Kyouhen Learns to Paint! [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Kyouhen

2012-01-14, 11:45 PM

Greetings playgrounders!

This is a blatant theft of Thanqol's thread! I blame him for the idea!
*cough cough*

ANYWAY! My little introduction paragraph thing. So I love doing artsy things. Something about reaching into the void and pulling out something pretty to look at has always made me happy. For a while I toyed around with things like Photoshop and 3DS Max and found that I was pretty good with them, and loved building and painting my little wargame models. So I eventually decided I wanted to get into animation, and decided that during high school I'd take as many art classes as I could. I applied to several colleges for art and eagerly waited for their responses.

Unsurprisingly I was rejected by all of them. As good as I may be with other mediums I can't draw to save my life. Around that time I largely lost interest in artistic pursuits and found other things to occupy my time. Then I got bitten by the pony bug and found myself needing to make pretty pictures again. I found I could make really good vectors, but those took far longer to do than I care for and have largely gotten bored of burning a full day just to make one image. Managed to hang in there for most of the Equestria Daily Artist Training grounds, but don't really have the time for that now. I tried to get back into drawing but pencils refuse to bend to my will and I actually hate working with them. No fun at all.

Then I remembered my paints. My glorious, glorious paints. A medium that obeys me and is pretty quick to work with too! So now I'm going to start one of these threads myself and follow Thanqol's example of "One painting a day, no excuses". I've even recently built a handy little paint set so I can do some quick work wherever I happen to be. :smallbiggrin:

So playgrounders, I'm looking to you folks to help keep me on track and help me improve. Any suggestions on what I can do better will be massively appreciated. I'm likely to paint mostly ponies, as I tend to do better and work faster when I'm working on a project I have fun with (who doesn't?) and those adorable little equines have thoroughly taken root in my brain. It's entirely likely that I'll end up painting some other things, and I'm probably going to toy around with different styles while I'm at it. I think I saw some challenge thread kicking around that I might sign up with too, just to keep a steady stream of ideas rolling in. After all, it would be a real shame to have this thread die due to an artist's block. :smalltongue:

And so, without further ado, Day 1 (~60 minutes)
(Warning, contains tiny spoilers to MLP:FiM Episode 13)

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/014/5/f/pinky_pig_pigging_out_by_bgkyouhen-d4mdhqp.png
Piggy Pie pigging out on her favourite snack. Overall pretty happy with this one. The cloud could probably have been done better, but I didn't feel like digging up a reference for it. Her back legs are a little off too. (No references for pose either) I probably should have had them tucked in towards her belly instead of sprawled out like that, not quite sure. The yellow for her cutie mark is off, and I probably should have mixed a lighter shade of brown for the chocolate. That and I probably should have used small lines for the rain instead of big globs. What do you guys think?

Pokonic

2012-01-15, 01:19 AM

Adorable, but it has its flaws. A bit like, well, Pinkie Pie, realy.:smallbiggrin:

Kyouhen

2012-01-15, 11:28 AM

Day 2 (~55 minutes)

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/015/f/9/day_2___fallen_angel_by_bgkyouhen-d4mfd8f.png

Nothing immediately demanded painting today so I decided to do a little scene from something I'm working on that's going to take forever to finish. Kind of needed to vent part of that project from my brain. Not terribly happy with how Gilda's claw turned out. Needs to be thicker. And I really don't like how the sky turned out. I should have left it empty space. This would have been finished faster except when I tried to paint the match for Gilda I realized I had painted her about half the size I had intended to and had to redo her. :smalleek:

Mazeburn

2012-01-15, 02:56 PM

Kyouhen

2012-01-15, 03:54 PM

Hi there. :)

I'm not the best at traditional painting, but I'd love to give you some advice if I can. What kind of paints are you using? It looks quite thick, acrylic or something.

First off - don't give up on drawing! It's clear you've got a good interest in art and it's something worth pursuing. Start small and simple, work up. It is possible for anyone to learn nobody here's born with a super-special talent, we've all gotta earn our cutie marks (except me. I have the cutie mark of making crass metaphors. :smallbiggrin:). It might take years, but a little a day, and it'll happen.

In any case, painting informs drawing and vica versa, so this stuff is a really good start. Anyway, you've got the nice beginnings of a style shaping up here, I like the coloured linework - is that all really done with a brush rather than markers? It's nice and crisp. I'd say experimenting with shading as well might be a good idea. Start out simple, introduce a clear light source and think about how the colour would react to it, then layer it on top of your base colour. That's usually a good way to get fairly neutral lighting. Later, you can begin mixing the lighting's colours into your base colours and get something that looks quite natural - it's tricky and it takes practise, but it can be quite fun. :)

Anyway, keep at it! I'll keep an eye on this thread and try to lend a hoof now and then if I can! :smallsmile:

Yep, working with acrylics. I hate trying to work with water colours, and oils are more expensive than I care for. Acrylics are nice and cheap, and I tend to have an easier time mixing the colours I want. I probably need to get some better paper to work on though. I had gotten a cheap sketchbook to work on, but that seems to be devouring my paints. Need to pick up something more suited to paints at some point.

It's less that I dislike drawing more that I hate working in pens and pencils. I can't seem to get any of the lines and whatnot I like with those. I might grab a tablet at some point, at which point I'm probably going to get into actual drawing again. I like getting the smooth strokes paints provide and have an easier time correcting mistakes with them. A tablet would work just as well, I just don't have the money for one.

Still toying around with the idea of lighting. I modified a few MTG cards recently and managed to get some half-decent lighting done with those. Today's drawing was just a quick little thing I wanted to get done before D&D, so I didn't get too into the lighting for it. (Poor choice of picture to avoid lighting with)

Mazeburn

2012-01-16, 08:31 AM

Kyouhen

2012-01-16, 08:44 AM

Yeah, you'll want probably 180gsm for acrylics. One tip if your paper's getting too wet from them is to take the sheet out and use masking-tape around the corners to 'stretch' it - this way it'll stay flat and won't rumple up after you're done. More relevant with watercolour/gouache, but still applies to acrylics. Also, try out masking fluid. :D Awesome stuff and can make your life a whole lot easier.

Huh, never thought about that idea with the tape before. I'm going to have to try it next time I do something biggish. (I don't really seem to have a problem with the paper warping unless I'm doing something with a background) Going to have to try that masking fluid sometime too, that could be really handy.

Kyouhen

2012-01-17, 12:13 AM

Busy busy day today! Didn't have a lot of time to paint so I threw a few quick things together.

Day 3A (~15 minutes)

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/016/e/9/day_3a___fluttershy__s_new_friend_by_bgkyouhen-d4mmjie.png

Had a bit of time on the subway, so popped out my paints and did a quick MTG edit of Fluttershy making friends with a cute little saproling token. Of course looking at it now I realize I forgot Fluttershy's eye sparkles. And of course the thing's already been sealed because the paint scratches off those cards entirely too easily. Oh well, just have to remember for next time.

Day 3B (~15 minutes)

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/016/1/8/day_3b___quick_scootaloo_by_bgkyouhen-d4mmjws.png

Another bit of free time and the feeling that the token wasn't enough effort for this means you guys get two pictures! Woo! Just a quick Scootaloo outline since I have issues drawing the fillies anyway. Even in vectors they defy me. Don't think this turned out too bad, though her mane needs to be a little thicker. Still don't think I got the proportions right though. Curse you filly heads! I kind of like how the outline-only thing looks. Almost looking forward to the next time I have no time to do any real painting.

Kyouhen

2012-01-17, 03:41 PM

Day 4 (~105 minutes)

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/017/0/3/day_4___the_cake_is_a_pie_by_bgkyouhen-d4moe25.png

This was stuck in my head all yesterday but I didn't have the time to do it. Had to get it just right so took my time with it. Toyed around with shading a bit to see what I could do. Really happy with how it turned out.

Kyouhen

2012-01-18, 05:54 PM

Day 5 (~3 hours)

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/018/7/1/day_5___tango_ponies_by_bgkyouhen-d4msgzt.png

I really need to stop getting ideas for these things. Took way too much time working on this one today, mostly because of the background. Had to adjust Lyra's pose a few times too. Pretty happy with how the fire itself turned out, but not too happy with the attempt at lighting the ground around it. No idea why it looks so greenish... Maybe I just need to get some better browns to work with. That and I can't seem to do a good job making ponies look like they're sweating. Oh well, it's done and I'm learning. Because I was going to be doing a full background with this one I thought I'd try Mazeburn's tape idea. I didn't have any masking tape so I tried it with packing tape (all I had) and it actually worked pretty well. Thanks for the tip! Only downside is I can't get the tape off the paper now.

Was trying to figure out what type of thing I could do for the current art challenge theme and was reading through Thanqol's fanfic. Got to this scene and decided I'd have to do it. There's a few other parts that I'm tempted to do some painting for, but those will probably have to wait a while. I'm probably going to avoid anything with too much background for a little while.

Kyouhen

2012-01-19, 02:16 PM

Day 6 (Forgot to check)

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/019/4/8/day_6___quick_sweetie_stuff_by_bgkyouhen-d4mw3g1.png

Lots of stuff I want to get done today, so not a lot of time for painting. So figured I'd take a shot at pony faces today. Picked Sweetie Belle because Scootaloo got the last quick painting and fillies continue to defy me. As do open mouths. Need to take a better look at examples of open mouths from that angle from the show.

Kyouhen

2012-01-20, 11:06 AM

Day 7

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/020/1/4/day_7___more_quick_scootaloo_by_bgkyouhen-d4n0b27.png

Kyouhen vs Scootaloo, Round 2, FIGHT!

I think I'm going to declare Scootaloo my sketch filly. I like having coloured outlines better than just using black, Scootaloo has very few colours, and the colours she has I have access to without dealing with mixing paints. And she'll probably be my sketch pony for a while more since fillies continue to defy me.

Things to work on next time: Legs are too short, bend on back leg needs to be higher, plot and tail are too small, and nose is too big.

Kyouhen

2012-01-21, 11:50 PM

Day 8 (~2.5 hours)

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/021/1/e/day_8___surf_ponies_by_bgkyouhen-d4n7apq.png

Needed one more good painting for The Challenge (assuming I'm calculating this right at all) and figured something beach-related would work. I haven't tried painting a scooter Scootaloo yet, so today she gets to be a motorboat!

Pretty happy with how this turned out. I think I'm getting closer to the right filly proportions, about the only glaring problem I can find with this picture is that Sweetie Belle's head might be a little small. Or at least that's the only problem I can find with the ponies. Perspectives seems to give me problems, so I'll have to work on that some too.

Apple Bloom was originally going to be in this, but the sketchbook I've been using is smaller than letter-sized paper and with the messed up perspective I couldn't fit her in without it looking horrible or being crowded. So she got cut from the picture. :smalltongue:

Thanqol

2012-01-22, 02:05 AM

Oh wow, I totally missed this thread starting up. And double oh wow, you're actually using traditional canvas paints!

My first recommendation is to nix the 'poorly' from your thread title. One of my very first pieces of digital painting turned out like this (http://thanqol.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d4gixxf). The lesson there is that it is possible at any stage of the process to produce legitimately good pieces. Don't bind yourself to a negative descriptor when it can be proved patently false in as little as 200 days.

Unfortunately, most of my advice relates to the digital medium and won't be much help to you. I can say this, though - don't aim for complete precision. Painting is like an illusion, using colours and shapes to make our eyes create conclusions. My great uncle, Constantine Kluge, was a master painter, and he produced things like this:

http://www.eliteauction.com/catalogues/011412/images/77_1.jpg

Look at it! And then look at it really, really closely. The policeman's head is just a blur of brown. Look at the trees; differently coloured smudges. You're not going to be able to get detailed precision with painting, or at least, not as easily as other mediums. That's not it's strength. Consider the whole picture and not the linework.

It might not be the style you're after, but it's a style I greatly admire. Moe's paintings are the same, if you look closely at them. Good luck! :smallsmile:

Kyouhen

2012-01-22, 09:33 AM

Thanqol

2012-01-22, 10:03 AM

Advice on shapes noted! Also noting the clouds in that. I like how those look. You're right that it isn't the style I'm after, but the style I'm after is my style and I have absolutely no idea what that is. Another reason for getting myself into this, as I'm sure if I paint and experiment enough sooner or later I'll find something.

From my own experience, the best way to learn is to replicate whole swathes of different styles as a means to learn technical skills, and then you'll naturally gravitate towards the one you like the most. Learn as many technical skills as you can so that style becomes a choice and not a trap; being able to switch between different styles freely is part of what makes a great artist.

And you learn so much from trying something new like that. If you do 10-20 paintings in Kluge's style, then a hundred days later when you need to draw clouds in something unrelated you'll remember a really good system for doing them.

And I've removed the (Poorly) from the title. It was more there as a half-joke or something. I have the unfortunate tendency to hammer away at something until I'm happy with it, and I've been mostly happy with everything I've done so far. I've long since gotten it stuck in my head that if I'm happy with my work then it qualifies as 'good' despite what anyone else thinks of it. I'll still listen to advice/constructive criticism, of course.

I think the only measure of good in this process is if you learned something from it. :smallsmile:

Kyouhen

2012-01-22, 11:09 AM

Day 9 (1 hour)

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/022/2/d/day_9___derpy__s_cannon_by_bgkyouhen-d4n8uvc.png

Not much to say about today's. The idea got stuck in my brain yesterday but due to time constraints today I couldn't do yesterday's painting today. (and yesterday's was intended for The Challenge, so it had to be done by today) Originally the cannon was going to be shoulder-mounted like the Pinkie Pie Launcher, but after looking at it I decided it wasn't nearly good enough for a cannon of doom and extended it. A lot.

Kyouhen

2012-01-24, 02:08 AM

Day 10 (Unknown)
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/023/f/8/day_10___unicorn_duel_by_bgkyouhen-d4nfw4k.png
http://i.imgur.com/pi5Ee.jpg Now now Trixie, you said no dragons!
http://i.imgur.com/N2nfK.jpg Foolish Twilight Sparkle! The GREAT and POWERFUL Trixie said no pink dragons!

The Challenge theme this week was transformation. The ATG Alumni group on Deviantart's theme this week is a pony in competition. My mind immediately jumped to this.

