Traditional Art My Anime Drawings (using references)

Hey guys (: ~

For the past week or so, I've been drawing a lot to try to improve my drawing skills. To accomplish this, I used references pictures and while drawing each I tried to focus on a different attribute (e.g. hair, eyes, hands, etc.). So the eyes might be better in one drawing, and the hair might be better in another. The other thing that I tried to work on was the time it took me to draw each.

By the drawings, I'll post a link to the reference picture and the time it took me to draw each.
NOTE: I did not trace anything. Personally, I like to take pride in my work and if I trace, I don't get that feeling of accomplishment because anyone can do it. Also it definitely wouldn't help my artistic ability at all.

Spoiler

This isn't from an anime, but it is an anime style drawing. It is a drawing of the vocaloids Gumi and Luka from their song Happy Synthesizer. I tried to focus on Luka's hair in this one.



This is the reference picture that I used:
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-...5BD%25B5%25E6%258B%25B7%25E8%25B2%259D_72.jpg
This took me 1.5 hours to draw and half an hour to perfect.

Spoiler

This drawing is from the anime Anohana. I tried to focus on the shading of the eyes.



This is the reference picture that I used:
http://www.zerochan.net/887786
This took me 45 minutes to draw and 10 minutes to perfect.

Spoiler

This is another drawing from Anohana. On this one I tried to focus on her "pose" (can't think of the correct term at the moment) especially that head tilt.



This is the reference picture that I used:
http://beneaththetangles.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/menma4.jpg
This took me 1 hour to draw and 15 minutes to perfect.

Spoiler

This one is from Gundam Seed. I really tried to work on the hands, but that didn't seem to go very well ):



This is the reference picture that I used:
http://www.freewebs.com/lacus_clyne_fans/stellae_lacus.jpg
This took me 1.5 hours to draw and 15 minutes to perfect.

Thanks for your time. Any help or constructive criticism would be nice. :D

 

If you're going to use "references," you should go with guys like Michelangelo or Leonardo da Vinci. Copying anime stuff won't get you far.

 

These are quite good, but using references will only improve your art so much. what you want to do is sketch out the body, either with a stick figure or just lightly drawing it out and erasing multiple times. To improve you must practice alot; it took me two years to improve decently. And if you use a ref you're just copying someone else's style.
But these are wonderful! I could never use a ref without me messing up somewhere XT

 

I would beg to differ here. Using reference pictures is a common step in learning to draw. But it is best if your references are in the type of style you want to be drawing in the end. Sketching renaissance artists doesn't really help you much to improve an anime style artwork.

I think these are rather nice for what they are. Biggest thing I would say is to try and incorporate more shading and textures since both are fairly minimal in these pieces, and of course to make unique works as you feel ready to.


And remember to keep challenging yourself. Even if the end result looks terrible if you learned from it that is more important than a "nice" picture under your skill level.

 

Thanks to the both of you (:

@Gultigargar : I had to reproduce a piece of art by da Vinci for art class last year. But since this was for myself and not for any grades, I wanted something that I would really enjoy drawing. Don't get me wrong, I love Leonardo da Vinci, I just thought this was a bit more fun. However I do understand that drawing anime will not help me improve dramatically.

@program: Thank you very much! I worked very hard on these. I understand where you are coming from because some of my friends in the Art departments of their schools said the same thing. As stated, I just wanted something fun to drawing my favourite characters.

EDIT:
@Mixt: I will try to add more shading into my drawings and create some originals as well in the future! Thank you for the advice (:

 

I agree that referencing is actually a very good way to improve. Because in referencing you do learn the other aspects like anatomy over time, even if it's anime (which is still an art style!) In fact referencing a whole bunch of things opens up a broad range of possibilities and is great for developing your own style, whether it be anime-based or along the lines of Renaissance artists.

I think you did a wonderful job referencing them honestly, it's not easy to reference things and get them so accurate like this. I agree that you could add shading and things too over time to improve on different things though, it would be a nice addition.

Overall nice work : D

 

Aaah, I see. I didn't mean to imply that you shouldn't draw anime, I just think you learn more from looking at what the old masters did. I actually like your drawings, so I just thought it was a shame if you didn't develop your skills as much as you should, but I was obviously wrong about that.

I totally get wanting to take a break form classic drawing. If you're going to continue with anime, I'd recommend taking a look at some of the work done by Production I.G. IMO, they are one of the best studios out there.

 

These are all really great as simple sketches and stuff. You've picked good anime references and you've incorporated them really well. You've definitely got something going for you.

I would love to suggest adding shading in. I like how you follow the reference picture's flow of like... different parts of the drawing such as how you can really distinguish that the hair is behind the body, etc. However, it still seems a little flat - shading will help you here. Study how light and shadows work and incorporate that into your drawings too. You can see them in the anime references and pencil work is a great medium to practice shading since you don't have to go to the trouble of picking colours etc.

Another thing is that i'm missing fluidity in the hair. I'll take the final drawing and reference as an example because there is a lot of hair there. HAHA. If you look at the lines in the reference picture they do not stop at one point and continue to the next. They are a continuous until the tips of the hair. The line are also curved, kind of like rivers; and they vary in thickness. The tips of the hair, where they meet to form an end of a clump of hair, is thinner as compared to the other. In your drawings, they look kind of flat and consist of straight lines. Try keeping the lines clean, that can help, and also do continuous strokes.

But amazing job, these are lovely. Keep practicing and good luck~ c:

 

Thanks to all of you (: !

By the looks of it, it seems like I need to work on shading my drawings. In the future, I will try to use references from Production I.G. or even draw my own.