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Description

EDIT 25 March 2016... finally updated this thing again... I wonder though... while it is fun to see them all next to each other... perhaps it would be better to make a vertical list, where I can put the little "profile" of every style next to the drawing.
BTW: Since I've been going through some old drawings lately I've actually been using this chart to help me date some of my works a bit.

About the idea
I’m not sure any more how I got the idea, maybe I got it when I was looking through my old drawings, or when I was looking at my Improvement Chart
Anyway, the idea was to draw the same girl in the same pose in the different styles I had through time.
So even though she seems older and younger, let’s say the girl I have drawn is supposed to be 14 years old in every style.
Starting from my first manga drawings till now.

So here are the things I have focused on:
Anatomy: how did I draw faces, hair, etc. ( I later realised I would have been even more fun if I had made full body drawings.

Shading: did I use shadows, how did those shadows look, did I use highlights, etc.

Something I didn’t focus on is quality. So offcourse my colouring wasn’t as smooth on my 12th as you see it here. But I wanted to focus on style, which is ( for me atleast ) a lot about how you choose to draw something, the quality of my colouring wasn’t a choise, I always did the best I could do at that time.

About this drawing
To keep things easy I have the different styles numbers. I will try to stay systematic, so this discirption won’t become just an amzing amount of text to read, but will stay organized.

1.
Age: 12 ( 2002 - 2003 )
Lineart: done in pencil
Colouring: usually felt-pens.
My first manga drawing looked like this. I started drawing this “drawing style from japan” after first watching Cardcaptor Sakura, and later SailorMoon which where always on TV in the morning back then.
I started to learn to draw manga by printing some SailorMoon images and coping features from those images. ( Mind you I didn’t literally copy them ) Here you can see that paper. www.freewebs.com/claudiaverhoe… ( I still have it ) The first times I drew manga I also always drew the mouth open, ‘cause that was how I saw it at the SailorMoon images.

2.
Age: 12 ( 2002 - 2003 )
Lineart: done in pencil ( sometimes fineliner)
Colouring: usually felt-pens.
A few weeks or maybe months after I started drawing “That drawing style from japan” I saw an educational program for kids on tv ( for the dutch people “Klokhuis” ) that had has subject “Manga” so from that day one, I didn’t draw “That japanese drawing style” anymore, I drew manga. Knowing how the drawing style is called gave me the afdvance of being able to search for tutorials. Sadly I couldn’t read English back then, and there weren’t that many drawing books on it yet, so I had to use this dutch website www.geocities.com/teken_manga/… , made by some students, to learn how to draw manga.

3.
Age: 13 – 15 (2003 - 2006)
Lineart: Fineliner
Colouring: pencils
I found someone on some kind of kids website that also drew manga, and asked her for tips. She recommended on of the Christopher Hart books, back then an amazing book to me. ( These days I think it doesn’t even look that much like manga )
It did teach me how to use shadows, and I also started using highlights one the hair. Back then I also finally saw that the weird black thing I drew in the middle of the eye, always just connecting it with the white dots, was actually the pupil and supposed to be round.
I also got the translated versions of some “How to draw Manga” later, which also really helped me.

4.
Age: 16 (2006 - 2007)
Lineart: Fineliner
Colouring: pencils
No major changes that I can mention, mostly small things.
Example:

5.
Age: 17 (2007 - 2008)
Lineart: Photoshop
Colouring: fabercastell pencils
I got in touch with deviantart resulting in starting to learn Photoshop, using highlight and shadows even better, and getting fabercastell pencils.
Back then I used Photoshop to trace the line-art to get smooth pressure simulating line-art. I didn’t use this method for long because of the time consuming tracing.
The colouring of the hair is inspired by among others: SrtaAiko

6.
Age: 18 (2008 - 2009 )
Lineart: printed very light and traced with colouring pencils
Colouring: fabercastell pencils
I’m getting more realistic, drawing more realistic noses, and the eyes in a more realistic shape. I don’t use black line-art anymore, but colouring pencil line-art instead. I also try to use more crontast and darker shadows.

7.
Age: 25 ( 2015 - 2016 )
Line-art: printed very light and traced with colouring pencils ( in digital work sometimes lineless other times with line-art )
Colouring: fabercastell pencils ( most of the time days these Photoshop though )
I admit this may not be a perfect update since it has been 2 years since I've worked with colouring pencils and I'm kinda rusty... My style has gotten a lot more realistic I guess... or atleast compared with how it used to be... but next to realism I hope to also work on making faces less "pretty" and more expressive and stuff.

Honestly I should have submitted this thing earlier, the last one actually already isn’t up to date anymore, I started using only one “Light” in the eyes instead of 3, I’m trying to get a little more realistic… or maybe just a little less manga. I still really like it, but I’m getting fed up with the stereotype stuff.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Media: (mechanical) pencils, fabercastell pencils, MS paint for the numbers, Photoshop CS and crappy basic image-edit-program to fix contrast and other stuff the scanner ruined.
Drawings © me

Description

EDIT 25 March 2016... finally updated this thing again... I wonder though... while it is fun to see them all next to each other... perhaps it would be better to make a vertical list, where I can put the little "profile" of every style next to the drawing.
BTW: Since I've been going through some old drawings lately I've actually been using this chart to help me date some of my works a bit.

