Week 2 Results: Hands 80/100

So...did my best, but still didn't quite finish. Partly due to getting carried away by these. I started the week with the challenge of 10 different styles:

I used plenty of references, many from good old childhood cartoons like Hey Arnold and Fairly Odd Parents, as well as a few other blogs and interesting pages I found. Links below.


Disney Styled Hands

Really Cool Penwork on this one

A neat style from an artist on DA

More wrinkly penwork

Love the design in these

After these I decided to work (finally) on the part of the challenge I was looking forward to the least...the forms. And ironically...they turned out to be my favourite ones to work on. Me. Who never uses a single form in my life drawings actually enjoyed structure and stuff. Mostly because I got fed up with following examples from books and decided to just break down the hands based on how I saw them. And here's what happened:

Kinda happy with the playfulness and motion of these. Was doing my best to keep them from getting all rigid like forms usually get when I work on them. And in fact I had so much fun doing this I decided to do my whole animated 10 frame hand rotation in the same fashion. Check it out!

                                         

This was waaay harder to do than I thought. So many things to keep in mind! Perspective, form, picturing how the hell one thing rotates and its affect on other parts. It's far from perfect, but I think it's a decent start.

A few last notes, here is an incredible blog site dedicated to resources and amazing tips for drawing:

FYeah Art Tips

And lastly and importantly: If you want to do the challenge, even if just a bit, I would love to link your blog/site/scan or whatever to this page, so message or comment me or whatever, I'll make sure to include them in my work!

Week 1 Results: Hands 50/100

These are in no particular order, I just felt like doing the colored ones this week.

1) Paint Sketches - Used my fave combo, only yellow, blue and red. Tried to exaggerate

shapes at this point as I had already drawn many hands and felt comfy trying

out something new. (Water colors and graphite pencil)

2) 1 Minute Gestures - Quick penwork to get the general jist of things. Should

probably do ten of these daily... (Brush Pens)

3) Markers and Pencil Crayons - I think these are my favourite. Had fun

trying out a new style, something I might implement in future projects.

(Copic Markers as base and pencil crayons)

4) Realistic - Most boring of the bunch. I probably did at least 20 of these. Second hand is my fave. 

A friend posed for it. Thanks Marco! (Oil Based Pencil)

5) Digital - Considering how much I detest painting in PS, I'm pretty happy

with how these turned out and with the fact that none too more

than 20 minutes to do. The last 4 in the top row and the second in the bottom

row are my faves. (Adobe Photoshop CS)

Here are some of the references I used:

Books

Drawing the Head and the Hands - Andrew Loomis

Drawing Dynamic Hands - Burne Hogarth

These two artists have made many fantastic books (which you can

download as pdfs by doing a quick google search buy on some website) 

Their styles are drastically different but they break things down to the 

smallest details. 

Blogs

Hugo de Faucompret - Gobelins 2012 Portfolio (Accepted)

An amazing artist who got into the school this year. Referenced

his watercolor sketches. Will reference a ton more I'm sure.

Pierre Vanderweed - The Mey Me Monster

An animation student at Sheridan. His improvement

over his time at school is ridiculous. Check out his

early work to compare. Referenced his hand sketches 

for style inspiration. 

That's it for today. Good luck on your's little lambs!

Week 1: Hands x100

So here's the first Challenge! This one should take two weeks and you can split it up anyway you like.

Draw 100 hands
1) 1-2 Minute Gestures (use your own hand, a mirror, a patient friend or willing strangers) x 10
2) The hand broken down into forms (this one you definitely need to reference some books for) x 10
3) Skeletal Views x 10 (can be partial drawings of the hand)
4) Muscles of the Hand x 10 (can be partial drawings of hand)
5) Realistic x 10
6) Markers or Pencil Crayons (feel free to experiment with styles) x 10
7) Paint Sketches x 10
8) Same hand pose drawn in 10 different styles (go pull out those fave artblogs of yours)
9) Digital
10) 10 frame hand rotation (put it together in that toonboom you pirated years ago)

Welcome to the Challenge!

Hey there,

So what's all this about? Being a bit of a ranter, I'll try to keep things brief and explain. I'm an ex-art student hoping to once again enter the academic world of art, specifically animation, speciafically Gobelins, which boasts to have the world's most difficult entrance exam. (I don't doubt that for one second from seeing the kind of people who get in, here's a link to their 2nd and 3rd year films: Click Me!). So in preparation for my entrance exams, portfolio and for myself, I've decided to create this 20 week challenge, which I hope some of you will join me in!

Here's how it works. I've picked 10 different topics, all of which should help bring your art to the next level, should you chose to fully dedicate yourself to this. Each topic will take up two weeks (I work full time, otherwise I'd knock this down to one topic per week) and you should be able to create anywhere from 25-100 drawings in that time. It's not easy.

I'll be posting all the references I used such as art books, blogs and whatnot to give you an idea of where to get ideas and learn from. (cause contrary to popular belief you don't just sit down with a pencil drawing the same thing and expect it to get better, you need to see your mistakes first) Also all my results will be up so I can make sure to stay on track. (yeah this sounds curiously like a diet plan...)

So I hope to see others join me in this expedition! Take your time, if you need more than 2 weeks per topic, don't sweat it, the important thing is to finish each topic before moving on. It'll help you in the future I promise.

Now go whip your artsy butt into some sexy shape!

Cheers,
Juli