Inktober 2019 Retrospective | Day 1: Landing

Well, initially, this was supposed to be called "Sprint," but I'd landed on a sketch I preferred quite a bit over what I'd originally intended.

Off to a strong start, I was with with this one. A strong cartoon pose often boasts a clear silhouette. Clear silhouettes mean whatever's being done is (likely) clear. It's clear, or so I feel, that's she's in motion. Landing might be a bit of a stretch if you drop the dust puffs at her feet, really.

Her execution is quite good, I think, that notwithstanding. It's a fun, dynamic pose. Good balance of value. In her design, I left her shoes white to contrast with her black afro. Since that focuses his visual weight up high, it makes her spindly white legs/tiny feet look lighter, almost weightless. Of her group, she's the smallest, the fastest, the most agile, and can double-jump, so it's visually appropriate. Another person in her group has black hair and black shoes. That makes him look solid, sturdy, and comparatively slower. As he's more of a 'strong attack, strong defense type,' I felt that was more appropriate as well.

My main goal, if I remember correctly, was to create not just a strong pose but a strong full body pose. I love me some cartoon portraits, but storytelling is my wheelhouse, and the whole body offers more material to work with as opposed to just a head-shot, bust-shot, or what have you. I mean, yeah, one look at this picture isn't going to download The Canterbury Tales into your mind. But you can see some personality, intent, character. Not just "I'm smiling." Or frowning, in her case.

Suppose I ought to say her name is Jay.

Her lifted boot kinda... kinda goes up a little too far. Looks like something's a little broken over there...

It's weird. Before it was inked, that area made more sense. I think because you could see more comprehensive folds? I dunno. But here, it just looks off. It bugs me. I wish I knew how to fix it, but it's no major deal.

Now, this particular style has quite abbreviated hands so as to speed up drawing time, but I sort of wish I'd put in more effort into the hands. For some reason, throughout this Inktober, I really committed myself to making hands look good. And for once, I think I succeeded. So more handy hands would have been nice here.

Thanks for reading.

#jay #cartoon #ink #inktober