Here’s little something I’ve been working on for the past several days. I wasn’t sure whether to share it, but maybe it’s, uhm, insightful At this stage I’m pretty confident this will turn out nicely in the end. Maybe you recognize the character, I gave her a slight animalistic makeover Will say more once it’s finished.
If you’re struggling with your own drawings and aren’t happy with the results, look below.
I did really struggled this time It took me about 26 hours and 17 iterations to get to the final stage. Why so long? Well, mostly because I’m still bad and couldn’t get it right Also I didn’t have a direct reference for this pose (wanted to be original in terms of the pose and the composition).
But remember! As long as you can see that something is off and make a correction, you can eventually converge on something half decent. So believe in your painting and push on!
PS. You may have noticed above that a few roughs look weird (number 6 and 7). This was an attempt at constructing the body to ensure I’m not deviating too much from the simplified anatomy. I ended up using the leg pose, but reverted the head as I didn’t like that angle.
Some things on my entry for the Yin & Yang challenge are embarrassingly wrong too and the first attempt to fix it made it only worse because I kinda worked with a wrong perspective in mind. I hope I can post the finished version soon…no chance you’ll ever see all those accidents before and in-between
Though I have to say, I really like version 3 in your timelapse. The only thing that does not quite make sense to me is that for this position, I’d imagine she would be squatting with her weight on her right toes and basically sitting on her right heel, so the foot would need some adjustments. But apparently you imagined her to sit on the ground with the legs to the side, which makes her attempt to get something from that trash can look much more desperate.
Unfortunately I don’t know that character, so I can’t judge if the changes to her look are a better fit…
oh hey its the trailblazer!! this is looking rlly good! the lineart is really clean and somehow you were able to draw all the little details, i swear the designs are sometimes so hard to draw but you aced it! i hope we get to see it finished!
(i also understand the struggle of drawing for so long it makes it seem fruitless, but you still soldiered on! thats amazing determination)
Thank you @anon61164405, I’m so happy that you like the end result and recognized the character!
Normally her face has more mature features, whereas here I opted for a more cutesy balance. But with her signature outfit, and especially once it will be colored, I think it will all come together nicely and convincing.
By posting this WIP I hoped to show that even if you’re not “good” yet, you can still get a pretty good result if only you keep at it and work slowly through the mistakes one after another. Then things will get easier with each finished painting. The details were daunting to me at first, especially the hair on some characters, but slowly I find it more and more manageable, all thanks to the work I finished previously.
BTW, this image is quite a stress test for my PC and Krita. I looked at how big some illustrations posted online are, and this time I’m working in something around 8K resolution. At one point I saw RAM memory usage spike to 32 GB and the image data itself is around 9 GB, so yeah. I wonder how it will be during the coloring. Some actions are noticeably slower (e.g. showing/hiding many layers, or undo), but still, the drawing itself is perfectly smooth and enjoyable.
Haha, yes I still made a few minor tweaks and additions during flat filling… Oh, where does it stop!? I hope it’s only smooth sailing (rendering) from here on
I imagine this kind of trash can is tall.…if so, there seems to be an inconsistency between the character’s pose and the trash can. The character would not be able to put his arm inside the can
This can be resolved if you place a packing case (or a cement step or something similar) under the character.
You’re right! What we know about the trash cans in real life is inconsistent with the presentation in the picture, possibly creating a tension when taking in the image. You could say this is a creative liberty I took, a gamble that I hope will turn out okay. One one hand I didn’t want to complicate the image, on the other it must still look believable. I drew the trash can at an angle, as if it’s being tipped to the side, which should bring down the rim and make it easier to reach inside. It’s still a bit of a stretch, but I hope it will work out in the end.
The finished painting will be cropped quite significantly and the trash can will be largely in shadow. I want the focus to be on the character and just signaling the idea that she’s rummaging in that gross trash is sufficient. Of course we’ll see how it turns out in practice
It just occurred to me that dogs and cats often drop things… Googling came up with some images similar to this one:
It would solve the height problem but perhaps take away from the simplicity of the scene. Or not. The hard part is that just doing the experience to be sure.
Only if you do this on a copy of the file, just to be safe. When I want to make a drastic change I usually take this precaution…
At this stage I’m pretty confident this will turn out nicely in the end. Maybe you recognize the character, I gave her a slight animalistic makeover 
Will say more once it’s finished.
Also I didn’t have a direct reference for this pose (wanted to be original in terms of the pose and the composition).
the lineart is really clean and somehow you were able to draw all the little details, i swear the designs are sometimes so hard to draw but you aced it! i hope we get to see it finished!
I still made a few minor tweaks and additions during flat filling… Oh, where does it stop!? I hope it’s only smooth sailing (rendering) from here on 
What we know about the trash cans in real life is inconsistent with the presentation in the picture, possibly creating a tension when taking in the image. You could say this is a creative liberty I took, a gamble that I hope will turn out okay. One one hand I didn’t want to complicate the image, on the other it must still look believable. I drew the trash can at an angle, as if it’s being tipped to the side, which should bring down the rim and make it easier to reach inside. It’s still a bit of a stretch, but I hope it will work out in the end.
