Alright, Mit, there really is no easy way for me to put this because I know you won't like what I'll say. The chief reason why I keep asking for critiques don't exactly have anything to do with a lack of self-confidence. Instead, it all amounts to being nice and the fear of any sort of consequence for choosing not to follow it. If I had my way, I'd produce anything without a care in the world and get everything produced at a much faster speed. While I don't have a problem with making changes, it's just when the critiques are forced upon me instead of simply optional changes where I feel very uncomfortable. Therefore, I have to constantly make baby steps in my work just to keep the critiques under control and the changes more bearable. Originally, I was thinking that the overall harshness from you and others with a similar mindset was warranted to an extent and that you guys knew better than me. By following your advice to the best of my ability and behaving myself, I’ll receive better treatment; however, I'm realizing that this was not even a realistic option in the first place. In spite of winning you guys over from time to time (although I wonder how sincere those moments are), it is now painfully obvious that it’s an uphill struggle with no real payoff. I could draw like Leonardo da Vinchi as far as I know (even stop “sugarcoating” everything I say), yet I doubt how much of an actual difference it’ll make because you’ll still find some other reason not to be truly satisfied. It all just boils down to an invisible hierarchy where the people who act and think like you from the get-go receive the most benefits. Besides driving myself miserable, the worst part about struggling with your standards is unintentionally discounting the numerous people who actually think I'm smart and talented. Say what you will, but I honestly care about them because they're way more supportive and respectful than you guys give them credit. I wanted to bring these issues up several times before and I actually have every now and then. Sadly, those attempts backfire due to not only a bandwagon effect against my favor, but how you guys paint yourself as the actual good guys. Besides calling me out on my own flaws (even if they are nothing more than assumptions you gathered from shallow observations), you also hid behind seemingly well-crafted arguments that make it sound like you know what you're talking about. With critiques that are more like nitpicks (i.e. Mario’s line of action), I have good reason to believe that you’re just looking for ways to vent out any frustration towards people like me. Even if you’re just trying to help, how you provide it is causing a little more harm than good. Now, since I want to complete my puppets by the end of spring, I request that I'm allowed to follow my own instincts without fear of any penalty. I'm still open to any suggestion I'll receive in the future, but I don't want so much as passive aggression over a blunder since that’s highly counterproductive. Also, I would deeply appreciate it if this applies for anybody else you and your friends interact with. I get that there are really stubborn people out there that you just want to smack in the face, but sticking to the high road leads to less trouble in the future. By the way, I took your advice into consideration, Mit. While I discussed why I shouldn’t follow the more stressful advice anymore, I'm not petty to the point where I dismiss it. I probably got this right anyway, but please don't look down on me if this is not what you had in mind at all.

I don't want to start anything, but Mario's line of action is certainly not a nitpick, as a line of action is basically the essence of any pose. I think Mit brought up some very fundamental and critical points when talking about the line of action and the silhouettes, as those are both extremely critical and fundamental. In fact when taking a figure drawing class, the line of action is usually one of the first things you talk about as that is how you typically start when drawing a figure. It really helps push the pose and make it interesting. Also what Mit said about "cheating" to make an interesting pose is extremely valid. I feel if you worry too much about making every little thing make perfect sense, a dynamic pose will be harder to create. Of course things still do have to make sense, but there are areas in which you can "cheat" a bit (i.e. the hammer not technically being held, but the illusion is still given) to make the pose look much better. Anyway, the new arms crossed pose looks tons better! :thumbsup: As for the hammer pose, I feel like his balance is thrown off a lot, as he looks like he is about to topple over. The head should typically be over the foot with the weight put on it (or if the wight is equally on both feet, which is rare, it should be in the middle of them). So in this case, the head should be almost directly over his left foot. :D

The hammer pose is getting there, but I'm obviously not Mit. [quote="Evil Yoshi Toes"]I feel like his balance is thrown off a lot, as he looks like he is about to topple over.[/quote] Pretty much. The folded arms are looking better as well.

