Artist Q&A
Jenine Woodhouse, Australia
Advice from pro artists on dynamic figures, mutants, Aurora Borealis, magic wands, decorative stone, and more.
Answer
Michelle replies
Dynamic poses are fun for the artist to create, exciting for the viewer, and can strengthen the story and composition of your illustration. They’re best achieved with loose gestural thumbnails or sketches, in which you can visualise the pose, angle and composition of the character.
During the initial sketch stage, a figure can become flat or stiff, taking away from the dynamic energy and storytelling that an artist wants to create. Some common situations that can cause this include lack of depth, inaccurate perspective or foreshortening, a non-dynamic camera angle, and a pose that’s not based on the beginning or ending of an action.
You can turn a non-dynamic pose into a dynamic one by creating gestural thumbnails. Work on top of a chosen gestural thumbnail with cylinders, blocks, volumes and perspective, before fleshing out the final pose with lighting, rendering, detail and special effects.