An Open Letter to ZL & Friends

[marmite]

I made these let me know what you think
[FLASH]http://www.swfcabin.com/swf-files/1269962658.swf[/FLASH]
and I made the porsche 928 from the movie scarface
[FLASH]http://www.swfcabin.com/swf-files/1269963379.swf[/FLASH]
This is My own work thats why I put a copyright watermark over the porsche 928 no stealing please

[WrenchClock]

Give it another go, Marmite. The line tools arn't great to draw with in flash, so practice with the brush or do something on paper

[peyoteclock]

fuck and i was totally going to steal that porsche!

[RenegadeClock]

Before you get to crazy with trying to draw stuff on the computer I think you should learn to draw with a pencil. Work on the fundamental disciplines of drawing: shape, line, perspective, proportion, shading, style, etc. Once you have a firm grasp of these concepts then you can use the computer to push your art to the next level.

On a professional level I'd call this crap, but for a beginner I've seen worse. If you stay focused and practice I'll bet you'll come back to this thread in a year and laugh at how much you've improved.

[Topcatyo]

You have some work to do.  For the first image you need to apply some perspective to objects other than the mug, and the animated smoke needs way more than two frames.  Also, the line tool is never good for smoke.

As for the porsche, it looks like you attempted to do perspective but it's all over the place.

As Renegade said, it's not really good, but it's definitely not bad for a beginner.  I would also agree with the suggestion to try drawing things on paper first before your foray into digital art.  I also agree with the suggestion to learn to use the brush tool, as it is much better than the line tool, since it feels more natural and orgnanice, then.

As for color, while you should probably get better at drawing first, when using color I would say never use the pre-made colors flash gives you in the swatch.  Never use any pre-made colors ever (unless they're colors you made and you are using them to keep a consistent color scheme).  Having your own personalized colors helps your art feel just a little less generic, and I'm certainly never going to complain about having control over more aspects of my art.

Keep it up.

[Silly Putty Clock]

On a professional level I'd call this crap, but for a beginner I've seen worse. If you stay focused and practice I'll bet you'll come back to this thread in a year and laugh at how much you've improved.

I want to emphasize this. Don't give up, no matter what. What you've got right now is awful, but it's not nearly as bad as my earliest work.

I suggest playing with the brush tool, but keep it ON THE SMALLEST SETTING. If you find the automatic smoothing frustrating, you can select the brush tool, open the Properties tab at the bottom of the screen, and set the "smoothing" setting lower. This will makes the edges of your brushstrokes rougher, but it will also prevent it from filling in sharp curves and creating gaps in the middle of brushstrokes like it tends to do. Plus, I personally like the look of rough edges, but that's really a matter of preference on your part.

[RenegadeClock]

You don't need to worry about people stealing your work because, being honest here, it's not good enough to steal.

Also, this is the internet. You'd be almost powerless to stop someone from stealing your work anyhow. Even the really good artists around here usually don't bother with copyrights. They ruin pictures more than anything else.

[Loki Clock]

Definitely do a bunch of perspective tutorials and develop a method for practicing it. First thing about perspective is, the further away something is the smaller it will appear, and so the rear of that table should be drawn narrower than the fore, allowing you to see the back legs. I wouldn't do a 3D computer keyboard quite yet. Start with an empty 3D room and draw things into it - even if you don't grid out the entire room, it'll give you anchors for guesstimating how your object's lines should be angled. If drawing from life make sure to put the object up near something angular to see these reference lines on the page.

For tool choice, I believe you should practice with both line and brush. Working with the line tool can help you develop some geometric intuitions, such as weighted curves, but hinder others where the geometry is difficult to mimic, such as the tops and bottoms of that coffee cup, or a partially-full moon, which should be made from elliptical sections, not from bezier curves.

Practice makes perfect, and the faster you draw the more practice drawings you should make, so if a normal drawing takes more than 10 minutes just go on to the next one. I promise it'll be a better use of your time. Draw real objects by looking at them whenever possible. Things never look or behave quite like you picture them to in your head.

[buttplug]

Watermarking like that is dumb. I'm sorry but no one is gonna steal your car picture man.

All it ends up doing is make you look like some kid from deviant art, which you surely don't want. It's probably the worst community for art out there.

[Loki Clock]

I'm sorry but no one is gonna steal your car picture man.

Oh yeah, and even when you do make something someone wants to steal, watermarking is incredibly easy to cover up, even when you stamp it all over the good parts. If you want to make sure nobody can claim something as their work, get good at a subtle signature and make sure you remember where you drew it. You can then provide the location of the signature as proof if necessary.

[Loki Clock]

But clearly the reason it's done here is so that people can zoom in on and highlight the text watermark...to which I say, lol really?

Sometimes I release things as SWFs just because there's hidden tinytext. It's about as universal a format as PNG, and both are appropriate formats for the content. So if he has something to preserve, even if it's silly, why sweat over such a choice? Recommending against JPG and GIF is another thing, of course.

[WrenchClock]

by the way why does the computer say Hellfire 666?

Probably because it sounds EXTREEEEME

[pop-tart]

[WrenchClock]

haha it's funny because poptart is black irl and he's stole many cars in his time

[pop-tart]

haha it's funny because poptart is black irl and he's stole many cars in his time

I shoulda put all the desk and shit in the trunk...

[zl]

that rainbow paint job, those vanilla wafer wheels... it only could have be drawn on... the hellfire 666

[zl]

oh and marmite I don't think I have advice that wouldn't be redundant in this thread - I think this thread has awesome suggestions already.

Just remember that improving your art isn't the only game here.  make art to have fun, and make art to reach your very own highest standards. The only end form worth shooting for is the one that best represents who you are.