Design—strong vs weak shapes (and colors and TEXtures too)

 Scrolling down my blog after finishing the most recent post, I noticed some things. One of the biggest differences between my drawings/paintings and those of the powerful artists I've been blogging about is the shapes they use. They're powerful and expressive, whereas mine are weak and smooth. Soft and gentle. 

Self-critique:

Not only the shapes, but the colors and textures are far more powerful and eye-catching in the Jae Lee piece. Of course it's not a perfect comparison—his is intended to be mega-powerful and badass, while mine was an anatomy learning piece and I wasn't going for anything of the sort. But in general my drawings do tend to be bland and gentle. I don't want them to be as crazy or savage as that one, but I do want to move in that direction, if just for learning purposes for a while, to overcome what I see as some of the weaknesses of my drawing. It can be very helpful to try out different approaches, techniques and styles, even if they aren't necessarily the way you plan to end up working. It all contributes to the gestalt of your art. 

I can see that more jagged shapes, rugged and chunky lines, and moving away from pink for a flesh tone would make my dude look a lot tougher. In fact next to Chapel he looks downright feminine. 

To crit the other way, mine looks more realistic. But then I can guarantee I put a hell of a lot more time in too. Because I was in a learning phase and struggling, and he was way beyond that. He had his techniques down pat. And was practically copying a Bisley piece. 

By contrast, this Fafhrd sketch is a lot stronger than the painting I posted above (mine I mean). The shapes are exaggerated in a nice way, and the thick lines are strong. His stance looks pretty cool. Even that thick jagged mountain edge behind him is strong and eye-catching. I also like the Fafhrd logo I drew down in the corner. It all looks good.  I wasn't struggling to learn anything or try anything brand new. Well, I was actually—I had never done such exaggerated anatomy, and really I didn't know anatomy very well. Mostly I just faked it. Though come to think of it I did work through a few anatomy books prior to this, including several by Burne Hogarth and Robert Beverly Hale. In some ways I think I knew anatomy better than I do now, and I was able to make it look cooler, unlike now when everything looks smooth and rounded off. I need to bring some of that back. It's weird how you can forget you used to know things like that. It was about three decades ago, and I totally stopped drawing for a good solid decade, during which all my knowledge evaporated. It didn't start to resurrect until I decided to get back to drawing in pencil a couple of years ago, and even then it took a good long time. I basically had to re-develop it, it didn't really come back. 

But I do see the importance of the way I've learned to lay out the anatomy now, as opposed to back then. Now I understand how the muscles wrap around the body (in places) and fit into and against each other. Back then I didn't grasp those things. As soon as I can bring some of that method back and fit it together with the way I draw now, this is gonna get good!

And suddenly I get it—diagram the muscles out the way I've been doing, with smooth simple curved lines, and then on top do another pass, drawing in the muscles more chunky and with cool shapes. Man, I was really starting to feel bad about blogging about nothing but other artists, when it's supposed to be about my art (at least sometimes), but this is really getting good now. I'm developing my ideas on how to proceed, rather than just drawing the same stuff over and over without making any progress. 

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I just scrolled down my Drawings gallery on Flickr, and I see it isn't all my drawings or paintings that are smooth and simple like that top drawing. It's only the learning pieces where I was drawing form, as opposed to putting a surface on it. Like these:

On other ones I didn't do it that way:

This one does look rounded and smooth, and yet he's so big and strong it doesn't make him look at all feminine. And there is a subtle sense of more sophisticated form in the muscles, it just isn't as pronounced as in the top Fafhrd piece or the pencil Thor above him. There are interesting shapes there, partly in the negative spaces where the plain gray background shows through. The pointed shapes of his hair and the wings on the helmet, and the rectangle of the hammer etc all move it away from 'Simple, smooth and rounded.'And if I had worked on it some more I quite likely would have developed the outlines a bit more and put some shadows in places on the arms etc. 

I really like the way I drew the pencil Thor just above it. I should draw like that more. It's really got some power and toughness to it. That was before I had learned how to lay out the muscles on the body, I was winging it.  By the time I did the color Thor I had learned it, at least for the 'Show muscles' (front of torso, arms, front of thighs and calves I guess). I still need to develop my understanding of the back and the rear thighs and a few details here and there. But it can wait, I'm ready to take what I know now and just draw for fun. To BE an artist, rather than all this endless striving to BECOME one—that ancient and eternal philosophical conundrum.