I had entirely too much fun painting this. Got dragged into a few games of MTG while I was nearly done, so I lost track of how long it took me to paint it. I put the finishing touches on it between turns.

Pretty happy with how the terrain turned out. Twilight's face refused to obey me, and I had to redo a chunk of the background flames. I had planned for Trixie to be taller than she is, but ended up not having space for her. Her neck got cut down and a big empty gap to her left that was supposed to be filled with her body got filled with flames instead.

Kyouhen

2012-01-24, 04:27 PM

the_druid_droid

2012-01-24, 06:52 PM

Day 11 (Forgot to track)

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/024/1/d/day_11___metal_mask_blasts_a_lich_by_bgkyouhen-d4nhmw1.png

Fear the power of Thanqol's mighty pen!

The other idea I had for the transformation theme this week. Thanqol's been doing chibis of a bunch of avatars, which lead to hilarity in Ponythread. I thought Aotrs Commander's avatar getting chibified by a blast of ink would be amusing to draw.

Apparently today wants to be one of those off days where nothing I work on wants to cooperate. Not at all happy with how Mask turned out. Not sure what bugs me about her (I think Mask was a her... feel free to correct me on this Thanqol) but she doesn't didn't seem to come out right. Might just be that the black outlines on Bleakbane make Mask look out of place, I dunno.

Hmm, one suggestion: since he just got hit with a blast of ink, it would heighten the effect to have some ink splatter still left on the Commodore. All I can see in the painting is the puddle at his feet, which makes it seem sort of watery, I guess.

Also, bravo with the painting! I played around with acrylics forever ago and they didn't agree with me very well...I'm thinking about looking into watercolors though, once I feel a bit better about my drawing abilities.

Kyouhen

2012-01-24, 07:25 PM

Hmm, one suggestion: since he just got hit with a blast of ink, it would heighten the effect to have some ink splatter still left on the Commodore. All I can see in the painting is the puddle at his feet, which makes it seem sort of watery, I guess.

Also, bravo with the painting! I played around with acrylics forever ago and they didn't agree with me very well...I'm thinking about looking into watercolors though, once I feel a bit better about my drawing abilities.

Watercolours are fun, though I find they're a fair bit more difficult to work with than acrylics or oils. Watercolours (from my experience, at least) tend to be a lot less forgiving of mistakes so you need to plan ahead a little more carefully. I like toying around with the paints and colours as I work, so acrylic and oil tend to suit me better. (Though oil is far more expensive than I'm willing to put out for, especially when acrylic can be painted onto damn well near anything I want. :smalltongue:)

If you do plan on getting into watercolours make sure you get some quality ones. From what I remember of my time playing with watercolours the cheap paints don't look anywhere near as good as the ones in the middle price range.

Thanqol

2012-01-24, 08:19 PM

Day 11 (Forgot to track)

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/024/1/d/day_11___metal_mask_blasts_a_lich_by_bgkyouhen-d4nhmw1.png

Fear the power of Thanqol's mighty pen!

The other idea I had for the transformation theme this week. Thanqol's been doing chibis of a bunch of avatars, which lead to hilarity in Ponythread. I thought Aotrs Commander's avatar getting chibified by a blast of ink would be amusing to draw.

Apparently today wants to be one of those off days where nothing I work on wants to cooperate. Not at all happy with how Mask turned out. Not sure what bugs me about her (I think Mask was a her... feel free to correct me on this Thanqol) but she doesn't didn't seem to come out right. Might just be that the black outlines on Bleakbane make Mask look out of place, I dunno.

Haha :smallbiggrin: And Mask is female - although when she's got the Mask on that's far less relevant.

Just one nit-pick: With the Mask, it doesn't transition from grey to the empty white, that makes it too vague. Solid black outlines for the eyes help emphasise how stark the empty whiteness is. Also, solid blacks under the hood and behind the Mask also look good. Example:

http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/4589/sketcharcani.jpg

Kyouhen

2012-01-24, 09:18 PM

Haha :smallbiggrin: And Mask is female - although when she's got the Mask on that's far less relevant.

Just one nit-pick: With the Mask, it doesn't transition from grey to the empty white, that makes it too vague. Solid black outlines for the eyes help emphasise how stark the empty whiteness is. Also, solid blacks under the hood and behind the Mask also look good. Example:

http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/4589/sketcharcani.jpg

*Adds a few quick touches*
Yeah, it looks like that was largely what I was missing. That and the cloak doesn't quite look right either. Oh well, still turned out half-decently trying to work from memory. Might have to come back and work on some more Mask stuff at some time in the future.

Which reminds me, this week has suddenly turned into MTG week. For the rest of the week I'm likely to be doing nothing but putting Applejack in several MTG cards. The EqD Artist's Training Ground 2 has started back up, and I had challenged myself to do the entire thing through modifying MTG cards to have ponies in them. Then I ended up doing Applejack because she never seemed to get much love. Figures it would restart right between a pair of Applejack episodes...

Kyouhen

2012-01-25, 11:20 PM

Day 12

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/025/f/e/day_12___pony_line_slinger_by_bgkyouhen-d4nmlv8.png

Original:

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=193550&type=card

So that was painful. Once again, challenging myself to do the entire ATG run as altered-art MTG cards featuring Applejack. I've learned today that in my moderately vast collection of cards I can't find a single card suitable for today's theme of "A pony in a duel". Didn't help that I had just drawn that the other day and was sorely tempted to just submit that. This is what I get for trying to manage my ideas based on how much time I have to work on them. It doesn't help at all that the minute I sat down to start uploading my pictures I noticed I had missed the deadline for submissions. I had completely forgotten they changed timezones, and had thought I still had a few hours to spare. >_<

Still, here's the image that I was going to submit:

http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/025/e/1/day_12___atg_edition_by_bgkyouhen-d4nmmb0.png

A lack of a decent card means that I had to get a little creative. I'm sure anyone who plays MTG will get what's going on. If I hadn't been late I was also going to take a cheap card and paint a massive hoof covering it to make it look like someone was holding it and submit that too. :smalltongue:

Quite pleased with how this turned out though. Applejack needs to be a shade lighter, as does her hat, and I wasn't able to preserve enough of the original background as I had wanted to, but still turned out quite nice.

And tomorrow's theme is "A pony on a rescue mission". FFFFFUUUUU- Can't even imagine what card would be good for that. I'm sure there's some good white protection-granting cards I can work with. Probably going to have to get Fluttershy to be an angel though.

the_druid_droid

2012-01-26, 02:38 AM

Kyouhen

2012-01-26, 05:19 PM

Day 13

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/026/8/1/day_13___applejack_to_the_rescue__by_bgkyouhen-d4noyvy.png

Original:

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=197531&type=card

I am never going to try painting a proper-sized pony on any card bigger than a 2/2 again. Seriously. The picture is deceiving, but that Shimmer is slightly bigger than my thumbnail. It is really hard to work at that scale.

Still, quite happy with how this turned out. And I got it done in time to be submitted to the ATG too! Huzzah!

Kyouhen

2012-01-27, 05:15 PM

Aotrs Commander

2012-01-27, 05:43 PM

Thanqol

2012-01-27, 06:11 PM

For some odd reason I couldn't get outline colours I was happy with today, so I tried a black outline instead. Still couldn't quite seem to get it right (curse you off days!) so there's a few problems with the outline.

Problem with black outlines is that they need to be really thin in order to work. Thick black lines look really bad, but thin, pencilly ones can be excused.

the_druid_droid

2012-01-27, 08:27 PM

Day 14

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/027/5/3/day_14___applejack_comes_home_by_bgkyouhen-d4nskzm.png

Original

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=20880&type=card

For some odd reason I couldn't get outline colours I was happy with today, so I tried a black outline instead. Still couldn't quite seem to get it right (curse you off days!) so there's a few problems with the outline. Couldn't get the hat quite right either. I also think Applejack's eye needs to be visible there, but after a few tries and failing to make it look right I decided to just leave it out.

I hated doing tiny ponies, but that tiny barn was lots of fun. No clue why, I just really liked painting the little thing.

And that's the final submission to EqD's ATG2. We now return you to your regularly scheduled paintings. And maybe a few more cards when I feel like doing them.

I think the issue with the hat is that it seems flat and a bit off from the perspective of the rest of the piece. Thinking of the hat brim as an ellipse, it needs to be a bit narrower, and thinking of the top part as kind of a deformed cylinder, you need to show the body of the cylinder, whereas you've only drawn the top, so it looks squashed.

I also agree the eye should probably peek through, even if it's only the white part. Good work finishing off the ATG though; I just submitted my final piece too! *brohoof*

Kyouhen

2012-01-27, 09:07 PM

Hey, I resemble that remark!

Yep, you sure do! :smallbiggrin:

Problem with black outlines is that they need to be really thin in order to work. Thick black lines look really bad, but thin, pencilly ones can be excused.

Yeah, that and black in general is a horrible colour to use. (See below)

I think the issue with the hat is that it seems flat and a bit off from the perspective of the rest of the piece. Thinking of the hat brim as an ellipse, it needs to be a bit narrower, and thinking of the top part as kind of a deformed cylinder, you need to show the body of the cylinder, whereas you've only drawn the top, so it looks squashed.

I also agree the eye should probably peek through, even if it's only the white part. Good work finishing off the ATG though; I just submitted my final piece too! *brohoof*

The brim being too wide really was the big mistake with the hat. I had tried reshaping it a few times but wasn't happy with any of the attempts and eventually settled with this. The top part wouldn't look as bad if the rest of Applejack was at the same angle as the hat. I'll probably have to touch on this perspective again sometime for more practice.

And huzzah! *Brohoof*
And one for Thanqol too.

Anyway, I had forgotten that I wanted to do a little summary thing from toying around with altering these cards now that the ATG is over. Learned a few things trying to mimic the art that had already been placed on the cards. First though, for completion's sake, here's the first two I had done.

Mock War Day 1

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/010/7/8/applejack___boros_recruit_by_bgkyouhen-d4lyub6.png

Day 1 Original

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=88992&type=card

Mock War Day 2

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/011/9/a/applejack___training_by_bgkyouhen-d4m1778.png

Day 2 Original

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=213764&type=card

So. Key thing I was watching as I worked on these was what I needed to do to reproduce the backgrounds. The ponies are all ponies, easily done on any other medium and not really the point behind this experiment. The point was to attempt to modify another artist's work as seamlessly as possible, and the first two days are probably the best examples of that attempt as they had the most that needed to be removed/changed. (Not that I wasn't messing around with how to draw Applejack, it just wasn't the primary objective)

Main thing I learned was in mixing colours. Mixing anything with either black or white is a horrible idea, both kill the colours. I've been aware of the fact that you should avoid using them for a long time now, but trying to reproduce a professional's work really drove it home. White tends to be more forgiving of the two though, as it only really dulls the colour. Black just flattens anything it touches, so most of the darker colours I used were actually mixed with a really dark brown I have. (The dark purples for Day 1 were actually mixed with a nice navy blue. Quite pleased with how those worked out. Most of the teals from Day 2 were just a combination of teal and navy as well)

I also learned a few things about subtle shading. Again, something that I had noticed before but never really payed attention to until just now. Every card has pretty much been tinted in the colours that the card belong to. Day 1 has an abundance of warm colours, Day 2 is cool teals and greys, Day 3 involved a lot of faded colours for the sky and Day 4 had green in everything. I just found this really interesting because for a lot of the work I was able to mix one main colour then change it slightly to get all the colours I needed. Day 1's a bit of an exception with all the dark purples in it, but Day 3 was done almost entirely with one colour lightened and darkened as needed.

So yeah, learned lots of stuff about toying around with colouring in a painting. Probably going to try experimenting with that a little, see what happens.

Kyouhen

2012-01-28, 05:22 PM

Kyouhen

2012-01-29, 01:57 PM

Sean Mirrsen

2012-01-29, 02:32 PM

Day 15

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/028/1/3/day_15___scootaboot_by_bgkyouhen-d4nwr42.png

And her hooves didn't even touch the ground! http://i.imgur.com/9QvF1.jpg

Had this idea when I was halfway through Day 4 of the ATG2. Absolutely had to finish it. Pretty sure it qualifies for the 'transformation' theme for this week's challenge too. Assuming anyone gets the reference. I really hope someone gets the reference. :smalltongue:
I have no idea what the actual reference is, because what I remember is likely in itself a reference. It was a game in an episode of Reboot, where Enzo ended up as the princess (and he used the phrase later as if describing a hypothetical partner (i.e. Bob) in the same situation to whats-her-name the aquatic-themed game character)

the_druid_droid

2012-01-29, 03:09 PM

Day 16

http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/029/8/6/day_16_by_bgkyouhen-d4o0c55.png

Today's D&D, so not much time for painting. I was originally going to do a line art thing, but messed it up. Instead of burning a bunch of white paint to fix it I decided to try whatever this is instead.

This is actually a really neat experiment! The only things I'd note are that her mane needs a little more volume, and the color of her cutie mark looks a little off - not quite pastel enough.

Kyouhen

2012-01-29, 05:59 PM

I have no idea what the actual reference is, because what I remember is likely in itself a reference. It was a game in an episode of Reboot, where Enzo ended up as the princess (and he used the phrase later as if describing a hypothetical partner (i.e. Bob) in the same situation to whats-her-name the aquatic-themed game character)

The hypothetical partner was actually Bob if I remember correctly, they just never actually name Bob. I think they point out he was talking about Bob later. But yes, that was the reference. :smalltongue:

This is actually a really neat experiment! The only things I'd note are that her mane needs a little more volume, and the color of her cutie mark looks a little off - not quite pastel enough.

Yeah, that was more me being lazy. I have problems getting small amounts of paint out of the jar thingies they're in and don't like mixing for such a small amount.

Kyouhen

2012-01-31, 05:58 PM

Wow, I must have been really tired last night. I could have sworn I had made a post here. Oh well, this post will just have to double up.

Day 17

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/030/8/b/day_17_by_bgkyouhen-d4o6cjw.png

An extremely long day at work (woke up at 2am, didn't get home until about 10pm) and no time to paint anything resulted in me painting that when I got home. I was trying to paint Pinkie Pie by filling in the negative space around her. Instead I ended up with whatever that is. Also two failed attempts at doing better heads. Hooray for exhaustion!

