Rizian Art

Hey guys! It's been a week since the last entry! Now this one will be a Tutorial about Drawing Women hair! I'm going to show you some basic shapes, where to put the hair, how hair works and how to sketch in a easy way the movement of hair. Let's do this!

For first step in this tutorial we will need to draw some faces, so we can start to work on this:

OK, there are our faces, front view and side view, now in the second part we can see in blue lines the marked area of hair source. This is a guide about from where the hair comes from. so let´s continue with this:

So now in the Third step we have to make some lines outside the head to mark where will be the limits of the hair (Points 1, 2 and 3). Now in point number 4 look at the arrow, this will be the source point of your hair, from this you can start drawing the limits of the hair as seen on the Fourth Step. Always try to add lines starting from point number 4, always depending on the place you've drawn it, it can give more realism to the hair, so we can start to add more lines and detail the front part of the hair:

Now at the Fifth step we must add a line where the front hair will be (point 1) and like I said before, adding more lines in the hair direction (point 2) will give more realism to it. In the Sixth step we must add the lines to detail more the hair, always remember to guide yourself by the source point. The number of lines is always up to you, but remember to detail the hair as most as you can to give it more realism.

And for finishing, let's take a look at some Hair movement.

Always try to remember the direction and the forces of the wind, that's one of the things that affects the most when drawing hair comes out, it takes some practice to understand some movements and adding dynamism to the hair you're drawing. Always take some references about hair, if you want to try something weird, do it but... it can sound a little bit boring, but try to learn the most normal hair styles first, so you can use that to create your own and add more personality to your characters.

I hope you liked this tutorial! I'll be back with a new article the next week, so I'll be on Social Media adding some cool things and some process about my related work! See you soon!

Previous Posts:

Composition and Dynamism in Scenery/Backgrounds
Tutorial: Create Scenery/Background
How I've improved in 8 months
How to get used to your Tablet
Improve your sketch abilities in 10 steps

Hi guys! It's been a long time since I wrote here in the Blog! Now with the new changes the new era of the Blog will begin with this new entry. Today I'm going to give you some advices if you want to start your own Webcomic or you actually have one but it needs some kind of boost to become better. Here we go!

1) It's your story, your drawings, take it very serious! It can be the internet, and most of the people become famous in internet doing some stupid and weird things, this is not the same. Even if you're working on a parody you must take the job real serious like a published comic too.Your watchers will appreciate it and they will respect you and your work.

2) Copying is the worst thing you can do, it can ruin your name, even if it is only in internet, as I mentioned in the previous post, you can do parodies, but you can't copy a previous one, that's really boring, redundant and come on, if you want to do Webcomics what you need first is CREATIVITY. Remember that Google is not stupid, original artwork always comes up first in Web searches.

3) Make the webpage of the comic really simple, do not add all the buttons and gadgets you found on the internet, the less elements you have, the most audience you will capture. PLEASE, for god please, try not to add music to your Webcomic, for most of the people it can be really annoying, usually readers love to read comics by listening their own music or concentrate in silence.

4) If you're taking a break make sure you're telling to your subscribers or followers about it, it's your responsibility to look after those people who are waiting week after week for reading your comic. In the worst of the cases you will get a lot of angry people spamming your e-mail and losing a lot of readers.

5) Make clear the rules since the beginning, if you're saying you will post one page a week that's what you're going to do until the end of the story, do not start to act like "oh... I'm bored, I think I'm ditching the Webcomic this week so the next week I'll do it, they won't notice" You're wrong dude, they actually will notice. Follow your own rules, make a contract with yourself.

6) Use Social Media to get in touch with the people who are reading your Webcomic, they will receive the news and updates and you can get some cool feedback, even a "hey bro, your comic is really cool I LOVE IT!" that's the most cool thing to read, believe in me. Do a Facebook fan page, a Twitter or Deviantart account, so you can be in touch with people in different ways.

7) You must have a special communication with people who are the followers of your Webcomic series, try to start a conversation trough Facebook like "Hey guys, what do you think about the new character in the new arc?" or something like "Hey guys, here's a sketch from the main character". You can always use promotional images for Halloween, Christmas or San Valentine. Always try to make a good interaction!

8) You can use ads and some other ways to earn money with your Webcomic, but remember always not to have a website packed in ads or some weird promotions, that's incredible annoying, do it simple, put like one or two ads, do not disturb people when they're reading your comic, if they want to support you I promise, they will do, so be patient, you can earn money if you do things properly. Some people use donation buttons, sell official merchandise and things like this, be really creative about this, but do not spam people.

9) PLEASE, I mean, REALLY PLEASE, do not use Comic Sans when making the dialogues for your comic, It is a really ugly font! Come on, you must have some sense of taste, try to imagine this: You bought your favourite Comic in a local store, so you open it and you find it all in Comic Sans. If you can, try to delete that stupid font from your computer right now!

