Sometimes there are hiccups :)

Willys Bubbles WIP

Yesterday i had one of them, i am too embarrassed to show you the eyes on this one, right now they are actually erased and show nothing but holes :) I just couldn't get the gaze and the pupils right on this which was noticeable when I came to do the second eye (serves me right for not working on both eyes at the same time).
Anyway so my pic for today is that i thought i would show you the progression of the mouth.

For all the artists here, i just wanted to highlight (briefly) the much debated issue of tracing your reference. I am not going to attempt to detail all the ins and out of why one should or shouldn't trace a reference, everyone has their own view points, some educated some not. Obviously my belief is that tracing is ok, its a method/tool in the art creation process much the same as a grid or any other numerous ways, they are all just methods, there is much that goes in the creation artwork beyond whether you trace or not. Just because you trace something doesn't mean that you are able to capture the essence of it and make it work, in fact its the opposite.

This latest hiccup demonstrates it entirely, just because i have traced the eyes to get positioning etc, doesn't mean i am able to render the eyes correctly, the eyes just don't look right. To start with the lines on the reference are dark and flat they don't quite represent the 3D aspect of the eyes correctly and therefore look "off".
For example: it doesn't really show how the eyeball sits within the eye socket, how the skin wraps around the eye, it briefly shows there is a shadow, but the shadow is flat instead of curved in certain places, in real life the eyelid wraps around your eyebrow / socket but in the photo it just looks like the one shade. If you have studied drawing eyes you will begin to understand a bit of how this works. I have only studied it briefly in the past which is i think why i am running into problems right now :) tells me that i need to do more sketching and life drawing... never mind i will get there :) What this means is tho, artists need to undertand and study how anatomy in particular works in order to draw or paint it correctly. You are making decisions throughout the process about what goes where if you dont understand it then you are going to struggle to get it right.

For now though, just wanted to point out how there are hiccups along the way keep plugging away you will get there :) practice practice practice its ALL part of the process :)