drawing.