Hey guys, i have a few critiques for the art of Harkovast i would like to discuss. First off though, i would like to say that i hope this discussion remains as civil and informative as possible, so the focus can remain on the artistic theory being discussed. Also, i would like to thank the creator of Harkovast for including this section and being generally polite with regards to criticism, which often seems rare in the artistic community.
Now, onto the critique. My primary complaint is with your anatomy. As someone who has been drawing for a couple years i feel that you have yet to grasp many of the fundamentals of character art. The most prominent flaws exist in the way you draw you characters faces. It just seems as though the faces are extremely two dimensional, as they lack a lot in regards to structure. For example, i have noticed that most of your characters have a fairly strong under bite, despite the fact that this is rare in most of the species you are presenting. Also, the eyes just don't seem like eyes most of the time. What i mean is that they feel as though you just drew shapes onto the faces (it is kind of hard to explain). In this regard, i would suggest trying to use more reference material when designing characters, as the human mind isn't built to represent 3d into a 2d medium naturally. As far as other anatomy goes, your characters are extremely stiff. While your illustrations are generally fairly detailed, it seems like you don't have a very natural feel to you linework. I would like to know what your process is in constructing your linework, because i know many people who end up with the same stiff feel in their drawings, and it regularly comes from being to deliberate. Also, one quick note on the coloring, it is generally considered good practice to use a dark color (ie: purple or blue) for shading rather than black, as black tends to make the drawings feel very gray and muddy, though the coloring is generally solid. If you are to get anything from this enormous block of text it would be that experimentation is important in artistic development, and that you will probably never get very good at drawing if you don't try to reach beyond your comfort zone. Also, to prove my artistic ability i will agree to do a drawing of any character from your comic (you choose) in my own style within a week (b/w inked).
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Hall of Shame
A critique discussion (hopefully)
This review seems a little mild for the hall of shame.
You are really meant to be a lot more hateful an angry and call names to get on here!
I guess I will let it stay…but next time you need to invent some insulting nick names for the characters (at the very least!)
In answer to your specific questions-
there is no real technique to how the characters are drawn, I just get a pencil and kinda draw em. I've not really had any formal training, so I'm just learning as I go. I don't know if that makes my efforts seem better or worse!
As for the faces, no they don't really look much like the animals they are supposed to resemble when you get down to it. But in the same way Bugs Bunny doesn't REALLY look much like a rabbit. The characters are all quite stylised and cartoony, so expecting them to be more realistic is not likely to happen.
Then again, the characters are not earth animals, they are creatures from another world that happen to have a passing resemblance to earth creatures, so who knows?
I wouldn't say they have under bites in the comic, though a lot have big square jaws. Again, they are not meant to look like realistic depictions of animals, so this isn't a problem that is going to go away I'm afraid.
The eyes are a weird shape. Not entirely sure why, but when I tried to draw them with realistic eye shapes they looked odd to me. Now I am so used to the retangular eyes they all have I cant imagine them any other way.
Previously, the most interesting criticism I got of their heads (which I half expected you to mention) was that the characters have very small foreheads, which would not leave much room for their brains. Yes, the person who told me that is a science buff. If you want realistic biology, this may not be the comic for you.
Thanks for your input. At least you liked the comic enough to bother to come and look at the forum and post your thoughts. So it wasn't all bad!
As to drawing a picture, you draw which ever character you like best. Any fan art would be much appreciated and would make me feel better as I sit in a corner crying about my line work (just kidding!)
Thanks for reading!
All I really get bothered by about the art in Harkovast is the heads. They're really small compared to the generally bulky bodies (although admittedly my style has big heads, so maybe it's just me), and the eyes are a bit off. I can't think of the word to describe it, but the eyes should be "thinner" on the away side, to make the heads look round.
It doesn't really detract anything, it's just one of those things.
Could that be because they are wearing armour?
A lot of the characters are pretty broad at the shoulder due to all their battle gear.
Seriously, this section is becoming far too reasonable! You guys are meant ot come here because you hate the comic!
Where is the HATE?!?!
Oh, that's good! Excellent.
Now we need someone to be a Harkovast fan and make a snooty, but subtle, remark about the person who dares to insult this magnificent comic!
…
Don't look at me. I'm not like that. I don't stoop to the level of name calling and bigoted unthinking trolling. UNLIKE SOME PEOPLE!!!!
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