My Sketchbook (~￣▽￣)~

[Spongy272]

Hi and welcome! I did this over at SBM so I decided to do it here as well  . I hope you enjoy my pics and feel free to critique or give out any advises! It helps me grow as an artist. With that being said, here's some pics from my sketchbook : 

 

 

Well, this is what I have for you for now. I'll be posting more in the future.I hope ya guys liked it  I know there's a LOT of talented artists on here so if ya got any advises to share then please, feel free to do so! I'd appreciate it a lot . Have a nice day ya'll!

[Spongy272]

Hey guys! I hope you're having a wonderful new years today  . Here's some extra pictures from my sketchbook that I'd like to show you ^0^! Here ya go:

 

 

 

Most of them are just random sketches xD But some are based on lessons I've learned and ideas I have for designs and animation :P. I hope to hear your thoughts on it ^-^ . Well, have a nice New Years! Peace :3

[terminoob]

I'm liking what you've got going on. Lots of potential. I'm gonna give you oodles of advice, but first I'm gonna ask you a couple questions:

Do you have any influences (artists, cartoon shows, comics, whatever - just anything you like, pretty much)?

Obviously you like drawing cartoons, so do you see yourself more into the animation side or the comics side or are they both interesting to you?

[Spongy272]

3 hours ago, terminoob said:

I'm liking what you've got going on. Lots of potential. I'm gonna give you oodles of advice, but first I'm gonna ask you a couple questions:

Do you have any influences (artists, cartoon shows, comics, whatever - just anything you like, pretty much)?

Obviously you like drawing cartoons, so do you see yourself more into the animation side or the comics side or are they both interesting to you?

I dig all kinds of forms of art, ranging from traditional art to digital art, comics, even spray paint art. But I see myself more into animation  It's a form of art that's different and more exciting than the rest and that's what I love about it. One of my major influences is Stephen Hillenburg and the show SpongeBob SquarePants.

[terminoob]

50 minutes ago, Spongy272 said:

I dig all kinds of forms of art, ranging from traditional art to digital art, comics, even spray paint art. But I see myself more into animation  It's a form of art that's different and more exciting than the rest and that's what I love about it. One of my major influences is Stephen Hillenburg and the show SpongeBob SquarePants.

Alright, so here's some advice. I don't know how old you are, but the earlier you do any of this the better off you'll be in the long run. There's also actually less than I had anticipated because I tried to keep it semi-open, but if you want anything more specific then just ask.

You need to have a solid foundation before you start to draw cartoons. I said this before in another thread asking for advice, but I'll say it here again. If you jump straight into just drawing cartoons, you're not going to grow as an artist. You're going to develop a style and you're going to draw everything in one style because you won't know how to draw any differently, and if you're asked to draw something else you won't be able to because you won't know how an arm is actually supposed to look you'll just know how it's supposed to look in your style. Stephen Hillenburg, Butch Hartman, Seth MacFarlane, Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, William Hanna, Joseph Barbara, Joe Murray - literally any cartoonist or animator you can think of is only drawing the way they do because that's their style that they developed and decided on but you better believe they're able to actually draw. I don't want to discourage any blossoming cartoonists, because cartoonists are great, but I didn't develop a foundation and I wasn't progressing as an artist. I didn't know how to draw anything, and it wasn't until I was 17 that I actually started to learn the basics and I had to completely relearn how to draw from the ground up after that because everything I thought I knew before then was completely and utterly wrong.

- Draw everything you see. Everything in real life should go into your sketchbook. Don't set up a still life or anything, just look around your room and pick something and draw it. Learn how everything looks. Your cartoons are going to benefit from this, because you're going to know where everything is supposed to go and how everything is supposed to look. If you study Character Animation at CalArts (which is where Disney and Pixar get all their talent), you're required to keep multiple sketchbooks and do daily life drawings so you know everything precisely as it should be. I'm assuming you're not going to apply to CalArts anytime soon so you don't have to be super rigorous, but it's a good habit to get into.

- There's thousands of books on anatomy. When you get a chance you should find some and study them. Drawing the Face and Figure by Jack Hamm is amazing. Gray's Anatomy is amazing.