Okay, Evil, I think I didn't make this actually clear. While Mit's general advice is helpful, the thing is that I know how lines of action work and his advice implies that I'm oblivious of this concept. While I'm not sure if that was Mit's intention all along, the way he phrased certain things and how he put more emphasis on his examples while putting down mine is way too similar to other instances where I dealt with more toxic artists in my life. For the record, I don't hate anybody who is more talented and smarter than me; however, I mind it when those traits are used to paint me as an ignorant monster with little to no hope of redemption. You wouldn't believe the lengths I break my back just to prove them wrong and treat me with more respect. When it seems like how it's not affecting much in the grand scheme of things and how it's not just you who think something's off, you could see why I bring my foot down.

I think you're missing an important detail. The hand should be behind the head. Otherwise it implies the hammer would be in front of Mario's face. Additionally, the hammer looks bent: [spoiler][img]https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/171084683637948416/280069809214062592/unknown.png[/img][img]https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/160304318430314496/280066486243033089/unknown.png[/img][/spoiler] Here's what's being implied by the positions of the hand and hammer. For the pose to read well you kinda have to cheat the hammer. In the end it would probably do you some good to better apply Mit's suggestions/criticisms

Now you're running into a problem where Mario's hand / hammer is going straight through his head, unlike the TTYD pose. Because of this, I prefer the off-balance pose more; it uses the line of action well, and the only thing you'd really need to do is rotate everything clockwise from the body up. I'd also like to bring up the use of line weight and making it a little more uniform; it's strange seeing thick outlines facing the light source right next to thin ones. I understand you're frustrated for not receiving praise but instead people are picking out all of the flaws, but that's the process of learning to improve. I've gone through phases of constant back-and forth only to find my ideas didn't work in the end. It's frustrating, but it's crucial. No art is perfect, but there's always better ways to compose art. Playing the victim just means you'll never learn them. (Also, wasn't uploading directly to the forums discouraged? Can't you set up an imgur account?) Edit: ninja'd

my intention was not to sound smarter and superior to you and i'm pretty sure i tried to make my critique as unbiased as possible so if even then you still got that out of it then i'm not entirely sure what to say. if you think i'm "hiding" behind "seemingly well-thought out arguments" (???) then maybe it's worth taking a step back here. i think your past experiences are making it so you see harshness and superiority complexes where they are not actually there. while i can't speak for everyone nor can i control a bandwagon effect, it's usually because if one person speaks up, then other people who've held their tongue will also speak up. you've been resilient to such critiques before so i can only assume this is where the mindset comes from, but this is a forum post, not a breakdown of your personality. but again i think my post was made as unbiased as possible and even if i sugarcoated it it would've been met with this response for being "insincere". i would hope you'd know by now that considering the obvious effort i put into making that post that it was a sincere post and i'm not going out of my way to try to knock you down a peg. the new poses are much better and achieve a dynamic look well. keep in mind that this critique is not to put down your own efforts, but to provide you an alternative view on how the situation could be handled from those with different backgrounds. by taking those into account it helps you achieve a more universally appealing look. i believe the hammer charging pose should be angled in the opposite direction (leaning right, not left). the TTYD pose may not have the most expressive line of action, but it works and is plenty dynamic because it's both expressive and balanced. mario's pose is most similar to that of a batting stance: [img]http://www.qcbaseball.com/hitting/images/battingstance.jpg[/img] which conveys to the viewer best what he's trying to do. nobody is trying to rob you of your respect by critiquing you. if anything that's the opposite: if people didn't respect you, would they go to such lengths to try to help you improve what you're trying to do? there's no ulterior motive here, nobody except you gets anything out of this.

