Low-Tech Alys fanart.

Alright, time for my latest piece of swanky coloured pencil fanart and one I've been meaning to do for a while as well as putting off for a while. I dunno, I just always looked at Alys and felt that drawing her would prove tricky.

And it was to a certain degree, but not so far removed from anyone I've drawn for the first time. I've come to realise that, for me, if I draw a character at least a couple of times then I can do more from memory. Somehow it's easier if I have references in my head and on paper.

Anyhoo, enjoy.

Quite good, Xander. She has a slightly 'yeah, come mess with me!' look on her face which fits her perfectly. A very good piece of work.

You're getting to be a top PS-artist. Her eyes make her look very Asian in this drawing, which to me is a good thing. Keep it up.

I'm glad you like the eyes. They proved a bit of a pain to draw for some reason. I think I'm too used to drawing oval shaped eyes and didn't realise these are the same but simply drawn much shorter.

I know her left hand looks a bit weird and I tried to add my own but failed miserably, so I just went with the original. Though I'm quite chuffed about how her right hand came out, despite there being no hand there to begin with.

Fantastic! She looks great. It almost looks like she is blushing or something.

Wow, very nice work! the colors are very well chosen.

Ah, so you finally completed your Alys fan-art. She looks good so far. Love her expression, though her nickname is a serious mistranslation as most of us know by now. The original Japanese name literally means "Tear 'Em to Pieces Alys" or "Yatsuzaki no Raira." ^^

And your drew her with a sword. Not that I'm complaining. She probably was a great swordswoman, even if she doesn't prefer using the sword. Anyone can wield a sword and hack away, but a slicer, now there's a weapon that requires great skill to use.

Anyway, good job Xan. Now I want to see you tackle Demi and Wren. ^^

Lyla2284 wrote:

Ah, so you finally completed your Alys fan-art. She looks good so far. Love her expression, though her nickname is a serious mistranslation as most of us know by now. The original Japanese name literally means "Tear 'Em to Pieces Alys" or "Yatsuzaki no Raira." ^^

That part proved a bit of a niggle. I couldn't decide whether to go with 'Tear 'em to pieces' or the one I did use. I pretty much just flipped a mental coin. The same goes for her weapon, I just picked one of the two.

Now...as for Demi and Wren, while I've definitely got plans to do them in the future, I think I'll just drop them on the end of my wee list. They'll prove to be most interesting to do, but I have a few other things I want to do first. If anything, I'll get plenty of practice in before they're done.

This one looks really great, Xander. I love the pose and the expression.

One little critique: she seems a little too thin below the waist. In particular, her leg seems like it should be a little wider. Not too much wider, but just a little.

That's true, I'm not sure why I didn't fix the leg to be honest. I think I was just being a bit lazy.

The waist, well I was probably just being a little too straight when drawing it out rather than widening it. I dunno, waists are funny for me to do, though I've had a good break today in drawing hands.

I notice I've done a fair few portrait style drawings and I really am trying to change that as of the current one, but PS characters have some funny feet that have few references and generally look strange. Plus I tend draw full body so big I am considering drawing those exclusively on an A3 pad. For some reason I get on better when I draw a character a bit larger, the detail and facial stuff is easier for me to place, but due to my methods I end up drawing them so big that on A4 I get down to their knees and hit the end of the page. The only snag with A3 is that I'd have photograph them in due to my scanner size.

Anyway, enough rambling.