Day 18

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/031/f/8/day_18___iname_life_and_death_by_bgkyouhen-d4o8t0f.png

Reference

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=80278&type=card

This week's CHALLENGE theme is life and death. I have an idea I want to do but didn't have time for it today, so instead I did some fusion thing between Iname Life Aspect and Iname Death Aspect while still toying around with working with just shapes instead of really working with outlines. I don't think this turned out too bad, though it definitely isn't Iname. (And yes, I know there's Iname as One, but that's a horrible card so bleh)

Thanqol

2012-01-31, 07:54 PM

Wow, I must have been really tired last night. I could have sworn I had made a post here. Oh well, this post will just have to double up.

Day 17

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/030/8/b/day_17_by_bgkyouhen-d4o6cjw.png

With negative space you don't draw just the outline. You draw everything except the pony. A pony-shaped hole in the world. Looks kinda rosarchy at the moment.

Also, I envy that your medium gives you access to awesome paint splatter effects.

Day 18

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/031/f/8/day_18___iname_life_and_death_by_bgkyouhen-d4o8t0f.png

Reference

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=80278&type=card

This week's CHALLENGE theme is life and death. I have an idea I want to do but didn't have time for it today, so instead I did some fusion thing between Iname Life Aspect and Iname Death Aspect while still toying around with working with just shapes instead of really working with outlines. I don't think this turned out too bad, though it definitely isn't Iname. (And yes, I know there's Iname as One, but that's a horrible card so bleh)[/color]

I have a shiney version of that card :smallbiggrin:

Kyouhen

2012-02-01, 03:19 AM

With negative space you don't draw just the outline. You draw everything except the pony. A pony-shaped hole in the world. Looks kinda rosarchy at the moment.

Also, I envy that your medium gives you access to awesome paint splatter effects.

Yeah, that was the original goal. Then I started adding to it when it looked horrible and that's what I ended up with. I'll likely end up giving it another few tries sometime in the future.

And there's bound to be some way to reproduce it with custom brushes for the digital medium. What program do you use again?

I have a shiney version of that card :smallbiggrin:

All my hate. :smallannoyed:

Thanqol

2012-02-01, 06:51 AM

Yeah, that was the original goal. Then I started adding to it when it looked horrible and that's what I ended up with. I'll likely end up giving it another few tries sometime in the future.

And there's bound to be some way to reproduce it with custom brushes for the digital medium. What program do you use again?

Paint Tool SAI. And while I'm sure there is a way to do that digitally, my best guess is that I have to be wearing hair plucked from the neckbeards of ninety nine virgins as a scarf while singing the Pony Poky to please the photoshop gods to let it happen.

This process may also involve shelling out four digits for a full copy of Photoshop, too.

Sean Mirrsen

2012-02-01, 12:44 PM

Paint Tool SAI. And while I'm sure there is a way to do that digitally, my best guess is that I have to be wearing hair plucked from the neckbeards of ninety nine virgins as a scarf while singing the Pony Poky to please the photoshop gods to let it happen.

This process may also involve shelling out four digits for a full copy of Photoshop, too.You may have better luck with Corel Painter in that regard.

Thanqol

2012-02-01, 06:30 PM

You may have better luck with Corel Painter in that regard.

... I didn't even think of that! I'll give it a look again later.

Sean Mirrsen

2012-02-01, 06:38 PM

... I didn't even think of that! I'll give it a look again later.I'm not sure how much it costs, but it has just about every conceivable tool and option for every possible medium. It even has a real palette, where you can mix paints. For real painting in digital form, I suspect it's the best there is. I'm just too used to the likes of Photoshop to make proper use of it.

edit: $350, as of now. There's a free trial though.

plus there's also the "free" option of course, but that's a very very wrong thing to even think about

Thanqol

2012-02-01, 07:25 PM

I'm not sure how much it costs, but it has just about every conceivable tool and option for every possible medium. It even has a real palette, where you can mix paints. For real painting in digital form, I suspect it's the best there is. I'm just too used to the likes of Photoshop to make proper use of it.

edit: $350, as of now. There's a free trial though.

plus there's also the "free" option of course, but that's a very very wrong thing to even think about

I actually already own Corel, it came free with my tablet :smallsmile: I switched away because I found I preferred SAI for linework at least.

Kyouhen

2012-02-01, 09:35 PM

I actually already own Corel, it came free with my tablet :smallsmile: I switched away because I found I preferred SAI for linework at least.

Well, why not do the linework in SAI then transfer it over to Corel for the colouring? A little annoying to do, but it might be worth it if you can get better colouring done.

EDIT:
Whoops, forgot I was posting that in my thread. And I have no idea what the general rule of thumb is for double posts in this subforum are. Nor can I seem to find them. Oh well, edits to the rescue!

Day 19

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/032/1/d/day_19___bees__by_bgkyouhen-d4oddcl.png

I apologize for exposing you to... whatever in the nine hells that is. Massive discussion about FlutterDash shipping and the Valentine's episode followed by Trixie starting the new ponythread on a bee theme and declaring a challenge for people to contribute bee-based memes resulted in this horror. Originally I was going to include the other ponies as other bugs, but for some reason my brain decided it needed to be a really corny Valentine's day card thing instead. And I have problems keeping my brain under control.

Now excuse me while I spend an hour or so on 4chan to punish my brain.

Thanqol

2012-02-01, 11:08 PM

Well, why not do the linework in SAI then transfer it over to Corel for the colouring? A little annoying to do, but it might be worth it if you can get better colouring done.

But I liiiiike SAI's colouring too :smallfrown: and I like a bunch of things in Photoshop Elements too.

EDIT:
Whoops, forgot I was posting that in my thread. And I have no idea what the general rule of thumb is for double posts in this subforum are. Nor can I seem to find them. Oh well, edits to the rescue!

I've posted, like, 10 times in a row and never had a moderator smack me down for it at times. I reckon the rule here is 'each new post should contain new content.'

Day 19

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/032/1/d/day_19___bees__by_bgkyouhen-d4oddcl.png

I apologize for exposing you to... whatever in the nine hells that is. Massive discussion about FlutterDash shipping and the Valentine's episode followed by Trixie starting the new ponythread on a bee theme and declaring a challenge for people to contribute bee-based memes resulted in this horror. Originally I was going to include the other ponies as other bugs, but for some reason my brain decided it needed to be a really corny Valentine's day card thing instead. And I have problems keeping my brain under control.

Now excuse me while I spend an hour or so on 4chan to punish my brain.

It's adorable, and yet I need to punch someone for that pun.

*Punches self*

Kyouhen

2012-02-02, 02:21 AM

But I liiiiike SAI's colouring too :smallfrown: and I like a bunch of things in Photoshop Elements too.

Ok, then stick with SAI. http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/032/c/5/pinkie_pie___tongue_by_bgkyouhen-d4obgoy.png

I've posted, like, 10 times in a row and never had a moderator smack me down for it at times. I reckon the rule here is 'each new post should contain new content.'

Actually it was more me wondering how often I can post in a row without it being considered spam. I don't want someone to get the impression I'm just trying to bump up my thread or am just spamming. Pointless fear I'm sure, but I'm paranoid so whatever. http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/032/c/5/pinkie_pie___tongue_by_bgkyouhen-d4obgoy.png

It's adorable, and yet I need to punch someone for that pun.

*Punches self*

It's about to get worse. I'm tired and it's late, but trust me, tomorrow it gets worse.

Kyouhen

2012-02-03, 02:17 AM

Day 20
By the gods. Roommate dragged me out to a pub earlier before I had time to do my painting. Figured that was fine, I'll take a little notebook and my paints and toss something together while I'm there. I swear it was the single most boring night I've ever had at a pub. Incoming picture onslaught.

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/033/0/d/day_20a___diamonds__by_bgkyouhen-d4oh9i1.png

When my roommate saw me pulling out my paintbrush he found a chunk of glass and said if I could use it in a piece of art I'd get 10 XP. So I tossed this together, folded the paper in half and stood it on the table. Easy XP. (Especially when I get another 15 for doing this much art! BWAHAHA!)

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/033/b/e/day_20b___forest_spirit_by_bgkyouhen-d4oh9n1.png

Original

http://www.onlineghibli.com/mononoke_hime/newimages/GreatForestSpirit.jpg

Next up is another entry for The CHALLENGE, the Forest Spirit from Princess Mononoke. I had decided I would try doing it entirely from memory. When I got to the eyebrows I asked a friend who was familiar with the movie what colour they were because I knew they weren't the same colour as the rest of the fur. The end result was me looking up what the Forest Spirit looked like and realizing how screwed up the painting was. So I fixed it.

For anyone not familiar with the movie, the Forest Spirit is a spirit of life and death which happens to be the current CHALLENGE theme.

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/033/d/4/day_20c___the_nightwalker_by_bgkyouhen-d4oh9rt.png

Original

http://www.absoluteanime.com/princess_mononoke/forest_spirit.jpg

Next up is the Nightwalker, also from Princess Mononoke and also for the CHALLENGE. Did this one from memory too, and was happy enough with how it turned out that I didn't bother doing any major revisions to it. The Nightwalker is what the Forest Spirit turns in to at night, and is basically death on a stick. Or at least it is later in the movie, not sure what it does normally.

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/033/e/b/day_20d___timberwolf_by_bgkyouhen-d4oh9v8.png
I tried painting a timberwolf. Was less than pleased with it, but at least the people who were watching me could figure out it was supposed to be a wolf. Biggest problem with it's the back legs, I'm not sure how but they ended up way too thick and aren't bending the way I had wanted them to.

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/033/0/4/day_20e___locust_swarm_by_bgkyouhen-d4oh9xh.png
And for my last work today, I did a little painting of a tree being devoured by locusts. This is also for the CHALLENGE theme.

Bunch of things for the CHALLENGE today. I had originally planned on doing something big worth 2 or 3 points like I normally do, but couldn't when I ended up going to the pub. Too busy to afford to let those points slip, hence the piles of small things done today. Now I'm back on track.

And good news Thanqol! The pun doesn't get worse today! Probably tomorrow though.

Kyouhen

2012-02-04, 03:30 AM

Sean Mirrsen

2012-02-04, 03:39 AM

Day 21

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/035/a/c/day_21___balance_by_bgkyouhen-d4ol7m5.png

Next submission for The CHALLENGE. Decided to do a picture based on that myth where the sun is taken too far from the earth and causes it to freeze, then is placed too close and burns everything.

Hooray for the weekend! I'll be able to have time to relax and not be getting home at stupid hours!
I... :smalleek:

I probably need to go rent a TBM and tunnel my mind out of the gutter, but...

Holy flaming flatulence Pinkamena, what were you eating?

Nice job with the fire and snow, but the composition could use some clearing up.

Kyouhen

2012-02-04, 03:42 AM

I...

I probably need to go rent a TBM and tunnel my mind out of the gutter, but...

Holy flaming flatulence Pinkie, what were you eating?

>_>
<_<
Strictly speaking that wasn't supposed to be Pinkie. I just wanted a colour scheme that would take little effort and that I already knew would look appropriately pony. Hence why I gave her straight hair.

That said, what's been seen cannot be unseen. I BLAME YOU! AND THE FLOWERS! IT'S TOTALLY THE FLOWERS' FAULT!

Sean Mirrsen

2012-02-04, 10:16 AM

>_>
<_<
Strictly speaking that wasn't supposed to be Pinkie. I just wanted a colour scheme that would take little effort and that I already knew would look appropriately pony. Hence why I gave her straight hair.

That said, what's been seen cannot be unseen. I BLAME YOU! AND THE FLOWERS! IT'S TOTALLY THE FLOWERS' FAULT!Or maybe mushrooms.

Big, tasty mushrooms. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwbDbpZd97g)

Except these seem to kick in much later in the digestive cycle. :)

Kyouhen

2012-02-04, 01:55 PM

Day 22

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/035/d/7/day_22___srsly_twilight__by_bgkyouhen-d4omprj.png

I was originally going to have Twilight yelling about a book with Rainbow Dash at the bottom, but Dash takes entirely too long to paint thanks to all her colours and a decently chewed-up book would be just as bad. Not a lot of time for that today, and I'm just as happy with Twilight freaking out over a pen. :smalltongue:

I managed to reduce my medium-sized brush to a whole 4 bristles trying to do the background for yesterday's painting. Not too surprised since I've had that thing for ages and it's had more than a few bristles broken off for various reasons over the years. I swapped to a hard, larger brush I've been using for sealing models and whatnot today and it really sped things up. Downside is now I need a new sealing brush. The entire reason I wasn't using this one before is because for whatever reason I can never get all the paint out of it, so when I try applying the sealing stuff to a model it ends up tinted unless I spend a good 10 minutes scrubbing the paint out of it. Oh well, at least I can paint large things faster now.

Kyouhen

2012-02-05, 11:27 AM

Day 23

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/036/1/7/day_23___lixie_wins__by_bgkyouhen-d4oql5h.png

Super quick painting today. Apologies to Lixie if I messed up her pony too much, it's hard to remember what everyone looked like now that everyone's running around with human avatars. :smalltongue:

And I can see why Thanqol went and did so many chibis, they're really fun to make!

Thanqol

2012-02-05, 06:29 PM

And I can see why Thanqol went and did so many chibis, they're really fun to make![/color]

I know, right? And they're also marvellous character design practice. 75% of each chibi was conceptual/design.

Glass Mouse

2012-02-06, 04:52 AM

Kyouhen

2012-02-07, 12:07 AM

Hey Kyouhen! I just trawled through this week's works (you know why), and it just struck me how... different your paintings are! You're all over the chart, ideas-wise, and it's great to see that creativity :smallbiggrin:
Also, your medium rocks. It's been so long since I tried real painting... Hmm.

I know you dislike the timber wolf, but I really like the colours and the way the brush strokes makes its back look like branches and twigs.
I agree with Sean that the sun picture could use a more solid composition. If you don't know it, the golden ratio (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio) is a great guideline, no matter your skill level.

Cheers!

Thanks! My mind tends to wander to strange places, and when it latches onto an idea I'm obligated to follow through with it. It helps that I tend to get bored of doing one thing too often and try to find something new to try. Except ponies. Ponies seem to be a good muse so far.