10) Experiment and try new things, that's one of the things I love the most in Webcomics, there's people using animated gifs or a incredible interaction between the Webcomic and the website, it looks really incredible and motivates a lot when it comes to read it, it is a different experience, try to imagine what do you want to do and get some help from a website designer or search on the internet for some cool resources for your Webcomic page.

11) Write the information about your comic, a description, a genre, a introduction to the main characters, the concept and if you can, try to link your work, if you have a Blog link it too! People usually loves to know a little things from the person and from the art of the person who writes the Webcomic they like.

12) Get some allies! Do you have some friends who have a Webcomic too? Link them to your page and tell them to link you too in return, you can get some extra visits, you both are winning audience trough this alliance.

Well, this has been all for now, I hope this was useful for you guys, remember that I'll be writting a new entry each Monday, so please stay in touch! Have a great day!

Previous Posts:

Composition and Dynamism in Scenery/Backgrounds
Tutorial: Create Scenery/Background
How I've improved in 8 months
How to get used to your Tablet
Improve your sketch abilities in 10 steps

Hello! Today I come to talk about "how to create a good composition of a scene", rather than a technical process I will tell you some little tricks and tactics to use when creating a scene and make it look more natural and dynamic. At the end of this short article you will have some basic tools to highlight items and make a difference when making the final art.

Let's get started!

To start I should mention the importance of the composition in each scenario, it is always important to see and bring out the elements in the image that we are developing, the aim of our drawings are not to simply illustrate with a good finishing touch, you have to know that a good image or piece of art always communicates something, and have a way to read it. Images are like books, have a beginning and an end, a walk on one side and the other salts, it is important to know which are the elements we want to highlight, the other elements that simply appear to narrate the scene and one that without them the scene just will lose personality and grace.

In the picture I posted at the top of this article we highlight as important elements to the two characters who appear in it, as they have a coloured subtly highlighting over the background, they have a completely different texture to that used in most elements that make up the image, it is also the place, the trees, the river and the sunset that through the colours and shapes show in the background where they are located these two people, and Finally there are the rocks, twigs, leaves and small lumps on earth because without these small elements that harmonize and give life to the image, this would not have the same impact.

There is a small visual theory which have guided me a lot since my college years, is on the visual weights and is called the Gestalt theory. To understand how it works I invite you to see the graph below:




The theory shows the trend of what is more harmonious to our eye and in which space you can put more or less weight, in fact if we put too many elements in the left up corner our image can become unstable and cause a nuisance eye of the viewer. A simple way to check that our image is well balanced is reversing the mirror image as to find possible errors:


There are some drawing software that have this option already built, it is actually very useful on the subject of the composition, because when you invert the image it will light some occasional little mistakes that can end up ruining our image and we never will realize. It is always important to also look at the elements within the crosses, this gives a complete view of the intervention of the elements and the dynamism, a part of which play with the weights always good but following the basic rules above all, you must first know them, understand them and end after break the rules.

I have prepared a video in which I made a quick sketch of a scenario in which I draw enough lines to give my shadows and highlight small features as I go along, I invite you to know my process:

Hello, everyone have a very good day!, it's 21 December, God sure willing this time is probably the last time I write for you :( ... Just joking, hehe, the world won't end so easily, So, let's go into the topic for today. I'll show you one other trick to improve your drawings and especially your sketches, these are little clues I've discovered through my growth as an artist and I want to share with you today! Let's begin:

1. Always when you go to try to start making sketches take about 5 to 10 minutes to perform hand exercises (warm up), later I will make a tutorial on how to do exercises to warm the hand (Step 4) before drawing, I recommend to watch for my Blog for To learn how effective this method.

2. Use some background music when working, an important part of the creative process is always have something to get some inspiration, I turn on the radio almost always when I need to relax and concentrate on my work, sometimes I seek for some classical music collection, however at night which is when my Creativity goes a genius "aggressive" I turn to my favourite music: indie, rock, alternative music, electronic music and some other genres. Always draw with the music that makes you feel comfortable, stay in the mood.

3. Be your own critic, look at your drawings, whenever you feel something strange is that in fact there is something wrong, it's not your imagination, refusing to correct the errors that you see at this stage of a design may end up being a big mistake for when the time of making the final art comes, always remember that a sketch should be clear and easy to understand for the person who will do the final artwork.

4. Always try to be basic (in a good way), try to do simple and light forms you already know, a basic structure with a rectangle one another triangle and four circles can easily form a large car the details are up to you, the basic shape can give you some keys to go to the next step, is an evolutionary process, every step you go the most close you are to the finished artwork, always remind this: The next time you want to draw something your mind has acquired the ability to draw that again better and better than before, and you will need less time to achieve it.

