A year without drawing... eesh... I think I'd die.

Tweeb, I think it depends on the type of discussion you're having on the artwork. If someone hasn't examined it closely and jumps to their judgements and starts picking it apart, they don't get anything out of it. But if someone has considered the artwork carefully and shares that with someone else who has done the same, you can offer insights to each other.
Skweeb: Like the gun, also love the colouring. Can't wait to see it in the character drawing.

CJ: Very nice! You captured the expression well. Only thing I can see is that the top half of her head is too short and the back of her head doesn't protrude enough.

On a sidenote: I'm not fishing for compliments or anything, but I'm wondering why no one has commented on my last drawing >_> I wasn't too sure of it and swing between thinking it's ugly and thinking it's not =P (not that it matters in art, but there obviously isn't some embedded meaning in my drawing and I want it at least to look pleasing)

This is a piece of fanart I was originally intending to watercolor, but I scanned it in, just so I'd have a CGable copy when I inevitably cocked up the watercoloring (I'm a painting n00b).

So I did cock up the watercolor, so I CG'd the digital copy. On one hand, I like it, but on the other I don't....not sure why.

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j2...bbles/toph.jpg

Madhatter-Sorry I missed it before. Sometimes I accedentally look over links. ^^ it's very cute. I love your style. It's so interesting and unique. (plus I love the color scheme red, white, and black.) very cute

Zesty- The only thing that kinda bugs me about it is the shines in the hair. The rest of the picture was drawn with cel shading (meaning, no fading from one color to the other) but the shines in the hair are done with many values in between. Generally when you do one style of shading it works well if you stick to that (but if it's your style that's okay) Otherwise, good job on it. Very nice job with the cel shading on the skin. I love cel shading.

That's probably it. In retrospect, CGing at midnight when you only got a few hours of sleep the day before probably isn't the best idea

Heh, I was drawing a serious version of a Very silly character I made up and I was very pleased with the results.

http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/553...ingtone0og.jpg

CelesJessica....you're either a genius or someone who should be put in a tiny room and looked at through a window for the rest of your life.

I wholeheartedly approve.

Tsk, thats my prime coloring time. 12am to 4am is when I do my best works. Anywho, I can give a few pointers when it comes to CG coloring. Its what I did most of the time when not doing lineart during the time of unlearning.
As for my gun coloring, Eesh. That was like a what...twenty second job. I totally BS'd it bigtime. I just did those squiggles to establish what colors will be used. Guess it turned out pretty good as a BS job.

1. Establish a light source direction (maybe two, three if you really know what you're doing). This helps with the shading and coloring in general and pulls it all together for a completed coherant feel.

2. Have swatches readily on hand on a seperate layer. This makes color fetching a lot easier.

3. LAYERS LAYERS AND MORE LAYERS. This I cannot stress enough. Make a layer for EVERYTHING. I've had upwards of 100 layers on some pieces. Yes the number ever increases...yeah..

4. If you use photoshop learn the glory of history snapshots. These are great failsafes for when you want to experiment something and have a 'save point' on hand. Have experimental fun on the new snapshot. If you don't like it simply delete and go back to where the first one was. Or the other way around. Whatever tickles your fancy. Simply right click whatever step on the history box and click New Snapshot.

5. Tutorials tutorials and more tutorials. Since you are a newcomer to CG coloring this step is a must do. Learn as many photoshop (or whatever program you are using) tutorials as you can. About any and all tools with their little ins and outs. The more you know the more power you have at hand to use little tricks.

6. Experiment, play around, dilly-dally. If you discover something new write it down for later use. I can't tell you how much shiz I've forgotten because I didn't write it down.

7. Always keep a backup of every file. It sucks when you find a way to improve a piece and realize..hey..I didn't save a pre-layer compressed .psd! *face palm* it has happened to me a lot....

8. Above all: HAVE FUN. Don't force yourself to color, draw, etc. This is the biggest cause for artistic blocks. Just sit back, relax, dink around. I make a ton of crap doodles to get the creative juices flowing for the real meat and taters.

If you have any other questions feel free to PM me. I don't want to sound like I'm tooting my own horn/being elitist but I know a few things when it comes to coloring. I'll be more than happy to help!:D

[edit] all this art talky has got me itchin to work on my goblin again! *arts!*

Sweet! You need to give all this advice more often. ^_^ What? I like the goblin...

Likewise, unless I was up until 5am the night before, and I had work that day.

The Toph drawing had a layer for every color, 2 layers for the lineart and a background layer, with each color set in its own personal subgroup to keep things organized. I'm right there with you on the layers thing....you can merge later, but pulling things apart takes time, effort, and lots of cursing.

I tend to grab tutorials whenever I can...got any good ones to suggest?

Dude, I never consider anyone giving me advice to be elitist (for the most part) and that's why I post stuff here, to get advice on it!

Oh, and yea, I use Photoshop. I have Painter and OpenCanvas, but as I understand it, you need a digital pad to really make use of those programs. However, my goal for the summer is to save up the cash for a 9x12 Intuos3, so that will soon no longer be a problem.

I agree with the second part, as long as your talking about the fact that I'm crazy enough to make up a character like that... ^^ heheh