The colours and strokes I'm happy with, it's mostly just the back legs on that thing that bug me. I'm a touch of a perfectionist, so I tend to be overly critical of my work even when it's pretty good. :smalltongue: Golden ratio is what I was trying for, except the entire thing kind of got away from me. I don't do too much planning with my paintings, preferring to just try projecting it straight from my mind onto the paper and going from there. I'm usually happy with the results, it just has the unfortunate side-effect of the work getting away from me and doing it's own thing before it's finished.

Speaking of which...

Day 24

http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/037/b/a/day_24___tyranid_thingy_by_bgkyouhen-d4ox5rx.png

Yeah, I have no idea what this thing is. Hit a bit of a creative block today, then things got busy so I couldn't do the bigger thing I wanted to do, then I still had to paint something and had no ideas what to do. One of my roommates has some converted Tyranid Carnifexi kicking around so I decided to take the basic body shape of one, put my brush in some paint, and see what I end up with. Pretty happy with how this turned out though I have no idea what it's supposed to be. The floppy antennae things on it's back were originally going to be tentacles but after I started painting the first one I decided it would be more interesting as a moth-like antenna thing.

Kyouhen

2012-02-08, 02:45 AM

Sean Mirrsen

2012-02-08, 03:02 AM

Day 25

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2012/038/9/0/day_25___lightbringer_by_bgkyouhen-d4p10rh.png

An extremely long day at work with no time for painting says I do this little painting today. I wasn't sure what I wanted to paint and was reading A Dance With Dragons when I got to the scene...

A Dance With Dragons Spoilers (Mostly relevant to Storm of Swords)

Stannis reveals his sword Lightbringer to the Night's Watch. The scene just immediately demanded that I paint it, so I did.

This is also my first work for this week's Challenge. I'm pretty happy with how this turned out, though the shadows still need a little work.
Yeah, the shadows might need work. I'm not sure how the scene is supposed to be set up, but the lightsource for the two giant shadows (I assume those are shadows) seems to be at the characters' feet. If the lightsource is the raised sword, the shadows would be stretching down and away rather than up.

Kyouhen

2012-02-10, 12:56 AM

Apparently I forgot to actually upload my work yesterday, so you guys get a double dose today!

Day 26

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/040/a/6/day_26___classy_overlord_by_bgkyouhen-d4p7vb9.png

Source

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=207915&type=card

I have one of those Zwipe erasable marker things and ages ago found out that they work really well with card sleeves. As such just about everything in my EDH deck is wearing a top hat and a monocle. This includes the equipment/spells/enchantments. I was playing yesterday and decided to have a shot at painting the Classy Overlord. Pretty happy with how it turned out.

Day 27

http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/040/7/2/day_27___daylight_by_bgkyouhen-d4p7vfc.png

Another entry for The Challenge. It doesn't matter how often I play this game, the light at the end of the tunnel out of Ravenholm is the most beautiful thing in the entire game. I really hate Ravenholm. Yes I can go through it blindfolded in hard mode, no that hasn't improved my hatred for that town.

Kyouhen

2012-02-11, 12:27 AM

Day 28

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/041/0/2/day_28___galstaff__unicorn_of_light__by_bgkyouhen-d4pbgdv.png

I'm Galstaff, unicorn of light! http://i.imgur.com/BgqS5.png
Sure you are Twilight, sure you are.

Decided to toy around with colouring methods with this one. Was looking at the Pumpkin Cake painting I did ages ago and thought I'd see how the outlines would look if I painted the entire thing the colour of the outlines, then filled in the lighter spaces after. Then I also decided to toy around with textures while I was at it. Pretty happy with how this turned out, I'll probably play around with this more later.

Kyouhen

2012-02-11, 11:50 PM

Day 29

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/042/2/6/day_29___the_ponystones_of_shannara_by_bgkyouhen-d4pfka6.png

I've actually been meaning to do this picture a dozen different times in a dozen different formats over the years but for some reason never actually got around to doing it. This is actually the reason I chose 'Light' as the current CHALLENGE theme, so I could finally force myself to do it.

This is a scene from The Elfstones of Shannara, a book by Terry Brooks. If you haven't read the Shannara series you should because it's an awesome series. This picture actually went through several changes as I was working on it, mostly the pony. At first I wanted to paint the pony (Wil) as a deer. In the books Wil is pretty much a half-elf, though the elf part of him's pretty badly watered down. I couldn't figure out how to do a deer, so I decided I'd just do him as a unicorn instead. Then I couldn't figure out what to do for his colour scheme.

Then I realized something. The constant singing? The ability to warp reality with her songs? Pinkie Pie has the Wishsong! So now Wil is Pinkie's ancestor.

For anyone who hasn't read the book, the Wishsong is an innate magical power a handful of Wil's descendants end up with that let them create powerful magical effects (ie invisibility, plant control, and murder) by singing. The Wishsong was created by Wil overusing the Elfstones in a battle against a demon called the Reaper. (The Elfstones can create powerful blasts of magical light that annihilates demons and other magical beings)

Kyouhen

2012-02-13, 01:16 AM

It occurred to me that I haven't done nearly as much for this week's CHALLENGE theme as I have for most of the other themes. And I'm the one that chose it! This clearly must be corrected!

Day 30

http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/043/b/1/day_30___the_ponies_of_light_by_bgkyouhen-d4pkbf8.png

Have some ponies of light! Fluttershy and Applejack are there too. I really like how Pinkie Pie turned out. She just looks adorable dressed up as Red Mage. Messed up Applejack's expression though. It didn't look that bad until after I saw what the picture looked like. Oh well, she can just be a worried Black Belt.

Thanqol

2012-02-13, 01:24 AM

Kyouhen

2012-02-14, 02:30 AM

Twilight looks good; the lines are distinct and her cape blends well. Pinkie's generally quite well proportioned too. The others I'm less enthusiastic around - tell me, do you pencil sketch before you start painting? I'm sure to do that even with my pure paints pieces just so I've got proportions right.

Actually I don't. I know it's poor form to go in blindly, but I have issues with trying to sketch things out first. It all ties back to my continued inability to control a pencil, resulting in the sketch taking way longer than it should and me losing interest in the project. If I just go ahead and try painting what I want things tend to go smoother. For my larger pieces it doesn't really cause much of a problem, but the more detailed ones where I have to work on a smaller scale tend to end up suffering.

Anyway, today's works!

Day 31

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2012/044/c/2/day_31a___sad_boat_by_bgkyouhen-d4pod23.png
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2012/044/e/f/day_31b___piss_off_ice_climbers_by_bgkyouhen-d4pod59.png

Another evening out, so I took along my little paint book. Following my line of thought above I've decided to avoid trying to do anything overly detailed on the smaller pages of my little book and decided to try working on shapes and whatnot instead. Not a lot to say about these, except that I probably could have done the darker parts of the ice in the second one better. That and I couldn't seem to pick a decent colour for shadowed ice.

Thanqol

2012-02-14, 06:54 AM

Actually I don't. I know it's poor form to go in blindly, but I have issues with trying to sketch things out first. It all ties back to my continued inability to control a pencil, resulting in the sketch taking way longer than it should and me losing interest in the project. If I just go ahead and try painting what I want things tend to go smoother. For my larger pieces it doesn't really cause much of a problem, but the more detailed ones where I have to work on a smaller scale tend to end up suffering.

I'd honestly think you'd significantly benefit from even a stick-figure skeleton, which is really all I do with a pure paints picture. It takes five to ten minutes and it'll save you so much drama down the line.

Kyouhen

2012-02-15, 04:18 AM

So another productive night at my philosophy club/pub meeting. (For certain definitions of productive)

Day 32

http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/046/e/a/day_32a___pepsi_pie_by_bgkyouhen-d4psliz.png

I was listening to a philosophical debate staring at my Diet Pepsi bottle when I had an idea. This is never a good thing. On the bright side I'm pretty sure I shaved a few points off of my roommate's sanity with this.

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2012/046/3/9/day_32_b___yay_winter__by_bgkyouhen-d4pslmt.png

Sitting at the pub after the philosophy club meeting I had another idea. Digging through my bag I found that I had forgotten my little notepad at home. Desperate to find something to paint on I decided to decorate the lid to the little container I use as my pallet. This was actually really fun because I didn't want to seal the paints, so I painted this on the inside of the lid so that it would show up normally on the outside. This means I had to do the entire painting in reverse, starting with the little eyes and smile and working my way back to the background.

And yes, Ned loves winter. Why else did you think he never gets tired of talking about it? :smalltongue:

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/046/e/9/day_32_c___graffiti_part_1_by_bgkyouhen-d4pslt3.png
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/046/c/1/day_32_d___graffiti_part_2_by_bgkyouhen-d4pslwq.png
http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/046/f/9/day_32_e___graffiti_part_3_by_bgkyouhen-d4pslzi.png
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/046/9/9/day_32_f___graffiti_part_4_by_bgkyouhen-d4psm1q.png

After painting the cheery Lord of Winterfell I found I still wanted to do some more paintings. Poking through my bag I came across a bag of clear MTG card sleeves. Once again, I had an idea. This time it was to make silly little graffiti things that I could pin to posters sitting around the campus. Totally worth it.

Kyouhen

2012-02-17, 12:37 AM

Double update powers ACTIVATE!

Day 33

http://th01.deviantart.net/fs71/th/PRE/f/2012/047/c/1/day_33_by_bgkyouhen-d4pwpsm.png

I've decided to start merging little not-so-good doodles into one picture so I don't clog up my DeviantArt account with images that aren't so great.

These were done while I was watching some friends do a philosophy debate. It was kind of heavily one-sided, so I got bored and broke out the paints. I haven't tried working with humans in a while, so I thought I'd try doing some paintings of the people sitting around the room. First one turned out pretty good (though I messed up his hair), last one looks horrendous. That's supposed to be a girl. Yeah, it's bad. I also randomly decided to paint notepads in my notepad. Yo dawg.

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/047/b/c/graffiti_3_by_bgkyouhen-d4pwpyw.png
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/047/3/5/graffiti_4_by_bgkyouhen-d4pwq2m.png

And my rampage around the campus continues. I was pleased to notice the ones I had put up outside the pub the first day were still on the walls. :smalltongue:

Day 34

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/047/5/b/day_34___cutie_mark_crusaders_fort_builders_yay__b y_bgkyouhen-d4pze5v.png

In today's episode of "Kyouhen Paints Stuff", the Cutie Mark Crusaders learn the value of proper supports in a snow fort!

Decided to try Thanqol's suggestion of sketching out the picture before painting it. I honestly have no idea if it helped at all. Shortly after I started painting I remembered why I stopped doing it before, it's really hard to keep track of anything more than basic areas once the paint hits the paper. Then those basic areas got messed up because I had to overlap them to make sure the background looked right. On the other hand the Crusaders at least ended up roughly the same size, so there's that.

Kyouhen

2012-02-18, 02:39 AM

Day 35

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/048/1/c/day_35___cutie_mark_crusader_cupcake_eater_by_bgky ouhen-d4q3h30.png

Turns out Applebloom's special talent actually was eating cupcakes.

I was out for a walk listening to music when Golden Cupcakes (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjutwQ_p1DE) started playing. Listening to Applebloom made me imagine what she'd look like if eating cupcakes really was her special talent and I decided I had to paint it. :smalltongue:

I REGRET NOTHING!

Thanqol

2012-02-18, 03:06 AM

Decided to try Thanqol's suggestion of sketching out the picture before painting it. I honestly have no idea if it helped at all. Shortly after I started painting I remembered why I stopped doing it before, it's really hard to keep track of anything more than basic areas once the paint hits the paper. Then those basic areas got messed up because I had to overlap them to make sure the background looked right. On the other hand the Crusaders at least ended up roughly the same size, so there's that.

I'm not talking about a detailed sketch, I'm talking about the most basic series of circles and squares possible. Look, I'll show you a reference of mine...

*Rummage* You remember Day 269 from my thread? Well here's my sketch layer:

http://img705.imageshack.us/img705/4783/day269.jpg

That's all you need.

Kyouhen

2012-02-18, 09:57 AM

I'm not talking about a detailed sketch, I'm talking about the most basic series of circles and squares possible. Look, I'll show you a reference of mine...

*Rummage* You remember Day 269 from my thread? Well here's my sketch layer:

http://img705.imageshack.us/img705/4783/day269.jpg

That's all you need.

Yeah, I'm trying to get into the habit of doing that now. The part that gives me the most problems is I'm a bit of a perfectionist and have a hard time leaving it that undetailed. Going to keep working with it though.

Kyouhen

2012-02-18, 10:20 PM

Day 36 (Friend in Deed reference, not really spoiler)

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/049/0/6/day_36___happy_sad_happy_sad_happy_by_bgkyouhen-d4q72kb.png

I refuse to believe I was the only one to think of this watching the new episode. :smallannoyed:

Also doing basic shapes before I start working is definitely letting me do a better job making full use of the space I have on the page.

Kyouhen

2012-02-19, 05:17 PM

Day 37

http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/050/e/f/day_37___frosty_flank_the_snowpony_by_bgkyouhen-d4q9uhc.png

Turns out Applejack's hat actually is kind of magical. Shame she still doesn't like giving it up for animating snowponies.

Decided to experiment today. Applejack and Applebloom are both full-sized paintings, which I ran through GIMP to get transparencies and Inkscape for resizing to fit them into the picture where I wanted them. I also used it to stick in the shadows. A friend is interested in starting a webcomic and I might do the art for it, so I'm looking at ways to improve my work in general. I thought I'd see what ways I can come up with to get better quality painting done for the smaller details. I didn't have a lot of time today due to D&D, so the whole thing's a little sloppy, but the point was SCIENCE! so that's fine. Turned out pretty well overall, though I'll need to make sure I use a better light source for future attempts.

Kyouhen

2012-02-22, 12:40 AM

I'm starting to do these double updates a little more often than I care for. Curse you being too busy until really late then just crashing when I get home!

