Scarlet Crusader (unfinished)

For some reason I felt like drawing a Scarlet Crusader. Fear teh religious zealots.

Comments appreciated.

disrigarding the anatomical errors and the flatness of the volumes, it's quite nice.

I dont like the face, but the rest is very nice.

Could you point out which anatomical errors you see, TDR? I'm eager to learn. And well, this is one of the rare times I even tried shading, so I'm a noob at volumes as well ;)

edit: nevermind about those errors, found out by comparing

First of all is composition, if you have planed the image before starting to draw then you didn't had to shorten the lower legs to fit into the paper.

The head is lil bit too small, or the arm is too big.

The length of an arm must hang down at the hip, your arm if is hanged down, it goes to the knee. Also the neck looks very long comparing to where shoulders bend.


Before starting choose good composition, always mark more space at the bottom, keep in mind that if you put frame around it the frame will cover more space. Then draw the background, then the subject. And at the very end you can add details such as armor, patterns, decorations, and jewelry.

i like it actually, apart from the problems already told. i think its awesome!

The nose is kinda funky, but I really like the belts and arm.

I don't know about you, but if i stand up straight and let my arms rest by my side, my wrists are at my hip, my hands go past the hip.

That's not the actual paper size actually, don't judge it on composition here, it's just the way the scanner cropped the image while scanning and I didn't feel like adding white.

About the head, I have the impression it's even a bit too big. The arms are too long but the legs seemed fine to me.

He was talking about the guy in the picture, who's arm is indeed a bit too long.

the legs don't seem fine at all, the knee is way lower than it's supposed to be.

The only really disturbing anatomical problem is with the legs being too short (starting of the knee). Once you correct that, most of the other problems (for example, the lenght of the arm) will be a lot less noticeable.
Also, the squeletton thing you use doesn't look correct to me.

ja, the skeletons legs look screwed up.

the bottom part of the leg should be the longest i think.

I've looked up a few skeletons, they're actually correct. I can't just lengthen the legs to fix the arms, that would screw up his torso. To fix my errors I should lift the position of the knees without changing the legs' length and shorten his arms.

Easiest way to fix it? Just draw it again.

Don't be afraid to throw away your drawings (not something I recommend), and don't develop any personal attachment to any single image; this will prevent your ability to move on and learn.

Your skeleton comparison with your drawing isn't right; you're lining up some joints which are bent on your crusader but hanging loosely on the skeleton. The arm is too long and the legs are too short (the top of the knee on your guy lines up with bottom of the knee on skeleton). It's not a major problem, but throws the viewer off and as such they can't focus on the content. Proportion is key, and must be established at an early stage.

As far as defining volume, not too bad. Keep in mind a consistent light source. It jumps around here a bit, conflicting on the face and shoulder plate. Push your values; let's get more black in there to define and delineate the areas of interest.

The details are quite nice; I like the gauntlet and belt areas.

I hope to see the finished version soon.