CosmicFlux

I saw you, Rowr, but I'm not in the SG...

Cosmic

I made Cosmic Flux (Rad/Rad Defender) and Cosmic Slash (BS/Reg Scrapper).

Cosmic

Have there been any servers no one has mentioned yet?

Cosmic

I only ever get booted for being inactive because I've fallen asleep at the keyboard. I have another computer for forum runs.

Justice is my home server and Freedom has some low level characters I've been trying to level, but I actually have a couple spots on each server.

Cosmic

Oh neat! I'll have to join!

Cosmic

There's always Mr. Awesome Was Taken (if it hasn't been taken already).

I'd love to play on a server where I know/somewhat know people. Currently my only RL friend still playing the game tends to only group with his SG or a regular group of others.

Is there currently a global chat group for the artistically interested, or those who regularly spend time here?

Cosmic

Thank you all so much for the suggestions. I actually did a little drawing last night and some this morning before leaving for work.

My lines were incredibly shaky, but I'm hoping that will improve in time. I did realize that I need a new pencil though. The one I'm using is a fairly fat mechanical pencil that as I was trying to draw just felt too large. I have a bunch of drawing pencils, but what I really need to get is a sharpener that won't leave shavings all over the place.

I was drawing while sitting at my computer, trying to draw a character that was on the screen. The fact that the character kept moving through idle animations didn't help. I took a screenshot, so I'll try again tonight.

I think I also need to get out one of my drawing books and go through all the basic steps for drawing a figure. While I wasn't pleased with what showed up in my sketchbook, I was very happy to actually be doing something.

To help focus my drawing skills, today I signed up for a non-credit class at one of the local community colleges. The class is called Drawing: So You Think You Can't Draw. While I don't think I can't draw, the description sounds a good place to start.

One of my biggest problems is actually finding time. I work all day where I can't really break out a sketch pad, but then when I get home I usually log myself into the game and I don't actually do any drawing. My hope is that the pressure of a class will help get me drawing. There's a part of me that also feels that I'll draw if I want to, and if I'm not now it's because the want isn't big enough.

Though if the class helps me to get better, to the point where I'm happy with what ends up in my sketchpad, I'm pretty sure I'll be much more content to take time away from other things to devote to drawing.

Oh the mind games I play with myself. It's a lot like playing Ping Pong without having to take up so much space for the table.

But, I'm hoping this class will fulfill two things for me. First, to give me a firm shove down the artistic path I want to be on and second, to help me get my pencil working in a coordinated effort with my imagination.

Anyway...I'm excited.

Cosmic

Wrap your head in tin foil, and it'll keep your brains from splattering outwards. An added bonus is that the tin foil does keep out Dr. Brainiometric's mind control beams.

Sadly, there is a Surgeon General's warning about 1 in 50 reporting that their foil-wrapped heads have begun to resemble Jiffy Pop.

UPDATE: While I had intended to do some drawing last night, I didn't have a chance. However, I ordered an instructional DVD on figure drawing from this online website. I watched the first part of that instead. I think I'm actually picking up some of it, though I must hate him for making it look so easy. :P

Between stuff at work, I have been working on a sketch of TA. This sketch probably won't see the light of day, but it's mainly to help me get into the groove, and to try to get what I'm seeing onto the paper. Eventually, I will have one that I'll be posting.

As I started working on the sketch, I do think it feels more comfortable now than it did the last time I was working at drawing. Now I just need to get a bunch more drawing in.

CosmicFlux

Thanks for the advice all! I did get myself a new sketch pad and a drawing board since I don't have a table I can dedicate to drawing. Because of double XP weekend, I didn't have a chance to do any drawing, but tonight I'm putting my new sketchpad to the test!

Thanks again!

CosmicFlux

I guess I'd better get my pencil sharpened then.

I really would like to be able to do character drawings, but I'm not sure if I'm really ready for that. While I am above the level of Stick Figure Drawings, I'm not quite at the Getting Anatomy In the Right Places stage.

Perhaps on my way home, I should treat myself to a new sketchbook.

CosmicFlux

Every so often, I get bitten by a creative bug and want to do something creative. I'm feeling it again, and I want to start drawing.

In the past, my problem is always keeping myself motivated and working to get better and to where I can actually see improvement. This actually applies to more than just drawing, but I mainly want to focus on my drawing skills right now.

Several months ago, I got energized to start drawing and get good at it. I had really high hopes, but fell down in the follow through and nothing came of it.

But, I want to end the cycle of getting myself all charged up, trying my hand at improving my artwork, and failing to see any change...or at least change that isn't significant enough. Dr. Perfectionism and Impatience-man are my dual nemeses.

So, how do I keep myself motivated even when I don't see the improvement I want to see?

I work an 8:30 to 4:30 job with an hour travel time on either side of that. While at times I can do some sketching in the office, it's probably better if I focus on my work.

So, I will have to figure out how to juggle my MMO game playing with drawing time. As much as I want to be the artist I want to be right now, I will have to get used to the fact that it will take time.