5. Having references is always good and bad at the same time, and that's because often we want to draw like an artist we admire, it's not bad, in fact it is very good way to inspirate you to learn, you can look out on their techniques, projects and processes to devise your own. Personally I always admired the work of Tite Kubo, Jan Van Eyck, Michelangelo and other several artists like Artgerm or Yuumei, not necessarily only cartoonists. The trouble about referencing from other artists is when you start focusing too much on their work and you don't stop to look at your own work and developing your own style, this is a serious part, because we can fall into comparisons and worse on, the imitation. The good part is that our referents can serve us as support material for developing our style, and always move on as individual artists and authentic, instead of trying to move towards being an artist who is not us.

6. Drawing always the same kind of person, the same object, or always use the same theme, it can be part to help you create your own style but if  it is carried to the extreme it can kill you when you need to draw something different, I recommend you explore other styles, other objects, e.g. have you drawn light lamps? Have you drawn a giant robot like a super-robot-chicken? Have you thought of drawing old people? Do you have any own characters? Why not draw them on their childhood, in their middle age and old age as well? When one varies the subjects in which one works one can emphasize one element that makes it easy, normal, common, difficult, strange, horrible and even charming, the artist is working to identify and point out that he likes to have a mental reference to your style and give that strength when drawing that object or that person.

7. If you like to draw a human, or animal, I can recommend to my useful links section in the sidebar of this Blog, you will find several links where you can perform exercises in anatomy, let me say that those wonderful exercises helped me so much in this time, you can spend from about 20-30 minutes a day you will start learning pretty quickly how the human or animal body works.

8. Try sketching only with a pen, is one of the things I'm always recommending to people who want to draw better, in fact it is a way to control the line, when you become unable to erase the lines you'll have to think twice the line you want for your sketch, first you go to into a conditional mode too, to think that you can grab a slight trauma without the pencil/eraser, but this exercise will help you gradually improve your ability to draw, the more you do it will be better, and you'll get used to make a stroke with more identity and ease.

9. Take your time, speed comes after you've mastered the technique, usually many people want to imitate the speed of professional artists in Youtube or Deviantart, well it's normal to want to get to this point someday, hell yeah! we all want to do that, but remember that you should know how to walk first and then you can learn how to run.

10. For each draw you have you will approach an inch closer to the goal you want to reach, whether small or horrifying, is cute, is a work of art that you cherish for the rest of life, and so on. My advice in this part is to fill at least one sketchbook a month, fill it with whatever you want to draw, perhaps at the beginning you must be thinking this: "A whole book? This guy is crazy!" I'm neither crazy nor sane, I rather an intermediate position, hehe. Many artists I admire had lots of notebooks filled, they usually fill 2 or 3 sketchbooks in a month with very epic drawings, most of them in pen or ink, that's so insane,so when you start to fill and fill sketchbooks you can feel like "I'm on the right way every time I do more drawings more easily and fluently".

Now I'm giving you a little gift, something really from my inside, try to keep this in your pocket, you could not miss the "Bonus track" of this publication, I think this is one of the most intimate advice I can give you, I learned this from a teacher of arts at the university, at first his exercise seemed pretty weird, but I said: "Well, why not?". The exercise was to always bring with me a small sketchbook, really tiny (could go into my coat pocket with no problem), then with the "little notebook" you could draw what you wanted anywhere, so the teacher told us the following: "I want you to fill this book with things you like to do, what do you like watch, things you admire, things that catches your attention in good or bad way and if it is possible I want the drawings or cuts that you will add to the sketchbook in colour".

The idea at first seemed odd, but when I filled the booklet I realized that in one way or another I began to realize the things I liked and I didn't know I liked them so much!, so I could easily make a mental map of my identity as a person and also as an artist (likes/dislikes). When you feel you can not go, your goal is farther than you can walk, run or crawl to it, have a look at your life, who you are, and that makes you to feel like you can always give one more step for it. Never give up!.

Identify ourselves first helps to identify the world around us.

Thank you for reading this Blog post, I'll be watching forward to any questions, suggestions or comments from you. I invite you to know my Deviantart and my Facebook page, so you can see new entries, news and the announcement of my upcoming Webcomic series. Do not miss it! Regards, until next time.

Many times when we're writing our stories and we engage too with our main character, develop their personality, habits, ways of seeing the world in which he or she lives, but in many cases we do not give sufficient importance to our support characters beyond to give more weight to the story that we are developing, they also have their own life.

These supporting characters in our story always play key roles in this, to these beings divided by five levels of relevance in the story, here's a brief stopover I've managed to somehow arrange the characters of the stories I've worked with:

First Level: Those characters without them the story just does not make any sense, usually the protagonist, often rivals, depending if the story revolves around the history between these two, or usually the villain or antagonist of the story (not in every story there is a well defined antagonist, but worth mentioning), provided the overall story revolves around their lives and how they relate to each other, a clash between these gives rise to our plot. As mentioned the name, placed first as its priority level in history is always the highest.