Day 38

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/052/c/d/day_38___yeah____by_bgkyouhen-d4qkb9c.png

Was toying around with an idea for a new Tumblr and made this. The idea's been kicking around in my head for a while, I just wanted to toy around with it. Not at all happy with the end result of this one, I tried applying some filters from Inkscape to see if I could get brighter colours and it just didn't work. Oh well, next attempt's bound to be better.

Day 39

http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/052/6/9/day_39___atg_week_35_by_bgkyouhen-d4qkbr7.png

Original

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/052/3/1/sample_ponies_by_astalakio-d4qh34t.jpg (http://astalakio.deviantart.com/art/Sample-Ponies-286331933)

I keep meaning to get back into the ATG Alumni thing but somehow never seem to actually do it. This weeks' theme was to imitate a different work of art, and I decided to give it a shot. I've been following Astalakio for a while now and really like his style, and he recently put up the sketches above. I decided I'd take a shot at doing Pinkie Pie in his style for this.

Turns out his style is really fun to play with. And Pinkie Pie herself continues to be stupidly fun to draw. (Though I mostly chose Pinkie Pie because I'm nearly out of white paint and Pinkie's about the only pony that I have all the colours for without needing to deal with mixing white/black.)

Kyouhen

2012-02-22, 05:44 PM

What's this? An update on time? INCONCEIVABLE!

Day 40

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/053/b/6/day_40___lazy_pinkie_by_bgkyouhen-d4qmptf.png

First entry for this week's CHALLENGE! Pinkie Pie's having a lazy day. Nothing will get done today. There's probably a bad storm or something stopping her from going out and throwing random parties.

EDIT:
And looking at it now I finally figured out what was bugging me about it. Her left arm should be going under the right arm, not over it. Bit of an awkward pose.

Kyouhen

2012-02-23, 03:43 PM

Day 41

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/054/2/4/day_41_by_bgkyouhen-d4qq0ss.png

Zero time for much painting today due to a late work shift, and don't really want to risk it at work as I'll be dressed fancy tonight. So here's some quick attempts at me trying to find ways to do ponies that I like more than how I currently do it. I'm trying to break away from the show-accurate paintings and figure out my own way to do them.

Started with me toying with body shapes but quickly broke down to me attempting to just find a better way to do noses. Side views of ponies with open mouths have been killing me so far, so that seemed like a good spot to eventually move my focus. I decided to try Dreatos (http://dreatos.deviantart.com/)' style of noses, but that hasn't worked out too well. Just going to need more practice.

Kyouhen

2012-02-26, 01:41 AM

Just so anyone who bothers following this thread knows, the reason I do double updates when I don't really have a chance to post an update instead of just doing two updates the next day is that for some reason I really dislike double-posting. I can forgive myself for doing it in this thread, but I still don't like putting up more than one non-discussion post a day. Everything still ends up going up here eventually anyway, so it's all fine. :smalltongue:

Super busy the last two days so have a pair of quick paintings.

Day 42
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/055/a/0/day_42______by_bgkyouhen-d4qvzfh.png
This popped into my head after I found out about the whole Derpy thing yesterday. (Long story short for any non-ponies who might follow this, Derpy's a fan-made pony who the animators of MLP elevated up to the point where she had a name and lines. Recently for whatever reason the episode with her talking has had her name removed and voice changed, leading to this whole controversy thing.)

Day 43
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/056/f/e/day_43___fluttershy__s_lazy_day_by_bgkyouhen-d4r06cd.png
And now it's Fluttershy's turn to be super lazy. Fun fact: Fluttershy snores. LOUDLY.

And a little bit of a heads up that's already shown up in these two paintings, I'm running dangerously low on white paint right now and haven't had a chance to get any. Expect little to no colours that involve white (ie Derpy's coat) until I have a chance to pick up some more.

Thanqol

2012-02-26, 01:59 AM

Derpy's neck there is too long and her body's much too narrow. Check your reference images!

Kyouhen

2012-02-27, 01:59 AM

Day 44

http://th09.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/057/3/1/day_44___cutie_mark_crusaders_lazy_day_yaaaaayy___ _by_bgkyouhen-d4r4sdk.png
Oh Applebloom, what a silly question to ask on a day when you've done nothing.

A nice pretty Cutie Mark Crusaders lazy day picture today. Haven't done a decent painting in too long and haven't put nearly enough work into finishing this week's CHALLENGE, so this got to be a two-parter.

Had lots of fun working with Applebloom. I really liked working with her pose. Love how she turned out too.

Things to watch out for later: Applebloom's spine should bend more and her tail should probably be a little longer. Scootaloo's too big. Or Applebloom's head is too small. Not sure which, but there is a definite size problem between the two. Sweetie Belle's raised leg should have been thicker too. I love how Scootaloo and Applebloom turned out in the conversation page though.

Kyouhen

2012-03-01, 01:46 AM

Wow, 3 days worth of updates at once. That's a new low. I swear I'm not forgetting, I just keep passing out when I would normally update. Waaaay too busy the last few days.

*Cough*
ANYWAY!

Day 45

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/060/3/a/day_45___moar_faces_by_bgkyouhen-d4rfxfh.png

More pony face practice due to lack of time. I realized when I went to start painting this that doing line art for these didn't really make much sense. I want to work on the shape of the side-view open mouth, and the fill colour is always the first thing to go in. So why have I been working on outlines? So I'm going to start just doing the fills for any shape practice. Lines can be reserved for times when they're more relevant.

Day 46

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/060/5/7/day_46___poorly_done_drogon_by_bgkyouhen-d4rfxjy.png

Another small kind of sketchy thing. Was reading A Song of Ice and Fire and once again got inspired by a scene. First attempt at painting a dragon probably could have turned out better. I think most of the problem with it lies in the neck being too thin. Thanqol, feel free to point out any other problems with the shape of that thing.

Day 47

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/060/e/b/day_47___early_shift_pinkie_by_bgkyouhen-d4rfxp5.png

There we go. It's about time I had a day where I could do something decent. I am so very happy with how Pinkie's expression turned out. This was pretty much my 3rd or 4th choice for what I wanted to do today though. Everything else required more white than I've had a chance to get, and though I had time to actually paint today I still didn't have time to restock.

Thanqol

2012-03-01, 02:21 AM

[color="#660066"]Day 46

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/060/5/7/day_46___poorly_done_drogon_by_bgkyouhen-d4rfxjy.png

Another small kind of sketchy thing. Was reading A Song of Ice and Fire and once again got inspired by a scene. First attempt at painting a dragon probably could have turned out better. I think most of the problem with it lies in the neck being too thin. Thanqol, feel free to point out any other problems with the shape of that thing.

Neck should get thicker at the point where it joins the shoulder. The torso and the tail look like separate shapes, they should flow smoothly into each other. But the idea is legit cool and the picture has charm.

Kyouhen

2012-03-05, 04:58 AM

Ok, yeah, this whole "I'm tired so I'll just go to sleep and upload my stuff tomorrow" thing is getting out of hand. Time to make a serious effort to stop doing that.

Day 48
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/065/4/8/day_48___derp__d_ponies_by_bgkyouhen-d4rw06b.png
That was done on Derpy Day, and I was at work and didn't have much time for painting so I did a few quick attempts at derping some ponies. Had to figure out what to do with the eyes since I was out of white paint at the time.

Day 49
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/065/b/6/day_49___fluffy_muffin_by_bgkyouhen-d4rw0a9.png
This was originally going to be for EqD's Derpy Day drawing thing, but I forgot to actually upload it anywhere and missed the deadline. Didn't turn out too bad, though I messed up the back and gave her too much tummy.

Day 50
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/065/d/7/day_50___new_fluttershy_vs_old_new_fluttershy_by_b gkyouhen-d4rw0dy.png
Decided it would be fun to have New Fluttershy staring down Old New Fluttershy. Of course Old New Fluttershy was promptly messed up when I got around to painting and extended her nose down too far. >_<

Day 51
http://th00.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/065/c/9/day_51___a_girl_and_her_shadow_by_bgkyouhen-d4rw0j5.png
No theme for The CHALLENGE was chosen this week, and I randomly decided to do some paintings based on shadows and silence (mostly because the person who was supposed to pick the theme was Shadowy Silence. I'm creative! :smallbiggrin:) So here's a series of small paintings about a girl spending a day with her shadow. I had wanted to do a better job illustrating that time was passing between these but I couldn't figure out how to get the sun and still be able to get the angles I wanted with the shadow. Couldn't seem to get the last frame dark enough either. Still, pretty pleased with how these turned out.

That's probably it for detailed things for the next few days. The paintbrushes I've been using are really old, and I've long since lost the proper protective thingies to keep them safe while travelling. The massive increase of usage and stuffing them in my bag (carefully though) and they're just about completely destroyed. All that I have left right now is my detail brush. I'm probably going to swap back to toying with line work for the few days and attempting to use my laptop to colour them in until I get a chance to get some new brushes.

Kyouhen

2012-03-05, 09:19 PM

Day 52
http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/065/4/1/day_52___finally__by_bgkyouhen-d4ryq2z.png
SCIENCE!
Due to my lack of anything beyond my detail brush I decided to try colouring this one in digitally. The outlines, mane, nose ring and eyes are all done with paint. Everything else was filled in GIMP. I think it turned out pretty decently, though I'll need to figure out how I want to do the eyes digitally when I try this again. They're too dark here, and if I give them outlines they won't look right. Might have to try doing them completely digitally via Inkscape next time.

As for the picture itself, human anatomy hates me. Especially hands. Never really did get the hang of muscles and whatnot. I did notice Iron Will only has 4 fingers including his thumb though, so that made things a little easier. The tail's uncoloured because when I made the painting I had left it open, and couldn't figure out how to go about filling it without having to close it since I didn't have room on the paper to do so properly.

Kyouhen

2012-03-07, 03:31 AM

Day 53 - Looking Back
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/067/7/1/day_53___looking_back_by_bgkyouhen-d4s36q6.png
Yet another little pub doodle thing. This idea got itself stuck in my head and needed to be released. Current theme in The CHALLENGE is re-examination, so have some guy looking back on his life.

And sadly that's the last painting I'll be able to do for about a week. A friend of a friend stopped by our table while we were at the pub and got a Kinder Surprise. Inside was one of those Japanese blow-up paper balloon things in the shape of a blue and purple bat. One vague permission and acknowledgement that they've given me free reign to do as I please later it was leaving the pub as a Japanese blow-up paper balloon Rainbow Dash. Sadly I neglected to get pictures of it. The vigorous repainting effort sealed the fate of my detail brush, now leaving me with exactly 0 paint brushes to work with for about a week until I can get some new ones. Oh well, I'm just going to switch over to sketches now.

Kyouhen

2012-03-08, 01:55 AM

Day 54
http://th08.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/i/2012/067/f/3/day_54_by_bgkyouhen-d4s6jmm.png
Did I mention I can't draw to save my life? I can't draw to save my life. That and looking at yesterday's picture gets me really antsy about not having access to my colours. I can't wait to get some new paintbrushes.

Anyway! First two parts of a little comic I'm tossing together for the current CHALLENGE theme. Text will be added when I finish the thing.

Apparently I can't draw Spike, his body shape threw me off more than a bit. I also couldn't figure out what was wrong with Twilight's eyes until I realized I had forgotten to have them come to that point. Then I forgot that the point is at the bottom, not the top. Oh well, it's practice and the comic will be finished tomorrow.

Kyouhen

2012-03-08, 03:22 PM

Day 55 - Pop Quiz
http://th00.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2012/068/8/3/day_55___pop_quiz_by_bgkyouhen-d4s800a.png
And the final comic.

This is my next submission to this week's CHALLENGE theme. For some odd reason I got the idea of Twilight studying her friendship reports for a test and how silly that was in terms of ways to prepare for such a test.

Things to work on:
Spike
Spike
Spike
Back of Celestia's head. That last panel annoys me, I got the shape of the head right but failed to put the details in properly, so now her face just kind of looks squished.
Spike.

Kyouhen

2012-03-10, 12:49 AM

Day 56
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/069/7/c/day_56_by_bgkyouhen-d4sd9ru.png

Some doodles I did at work. First two are me attempting Spike without a reference, next few is a random idea that popped into my head interrupting my Spike practice, and last one's Spike with a reference. I have no idea how to draw Darth Vader's helmet without a reference. Also I'm noticing I still do that thing when drawing where everything I do ends up almost itallicized. Trying to fix that, but mostly confused why it happens when I draw but not when I paint. :smallconfused:

Kyouhen

2012-03-10, 07:38 PM

Day 57
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/070/1/2/day_57___repo_ny_poster_by_bgkyouhen-d4sg9aj.png

Original
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7a/RepoGeneticOperaOfficialPoster.jpg

Oh Repo!nies, I missed you so.

Did this one for the current ATG-Alumni theme, which is to make a movie poster. I had ponified the cast of Repo! The Genetic Opera ages ago and haven't done anything on them since, so I decided to do my poster on it. Few small problems, mostly with the legs, and the GeneCo cutie mark thing could have been done bigger.

Also I think I'm starting to enjoy using pens. I might pick up a few coloured pens and start doing sketches when I don't have time for a proper painting instead of burning paint on those little shape/line practice things.

Kyouhen

2012-03-11, 11:37 PM

Day 58
http://th03.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/071/b/8/day_58_by_bgkyouhen-d4slkj8.png
Blarg. Not at all happy with this. There was originally going to be an extra panel or two with Twilight burning out her other eye, but I seem to be having one of those days where I just can't focus on anything, and as such can't seem to draw anything I'm happy with.

Last submission for The CHALLENGE so Twilight can take another look at everything everywhere. Oh Twilight, why you so silly?

Thanqol

2012-03-12, 09:16 PM

Kyouhen

2012-03-13, 12:21 AM

*Snaps fingers* I just realised why your pencil sketches look so bad - because I've seen my own pencil sketches looking that bad. I think your number one problem here is that you're using the wrong materials. If you use a random HB pencil and line paper that's 5-10 points off your art score right away. Get a proper sketchbook and a proper range of art pencils from 3H to 6B and use those; I guarantee your pictures will look immensely better after the switch.

What also helps is getting a good set of artline pens for inking; a 0.4, 0.6 and 0.8 can produce some really beautiful looking lines and really open the door to professional looking inking. Using blue ballpoint pens for inks is awful, awful.

