Phantasy Star: Fringes of Algo

I always got a laugh out of Kyra teasing Chaz while she was tagging along, saying he was like a baby brother and so forth. I needed one last thing to do so I decided to draw this up.

While it may be a little rough and not my best piece, it did provide a few lessons on drawing people at angles. My hands seem to be getting a little better too, though I still have a lot to learn. The magic effect is pretty rough especially but at least it helps cover the areas I was having a hard time drawing in correctly.

Anyway, this will be my last piece for a while. I've been doing too much too quickly with little real practice and it shows, even if I have only been at this for 3 weeks. I'm going to go back to some tutorials and try and improve. Plus I need time to come up with some ideas.

As always, critique is most welcome so feel free to leave what you can offer.

As I said to you already, this is full of awesomeness (and you have a knack for drawing Chaz!). As always, well done, and keep up the GREAT work!

Kyra: Just hold still Chaz. I told you not to do that!
Chaz: But that penguin took my sandwich!

=P

Great work Xander. I'll admit you need some practice (take a look at Kyra's skinny arm for example) but honestly, you're still better than a lot of people I know who have been doing art for years. I find it hard to believe you only been doing this for 3 weeks.

Keep up the good work man.

Hey thanks Atlin. Yeah, if I'd maybe added an extra bit of curvature to the arm it might have made the difference. And I think next time I draw Chaz I'll use the darker tone as his main hair colour as well.
I actually drew this down to the waist but cropped it out in the end to centre things more. Ironically Chaz's hand is down there and it's actually near perfect. Ah well! I also thought of adding some speech in as well but I couldn't think of anything.

Anyhoo, an idea came to me for my next piece today and it's much much simpler than this but i've sworn to try and practice it and try some tutorials before I do the proper piece. And maybe not try and squeeze it into one day as well.

Anyway, again, thanks Atlin. If you have anything at all to add please please tell me. I don't take critique as an insult as I've seen people do over the years, so don't be afraid to pipe up.

Oh wow another drawing. I like this one too it has a very comedic appeal to it. Also it’s good to see some artwork of Kyra I feel she gets forgotten a fair bit out of the PSIV cast. So it was nice of you to draw her. Keep it up mate.

Thanks Lucas. How come you haven't uploaded anything to the gallery in a while? I like your drawings, the Elisa-Le-Farg one is pretty cute looking in particular. Plus I'd like to see how they'd turn out in colour.

Xander wrote: I don't take critique as an insult as I've seen people do over the years, so don't be afraid to pipe up.

Xander, I read this and I hope you don't mind my two cents... just wanted to throw you a bone!

I agree that constructive criticism is very helpful and useful, so critique is beneficial. As you say, it shouldn't be an insult, but sometimes others make it as such when they respond with something that is very unhelpful (e.g. "that face looks funny!"). Criticism is meant to be compassionate and with integrity; it is evaluating without finding fault, and is meant to uplift the artist/writer in an encouraging way.

For your presented piece here, the only constructive criticism I can offer is to keep working on your angles; the shape of hands can be difficult to draw. However, you are particularly great with drawing men (look at Chaz here - excellently drawn). I would say that you are learning fast, and well. As Atlin pointed out, it really is hard to believe that you just started this hobby.

I'll shut up now. ^^

BTW: You should get on DA and add me.

No problem, RW. It's a solid definition. Certainly goes further than what I'd normally say.

And besides, it's nice to know I'm doing well for my experience level as well. I've certainly come far from my first piece, which was pretty weird looking. I've got a tutorial on basic torso drawing and how it generally works in relation to size, angles, etc, so I figure that'll help me out a great deal.

Funnily enough I have thought of DA a couple of times. Given how i'm right now using Photobucket, I'd be better off having a more dedicated repository for my stuff online. I'll need to check it out later.

Ah... I remember this image, with different characters of course. Rolf and Amy from the Compendium, wasn't it, Xan? Still, I don't blame you for using images there, it's an excellent source of reference.

As far as constructive criticism goes, Chaz's face is a little too manly, of you know what I mean. He has a very childish, boyish look about him, and the ears are a little too high up on the head. You might want to move it down by a little next time you draw. The ears are a bit small as well, and Shorty could use with a little more shading on his armour. Add more variants of grey. There's currently too much white in the shading.

No complaints with Kyra, though. Love her expression. You captured it very well. Though you might want to add a little more white or lighter yellow to her gold collar. It will have a more metallic effect.

So yeah, that's my own little opinion. But you are improving very quickly.

Yeah I was maybe a bit too easy on the armour highlights. The problem is that if I want to do grey I have to mix the black and white pencils together and I think in this case I wa over zealous with the white, I really ought to have left some black. I do have a silver pencil which is actually quite grey looking, so I may need to do some experimentation with the three of them.

The gold...not my best. I think I used a shade too dark for that, because I had some real problems getting the white and lighter shades to show.

Ah anyways, lessons learned. If I'd maybe taken my time a bit more it would have had more zing to it. Thanks for the input Lyla.
Oh and I've gone and ordered some new pencils. They have hard cores and are good for detailing so things should be a bit smoother and even next time. It might help make things like the armour easier to do right.