Second Level: Those characters who despite having a high relevance in history, with a related life of one form or another to any of the characters of first level, they are not as important as the main characters. A clear example of a character in Second Level is the travelling companion of the protagonist, a childhood friend or a close friend who has enough appearances followed in our history, and surely at some point there will be a piece of their personal history. These characters include them in second-level and supporting characters from the first level and gives a break to the story of just focusing on a single angle.

Third Level: Those characters that appear from time to time, the reader will always remember something specific they did the last time they appeared in our history. For example, a king who always mentioned for doing something and rarely appears to give orders, also a relative that died and always advised the First Level a character or in some cases Second Level, or we can say that an assistant or servant of an important character that appears from time to time to make a dialogue with a character of first or second level would serve as an example. The difficulty of the third level is that many of these people can easily fall into the category of second level or fourth level, depending on how the author manages the character.

Fourth Level: Those characters that appear fleetingly in our stories, but yet many fail to remember at least that was what made or gestures, if you have a funny name that's probably one of the few things that the reader remember him. Not for this fourth-level characters are less important, their work in history is to harmonize and to put bad form "fill" an empty space in a character that does not stand out much, but if you can use for more than a dialogue. A good example of this is a strange encounters with the protagonist, a conflict will gun for anything that comes to mind and so he came, so it goes. Usually these characters appear in a single chapter or fragment of our history, yet many times these characters have gained enough popularity to scale to a third level.

Fifth Level: Those characters we just provide the backdrop, yes, background, his role is simply to make space, when we speak of a crowd can say a thousand, two thousand, three thousand, five thousand people are these characters Fifth Level are present in our history when we mention a "crowd", or illustrate to people walking on the street or shopping at a market, does not necessarily have to name them by Michael, Craig, Allan and Ashley, their work is simply to exist.

Well, those are the five levels that I propose to differentiate the characters in your story, you can serve pretty when creating characters for a new project or simply enhance an existing one, but let me give you some advice:

It is not all mathematics and physics, many characters can fall as well level up whatever the author wants.

I hope you have served my article, thank you for reading this Blog entry, I really am very happy that my words pass through your eyes. I invite you to follow me on Twitter or follow me through my page on Facebook for more updates and new entries! Have a nice day! :)

The sketch is a really important process in drawing, painting or creating something, in my experience as an artist I can say that the sketch is part of the process in any artwork that matters most. Why?

The sketch is the part that gives the composition, character, even your own identity to the artwork you're doing as well as give you the ability to view and correct any errors in your piece. Beyond the reasons for its importance is also there's something I call "The power of the sketch" or "Sketch power". Among an artist is more developed in their ability to get out of his mind a basic sketch will have more ease of making parts with its own identity.

Finding sketch development is mostly a capability that is developing and identifying in each work that you made through your artistic career. For example, there are people that make a persons with models, drawing dolls and others tools, it's not bad, there are people who always starts to draw people with little circles and geometric shapes, the two are different ways to raise an illustration, but, does that really affects the future of illustration? My answer is yes, since basic guiding these lines in our brain in a way we can identify what we wanted to do at first can be a really useful base for achieving what we wanted in our minds.

It is difficult to take a sketch from another person and perform this work under their own concepts, our brain will feel quite uncomfortable and simply will create a barrier between you and the paper. If you are learning to draw I recommend you to force yourself and try to capture objects and bodies in your own way to draw, try to make simple lines, do not complicate, the drawing must be progressive, stylish and not something exact, is not mathematics.

For best results with "the power of the sketch" I'll give these simple tips:

1. Try to draw anything you have to look at and thus adapts to your own thought, have you tried creating a great sword from a RPG just seeing a knife in your kitchen? Have you tried to create a powerful gun just seeing a toilet paper tube?

2. Like fantasy? Have you tried watching people differently? Have not you tried to turn your best friend into a dwarf or a troll or an elf? You can guide you and illustrations of various creatures that have made others to create your own.

3. Once you take notice that something you liked or made you work simpler to make something you already have in mind should have it in mind for next time. For example: I do better when I draw the heads first as a circle and identify the position of the eyes from two cross-shaped lines.

4. Are you a retailer or just like the simplicity of the drawings? You can go for either of these two ways, but can give you the opportunity to explore the other side of your style, it will give you more clues to identify what you like and what's the hardest part to work on.

5. Draw, draw and draw, never stop drawing when you have time to do it.

I hope I have served my advice and my Blog post, soon I will be writing a new one, so be aware of my page on Facebook for an upcoming entry!

And tell me, do you like to be quite retailer or like to be a little easier when drawing?