My general case tip is sketchline with the 3H, primary lines with the 2B, ink with a 0.6 pen, but that's not a particularly scientific method.

I have a proper sketchpad, I'm just trying to avoid using it too much as it's nearly out of pages and it takes to my paints much better than typical notepad paper does. You make a good point with the range of pencils and proper inking pens though. I was mostly just going off of what I saw SiuiS doing when I met him, and once again this is only really going to happen until I have the time/money to do some paintbrush hunting. (Which might actually be a while. >_<) Kind of reluctant to put out the money for a decent set of drawing tools right now when I want that money for better paintbrushes anyway. I'll keep that in mind for the future though since I wouldn't mind stopping those random sketchy painting things and saving my paints for when I have the time to do something good. (Most of the time when I do the little ones on lined paper I have no idea just how much time is available to me, which gets annoying once in a while when I run out of time before the paint dries)

Day 59
http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/072/d/3/day_59___here_we_go_again_by_bgkyouhen-d4sp9z9.png
This one's for the ATG-Alumni DA group. This week's theme is to do some form of pony sculpture, with the bonus theme of shading. So here's Twilight wandering around the Everfree again. I couldn't really think of any way to make her look more like a statue, kind of annoying me. Also messed up her front legs, and getting some proper shading done with pens is kind of hard. Especially her face. Looks too much like she has a beards. I might have to work on that this week.

Thanqol

2012-03-13, 12:24 AM

Kind of reluctant to put out the money for a decent set of drawing tools right now when I want that money for better paintbrushes anyway.

A set of pencils will cost you $10, and a notepad about the same. If you're not able to afford that then owch, sorry to hear that.

Kyouhen

2012-03-13, 12:28 AM

A set of pencils will cost you $10, and a notepad about the same. If you're not able to afford that then owch, sorry to hear that.

Really? I thought they were more than that... How much are the pens? And once again, it's more that I'd rather get my new paintbrushes sooner than wait a little longer because I got some pencils. :smalltongue:

Thanqol

2012-03-13, 12:34 AM

Really? I thought they were more than that... How much are the pens? And once again, it's more that I'd rather get my new paintbrushes sooner than wait a little longer because I got some pencils. :smalltongue:

The pens were about $3-4 each when I got them. You can get decent supplies from a newsagent, art store, or even a large bookstore.

Kyouhen

2012-03-13, 12:03 PM

The pens were about $3-4 each when I got them. You can get decent supplies from a newsagent, art store, or even a large bookstore.

Huh. I might just have to acquire some when I go and get some new brushes then.

Kyouhen

2012-03-14, 02:22 AM

Day 60
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/074/b/2/day_60_by_bgkyouhen-d4ssydr.png
Was super busy today, but saw this tree that I thought looked pretty cool and decided to sketch it out. Turned out pretty decent too.

Oh yeah, Thanqol. Not sure if I already mentioned this, but the lined paper I use is in a pocket notepad. I grabbed it because my actual sketchbook is a little large and when I'm out and about I can't always be sure I have room to work with it. So yeah, that's why I'm using lined paper. Anything done on lined paper is actually a full-page picture, while anything done on white paper actually is in a sketchbook. If I can find a decent sketchbook the same size I'll definitely grab one, but considering the pocket notepad was like $3 for 200 pages I somehow doubt I'll find one that gets me the same value. :smalltongue:

That and either way I don't really care how good/bad the things in the notepad look. The sketchbook is generally for the longer, better works while the notepad is generally for practice doodle things. Quality in the notepad doesn't really bother me as long as I can use the practice to get better results with the sketchbook.

Thanqol

2012-03-14, 07:30 AM

Day 60
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/074/b/2/day_60_by_bgkyouhen-d4ssydr.png
Was super busy today, but saw this tree that I thought looked pretty cool and decided to sketch it out. Turned out pretty decent too.

It did, that's cool! Good work.

Oh yeah, Thanqol. Not sure if I already mentioned this, but the lined paper I use is in a pocket notepad. I grabbed it because my actual sketchbook is a little large and when I'm out and about I can't always be sure I have room to work with it. So yeah, that's why I'm using lined paper. Anything done on lined paper is actually a full-page picture, while anything done on white paper actually is in a sketchbook. If I can find a decent sketchbook the same size I'll definitely grab one, but considering the pocket notepad was like $3 for 200 pages I somehow doubt I'll find one that gets me the same value. :smalltongue:

That and either way I don't really care how good/bad the things in the notepad look. The sketchbook is generally for the longer, better works while the notepad is generally for practice doodle things. Quality in the notepad doesn't really bother me as long as I can use the practice to get better results with the sketchbook.[/color]

Reasonable plan. Probably a flaw in my behaviour I don't have something similar.

Kyouhen

2012-03-14, 05:47 PM

Day 61
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/074/6/c/day_61___brushie_brushie_by_bgkyouhen-d4suz95.png
Got my new brushes~

So happy to finally get back to painting. I really enjoy it a lot more than sketching. Didn't end up picking up any art pens though, as the only sets available at the place I went to cost just over $20 and I was far more interested in getting my brushes. On the other hand I got a 40% off coupon for any one item good until the end of the month, so I might pick them up either way. I'll probably get at least one though so I can do text in paintings easier/faster. Even that simple "Brushie Brushie" took far longer than I care for. They also had pocket-sized sketchbooks of 100 pages for $6, so I might pick one of them up at some point after I've finished off my current one. Don't really want to swap the current one out while there's so many pages left in it, just seems wasteful. :smalltongue:

Also I might end up getting a set of detail brushes sometime over the next week, not too sure. The one that came with the little set I picked up didn't quite seem to get me the lines I normally like, and it's a bit bigger than the one I used to have. I'm not sure if I had problems keeping the lines consistent because of it's size or because it's just new and hasn't been broken in. I'm going to wait a few days to see if it improves at all, and if not I'll probably get a few more. Either way I can paint again, so I'm happy~

Domochevsky

2012-03-14, 06:37 PM

Hm... ok, that last one is pretty cute actually. :smallbiggrin:

Kyouhen

2012-03-14, 07:04 PM

Hm... ok, that last one is pretty cute actually. :smallbiggrin:

Thanks! I was morally obligated to do something with happy ponies and paintbrushes. Took a little while to settle on what I was going to paint. Alternatives were Pinkie Pie holding a bunch of brushes over her head in typical Zelda Item Acquisition style or Fluttershy cuddling the brushes. Decided going with the classic meme would be best. :smalltongue:

Kyouhen

2012-03-17, 09:56 PM

Well that whole 'Do a better job updating every day' thing didn't last half as long as I had hoped. >_<

Day 62
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/077/3/1/day_62___extreme_crusaders_by_bgkyouhen-d4t730h.png
First submission for this week's CHALLENGE theme: Adrenaline. I think the Crusaders sky-diving into a ring of sharks, fire and rocks qualifies.

I really need to find a better way to do shading with Sweetie Belle and Rarity. Getting highlights on the bodies of white ponies confuses me right now. I also decided to try finding a better way to handle black outlines and used a marker for the eyes instead of paint. Figured I'd try it with something small before I ruin a better painting with it.

Day 63
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/077/a/c/day_63___daring_doo_thing_by_bgkyouhen-d4t73go.png
This was originally going to be a comic based on my roommate's hilarious exploits in Skyrim. For whatever reason I just couldn't focus yesterday, and as a result I'm not at all happy with how this turned out and couldn't force myself to do any more. Also I definitely need to get my hands on some new detail brushes. None of the brushes I have work well for it. On the bright side I tried doing the outlines in black pen and they turned out pretty well.

Day 64
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/077/e/b/day_64___pinkie_walks_away_from_explosions_by_bgky ouhen-d4t74gd.png
Second submission for this week's CHALLENGE. I'm finding that these new brushes soak up a lot more water than my old ones did, which is leading to some interested results. Mostly the paints just end up more watered down and stretch a little further. It's taking a bit more time to get enough coats done for the lighter colours, but the paints are going on smoother and mixing better which is always nice.

Pinkie's mane ended up too uniform with the bumps, and her legs are a little off. Gummy turned out pretty well though which is a miracle since I didn't have a brush small enough to give him the attention I wanted to. I also dug up a fine-tip marker and used that for the outlines. I think I might start doing that instead of using paint. (You have no idea how long it takes to do outlines with paint.)

Kyouhen

2012-03-18, 11:36 PM

Day 65
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/078/d/b/day_65___more_daring_do_by_bgkyouhen-d4tc16q.png
Busy day so I did some sketches to continue that Daring Do comic I had mentioned. Not done with it yet though, I'll probably make the last few frames later this week or something. This is also my last entry for this week's CHALLENGE. Not sure if it counts though, I think I'm getting 'adrenaline' mixed up a little more with 'adventure' than I probably should. It's really up to Glass Mouse if this counts.

And I don't know why but I'd swear that lately my art has been on a steady decline. It's getting really annoying that I suddenly can't seem to get anything to look the way I want it to...

Glass Mouse

2012-03-19, 06:40 AM

Assorted thoughts ohoy! I'm at school, so they're probably a bit fragmented.

That brushie painting is disturbingly cute. I'm surprised and pleased that the meme still lives.

The fire in the Pinkie picture looks really good. You hit "ball of fiery death" well. I would've utilised shadows and highlights a lot more, though. The drama factor would be much greater if the light reflected on Pinkie's fur, and her face was draped in shadows (it'd be a great shaping exercise, too).
I think there's something wrong with her front legs, but I'm not well-versed enough in pony anatomy to pinpoint what exactly.
Nice attempt at perspective on the lizard!

The comic. Ehh... The last panel is adrenaline-filled, let's keep it at that :smallwink:
There's a nice flow to the first four panels, but the joke shifts pretty abruptly when the explorer notices the cart. I probably would've made two separate comics and elaborated on the zombie part more.
The first panel has a nice choice of colours and environment. There's some perspective errors, but they're not the focus. I will say, however, that I wasn't sure what was happening at first. The explorer pony is neither running nor sneaking, so it wasn't obvious that s/he was trying to get away from something.

As for overall art, consider training yourself away from fuzzy lines. Try to do a ton of sketches where you don't lift the pen from paper unless it's absolutely necessary (aka; the line you're drawing doesn't connect to anything at all). This'll keep your drawing faster, more focused on the overall impression, and hopefully keep you from getting lost in detail and destructive perfectionism.
Easier said than done, I know. Fuzzy lines are so tempting :smallwink:

Lots of different and critical stuff here. I hope at least some of it is useful, and I'm sorry if something comes off harsh. You're still awesome.

Kyouhen

2012-03-19, 09:42 AM

The fire in the Pinkie picture looks really good. You hit "ball of fiery death" well. I would've utilised shadows and highlights a lot more, though. The drama factor would be much greater if the light reflected on Pinkie's fur, and her face was draped in shadows (it'd be a great shaping exercise, too).
I think there's something wrong with her front legs, but I'm not well-versed enough in pony anatomy to pinpoint what exactly.
Nice attempt at perspective on the lizard!

Yeah, I was planning on playing with shadows more but I don't trust my ability to handle the lighting on Pinkie and Gummy without a good detail brush. Really need to find some time to go get some soon.

As for her legs the main problem is the one front leg is larger than the other and they both round off too much at the end. For some odd reason I couldn't get them the right shape when I got around to actually painting it.

The comic. Ehh... The last panel is adrenaline-filled, let's keep it at that :smallwink:
There's a nice flow to the first four panels, but the joke shifts pretty abruptly when the explorer notices the cart. I probably would've made two separate comics and elaborated on the zombie part more.
The first panel has a nice choice of colours and environment. There's some perspective errors, but they're not the focus. I will say, however, that I wasn't sure what was happening at first. The explorer pony is neither running nor sneaking, so it wasn't obvious that s/he was trying to get away from something.

Might as well tell you how the whole thing ends. Daring Do (the adventurer pony) fights her way through a bunch of vampires into the cave, only to be killed from behind by the guard that's been chasing her (which she also hasn't actually seen yet). This actually happened to my friend while he was playing. Chased halfway across the world by a guard he didn't even know was still following him, wanders into a random cave, kills an army of vampires and is killed when the guard finally caught up with him. There was a good half hour/45 minutes from the point he left the city to the guard catching him, so it was kind of hilarious that it followed him that far. :smalltongue:

As for overall art, consider training yourself away from fuzzy lines. Try to do a ton of sketches where you don't lift the pen from paper unless it's absolutely necessary (aka; the line you're drawing doesn't connect to anything at all). This'll keep your drawing faster, more focused on the overall impression, and hopefully keep you from getting lost in detail and destructive perfectionism.
Easier said than done, I know. Fuzzy lines are so tempting :smallwink:

Lots of different and critical stuff here. I hope at least some of it is useful, and I'm sorry if something comes off harsh. You're still awesome.

The fuzzy lines are actually a bit of a necessity when I'm drawing. I have really shaky hands and as such have a really hard time doing straight lines with pencils/pens/etc. Hence why I prefer paints, a paintbrush stays where I put it. Kind of annoying. >_< I'll try working away from the fuzzy lines, they just tend to end up looking better than my attempts at straight ones.

Kyouhen

2012-03-19, 10:32 PM

Day 66
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/079/8/7/day_66___pinkamena_by_bgkyouhen-d4tfkdy.png
This week's CHALLENGE theme is madness, so of course I have to open up with Pinkamena.

Without my detail brushes I can't really do detailed things (obviously) so I decided to try doing this one large and messier than normal using only my largest brush. I think it turned out pretty decently, except for her mouth. I couldn't quite figure out how to get her to show teeth properly from this angle, so her mouth stayed closed and now it looks a little weird. Also I couldn't quite get the effect I was aiming for with this picture. When I say 'messy' I mean messy. Probably going to spend the next few days trying to force myself to stop worrying about the little details.

Kyouhen

2012-03-21, 01:07 AM

Day 67
http://th07.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/i/2012/080/f/3/day_67___pinkie_practice_by_bgkyouhen-d4tjk7a.png
Suddenly got called in to work today, so didn't have time for painting. Decided that since I seem to be having problems drawing ponies lately I'd do some practice with Pinkie Pie in a few poses. These didn't turn out too horribly, and I think I'm getting better with her hair.

