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Practicing caricatures.

welp, I killed the topic

Oh, I didn't see this topic being updated.

Great job on the caricatures, Gorsal. They need some shading though (I guess that's asking too much since they're doodles).

GORSAL.

I'm gonna give you some general tips on caricaturing, if that's cool with you!

The most important thing to think about with caricature is shape. If you can, try and break down someone's face into just one very simple geometric shape, and then build other shapes onto it.

I'll walk you through something I drew myself because I'm really that arrogant.

Take a look at this guy:

I'm choosing him specifically because he has an insanely strong face shape that's very easy to work with.
The first thing I look at is the general face shape; in this case it's best described with a long rectangle. Pretty much his whole face is very angular, but I'll break that down as I go along.

(Excuse the MSPaint-o-vision)
Then, look for what stands out on his face. I think probably the biggest quirk on this guy is how long his forhead is, it's practically half of the length of his head! That's something that'd be good to exaggerate, so you could draw the brow line lower than you would usually.

Again I'm going to bring up shapes; this guy has pretty high cheekbones and a fairly narrow jaw. These nearly form an inverted triangle, which his lips sit in the middle of.


Some other things you might notice;
-his eyes are a little close together, which will help push the narrowness of his face more.
-his lips are pursed, which again, help to exaggerate how narrow his face is.
-he's also got very thin, sculpted eyebrows which, if we draw them a little smaller than they actually are, will help to make his brow look longer.
-the arch of his eyebrow is also really really sharp, which we can push to exaggerate his general angular look.


My drawing of him is about a year old so it's very very rough, but hopefully you can still see what I'm getting at.

TL;DR version:
reduce someone's face to the most obvious shapes, and, in your head, try and describe them in as few words as possible.
Keep those words in mind all the time you are drawing them!

I'm not exactly an expert at caricatures, as you can see, but going about it with a clear method has made it much easier.

Also, look at other caricature art!
Here are some DA's to take a look at:
http://nelsonsantos.deviantart.com/gallery/
http://starmasayume.deviantart.com/gallery/#Caricatures (these ones are especially good since she usually has a photo of the real person alongside them to compare)
http://jimmyemery.deviantart.com/gallery/ (this is probably my favourite of the bunch, I think they're a lot more subtle than a lot of other caricaturists)
I'd suggest looking at Derren Brown, too. If you can get his book Portraits, do! It's pretty expensive, though.

Another interesting thing to do; search for several cariactures of the same person, and look at how different people exaggerate different features.

LAST BUT NOT LEAST
Even if you don't want to do caricaturing as part of your real drawing career, it's always a good idea to try it out every now and then, since it trains you to look for strong shapes which are always a good idea in character design.

SO ENDS ANOTHER WALL OF TEXT.

yeah, any tips coming from you is great, Epistaxis c:

I kind of did it in some faces (mainly Hirokazu Tanaka and David Wise), but I guess I'm still attached to the 'realistic' vision.

I just did them for the laughs, but it's very fun to make. I'll try incorporating those tips in the next time.

I haven't doodled anything in a while, so I picked my mech pencil up and started doodling...

http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/5432/skh05.jpg
http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/1831/skh04.jpg
http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/3968/skh03.jpg

Okay dude seriously.
Stick with stuff like those doodles because it is far more strong than any of your anime stuff.

I mean, it has better sense of shape and way, waaaay more energy.

That or just apply some of that energy to your more anime-styled drawings. I'm serious.

Really, seriously. Try not to think about style so much and let it develop naturally. If you force yourself into a style then your work will suffer.

I'd've thanked Zeemort's posts if it weren't for the thank button disappearing :nostalgia:

Captain Awesome ftw (really should reference butt and legs in future, it's really lacking)

I suck.

(03-24-2010, 01:52 PM)Epistaxis Wrote: Okay dude seriously.
Stick with stuff like those doodles because it is far more strong than any of your anime stuff.

I mean, it has better sense of shape and way, waaaay more energy.

That or just apply some of that energy to your more anime-styled drawings. I'm serious.