- If you want to be an animator, then animate. The earlier the better. There's an independent animator named Harry Partridge and he has a whole slew of tutorials up on a YouTube channel called HuHa2 (called Happy Harry's HuHa2 How To's). Watch all of them. I can't praise them enough. Then after you watch them get to animating. You may think you need something fancy like Flash (or whatever it's called now) but you don't. One of my friends and I started animating when we were, like, 9, using MS Paint. You can do flipbooks. Post-It notes. Just moving paper around under a camera. If you want to animate then find a way to animate and just do it.

If you're into animation, then you need to really be into animation. Stephen Hillenburg is great, but he's also not currently doing Spongebob. He's off making short films. Find his short films, first off. You can be influenced by him and by Spongebob, but you need to have a backlog of stuff in your head to be able to draw from. Influences are to help you understand how other artists solve problems and to give you ideas for how you can solve a problem. You're, like, borrowing from them. I really like Jhonen Vasquez, and seeing how he drew Johnny the Homicidal Maniac opened my eyes to how stylized you can actually make your art and that helped me really get crazy with my anatomy and I got some really cool and funky looking stuff because of it. It's bad to copy straight-up (for example, a lot of people like to draw in a "Disney" style - that's bad because that's not their style and they don't know how that style actually works and it makes their work come out looking like a hot mess), but borrowing is fair game. You just have to know the difference.

- You're inevitably going to watch Disney movies. Disney made a lot of garbage, and the stuff they're putting out now isn't too hot either. Watch Bambi, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Lady and the Tramp, 101 Dalmatians, anything between The Little Mermaid and Tarzan, and Princess and the Frog (because the artists working on this were - get this - influenced by the background art for Lady and the Tramp; watching this is so you see influence in action).

- For animation: Windsor McCay, Donald Duck cartoons, Fleischer brother cartoons (Popeye, Betty Boop, and Superman), Looney Tunes (keep an eye out for Tex Avery and Chuck Jones), Hanna-Barbera cartoons (the animators working now grew up on Hanna-Barbera so they're undoubtedly influenced by them), Ren and Stimpy, Animaniacs, Laika films, early Tim Burton (tread carefully), Rocky and Bullwinkle and anything that studio produced (they did two Gerald McBoingBoing shorts and a short called Rooty Toot Toot - watch them), anything made by Bruce Timm, anything made by Genndy Tartakovsky, anything made by Craig McCracken. That's just the tip of the iceberg too. Find anything you like, watch it, look at concept art for it, learn from it. If you're serious about this then don't be afraid to get nerdy about it.

- Same goes for comics. I won't give as much because I could go on and on about it for way too long, but start from the ground up. John Tenniel (he illustrated Alice in Wonderland), Windsor McCay, Will Eisner, and Jack Kirby. 

- Anime is weird. Don't try to draw it. Tezuka, Oda, Toriyama, etc - they all know how to draw, probably better than anyone. You really need to have an understanding of anatomy to be able to draw in that look, and not a lot of people actually know how to draw correctly in the first place and they get way too into the genre and they just lift stuff from it without understanding why artists actually draw the way they do and it's really bothersome and it really hinders growth as an artist. There's a lot of good anime out there but there's a whole lot more bad anime out there and it gets in the way. If you have to watch anime, then watch, like, anything Shinichrio Watanabe does, watch FLCL, Metropolis, Redline, Evangelion, Dragonball, and Astro Boy. Read One Piece for design inspiration. 

- Don't just look at stuff from America. Look at European comics and animation. Sylvian Chomet is amazing. Herge and Moebius are both extremely influential artists. Read some Asterix. 

As a note to end on, I keep seeing around the site that you really want a tablet (and I think you posted a status about really wanting a 27 inch Cintiq). Tablets are great. Digital stuff is great. Anyone can do it. Don't go digital. It's going to be a huge crutch for you and it won't help. Learn how to actually draw first, and see if you even like it enough to want to continue. You may wind up hating it down the road, and then you'll have a tablet you don't do anything with. And really don't go for a Cintiq. I get that they're nice and all, but it's overkill. You're not a paid professional. It's nice to have, but it's so absolutely unnecessary right now. A lot of people get tablets and then wind up not learning how to really draw because the computer makes everything look nice and they think they can get away with it but it really doesn't come out that good, and I'm saying this because I was a person who got a tablet and I wound up not learning how to really draw because the computer made everything look nice and I thought I could get away with it but it really didn't come out that good. 

