dearbhla

pixel studies

Sétanta & the Hound 🐺🩸

This print is exclusive right now to my monthly postcard club! If you’re interested in art and learning more about Irish myths and folklore, consider checking it out here.

I've been resource gathering for YEARS so now I am going to share my dragons hoard

Floorplanner. Design and furnish a house for you to use for having a consistent background in your comic or anything! Free, you need an account, easy to use, and you can save multiple houses.

Comparing Heights. Input the heights of characters to see what the different is between them. Great for keeping consistency. Free.

Magma. Draw online with friends in real time. Great for practice or hanging out. Free, paid plan available, account preferred.

Smithsonian Open Access. Loads of free images. Free.

SketchDaily. Lots of pose references, massive library, is set on a timer so you can practice quick figure drawing. Free.

SculptGL. A sculpting tool which I am yet to master, but you should be able to make whatever 3d object you like with it. free.

Pexels. Free stock images. And the search engine is actually pretty good at pulling up what you want.

Figurosity. Great pose references, diverse body types, lots of "how to draw" videos directly on the site, the models are 3d and you can rotate the angle, but you can't make custom poses or edit body proportions. Free, account option, paid plans available.

Line of Action. More drawing references, this one also has a focus on expressions, hands/feet, animals, landscapes. Free.

Animal Photo. You pose a 3d skull model and select an animal species, and they give you a bunch of photo references for that animal at that angle. Super handy. Free.

I was talking shop with an artist in the studio today and I shared this page from Andrew Loomis, which might be the single most valuable page I've ever encountered in a how-to-draw book. I can't BEGIN to say how many hours this "hanging figures on the horizon" technique has saved me.

(EDIT: Over on another site, someone said they didn’t understand how to read this pic, so maybe adding a second pic and some explanation will help?)

Let’s say I want to draw “Joe” standing further back. I need to know where to place him so he looks like he's the same height, even though he's further away. If I get it wrong, he’ll look giant or tiny.

I can do that by making sure that the horizon cuts thru Joe AT THE SAME HEIGHT, no matter how close or far away he is. In the original picture, it cuts thru the original Joe at the waist.

So let’s look at three different Joes.

A: Wrong. Horizon goes thru his knees. In this context, he’s a giant.

B: Correct. Horizon goes thru his waist, just like the original Joe!

C: Wrong. Horizon goes thru his head. In this context, he’s tiny.

STRICTLY BUSINESS !