Art: Then and Now (AKA Show Everyone How Much You've Improved)

[Amazing_Grace]

I promised I would start this topic a while back and finally got around to scanning up a bunch of my old arts and some new good ones.

So! I bring to you the "Art: Then and Now" topic!

Basically a place people can unashamedly show off their art from back when they sucked eggs, and from now when you dazzle the heavens with the strength of your talents. No place for shame in here! Give us the worst you've got, and the best you've got, because modesty has no place here either!

Arts do not have to be iDOLM@STER related because I didn't even know iM@S was a thing when I sucked this bad and I never draw iM@S fanarts anymore so all my best ones are OCs lol, but if they are, that's OK too! All kinda of fanarts and OC drawings are welcome. You can present them in whatever order you like, and as many images as you want, though it might be nice to either include links to outside sources if you want a lot of pictures in the same post, or to post them separately.

To kick things off, I'll get started. I really want to do at least two or three bad ones (and oh hey, I guess I have a few really good ones too), so I'll just show you the first two and post some more after others have had a chance. Because I always wildly spam threads I open before anyone else even has a chance to participate.

First, the bad:



...OK, what the heck even IS this?
Like, those noodle arms, and the body shapes, and the anatomy, and the HAIR, and the CLOTHEEESSSSS...
AND.
THAT.
DRAGON.

I JUST CAN'T YOU GUYS.

Now, some good.
This is not my best, I'm personally saving my super-duper-OMGHOWDIDIEVENDOTHIS drawing for a little later.

But hey, take some OC concept art.



Let's be honest, I chose this one so you can see how differently I draw elves now.
Holy geez.
Her anatomy makes sense.
And there aren't all these random lines all over.
And her clothes don't suck.
AND OH LOOK SHE'S INKED
WHAT GRACE INKED SOMETHING!?
THROW A RIOT
IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD
ARMAGEDDON
I'm sorry.

Also just so I can kinda clear this up briefly.
This characer has ice powers.
That hand in the lower left corner is kinda shooting out little ice needles.
Those aren't detached fingernails or whatever you could think they were.

So hey, your turn, guys! what are your best and worst drawings? Feel free to spread things out into multiple post, image dump thirty pictures in one post at me, go wild!

[altuixde]

The one on the left is the second thing I've drawn since I decided to learn how to draw. The one on the right was finished a week later, after I had read how to ink properly.

This is a great idea for a thread, Grace! I can't wait to see more images from the people on this forum who have been drawing for many years.

[Amazing_Grace]

This is a great idea for a thread, Grace! I can't wait to see more images from the people on this forum who have been drawing for many years.

Why, thank you. Marx kinda helped me think of it too, so props to him.

It's really cool to see how much people have improved. And it makes us all feel good about ourselves too. If these people could go from what they did then to what they can do now, then I can too! INSPIRATION~.

[MetalPredat0r]

May as well contribute to this. I post regularly on my own fan art page so you guys already know how I draw right now. Now time for some past stuff. Here's a drawing that I made over a year ago and I still consider one of my best works of all-time.



I remember drawing this around sophomore year of High School, hence the date. I took plenty of time working on this one picture. This is of an original superhero character I created called "The Patriot". This was around the time I was experimenting with comic book-esque shading and details and I still think this piece holds up well today.



Next up here is an old picture of Maka Albarn from Soul Eater. It certainly has it's faults especially with the head and eyes being way too big and disproportional to the body. My future works fixed these issues from then on.

However, nothing compares to the horror that is.....my drawing style as a freshman!



*barf*

Yes, I was THIS bad back then. This is a drawing of my character, Nicole Sanchez, with her little sister, Mia. It REALLY shows it's age and is absolutely dreadful. I honestly plan on re-doing this one day with my current style and plan on posting it and the original here for a bit of a comparison of how I've improved as an artist. I can't believe I thought this looked good back then......

That's all I have for now.

[Amazing_Grace]

That first one actually wasn't bad at all! You were still good back then!

But yes, looking back on old drawings you thought were good is just hilarious.
AlsothatfreshmanyearoneIkindalaughedabit
Butthat'swhywe'rehere
Tolaughatourselves
Andotherpeople

Well, I think I'm going to go ahead and do another one myself.  Let's show you how bad I was at the very beginning, along with something I actually REALLY liked.



OH MY GOSH WHAT GRACE
GRACE WHAT
GRACE
WHAT IS THIS
WHAT DID YOU DO
I did this when I was, like, 9. Considering, it might not be that bad, but...but...my gosh...
...what even is it?



AAAHH!!!
WHAT IS IT?!
More ugly because you guys I really want you to see these. One more then I'll display the "YAY".
But my gosh...those hands (if they can even be called that)...the legs...
SHE'S YELLOW
LITERALLY YELLOW
WHAT THE HECK?!



This one's from...10 or 11, I wanna say. I still thought I was good. Oh my gosh.
...what's with those proportions?
And...and the head...
...but...
...but those proportions...
...oooooohh gosh... *buries face in knees*


Thankfully, I don't draw like that anymore. Now, I draw like this:


KAIDEN~
Considering I can't ink or do, like, anything, I am very proud of this. I actually think it's one of the greatest things I've ever done. Like, I actually inked! And shaded! And it didn't ruin literally everything! YAY~!
Love this OC too.
Like, this guy.
Can't even explain how much fun I have with him.

Funny story about this guy: his whole personality is just a troll. Everything he says and does is to get a negative reaction out of people.
So I'm scanning this drawing, and I finish, and I leave to go take care of something. When I come back, I lift the scanner and see the drawing has become stuck to the top of the scanner (which happens sometimes from like, static electricity or something? Science geeks, correct me on that). I then spend about five minutes furiously clawing at the picture to get it off...
...and then I slowly turn to my pile of already-scanned items...and I see I already removed Kaiden's drawing from the scanner before I left.
I then proceeded to yell at a piece of paper for about ten minutes.

[Okayu]

Bumping this thread for newer artists to get a chance to join in.

[Amazing_Grace]

Lolol remember when I was active on this forum?

Me neither.

But I came back to laugh at myself because now I'm so much better that my GOOD stuff looks like crap now leeeel