Need anything else, don't be afraid to message me. I'm always up for helping aspiring artists.

[Spongy272]

7 minutes ago, terminoob said:

Alright, so here's some advice. I don't know how old you are, but the earlier you do any of this the better off you'll be in the long run. There's also actually less than I had anticipated because I tried to keep it semi-open, but if you want anything more specific then just ask.

You need to have a solid foundation before you start to draw cartoons. I said this before in another thread asking for advice, but I'll say it here again. If you jump straight into just drawing cartoons, you're not going to grow as an artist. You're going to develop a style and you're going to draw everything in one style because you won't know how to draw any differently, and if you're asked to draw something else you won't be able to because you won't know how an arm is actually supposed to look you'll just know how it's supposed to look in your style. Stephen Hillenburg, Butch Hartman, Seth MacFarlane, Chuck Jones, Tex Avery, William Hanna, Joseph Barbara, Joe Murray - literally any cartoonist or animator you can think of is only drawing the way they do because that's their style that they developed and decided on but you better believe they're able to actually draw. I don't want to discourage any blossoming cartoonists, because cartoonists are great, but I didn't develop a foundation and I wasn't progressing as an artist. I didn't know how to draw anything, and it wasn't until I was 17 that I actually started to learn the basics and I had to completely relearn how to draw from the ground up after that because everything I thought I knew before then was completely and utterly wrong.

- Draw everything you see. Everything in real life should go into your sketchbook. Don't set up a still life or anything, just look around your room and pick something and draw it. Learn how everything looks. Your cartoons are going to benefit from this, because you're going to know where everything is supposed to go and how everything is supposed to look. If you study Character Animation at CalArts (which is where Disney and Pixar get all their talent), you're required to keep multiple sketchbooks and do daily life drawings so you know everything precisely as it should be. I'm assuming you're not going to apply to CalArts anytime soon so you don't have to be super rigorous, but it's a good habit to get into.

- There's thousands of books on anatomy. When you get a chance you should find some and study them. Drawing the Face and Figure by Jack Hamm is amazing. Gray's Anatomy is amazing.

- If you want to be an animator, then animate. The earlier the better. There's an independent animator named Harry Partridge and he has a whole slew of tutorials up on a YouTube channel called HuHa2 (called Happy Harry's HuHa2 How To's). Watch all of them. I can't praise them enough. Then after you watch them get to animating. You may think you need something fancy like Flash (or whatever it's called now) but you don't. One of my friends and I started animating when we were, like, 9, using MS Paint. You can do flipbooks. Post-It notes. Just moving paper around under a camera. If you want to animate then find a way to animate and just do it.

If you're into animation, then you need to really be into animation. Stephen Hillenburg is great, but he's also not currently doing Spongebob. He's off making short films. Find his short films, first off. You can be influenced by him and by Spongebob, but you need to have a backlog of stuff in your head to be able to draw from. Influences are to help you understand how other artists solve problems and to give you ideas for how you can solve a problem. You're, like, borrowing from them. I really like Jhonen Vasquez, and seeing how he drew Johnny the Homicidal Maniac opened my eyes to how stylized you can actually make your art and that helped me really get crazy with my anatomy and I got some really cool and funky looking stuff because of it. It's bad to copy straight-up (for example, a lot of people like to draw in a "Disney" style - that's bad because that's not their style and they don't know how that style actually works and it makes their work come out looking like a hot mess), but borrowing is fair game. You just have to know the difference.

- You're inevitably going to watch Disney movies. Disney made a lot of garbage, and the stuff they're putting out now isn't too hot either. Watch Bambi, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Lady and the Tramp, 101 Dalmatians, anything between The Little Mermaid and Tarzan, and Princess and the Frog (because the artists working on this were - get this - influenced by the background art for Lady and the Tramp; watching this is so you see influence in action).

- For animation: Windsor McCay, Donald Duck cartoons, Fleischer brother cartoons (Popeye, Betty Boop, and Superman), Looney Tunes (keep an eye out for Tex Avery and Chuck Jones), Hanna-Barbera cartoons (the animators working now grew up on Hanna-Barbera so they're undoubtedly influenced by them), Ren and Stimpy, Animaniacs, Laika films, early Tim Burton (tread carefully), Rocky and Bullwinkle and anything that studio produced (they did two Gerald McBoingBoing shorts and a short called Rooty Toot Toot - watch them), anything made by Bruce Timm, anything made by Genndy Tartakovsky, anything made by Craig McCracken. That's just the tip of the iceberg too. Find anything you like, watch it, look at concept art for it, learn from it. If you're serious about this then don't be afraid to get nerdy about it.

