[Basse_Ex]

I don't draw enough women. Never have. They've just never seemed that interesting to me... uhh... as art... that is... ehhh...

... well... where was I?

Anyhow, I just started posting over at the "Drawing Class" at "The Drawing Board" forum... and... well... almost all the reference photos are sexy girls, so to be able to keep up with all the others there, I've done a little practicng of my own...

Here:

Nude
Done with ink over a quick pencil sketch.


In addition, here's my three pictures for the "Drawing Class":


The Eye
Done directly in ink.


Babewatch
Done with pencils, ink, and colored in photoshop based on scans of pencil lines(Very quick and effective way to get the tones in).



mommy
Done with pencils, ink, and colored completly in photoshop.
The text is from a song called "Rippin' Kitten" by Goldenboy and Miss Kitten, that happened to start at the exact moment I started the drawing, which really made the mood(And no, that one is not supposed to be sexy)

I've used reference photos for all the pictures... The two reference photos for the three last images can be found in the original thread here:
The Drawing Board

The reference for the first one... well... I don't quite think I should post that one...

anyhow... C&C much appreciated.

[swampbug]

I like the first ones pubic hair and camel toe

[Basse_Ex]

Yes... the camel toe is very nice...

HUH?

[jezelf]

Hi there, Basse_Ex

I think out them all I keep looking at 'The Eye' the most. I love the sketchy feel to this and the use of 'negative' space to suggest form - there's also evidence of this in he Nude.

I guess it's because it reminds me of Frank Miller's work. Are you influenced by him?

It'll be interesting to see you use technique you used for 'the eye' on a character. I think it's either the texture of your paper, or a dry brush on that one - it gives it more 'life' to me than any of the others. It think that's why I prefer it.

It can be fun doing the 'just draw what you need' lesson in life drawing etc.

Do you prefer to just be straight B&W like that? have you tried using ink, charcoal and white chalk?
Or even just charcoal and a putty rubber. the idea is to grey out the paper first - get rid of that white with the ink/charcoal and then work in with your black charcoal.

if you've just used charcoal to smudge into the paper you can use the putty rubber to bring back the white paper and to act as highlights. If you washed the paper grey with diluted ink, first, the you of course work into it with white chalk.

If I had to point something out, I guess it would be to be careful with your weighted in lines. Inking with a brush is a difficult thing and one slip of the wrist can leave you with more weight in areas than is needed. Most noticeably on the girl on babewatch, is under her left forearm (flexor carpi ulnaris) and the side of her left hip (Gluteus maximus) also a more confident, unbroken line could improve this piece.
that, perhaps?

though this babewath and mommy aren't the kind of style I normally go for, I must say I really do like 'mommy' the image as a whole, works really well for me. I love the use of the colour half-tone and the colours themselves.

It gives it a pop-art feel. her pose is cool too and her expression all enhances the image. like with your B&W stuff, the sharp contrast of the colour and the white works well.

I guess if I were invited to critique this I would just say that perhaps use the same size of colour half-tone for the background and the dress? maybe that's just me, but they look like they are different scales and therefore the background a different resolution? - but it could just be the pattern playing havoc with my eyes!

the picture gives me a 50's pulp comic book feeling, and perhaps it might be complete it you used a more 50's stylised font?
Looks great, still though - I'm just being picky. it could make a great flyer!

Anyway - I wouldn't say to stop doing what you're doing it all looks good!

cheers
jez.

[Basse_Ex]

Jezelf:

Uhmm... you see very correctly, there's some huge Frank Miller influence there in my work, and I'm extremely happy whenever someone notices it.
Otherwise, all those countless hours(Since I was 7 years old,actually) of staring and drooling over his work would have been completly wasted.

The eye is the one I'm most satisfied with myself. It was fun doing it. I practiced each shape directly with ink on paper 5-30 times, then made used them as reference when I did the whole picture. Obviously I practiced the shape of the eye a bit more than the other, so that's why it's called "The Eye". It was done very late at night, finished in under 30 minutes, and I was extremely releaved when I woke in the and saw that I hadn't been hallucinating, and it is actually a quite nice picture.

I'm also very happy that you liked the inking style. I used the same brush(Pentel color brush, a refillable brush) for both the nude and the eye, and have lately started to consider exchange my Windsor&Newton series 7 for in my comics work also. It's has a very flexible lineweight, and a capability both for excellent dry brushing and solid lines.
It work best on rough paper, in large formats, as in the Eye, but doesn't work quite that well on smoother paper in smaller formats, as in the nude.
The brush has some of the qualities of Jon J. Muth's black and white work, which is another big influence on me.

One more good thing about the pentel color brush is that the ink seldom starts to dry out, and if it does, you can just change the inkcontainer, unlike what I did with my Windsor & Newton in the other two pictures.
I'm not awfully satisfied with them, they're not the style I usually go for either, and you're right about all your critiques on them.
I tried to change the colors of the "Mommy" picture, but I'm not quite sure what I think about the change.
Here it is:


Mommy2

I don't quite know what to do with the font. I'm not at all experienced with these type of design things, and all the text choices were done simply because I have just installed photoshop 6.0, and I just went "Ooooh... what does this do?"...

If anyone has any suggestions for font, or that type of thing, I would greatly appreciate it, since that's the thing I'm struggling most with right now.

But, these images were done just for fun, so it's no biggie.

anyhow...

Hmmm... yes... charcoal....

I've used some charcoal, also with putty rubber. I've gotten it to work quite well as source material in color pieces, but I still haven't found a way of integrating it in my B&W work.
I prefer straight B&W, especially for my comics, but it's very tempting to use grey. But I haven't any way of using grey that I'm completly happy with yet...

wow...

... that was a long post...

Thanks a lot for taking the time, and just be as picky as you please.

Otherwise...

... what's the point?