When starting out is it better to begin drawing one thing versus another? Such as, drawing something interesting on my desk or a person, etc.

Is it a good idea to set aside time each day for drawing? I'm sure more time is better, but is a half hour to an hour every day enough while in the formative stages?

Would taking a figure drawing class help? Or if I am diligent in my own efforts with enough critical eyes observing and critiquing my work, can I get through this formative stage without taking classes?

Thanks in advance for any advice, encouragement and help you can give.

CosmicFlux

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Fear the power of my four year old's imagination mortals!!!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...ehV11l14ns.jpg

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OH GOD. The one in the middle used to try to touch me in the park!

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I can just hear the Krusty the Clown-esque voice asking "Foo, wanna touch my peg leg?"

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What I don't understand is how people fill up their PM boxes... I think I have *maybe* 50... o_ô


[edit: Creepy. I have 32 recieved and 18 sent. 50 on the dot...]

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I have 7, and one of those is the Welcome message from Administrator.

Cosmic

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How many raffle winners are there going to be? Just as many as you can draw in 12 hours? About how long would one take?

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OMG. I thought that said waffle winners. I was almost so there.

Cosmic

I'm a wannabe art freak. In time, I do plan to cultivate my art freakiness to epic proportions, but alas I'm not there yet.

Cosmic

Justice!!

Though, I do have characters on most other servers, but they're all either level 1 or 2.

This weekend, I hope to finally get my Fire/Kin controller up to flaming monkey levels.

Cosmic

The main reason for my question, at least initially, was as a means to steady my hand and get used to drawing a particular curve, etc.

I honestly didn't want to trace, but if it could have been a helpful exercise, I'd consider it.

Reading all of the responses here, and just drawing over the last couple days, I'm very glad I'm pushing through and not tracing anything.

I think so far, the progression of drawings, from the fishy lipped girl to the Statesman/Positron heads to a not-quite-right-but-not-too-terrible-either drawing of my scrapper and finally to the female figure I copied off a drawing on a website, has made it clear that I don't need or want to trace, and when I put some effort into it, I can actually get the lines to go the way I want them to.

Cosmic

Former Hellion Girlfriend and falsely convicted purse snatcher (it was her ex-Damned boyfriend, honest), turned reluctant villain after rescued from the Zig by Arachnos.

Smoosh

Here's my Thugs/Dark MM, Echo Navari

It's a sad tale of when good elves go bad. Really bad.

Cosmic

No cute Positrons or elongated Statesman heads this time.

First up, a rough WIP sketch I started today of my Claws-Regen Scrapper, Shadow Crash.

Shadow Crash

When I sketch between calls at work, I don't have any art books to refer to when I'm stumped on a particular part of the body. I found an anime tutorial and sketched/copied from one of the figures on the page.

Figure

Nothing really to show from last night. I mainly spent some time copying stick figure action poses from the How to Draw the Marvel Way book. I'm not sure how productive that actually is, but it was working my brain and pencil to try to get the line I was trying to draw drawn...so I guess that's helpful.

Cosmic

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A few of my pieces are in my sig. I'm updating my website tomorrow ( DouglasShuler.com ) to include a ton more samples and more info on commissions.

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* makes note to check DouglasShuler.com tomorrow *

Cosmic

Thanks guys.

I think by the time I got to the lips on the first one, I'd struggled so much with the nose and it was late, that I sort of gave up trying to get them right.

Today, I've been working on a sketch of my Claws Scrapper, but it's going so-so. Decided to put it away and work on it again tonight.

For the most part when I do a full figure, I think I get the stick figure right. The next stage of converting the stick figure to basic shapes goes okay. Taking it from spheres, boxes and cylinders though gets very tricky. I think that's what I need to work on.

Cosmic

So, I was able to pick up a scanner today, which means I can now scan that which I scribble into my sketch pads.

After logging out of CoV last night, I picked up my sketch pad and started working on perfected my rendition of the human head. While I'm still short of perfection, I feel I got some good practice in and am getting a better understanding of forcing my hand and pencil to do my bidding.

This was me copying from one of the drawing books I have here. It was just one of those "Here's how you draw the head" bits, and so I followed step by step. Here's where I ended up:

Image1

Today, as I sat at work waiting for people to call in with Internet connection problems, I was staring at the CoH board madly refreshing in hopes that something new would appear. I realized that Statesman's head seemed like an interesting subject, and I tried my hand at that. I felt like his head seemed a little too long, and so I used Positron as my second subject. I think Positron turned out better than Statesman, though I'm not really happy with his antenna thingies.

Image2

Anyway, that's what I have so far. I think those two are an adequate representation of my current level of skill, at least as far as drawing heads goes. Between last week and last night, I can see a marked improvement in what I've drawn. Though I still have a ways to go, I'm actually quite enthusiastic and confident, and have a feeling that I'm actually going to be able to stick with it this time.

Cosmic