Really, seriously. Try not to think about style so much and let it develop naturally. If you force yourself into a style then your work will suffer.

Haha, thanks. I wasn't really serious on forcing myself to only draw anime, but I want to have alternate styles. I have a problem when drawing anime: the characters look ridiculously stiff. It seems like most anime drawings that I see have more focus on detail than energy. Cartoons are the exact opposite (well... not counting cartoon paintings/cariactures). It's hard for me to draw an energetic anime drawing.

So far I have three styles. My first style (and my original) is my cartoony style. It's the style that I've been practicing since 3rd grade. Dr. Robb and Tin Jr. are one of my very first OCs. Also, it's very.. very cartoony and not very popular:

http://www.newgrounds.com/art/view/relmm...io-bruthas
http://ashurasonic.deviantart.com/art/Ca...y-94745833

My second style is my retro style. It's my attempt at mixing anime with cartoons. I've been practicing this since last year:

http://www.newgrounds.com/art/view/relmm...-then-some

My third style is a custom style. It's an imitation of another person's style. Anime is MUCH more popular than cartoons on the internet, so I adapt the anime style most often than other styles (like the TDI style).

http://ashurasonic.deviantart.com/art/Ch...y-92668771

I used to focus on my first style.. but once anime became a popular phenomenon, I started to deviate into more appealing styles.

anyways... more doodles for your noodle, I took the time to shade these a bit
http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/6564/skh07.jpg
http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/8804/skh09.jpg
http://img260.imageshack.us/img260/9379/skh08.jpg

that had absolutely nothing to do with her comment
just sayin

you forgot yoshi's spikes

Oekaki stuff.

holy shit that looks nice

(03-26-2010, 12:51 AM)Innocence Wrote:

(03-24-2010, 01:52 PM)Epistaxis Wrote: Okay dude seriously.
Stick with stuff like those doodles because it is far more strong than any of your anime stuff.

I mean, it has better sense of shape and way, waaaay more energy.

That or just apply some of that energy to your more anime-styled drawings. I'm serious.

Really, seriously. Try not to think about style so much and let it develop naturally. If you force yourself into a style then your work will suffer.

Haha, thanks. I wasn't really serious on forcing myself to only draw anime, but I want to have alternate styles. I have a problem when drawing anime: the characters look ridiculously stiff. It seems like most anime drawings that I see have more focus on detail than energy. Cartoons are the exact opposite (well... not counting cartoon paintings/cariactures). It's hard for me to draw an energetic anime drawing.

[bla bla styles bla]

Did you... actually read my post?
TRY NOT TO THINK SO MUCH ABOUT STYLE.
You easily CAN put some of that energy into your anime styled drawings if you stop thinking "This is how I do things in this style".

Look at this:
http://lysol-jones.deviantart.com/art/Bee-105749878
In fact, look at lysol's whole gallery because he's a legend.
There's a definite anime influence but it's still very expressive and fluid.

Your poses looking stiff are nothing to do with your style and everything to do with you not understanding why it looks stiff.

I'll keep this brief. Because mostly you've ignored criticism thus far.

Read this:
http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/05/a...ne-of.html

Parts of it however, will not make sense until you have read these:
http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/05/a...ction.html
http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/05/a...h-and.html
http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/05/a...check.html
http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/05/a...cters.html

Read these. Do the exercises. It doesn't matter what style you're going for, because energy and shape are Very Important Things regardless of style. Don't gimme any shit about how you aren't animating; ANY drawing needs to keep shape and energy in mind.
Also don't give me any shit about not wanting this exaggerative a style. You study this extremely expressive stuff, and then you use what you've learned to give your own work a more expressive feel.

Again, and if I have to say this any more I will scream: stop thinking about style. Let it happen naturally. This is the number one most important thing you must learn.
DO NOT THINK ABOUT STYLE.
DO NOT THINK ABOUT STYLE.
DO NOT THINK ABOUT STYLE.
Learn all the technical stuff and your style will learn itself.