- Same goes for comics. I won't give as much because I could go on and on about it for way too long, but start from the ground up. John Tenniel (he illustrated Alice in Wonderland), Windsor McCay, Will Eisner, and Jack Kirby. 

- Anime is weird. Don't try to draw it. Tezuka, Oda, Toriyama, etc - they all know how to draw, probably better than anyone. You really need to have an understanding of anatomy to be able to draw in that look, and not a lot of people actually know how to draw correctly in the first place and they get way too into the genre and they just lift stuff from it without understanding why artists actually draw the way they do and it's really bothersome and it really hinders growth as an artist. There's a lot of good anime out there but there's a whole lot more bad anime out there and it gets in the way. If you have to watch anime, then watch, like, anything Shinichrio Watanabe does, watch FLCL, Metropolis, Redline, Evangelion, Dragonball, and Astro Boy. Read One Piece for design inspiration. 

- Don't just look at stuff from America. Look at European comics and animation. Sylvian Chomet is amazing. Herge and Moebius are both extremely influential artists. Read some Asterix. 

As a note to end on, I keep seeing around the site that you really want a tablet (and I think you posted a status about really wanting a 27 inch Cintiq). Tablets are great. Digital stuff is great. Anyone can do it. Don't go digital. It's going to be a huge crutch for you and it won't help. Learn how to actually draw first, and see if you even like it enough to want to continue. You may wind up hating it down the road, and then you'll have a tablet you don't do anything with. And really don't go for a Cintiq. I get that they're nice and all, but it's overkill. You're not a paid professional. It's nice to have, but it's so absolutely unnecessary right now. A lot of people get tablets and then wind up not learning how to really draw because the computer makes everything look nice and they think they can get away with it but it really doesn't come out that good, and I'm saying this because I was a person who got a tablet and I wound up not learning how to really draw because the computer made everything look nice and I thought I could get away with it but it really didn't come out that good. 

Need anything else, don't be afraid to message me. I'm always up for helping aspiring artists.

Wow, this is extremely helpful!! I'll definitely look into it  (I'm 16 btw xD)

[terminoob]

Just now, Spongy272 said:

Wow, this is extremely helpful!! I'll definitely look into it  (I'm 16 btw xD)

Okay, I totally didn't know that. So you have the means of like getting to a library or a bookstore and getting books. In that case:

- Like I said, the Jack Hamm book (which is actually called Drawing the Head and Figure, not the Face and Figure). There's a PDF of it but get the real thing.

- Will Eisner published a series of books on sequential art. Find them.

- Drawing Comics the Marvel Way. Extremely helpful whether you're an animator or a comic artist because it teaches you all about posing, staging, composition. All the stuff no one thinks about.

- Animator's Survival Kit. If you're gonna be an animator there's zero way you're gonna be able to get away not having this.

- There's a giant book called The Illusion of Life and it's a book by Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas, two of Disney's "nine old men", and it's absolutely amazing in every way possible.

- There are these guys named Tom and Tony Bancroft, and they used to be Disney animators. Since leaving Disney they went on to publish some books. Tom Bancroft published Creating Characters with Personality and Character Mentor, and Tony published Directing for Animation. All great reads. They also have an animation podcast that's a must-listen. 

- "Art Of" books are really cool to look at if you want to get really nerdy, but only really buy them if you want to be a designer. Pixar ones are usually stunning - in particular The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Up, Brave, Monster's University. All phenomenal stuff in those books if you want to see the nuts and bolts of an animated movie.

[Spongy272]

7 minutes ago, terminoob said:

Okay, I totally didn't know that. So you have the means of like getting to a library or a bookstore and getting books. In that case:

- Like I said, the Jack Hamm book (which is actually called Drawing the Head and Figure, not the Face and Figure). There's a PDF of it but get the real thing.

- Will Eisner published a series of books on sequential art. Find them.

- Drawing Comics the Marvel Way. Extremely helpful whether you're an animator or a comic artist because it teaches you all about posing, staging, composition. All the stuff no one thinks about.