About the idea
I’m not sure any more how I got the idea, maybe I got it when I was looking through my old drawings, or when I was looking at my Improvement Chart
Anyway, the idea was to draw the same girl in the same pose in the different styles I had through time.
So even though she seems older and younger, let’s say the girl I have drawn is supposed to be 14 years old in every style.
Starting from my first manga drawings till now.

So here are the things I have focused on:
Anatomy: how did I draw faces, hair, etc. ( I later realised I would have been even more fun if I had made full body drawings.

Shading: did I use shadows, how did those shadows look, did I use highlights, etc.

Something I didn’t focus on is quality. So offcourse my colouring wasn’t as smooth on my 12th as you see it here. But I wanted to focus on style, which is ( for me atleast ) a lot about how you choose to draw something, the quality of my colouring wasn’t a choise, I always did the best I could do at that time.

About this drawing
To keep things easy I have the different styles numbers. I will try to stay systematic, so this discirption won’t become just an amzing amount of text to read, but will stay organized.

1.
Age: 12 ( 2002 - 2003 )
Lineart: done in pencil
Colouring: usually felt-pens.
My first manga drawing looked like this. I started drawing this “drawing style from japan” after first watching Cardcaptor Sakura, and later SailorMoon which where always on TV in the morning back then.
I started to learn to draw manga by printing some SailorMoon images and coping features from those images. ( Mind you I didn’t literally copy them ) Here you can see that paper. www.freewebs.com/claudiaverhoe… ( I still have it ) The first times I drew manga I also always drew the mouth open, ‘cause that was how I saw it at the SailorMoon images.

2.
Age: 12 ( 2002 - 2003 )
Lineart: done in pencil ( sometimes fineliner)
Colouring: usually felt-pens.
A few weeks or maybe months after I started drawing “That drawing style from japan” I saw an educational program for kids on tv ( for the dutch people “Klokhuis” ) that had has subject “Manga” so from that day one, I didn’t draw “That japanese drawing style” anymore, I drew manga. Knowing how the drawing style is called gave me the afdvance of being able to search for tutorials. Sadly I couldn’t read English back then, and there weren’t that many drawing books on it yet, so I had to use this dutch website www.geocities.com/teken_manga/… , made by some students, to learn how to draw manga.

3.
Age: 13 – 15 (2003 - 2006)
Lineart: Fineliner
Colouring: pencils
I found someone on some kind of kids website that also drew manga, and asked her for tips. She recommended on of the Christopher Hart books, back then an amazing book to me. ( These days I think it doesn’t even look that much like manga )
It did teach me how to use shadows, and I also started using highlights one the hair. Back then I also finally saw that the weird black thing I drew in the middle of the eye, always just connecting it with the white dots, was actually the pupil and supposed to be round.
I also got the translated versions of some “How to draw Manga” later, which also really helped me.

4.
Age: 16 (2006 - 2007)
Lineart: Fineliner
Colouring: pencils
No major changes that I can mention, mostly small things.
Example:

5.
Age: 17 (2007 - 2008)
Lineart: Photoshop
Colouring: fabercastell pencils
I got in touch with deviantart resulting in starting to learn Photoshop, using highlight and shadows even better, and getting fabercastell pencils.
Back then I used Photoshop to trace the line-art to get smooth pressure simulating line-art. I didn’t use this method for long because of the time consuming tracing.
The colouring of the hair is inspired by among others: SrtaAiko

6.
Age: 18 (2008 - 2009 )
Lineart: printed very light and traced with colouring pencils
Colouring: fabercastell pencils
I’m getting more realistic, drawing more realistic noses, and the eyes in a more realistic shape. I don’t use black line-art anymore, but colouring pencil line-art instead. I also try to use more crontast and darker shadows.

7.
Age: 25 ( 2015 - 2016 )
Line-art: printed very light and traced with colouring pencils ( in digital work sometimes lineless other times with line-art )
Colouring: fabercastell pencils ( most of the time days these Photoshop though )
I admit this may not be a perfect update since it has been 2 years since I've worked with colouring pencils and I'm kinda rusty... My style has gotten a lot more realistic I guess... or atleast compared with how it used to be... but next to realism I hope to also work on making faces less "pretty" and more expressive and stuff.

Honestly I should have submitted this thing earlier, the last one actually already isn’t up to date anymore, I started using only one “Light” in the eyes instead of 3, I’m trying to get a little more realistic… or maybe just a little less manga. I still really like it, but I’m getting fed up with the stereotype stuff.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Media: (mechanical) pencils, fabercastell pencils, MS paint for the numbers, Photoshop CS and crappy basic image-edit-program to fix contrast and other stuff the scanner ruined.
Drawings © me