An Egg-sellent Recovery

Well I'm aiming to Capture an Exeggcute for @Seppe

 

Claiming this!

 

First of all, this is a cute pun and a cute concept. Since I know you've got a bit of art experience, I'm going to be a little more in-depth with this one.

Let's start with the first impressions on this. We have an interesting perspective of a Chansey holding up an egg of an Exeggcute, with what is presumably its other "siblings" cheering and watching nearby. The first thing I notice is the interesting perspective you've set for the scene, which I applaud you in stepping out of what might have been a comfort zone to do.

Pokemon anatomy seems like a good place to start. The Exeggcutes all have individual features that seem in good proportion to their bodies. They look fine, but then again they are very simple mons, so that's great. If I wanted to nitpick, I think the only thing I'd like to see is a little bit more of an indication of what's been fixed that sets it apart from the others. There's a little bit of a thing on top of its head, which makes me think that a crack has been repaired, but then you have its sibling over to the right looking pretty happy even with its skull-shell busted straight open, yolk showin' to the world. However, I think that'd be fine if you maybe insinuated "band-aid" or "bandage" a bit more on top of the fixed one's head, if only to set it apart from the others a little bit as an individual.

One of the things I wanted to point out was the Chansey's anatomy. One of the first things I notice is that she looks to be missing her egg pouch, or that the apron she wears covers it. However, it shows no sign of it being beneath. There is no bump of where the egg is supposed to be. Perhps that dark spot above the apron is supposed to insinuate an empty pouch, but that doesn't come across very clearly if so.

On her proportions: let's check a reference here. If we were staring at her straight-on, the Chansey in your drawing would still be a fairly tall for a 'mon of its species. However, in your drawing, we're viewing her from partially above. This would foreshorten her height by a lot. She would be more squat and round than she would even appear from a level perspective. On top of that, I feel like we could even see a little more of the top of her hat and her head.

I get this impression from the treatement of your perspective. When we decide how we're viewing a figure on a plane, we take clues from its surroundings to decide where our view is from. It's harder to measure perspective in organic shapes than it is in geometric, so our eye automatically goes to the geometric. At the bottom right--the brightest side of your work--we have a very tall perspective of those desks (or chairs). This tells us that our perspective is pretty high up, perhaps almost from a security-camera type view. But our view on the body and her taller proportions makes us theink that we're a little lower. The perspective of the desk is also confusing. From the bottom edge, we can see that it's a very curved counter, but the top is actually curved less than the bottom--a trait that gives the impression of viewing it from a shorter viewing point. The edge of that counter should be sweeping out at least as much, if not even a little more (since it's closer to the viewpoint), than the bottom edge. Also, pay close attention to the little signs on the front of the counter. They're pasted onto a curved surface, but don't have a curve themselves, and there also seems to be no foreshortening on their symbols.

It's these things that make it seem a little... off. That being said, I think that you came really close to nailing it! Your tile perspective is nice, as I can see that as it goes off to the top right, they get shorter, as they should with linear perspective. I think once you got to the back, the only mistake you made was that the tiles suddenly got a little wider, when that should be flipped. After the Chansey, it just feels like you missed a line or two to divide the tiles. Another thing that feels off is the concave little alcove that's behind the desk. The lines you have to mark where it dips back tilt off to the left, which gives the wall an unstable, topsy-turvy feel. Using a ruler or some other straight-edge when it comes to perspective really helps make your solid objects feel, well, solid!

I want to move onto your shading. I like the fact that you've used a bold light source from the bottom right (presumably a glass door of sorts that's letting in sunlight). For the most part, I like the shading that you've done. You've acknowledged the shadows on the chair/table (going to call it a chair from now on), the Chansey, the individual eggs, and the desk, but there are still some things I'd like to point out. For example, I don't see a shadow for Chansey's raised arms on the ground or on her body. Her hat also seems to be void of shading. The shadow of the counter is shorter than that of the chair even though it's presumably a taller object. Chansey's shadow is even darker than the chair's, despite the chair being closer to the brightest light source. I feel like the chair's should also be far taller, as the gap on the inside of the shadow doesn't correlate very well to the height of the chair's legs.

Another thing I'd like to address is the quality of the edges of these shadows. Here is a good example of what I mean by the shadow edges. Notice how on the edges of the shadows get fuzzer the furthe away they are from the thing they're being cast from. I'd like to see some sort of acknowledgement of that in your shadows--especially on the chair, the counter, and the Chansey.

The shading at the top left, of that wall, is also worth noting. On top of the wall line being a bit curved, the shading strokes are also curved. If you're going to use sketchy shading, you have to be really careful on how you exe(gg)cute it. These lines also added to the impression of the wall drastically leaning away. The lines there also seem a little sloppy.

I want to see from you the kind of careful filing and lighting that you did on the bottom-most table on everything else. Everything on that table is well-filled in to the edges, very well defined, and beautifully and smoothly blended. If you can replicate that quality of shadow on the rest of the work, it would be breathtakingly spectacular!

I'd also like to see some more constrast. The top left is almost devoid of contrast, with the Pokeball and the tiny shadow being about as dark as anything over there gets. It all feels a very same shadow uninteresting gray at the top left compared to the brilliantly dark shading at the bottom middle and on the right side. I'd also like to see some more whites--you have this bright light source that seems to peter out fairly quickly, with only an inkling of its light touching the Chansey. It gives a lot of the work a very gray, dingy feeling.

For now, I'm going to score this a 38/45, not yet passed. I feel like this is almost there (and gosh, is it cute!). A little bit more attention and TLC to the shading on this and fixing some of the more obvious issues with perspective (like the back wall and the counter) would get you there perfectly!​