- Animator's Survival Kit. If you're gonna be an animator there's zero way you're gonna be able to get away not having this.

- There's a giant book called The Illusion of Life and it's a book by Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas, two of Disney's "nine old men", and it's absolutely amazing in every way possible.

- There are these guys named Tom and Tony Bancroft, and they used to be Disney animators. Since leaving Disney they went on to publish some books. Tom Bancroft published Creating Characters with Personality and Character Mentor, and Tony published Directing for Animation. All great reads. They also have an animation podcast that's a must-listen. 

- "Art Of" books are really cool to look at if you want to get really nerdy, but only really buy them if you want to be a designer. Pixar ones are usually stunning - in particular The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Up, Brave, Monster's University. All phenomenal stuff in those books if you want to see the nuts and bolts of an animated movie.

I'll see if my school library has em when I return to school this Monday  . Thank you for the extra suggestions, I'm writing them down in my sketchbook so I won't forget!:D 

[Spongy272]

 

I decided to make a quick sketch and dedicate it to hilaryfan80 and Terminoob. You guys have helped me A LOT and I feel so grateful for it. Sorry for the horribly drawn laptop xD

[Spongy272]

Heller! I'm gonna post more sketches from my sketchbook and also an extra one which is actually a painting I made for my grandma  Hope ya guys enjoy ! :

 

 

 

I made her a Gary the Snail painting xD . Thankfully she liked it  Welp, that's all I have for you at this moment. Have a nice day ;3

[Spongy272]

Hey guys! Sorry that I haven't posted any pictures in a while /~\ Hopefully, I can get back to my regular schedule. Because of my tardiness I will be adding even more pics ( even though they're random as heck) and will be announcing a new topic for the future  . Hope ya guys enjoy, here ya go  :

 

These are more recent pictures that I have in my sketchbook.I believe I have a little bit more to show ya ( I'm almost running out of pages ;-; gotta buy a new one!). Anyways about my announcement, I was thinking about creating a whole 'nother topic not based on paintings or drawings and etc. but rather crafty stuff like constructing designs out of polymer clay or creating something out of cardboard boxes. I don't know if I explained that right but hopefully you understand xD . I'm really excited about it not only because I get to show ya some of what I did but rather I'd love to accept requests from you guys ( You must be confused by now, it's okay xD I'll be posting it up soon so don't worry.) I was thinking of doing this exclusively for SBC but I'd figured I'd do it for SBM as well. Because... why not?  Well, I hope you guys have a wonderful day today!!

 

P.S.( If you want to read the detailed (well... almost detailed?) descriptions I've made for almost all the pics I've posted here on this topic then here's the link :http://www.sbmania.net/forums/topic/50322-my-sketchbook-v/ . I was supposed to do this when first creating this topic .-. . My apologies!  (╯_╰) ) 

[Spongy272]

**UPDATE**

Hey guys! Sorry if I haven't posted anything in a while.. but I have some updates for ya  

 

1) I received a certificate upon my completion in my Digital Color Theory course at my University.(WOOT WOOT!!) I can't wait to show ya all my projects that I've been working on for the past 11 weeks so stay tuned!

2) I'm no expert at Photoshop... but I've learned alot at my University. I was wondering if I should set up a shop for photoshop requests now that we can donate each other. It's still undecided though but stay tuned for any news.

3) I have two new sketchbooks which means that my previous sketchbook is full! I will sometime during Spring Break show ya guys the rest of my drawings and then move on to show ya some new drawings from my latest sketchbooks.

 

Welp, I think that's it for today. I hope you guys have a wonderful day today!

[Spongy272]

Heller!! Sorry if I took a while but here I am! And as promised i'll be showing ya LOTS of pictures:D At first I was just gonna include 30 pics like I did over at SBM but I'll do 60 ;3 (Because SBC is far more special) ..(jk xD ;3). Here ya go: 

 

(Note: The University images are not in order. Sorry xD!)

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed! I know its alot... But hopefully you weren't bored xD. But hey, you get to see about an extra 40-50 images that I have yet to post in SBM ;3 I'll post the rest on SBM sometime during the weekend which will have a more detailed explanation to some pictures ;P FYI the link I think is on my pre-previous post... just in case ;3 . Welp, bye guys and stay tuned!