Kyouhen

2012-03-21, 08:51 PM

Day 68
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/081/0/3/day_68___the_night_surgeon_by_bgkyouhen-d4tmgwo.png
Next submission for the CHALLENGE is another Repo!ny scene, specifically part of the song Night Surgeon. (Song has some bloody/violent/etc parts so I won't link it here just to be on the safe side. You can probably guess how things go based on the picture.)

It turned out decently. I'm getting better with these new brushes and how they handle. The background could have turned out much better than it did, Pinkie's expression is a little weird (I was aiming for more of a sneer or something), and I probably should have attached her scalpel more to the middle of her arm. I really like how her jacket turned out though. I wanted to put in Rarity or Gilda in, as the characters I cast them as when I first set up this crossover ages ago also show up during the song, but I definitely wouldn't have been able to get either of them looking good with the space available. Note to self: Get a bigger sketchbook when I finish with this one.

Kyouhen

2012-03-25, 09:43 PM

SUDDENLY WORK!

Yeah, okay, I know I said I'd try harder to make sure I post an update more often. But by the gods I've been swamped with work lately. Haven't had time to do anything really good over the last few days, so here's a bunch of sketches. They're only links for now because I need to be up super early again tomorrow and need as much sleep as I can get at this point, so I'm skipping out on the normal cropping and whatnot. (My phone takes really big pictures) Only real reason I'm updating now at all is because there's some CHALLENGE-related stuff in there and I want to make sure that gets put up by the deadline. I'll edit this post when I have time to clean things up later.

Day 69

http://th00.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/091/9/6/pinkie_faces_by_bgkyouhen-d4umdi2.png

Tried toying around with pony poses since I've been having issues with pony anatomy lately.

Apparently those pictures were actually from a previous day? I think I got something mixed up somewhere here... Really gotta make sure this doesn't happen again... The expressions must have been the actual Day 69 then.

Day 70

http://th07.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2012/091/0/e/chibi_me_by_bgkyouhen-d4ume3e.png

Attempts to chibi myself. Am planning on filling out a "Meet A Pony" meme thing I had found ages ago on DA, but it requires you to draw yourself so I thought I'd try to figure out how to draw myself first.

Day 71

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2012/091/d/9/lovecraftian_horrors_by_bgkyouhen-d4umh4x.png

Three Lovecraftian horror doodles for the CHALLENGE theme. I was originally going to turn all the ponies into horrors, but had a bit of time after work and decided to walk to the subway instead of take a bus. Let myself explore a bit since I knew the general direction I wanted to go and ended up finding that sculpture and absolutely had to try drawing it.

Day 72

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/091/f/0/ego_style_sketches_by_bgkyouhen-d4umhow.png

And two attempts at drawing a pair of pictures by egophiliac that I have hanging on my wall.

And now I'm off to grab a few precious hours of sleep before I have to get up again for work. Woooooo- *collapses*

EDIT:
There, done editing. No idea what happened with the numbers... I know I drew something but can't for the life of me figure out how I messed up the numbers. I must have miscounted the days or something.

Kyouhen

2012-03-31, 01:26 PM

I live! Fixed the previous post and here's what I've done since. Still been stupidly busy so haven't had time to do much, but here it is.

Day 73

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/091/a/9/crackle_sketch_by_bgkyouhen-d4umi97.png

Quick doodle of Crackle because Crackle's awesome.

Day 74

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/091/f/0/random_bug_by_bgkyouhen-d4umio7.png

First submission for the current CHALLENGE. This week's theme is bugs, so I drew a beetle thing.

Day 75
http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/091/0/c/applebug_by_bgkyouhen-d4umiy1.png

And next is Applejack in bug form. In retrospect that would be much more obvious if I bothered to colour it, but didn't really have time to get to that.

At this point I'm super sad because all the work/lack of sleep/etc finally caught up to me and I failed to do anything Thursday. :smallfrown: Oh well, guess I'll just have to start again!

Day 1

http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/091/c/5/day_1___find_a_pokemon_by_bgkyouhen-d4umk10.png

"There must be a pet here, that will fit the ticket. How 'bout a Ledyba or a cute Kricket... ot.... Kricketot."

http://i.imgur.com/EAqtS.jpg

"Well I'd like to see you come up with a rhyme for Kricketot."

This is what happens when I decide to take on too many challenges at once. Combine the 'bugs' theme with the Ponymon theme for some Tumblr thing I've decided to join and you get this. I was tempted to do the old man that teaches you how to catch Pokemon so I could fulfill the ATG Alumni's theme of drawing an old pony too, but this idea just seemed hilarious to me.

Kyouhen

2012-04-01, 09:34 PM

Day 2

http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/092/a/1/day_2___old_pony_by_bgkyouhen-d4utmhe.png
http://th04.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/092/4/5/day_2b___bugs__by_bgkyouhen-d4utmqn.png

First up today is my entry for this week's ATG-Alumni theme, drawing an old pony. I figured I'd draw the oldest pony there is. (I just didn't mention what the theme was.) Was mostly looking to toy around with shading for her hair, and am pretty happy with how it looks.

I also did some doodles for the CHALLENGE theme to make sure I've got enough done for it. First is Pinkie bugging out reality, second is Pinkie on a giant spider because... actually I don't even know why I did that. :smallconfused:

Thanqol

2012-04-02, 09:35 PM

Sorry I haven't been providing commentary or advice, but the problem I keep facing in this thread is that physical paints are so far outside my sphere of influence that I'm kind of at a loss about what to say. You also haven't indicated anything specific you're working towards so providing direction is a bit hesitant too.

One question, though, how do you hold your pencil? Shakey lines look like an ongoing problem in your work, and this (http://chiseledrocks.com/main/musings/topics/how_to_hold_the_pencil)was an enormously useful help in breaking that.

Kyouhen

2012-04-05, 09:38 AM

So apparently the forum keeps eating my posts, so let's try this again!

Day 3
http://th06.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2012/094/f/7/day_3___make_up_award_by_bgkyouhen-d4v264n.png

Quick random comic doodle thing I did thanks to a conversation that happened at work. I have absolutely no idea what started the conversation or why this even popped up in my head.

Day 4
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/094/4/5/day_4___crazy_steve_by_bgkyouhen-d4v266w.png

Crazy Steve amuses me so I did a quick colour painting of him. His design is somewhat heavily inspired by a certain chibified avatar from this forum. :smalltongue:

Day 5
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/096/f/c/day_5___sad_scoots_by_bgkyouhen-d4v6jvf.png

First entry for this week's CHALLENGE theme of 'Failure'. Expect a lot of sad CMC pictures. Poor Scootaloo. :smallfrown:

Sorry I haven't been providing commentary or advice, but the problem I keep facing in this thread is that physical paints are so far outside my sphere of influence that I'm kind of at a loss about what to say. You also haven't indicated anything specific you're working towards so providing direction is a bit hesitant too.

One question, though, how do you hold your pencil? Shakey lines look like an ongoing problem in your work, and this (http://chiseledrocks.com/main/musings/topics/how_to_hold_the_pencil)was an enormously useful help in breaking that.

Not a problem! I understand that I seem to be in a rather visible minority in terms of my chosen medium. :smalltongue:

My current goal is more or less to figure out what my preferred style is and currently to figure out how to do some paintings a little quicker. I can spend hours on one painting and be happy with the results, but I'm trying to figure out how to make it faster and still be happy with it. The sketches and doodles are mostly my attempts at getting better at anatomy/poses/etc, while the actual paintings are my attempts at getting better at working with colours. (Different methods of shading, black vs coloured outlines, etc) I know I should probably pick something a little more specific to work on, but I'm not quite sure which direction I should be going right now.

As for the shaky lines, that's actually more of a physical issue. I have shaky hands, which gives me problems with sketches. It's actually the main reason I prefer to work with paints over pencils, as a paintbrush tends to stay where I put it. (It's also why I'm reluctant to put out the money for a tablet) Currently I tend to do everything with a brush grip, but I'll give some of those other grips a try to see if it helps.

Kyouhen

2012-04-09, 12:20 AM

Post Easter holiday catchup post, GO!

Day 6
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/099/c/0/day_6___applebloom_paints_by_bgkyouhen-d4vmt5o.png
This is one of those ones that I should have painted. It's supposed to be Applebloom trying to get her cutie mark via painting, and obviously failing (and making a horrible mess while she's at it.)

Day 7
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/099/d/5/day_7___pinkie__s_new_recipe_by_bgkyouhen-d4vmtaw.png
Doodle for the day is Pinkie Pie's latest cupcake recipe falling apart horribly

Day 8
http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/099/1/f/day_8___sweetie_learns_to_triforce_by_bgkyouhen-d4vmtf0.png

Yay memes! Sweetie Belle tries to Triforce but doesn't quite get how it works.

Day 9
http://th05.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/i/2012/099/8/a/day_9___a_day_at_the_zoo_by_bgkyouhen-d4vmtty.png
And for my last entry for this week's CHALLENGE theme of failure we have a bunch of animals. My family decided to finish off our Easter holiday by visiting the zoo, so I drew a pile of animals that we saw. What does this have to do with failure? Part of the reason we went was because my sister wanted to draw some animals. My mom then got her sketchbook as well and declared that we were going to have a contest to see who could draw each animal best. Note: My sister is an art school graduate. Much failure was had today. :smalltongue:

Animals pictured, from left to right: Lion, penguin, crocodile eggs, snowy owl, warthog, gorilla, meerkat, hyena, turtle, drunk polar bear, flamingo.

The crocodile eggs were a joke sketch by me in an attempt to keep up with my sister when she was actually drawing a crocodile. (Not only do my crocodiles not suck (compared to everything else I drew) but I got several!) The drunk polar bear is the result of my dad asking where the polar bears were while we were on the way to see them, only to have me respond by pointing at a bar called "The Polar Patio" and declaring that they were getting a drink. That joke went on for a few minutes and I needed to make a drunk polar bear. :smalltongue:

Kyouhen

2012-04-09, 11:06 PM

Day 10
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/100/b/e/day_10___singed_pony_by_bgkyouhen-d4vr4xx.png

Reference
http://media.giantbomb.com/uploads/9/97398/1829317-singed.jpg

There's a contest in the League of Legends forums for ponifying the champions, and I plan on entering it. I decided to do some sketches of best champion to figure out how he's going to look before I try actually painting him.

I wanted to keep the design fairly simple in FiM fashion, so I had to cut out a lot of Singed's outfit. For the first attempt I decided to have his bottle pointing backwards because I figured it would look odd if it was jabbing into the back of his head.

For the second attempt I turned the bottle around, instead planning on having the head of the bottle over his shoulder. (Not shown in that one since I was also working on his face) I decided to remove the pupil from this one, and add more bandages and some armour. I think it looks much better than the first attempt.

The last one's where I hit a snag though. From the front pony legs seem to come out of their chest, which complicates things when there's supposed to be shoulder pads. I couldn't really figure out how to make them work, so I tried just having the spikes coming out of the armour near the legs. Not so happy with how that turned out. I might just remove the shoulder pads completely and replace them with the bracers that Singed has. Otherwise I'm liking how it looks. I don't think I'll bother including his shield because it would either make him look too cluttered or cover half his body no matter where I put it.

Kyouhen

2012-04-16, 08:29 AM

Life, why U so busy? http://i.imgur.com/DrMmg.jpg
Sorry for the lack of updates, been stupidly busy. Still. Currently awake enough to throw up what I should have thrown up all week, and I'll make another update later today with whatever I end up doing today.

Day 11
http://th04.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2012/107/6/d/day_11___more_singed_by_bgkyouhen-d4wh2qq.png
More attempts at making a pony Singed. I took the bottle off the last one since I've pretty much settled on how it'll look, so it's just taking up space. I think I like the first one of these more.

Day 12
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/107/c/c/day_12___bathulhu_by_bgkyouhen-d4wh2td.png
I had enough time to grab a marker on my way to work so I can stop using those pens. That actually looks considerably better. As for why this exists, I get into some interesting conversations at work. :smalltongue:

Day 13
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2012/107/f/1/day_13___ninja_cho_by_bgkyouhen-d4wh2x2.png
More amusing conversations, this one regarding how silly it is that certain League of Legends characters can still hide in the bushes.

http://th02.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/107/c/9/day_14___so_much_stuff_by_bgkyouhen-d4wh33r.png
I got tired of having nothing to do on set because my costume doesn't even allow for me to keep my phone on me, so I grabbed some cue cards and cut them into tiny pieces that I could fit into my pockets without them being noticed. This is what happens when I'm at a very long day at work.

The first two are my entries for last week's CHALLENGE. Orbital bombardment saving an overrun Space Marine position, and a near-dead Pikachu grabbing a Smash Ball. The Batman one is based on a conversation I actually heard on set. A kid kept jumping in and out of an alley around some other kids, and when one of the ADs went over to send them all back to holding that's the conversation they had. The AD wasn't even trying to be funny. :smalltongue:

Day 15
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/107/0/9/day_15___pirate_dash_by_bgkyouhen-d4wh37x.png
...That's supposed to be a pirate Rainbow Dash. I have no idea how I failed to make her look like a pirate so badly. Probably because I forgot to give her a hat.

Day 16
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/107/1/e/day_16___a_new_day_by_bgkyouhen-d4wh3cb.png
Had enough time yesterday to do some actual painting. This was my other submission for the CHALLENGE, the Cutie Mark Crusaders watching a sunrise. This was mostly an excuse for me to play around with shading.

Kyouhen

2012-04-17, 09:53 PM

Day 17
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/108/8/5/day_17___random_doodles_by_bgkyouhen-d4wnlqt.png
This week's CHALLENGE theme is Batman, so have a Batman misplacing something in his utility belt. I have to wonder if he ever gets the compartments mixed up and how long it takes him to figure out where everything is when he does.

Also a Pinkie Pie. She's supposed to be doing that bouncy thing Pinkie Pie does. That didn't turn out so well.

Day 18
http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/108/c/9/day_18___batmarebile_by_bgkyouhen-d4wnm7w.png
This week's ATG-Alumni theme is Equestrian technology, so I crossed that with the CHALLENGE theme to make the most advanced wagon available to ponies! It's a real shame Alfred's no fun though.

