Thanks Deino :)

I love her eye! Great drawing.

Thanks Roytje :)

Put me in the fan column, too Deino. The first impression was of one of those grotesque deep-see dwellers. Really really good.

Fantastic fish/face. Nice description, too.

That's awesome. I would love to be able to create creatures like this.

awwwww that's pretty ^_^ great job on it =3 i like the tree mostest =D

Wow! O_O
Okay, this is on the wrong board.
This is Intermidiate/Advanced quality.

Yeah, that tree is the first that actually looks like a tree and not a blob of green on a lump of brown

And thank you too Sanzo. Usually though I don't use the intermediate board unless I use the extra space. Which may never happen since the beginner board got more pixels to play with.

You better finish it >:D

Modifying angles, lighting, or the original 3D form of the reference is the kind of stuff I'd like to ultimately do when using references. Just anything that demands the 3D form is understood so that it could be used to produce other 3D forms is what would benefit me most. I tend to be more 2D-oriented when copying photos regardless of whether I'm using measuring devices or just freehanding, and that's useful for copying 2D images, but not for inventing 3D ones. I tend to ask questions like, "what's the 2D shape of this highlight? How does it relate vertically and horizontally to this other mark?" Rather than, "what's the 3D form of this figure"? If I understood the 3D form, then I could invent my own highlights without using the precise shapes in the photograph.

I pretty much knew this picture wasn't what I should have been doing when I started on it based on my goals, regardless of the grid (though the grid made it that much worse). I set out only to draw the reference as accurately as possible and nothing more. In that sense, it's one of my biggest failures since that's the last thing I want to be doing in the future as I progress. I didn't even try to experiment with painterly techniques - I was trying to be as unpainterly as possible in this one so that it would look just like a photo. Generally I get the most comments about the painterly aspects of my works when working from photos, but this time I really wanted to try not being painterly (I tend to be painterly for economical purposes, not intentionally). I didn't even really achieve the photorealism I intended to achieve despite the use of the grid for the line drawing, so I didn't even succeed in that respect. While it's completely against my personal goals, I still admire the artists on here who can make their paintings look just like a photograph. I was hoping to achieve it here, but I think I deviated too much in the shading and still relied too much on lines which gave that sort of cartoony effect in places.

omg biggest posts ever. great pic and i've been a victim of the grid in the past. when the masters of the past were working on frescoes - they couldn't draw straight from life, so they did their preliminary drawing and they would grid that whole wall up before doing some of the greatest paintings ever made, theres no shame :):)

Mmm... (damn you essay writters.)

Really cool work, with good use of line weights. It looks so clean. I also like the background choice and how faint some things are.

I hate you in the jealous way. D:
I loves how it's all lines and its simpleness.

I like lines too... the gradation in the background is a nice touch. You have a good grasp on perspective. I struggle with it sometimes (in my real work -stuff not on here) I dig it. I also like how you have little details in a lighter shade.

Whaddaya talkin' 'bout? I like the hair .... like golden strands of wheat.

i think how the hair is finalized is fabulous.

Really nice, Huirimeir, really nice. And, no sketchy lines!

The blue and the brown go so wel together. Great!

thanks Roytje!!

extremely great likeness.

the colours used are phenomenal..the lips and eyes..I have tried to pain this woman's face along with others, but hers the most and I have yet to ger all her facial feature correct...so I enjoy looking at this..the only thing I would stay to tune up some..would be the hair , needs a little definition..but that is me of course, you are your own artist and for you this maybe finished. But this is phenomenal! pardon my mispellings.

Beautiful draw! Very well done!

I think you can be a believer of both, and I am. Being Roman Catholic myself I learned about His creation and evolution, and it's funny it seemed easy for me to blend the two, meld it if you will. I believe He exists and created the Earth and everything around us, but I also believe in the Big Bang and evolution... hmmmm maybe that makes me a bit by-polar. That would explain things.

You can have Creation and Evolution, I believe it. Maybe someone just needs to find the middle where both fits.

Awesome piece Opium, love that hair. He does look tired.....

Excellent portrait! Very impressed with it.

Thanks Marcello, patience, sweetcell, and gerbear! :)