I'm not afraid to admit this, but I have some intense trust issues. Even though it's something I need to work on, it's just that I often get burned too many times when I let my guard down. One moment everybody seems alright with me and willing to give me friendly advice. Then they eventually see something about me that bothers them and ignore me overall at best. Sure, it doesn't stop me from at least attempting to fix the problems, but do you understand the frustration I feel if it only satisfies them for a couple of months before returning to ignoring me if I'm lucky? As a result, I'm always treading carefully and not opening myself up unless I know everything turns out well in the end. By the way, Cake, I don't really want praise as much as you think. Actually, I'm fine with critiques as long as they aren't so intense and are straightforward in the way that I'll execute them correctly in a couple of tweaks at most. If I wasn't okay with critiques (even the occasional intimidating one), I'd actually let out more outbursts and refuse to even try them. Sometimes, it's just that I have my limits and it's hard to keep a leveled head for too long under pressure. Anyway, here's an adjustment that takes my ideas and works with yours. Even though this one is hosted on Imgur, I typically avoid doing that for smaller images done quickly. If it's a problem to host any kind of image through attachments, then I'll host it all through Imgur for now on. [img]https://i.imgur.com/GNSN2n9.png[/img]

Just regarding the layering of the objects, I think maybe for that pose his arm should be in front of his head while the hand remains behind, and the back of the hair should go behind everything. :)

I looked into it several days ago and the results are below. Also, it's good to work on Koopas again! [img]http://i.imgur.com/3ht86O5.png[/img]

I think the new hammer pose looks good! For the fist, I'd go with B. A looks more like the hand is coming toward us (like he's gonna punch us), so I think B makes more sense. I think the back pose looks good, and I agree the nostrils aren't really needed. The only thing that maybe looks a little funny is how the foot connects to the shell rather than to the body. I feel like maybe the shell should go in front of the foot rather than behind. :)

[quote="Cake"]I'd also like to bring up the use of line weight and making it a little more uniform; it's strange seeing thick outlines facing the light source right next to thin ones.[/quote] Sorry I'm late on this, but you didn't quite understand: [img]http://i.imgur.com/xMYBTJ8.png[/img] You're using thick outlines facing the light source, when thick outlines are normally used to denote which areas are in the shadow. It works against the point of using different line weights. [img]http://i.imgur.com/dChgIg3.png[/img] Aside from that, the difference between the thinnest (which is already a thick enough line, unlike my circles that thin out) and thickest is around 7x or so. The thick lines are a little too thick, especially when they intersect between two shapes. This seemingly makes Mario's feet a separate object from his torso; all disconnected and ray-man like. Also worth noting from the original paper mario style is how a thicker line weight surrounds Mario, but everything within that outline is a thinner outline. It helps keep details from being lost while separating Mario from the environment. [spoiler][img]http://scoop.previewsworld.com/Image/NewsImage/4/174526/842016/2[/img][/spoiler] I'm not trying to say that you shouldn't vary line weight at all; I'm just trying to point out the problems with how it's currently being used.

There's a reason why thick outlines are placed "haphazardly" throughout. You say that thick outlines should only work like shading; however, I use my thick outlines for emphasizing notable parts of a puppet. For example, the outline gradually thickens when it goes around the nose. Also, the object's size plays a role in the overall thickness, which is why the thinest outline of the main part of the cap (not the brim) looks a bit thick. Besides, even if I took your suggestion anyway, there's still the problem that the outlines won't match up with the light source once I start rotating them all around in animation. Before you mention it, there is no practical way to have a dynamic outline rig, and there's no chance I'll ever use the animation style used in [i]Color Splash[/i] unless I'm dealing with crowds of characters. Now, you have a concern that my Paper Mario puppets have a Rayman-like quality to them, but if you look carefully at the original sprites, that also exists to an extent. While it's no excuse for me to purposely loosen up on the quality of my work, even the original sprites have flaws in their anatomy and posing. Still, if the feet are that much of an issue, I'm willing to thicken those outlines a bit if needed. As for the thick outline that borders all of Mario in that artwork, it's somewhat possible for me to emulate that effect. All I need to do is create a copy of the puppet after I'm done animating the whole scene and place it behind the puppet (although I have to retexture and resize it first). Still, I would only do this if I absolutely have to (especially since I never tried this technique before), which doesn't seem like it's going to be the case anyway. You see, if you look at the actual game footage, all the characters in that game lack the very thick outline you mentioned before. The image you're showing me is actually promotional artwork, which I'm not that concerned about emulating down to the last detail. Pardon me for stating this, but the "problems" you have about my outlines seem a lot more like insight on your personal tastes in art. While there's nothing wrong with that, it's just that I can't cater to every opinion I receive. On top of that, there are people who would like the outlines to remain the way they are instead of changing them based on your suggestions. If my current outlines are that much of a problem anyway, then I'd rather take the more uniform approach I had in my previous art direction.