Kyouhen

2012-04-23, 02:40 PM

So I made another link post last night before I passed out, and apparently the forums ate it. Blech.

Day 19
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/114/7/e/day_19___bat_bat_by_bgkyouhen-d4xfvu8.png
Bat bat! Yeah, no idea why I decided to do this.

Day 20
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/114/0/b/day_20___bat_dressed_as_a_man_by_bgkyouhen-d4xfvzn.png
I've done a man dressed as a bat and a bat dressed as a bat, so here's a bat dressed as a man!

Day 21
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/114/8/2/day_21___gummy_joker_by_bgkyouhen-d4xfw35.png
Have a Joker Gummy. Such a happy gator. :smallbiggrin:

Day 22
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/114/9/c/day_22___tanky_bane_by_bgkyouhen-d4xfwcc.png
After doing the Joker Gummy I decided I wanted to do more pets as Batman villains. Here's a Bane Tank.

Day 23
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/114/d/d/day_23___the_riddler_by_bgkyouhen-d4xfwg8.png
Who?

Day 24
http://th05.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/114/3/e/day_24___random_doodles_by_bgkyouhen-d4xfwkq.png
And apparently yesterday was one of those days where nothing I draw comes out right. Except for that pattern thing, but that was only done because nothing I drew was coming out right.

Today's work will be up later tonight, haven't done anything yet. I've been neglecting actual painting WAY too much lately, so I'm going to try getting back to that. Managed to pick up some finer brushes so I should be able to do smaller, faster works again.

Kyouhen

2012-04-24, 12:28 AM

Thanqol

2012-04-24, 12:31 AM

Day 25 (Warning, MLP:FiM Finale Spoiler
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/114/2/4/day_25___quick_chrysalis_by_bgkyouhen-d4xhxgn.pngAnd here's a quick painting, as promised. Only real problem I have with how this turned out is that her hair isn't stringy enough, but otherwise for a quick painting with some unfamiliar small brushes it came out pretty well.

The back shell/carapace thingy needs some more shine to it. Also, I'd shy away from black lines in the iris of the eyes, just in general. Finally, add shine highlights to the eyes; it's almost a crazy level of change you'll get :smallsmile:

Kyouhen

2012-04-25, 02:46 AM

The back shell/carapace thingy needs some more shine to it. Also, I'd shy away from black lines in the iris of the eyes, just in general. Finally, add shine highlights to the eyes; it's almost a crazy level of change you'll get :smallsmile:

...And now I feel really, really stupid for forgetting the eye shinies. I never forget the eye shinies! They're the most important part of the eyes! http://i.imgur.com/2c0gc.jpg

Day 26
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/116/6/5/day_26___no_more_muffins_by_bgkyouhen-d4xlxni.png
I wanted to do something better, but suddenly got called in to work and had exactly zero time to do much beyond this. I decided to have a shot at drawing without doing the pencil lines first, and might start doing that more often so I can get better at quickly figuring out what I want to draw and putting it directly to paper. (I'll still use pencil to plan my better works, this is mostly an exercise in getting pictures to look like what I want them to look like)

This week's CHALLENGE theme was my choice, and I chose withdrawl. So here's a Derpy all sad at her lack of muffins. Expect more crazy ponies lacking things later.

Kyouhen

2012-04-25, 10:30 PM

Day 27
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/116/f/b/day_27___meet_the_pinkie_by_bgkyouhen-d4xp6ms.png
Well that one took a while. Redrawing the same thing over and over gets kind of annoying. Also annoying is that I seem to draw Pinkie best when she's in rage mode.

Kyouhen

2012-04-26, 10:00 PM

Day 28
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/117/4/d/day_28___hugs_plz_by_bgkyouhen-d4xsorp.png
And today we have Chrysalis begging for hugs. Poor changelings, needing love to survive. :smallfrown:

Kyouhen

2012-04-27, 11:58 PM

Day 29
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/118/e/c/day_29___booooks_by_bgkyouhen-d4xwmdx.png
Twilight's books are missing! Spike should probably look more worried there. Whoops.

Decided to try a different style of eyes for this one, inspired by a picture SiuiS drew over in Ponythread that's buried too deep for me to dig out. Pretty sure I like how they look.

Kyouhen

2012-04-29, 09:12 PM

Day 30
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/120/7/7/day_30___gotta_fly__by_bgkyouhen-d4y4qy4.png
Next submission for the CHALLENGE: Rainbow Dash unable to go that long without flying. On the bright side, she won't be breaking out of the hospital again anytime soon. :smalltongue:

Day 31
http://th00.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2012/120/b/7/day_31___deprived_ponies_by_bgkyouhen-d4y4ra7.png
And here's a Trixie with no crowd and overworked Applejack. Probably should have swapped the Applejack to read "All play and no work" instead.

Kyouhen

2012-04-30, 08:24 PM

Day 32
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/121/4/e/day_32___what_now__mana_leak_by_bgkyouhen-d4y8jpo.png

References
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=241831&type=card
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2011/362/9/5/trixieyes_gif_by_workingorder-d4fw3x1.gif
Decided I wanted to do a Mana Leak Trixie. Then decided I had to do her in the "What now?" pose. Then I couldn't leave it at one, because nobody plays just one Mana Leak, and made a second.

Cleaning that guy out of the background for these ended up being way easier than I had expected. The way his arms are held made it so I just had to replicate the colour of the highlights of the clouds and not worry about trying to make it brighter as it got closer to the flames, it all just looked like more clouds. The area near his cape's really dark too, so I was able to just fade it to black.

Had a bit of a scare with the first one though. To get a more consistent outline I tried using my shiny permanent marker, and it worked quite nicely. But when I put the sealing on the card it ended up picking up and smudging the marker everywhere. Managed to repair the damage quickly enough though. I might pick up a black acrylic marker for outlines if I do more of these.

Kyouhen

2012-05-02, 01:45 AM

Day 33
http://th06.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/122/7/c/day_33___doodles_again_by_bgkyouhen-d4ydfgw.png
Another long day at work, and another few random doodles. We've got Rainbow Dash finding a new garden (Guess who's on the ground. Not too happy with that one, think I went too small), eye practice with Derpy (who's mouth got messed up when a horse decided to sneak up on me), Pinkie prodding the fourth wall, Pinkie with a cupcake, and a Chrysalis silhouette thing.

Thanqol

2012-05-02, 05:48 AM

Kyouhen

2012-05-02, 01:29 PM

I actually really like that Chrysalis silhouette, and I think that stylised silhouettes - and splatter silhouettes - are a strength of your medium. You should totally do some more like that, see what you can produce. :smallsmile:

As usual heaps sorry about not posting here I just dunno what to sayyyy

Yeah, I'm pretty happy with how it looks. Except the back legs. Back legs seem to give me problems some days. That and I forgot her crown thingy. Actually that one kind of got away from me completely. It was originally just going to be her head/neck, but it ended up being kind of small so I kept going...

And as usual don't worry about it, any input when you have some is fine. :smalltongue:

Kyouhen

2012-05-02, 09:44 PM

Day 34
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/123/b/e/day_34___twilight_of_replication__for_sale__by_bgk youhen-d4yghde.png

Original
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=195630&type=card

I spent 5 hours making this thing. That art box? For anyone who hasn't handled MTG cards before, that's a 2"x1.5" box. I spent 5 hours on that. I have no idea how it took me that long.

...Yeah, sorry. Still trying to figure out where my afternoon went.

ANYWAY! Really happy with how this one came out, even though I basically had to completely redo the background and everything. And that Twilight in the bottom left is going to die. I had to redo her head like 4 times before I got it right, then I realized the problem was her ear was at the wrong angle and took it off.

Kyouhen

2012-05-10, 09:25 AM

I live! Internet died off for a few days, so I haven't been able to upload anything. Catch-up post, ACTIVATE!

Day 35
http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/131/a/4/derplr_by_bgkyouhen-d4zc13f.png
Last week's (the week this was drawn) CHALLENGE theme was social media. I decided that Derpy would be a good mascot for a site with a name like tumblr, so here's a shiny new logo for them. :smalltongue:

Day 36
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/131/1/b/reddit_faster__by_bgkyouhen-d4zc16o.png
More social media, this time one of the Reddit ponies ponying Reddit.

Day 37
http://th06.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/i/2012/131/a/d/twilight_learns_to_im_by_bgkyouhen-d4zc1bk.png
And last set of social media ponies, with Twilight learning the basics of appropriate times to use [insert messaging system here]

Day 38
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/131/c/5/brek_lol_by_bgkyouhen-d4zc1j7.png
Decided to draw a character I'm making for a D&D campaign I'm joining. A friend wants to run a West Marches campaign, and I mentioned I might try making a divination specialist wizard to see how hard he'd be to kill, since the last time I was in a West Marches campaign I burned through half a dozen characters in a matter of months. He challenged me to do it, so I did. I told him what type of spells I'll have access to at 1st level, and he cried. :smalltongue:

Day 39
http://th08.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/131/5/d/silhouette_things_by_bgkyouhen-d4zc1n1.png
Some more silhouettes. Decided to try toying around with shapes and line directions to see what happens.

Day 40
http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/131/9/3/pinkie_pie_brings_the_cake_by_bgkyouhen-d4zc1q2.png
Not much to say about this. Just Pinkie Pie with cake.

Day 41
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/131/b/0/valve_pinkie_by_bgkyouhen-d4zc1sn.png
Even less to say about this. Pinkie Pie is now a Valve fanpony.

And that should get me caught up as of yesterday. I'll be doing and posting today's work later tonight.

Kyouhen

2012-05-10, 11:04 PM

Day 42
http://th08.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/f/2012/131/8/c/colour_practice_by_bgkyouhen-d4zf391.png
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/131/b/d/provoking_the_lich_by_bgkyouhen-d4zf2s2.png

I got tired of trying to work with black and white sketches since I haven't had too much chance for painting. (Wardrobe at work tends to get a little antsy if I have open paints near me while in costume) So I grabbed some coloured markers and toyed around with those to see what I could come up with for colouring.

Pretty happy with just scribbling in the colour, though I'll probably just use the darker colours (like the purple) for outlines instead of fill because they make it hard to see the black outline. Also that second Pinkie Pie doodle, the one with the horde of lines around it, was done with acrylic pens. I grabbed some of those while I was out too in hopes of using them to get more consistent outlines when I do my MTG alters. The problem is I can't quite seem to get the lines thin enough without moving really fast. I'm going to have to experiment with those a bit more, see what I can come up with.

Kyouhen

2012-05-12, 01:42 AM

Day 43
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/132/a/9/air_raid_by_bgkyouhen-d4zju7e.png

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/132/0/9/mother__s_day_by_bgkyouhen-d4zjueb.png

First up's a Darwinian battle. Because I can.

Second up is my first entry in this week's CHALLENGE theme of 'orphans'. Poor Pinkie Pie, she swears she didn't realize they were sitting there!

Kyouhen

2012-05-13, 09:55 PM

Day 44
http://th07.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/i/2012/134/9/f/colour_practice_2_by_bgkyouhen-d4zt6qo.png
Messing around a bit with colouring with the new pens again. And yes Pinkie, I did and I'll do it again it's called practice!

Day 45
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2012/134/d/e/mother__s_day__conclusion_by_bgkyouhen-d4zt6o2.png
And because I did that comic the other day I'm obligated to bring it to it's natural conclusion. Poor Pinkie. :smallfrown:

Glass Mouse

2012-05-14, 07:59 AM

I feel so bad for laughing at that last painting XD

It's good to see you draw humans. There's a fine sense of movement, and the nose has depth. Are you planning to get good at drawing them?

Kyouhen

2012-05-15, 05:50 AM

I feel so bad for laughing at that last painting XD

It's good to see you draw humans. There's a fine sense of movement, and the nose has depth. Are you planning to get good at drawing them?

You're a horrible person and you should feel horrible.
Then again I painted the thing...

And probably! I really should actually work on doing humans, I just don't seem to come up with very many good ideas that I really want to draw/paint that involve them and have a hard time making anything look good when it's forced. I'm sure I'll come up with something eventually.

Day 46
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2012/136/5/1/necromentals___fire_and_water_by_bgkyouhen-d4zyf9a.png
Undead elementals. You know it's awesome. That's not how they actually look by D&D standards but I thought I'd amuse myself and make my own version.

Kyouhen

2012-05-21, 08:53 AM

Apparently I fell asleep while trying to post this. GAH! Why am I so busy?! >_<

Day 47
http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/142/f/c/shadow_thingy_by_bgkyouhen-d50ow9o.png
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/142/9/3/ghoul_face_thing_by_bgkyouhen-d50owd0.png

A shadow pretending to sit on a throne and a ghoul face thing. Not so sure it really looks like a ghoul anymore, but whatever. I was going to give it some claws or something but the face ended up being bigger than planned and I couldn't fit them in.

Day 48
http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/142/3/e/poorly_done_nmm_by_bgkyouhen-d50owgh.png
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/142/b/1/zombig_mac_by_bgkyouhen-d50owlz.png

Me toying around with poses on Nightmare Moon which could have turned out better, and a zombie Big Mac who I didn't realize I couldn't colour in until after I coloured in the part around his ribs. Hooray for poor planning!

Day 49
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/142/b/1/haunterjack_by_bgkyouhen-d50owph.png
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/142/0/4/rarityveous_by_bgkyouhen-d50owsm.png

...Yeah, I don't even know why I did these. The Applejack Haunter just kind of popped into my head for no apparent reason, and the Rarity was done so she could join the fun. Rarity could have come out better, I think her head just needs to be bigger.

Day 50
http://th03.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/f/2012/142/9/e/random_doodles_by_bgkyouhen-d50owx4.png

Didn't even get a chance to take out my sketchbook at work, so I did a few card doodles instead. The flower thing at the bottom was a design that they had painted on one of the walls on set, but they sent us home before I could finish it.

Day 51
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/142/9/3/raritableye_by_bgkyouhen-d50ox0b.png

Wasn't happy with the last Rarity and decided to try making her a ghost with arms, Sableye! That didn't work too well either... Curse you Rarity!

Really sorry about the lack of consistent updates lately. Work's been absolutely insane and I just crash when I get home. Fortunately today's a holiday! Hooray for a chance to relax!