I was going to upload this last night, but it was very late and I'd rather go to bed. By the way, for the front head, one idea I came up with is to apply a couple of breaks in the outline. I'll show you this a bit later, but it'll be between where the bridge of the beak starts and the base of the beak starts. [img]https://i.imgur.com/JbBfOt9.png[/img] By the way, I laid out the sheet for Mario already. If I have to apply those last minute changes seen in the progress sheet, it wouldn't be out of the question at this point. [spoiler][img]https://i.imgur.com/nk8MKta.png[/img][/spoiler]

Finally knocked out all the hands! Once I get some more feedback, I'll finish up my Koopa. For now, I'll work on Kent C. Koopa's hands a bit. [img]http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb109/E-Man276/Progress_sheet_zpsibgv2rfy.png[/img]

I've managed to get two progress sheets out, but only because Kent's large size warranted a separate one. [img]https://i.imgur.com/RoN4zK8.png[/img] [img]https://i.imgur.com/yFi0VGS.png[/img]

Kent Koopa's new hands look much more natural! For his pointing hand, A looks good to me :) For the fists, I'd maybe make the thumb only show on the bottom of the hand more like in the example the person made for you. In a fist facing the viewer, the index finger should be in front of the thumb and the thumb should be coming more from the bottom than from the side, and the side of the hand where the thumb connects isnt quite so visible. I'm not sure if I explained that well, but basically I think you should make it look a bit more like the example the person made :D By the way: [img]https://thumb9.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/2295023/512892292/stock-vector-punch-color-icon-squeezed-fist-isolated-vector-illustration-512892292.jpg[/img] This is a very simple clip art, but looking at extremely simplified images can help you see the bare minimum you need for something to be recognizable, then you can expand based on that to make it look more realistic or more in a specific style. That's just a tip I've been taught so I thought I'd share it, I think it can help out a lot

That fist really was helpful to me! I managed to hammer these new fists out along with some new parts. By the way, the good captain replied when I was working on this new progress sheet, so I still have plenty more changes to address. Thankfully, that just gives me something to do. [img]https://i.imgur.com/STpXbfa.png[/img]

It's a bit late to be saying this, but the front/back/left/right poses are offputting to me because you don't usually see anything at those angles in the game. It's usually just a 3/4th angle facing forward or back, and flipped accordingly. I'll admit that they have their uses, however.

Admittedly, not every character in my project will have these angles. Kent C. Koopa and the Big Lantern Ghosts are two examples. Basically, my guidelines for which characters are granted more than the bare minimum on their master texture sheets are: - The character is a main character from the original work (Mario, Peach, Bowser). - The character has a very important role in the story regardless if they had a starring role in the original work (Doopliss). - The character is reoccurring enough to warrant additional permanent parts (Goomba, Koopa Troopa). - The character is just an edit of an existing character with a high amount of parts, so creating new parts isn't a big deal (Goompapa, Dry Bones). I realize that it's a lot of work and I would have started animating a lot sooner; however, it helps when creating more dynamic poses.