Ferstofus's art Reviews on Newgrounds

[仮面]

Oh baby, what a delight. I don't even know where to begin. Let's start with the colors, I loved the intensity (saturation?) of the red and how that's contrasted with the black all around in the hair, the masks; also the work on textures on the girl's skin, dress and hair and of course the use of value (light/shadow) here is _so_ creepy, _so_ creepy, I love it and with the contrast on the stark eyes and how the shadows on the surrounding parts give such emphasis on the terrifying girl to me.

I loved all of that, as well as the liquids dropping from her eyes, nose and mouth, they have such thinness and smoothness to their lines that really unsettles me (in a good way). And the variety in the shapes for the eyes on the right painting plus the textures on the left one (in and outside of the eye) are also giving me the creeps. I just love it.

The masks designs also unsettle me in a good way, giving me the feeling that they are apathetic to me in some way (even though they're just masks), my favorite one is the one right beside the girl's head as I really like the shadows and forms on its eye and nose and with the creepy smile and how open the eye is for I really feel like it has "gotten me", let's say, noticed me and now I'm afraid. I forgot to mention the skull, also giving me the creeps, specially due to the textures and lines I believe. I just love all of this.

Ok for some constructive feedback...I guess I'd enjoy more monstruous features on the masks, like fangs, maybe vertical eyes, there's already one with a beak and one on the top-right has some fangs but I think I'd enjoy more. Though I'm interpretting the human features on the masks were a part of the creative vision here so I don't know how my suggestion could be implemented without going against that, but who knows, maybe I misinterpreted or maybe there's a way.

Anyway, freaking tremendous work of art here to me, thank you so much for making this!

SketchMeNot responds:

Wow, oh my gosh, first of all thank you so much for providing such detailed and thoughtfully worded feedback! It makes me so happy seeing an artwork I worked on inspire so many thoughts! Thank you so much! I'm so glad you like the piece! It was so much fun to work on as I looooove working with themes of horror and general spooky vibes hehe (>w<)

Oh yeah, as for the masks, they were designed by my friend, who I collaborated with on this piece. I only arranged them for the composition and drew over them. I am pretty sure he mentioned that he wanted to keep the masks looking fairly humanoid, as opposed to making them more obviously demonic like hannya masks or something. He has a super unique way of drawing faces so that ended up working pretty well in making the masks look unsettling in a more subtle way. He also created the illustrations featured as the three paintings on the wall hehe (^w^)

Thank you again so much for your awesome comment and thoughts on the piece! It was super nice to read! Thanks again for enjoying my, and my friend's, work on this piece! (^w^)

[Frankelda's Book of Spooks]

Wow, perfect use of value and texture to me, with the light calling attention to the distinct shapes and also strengthening the use of color and some blue x red contrast on Frankelda and also "smooth" and realistic shadows when it comes to value; while the texture specially on the dress, hair and face is intricate yet simple and clear to me.

Also I enjoy the variety of colors, red, pink, blue, light blue, orange, green(?) and how you implemented them, tying them to some areas or elements of the picture and to me making it easy to digest everything without feeling it as chaotic.

The characters are expressive to me too, specially in how you used the lines and shapes, really liked that.

And finally the composition is also pleasant to me, I feel like you organized really well the space ocuppied by Frankelda and the book and their position in the picture, in a way that I can look at and appreciate the ammount of details fully with enough space around for my eyes to rest.

If I could think of any sort of constructive criticism I guess I'd suggest more space between the areas of denser detail (like the forearms and the dress) for I think it would give me even more easiness to appreciate each one, doing something like drawing her right forearm in a position slightly higher and her left one in a position slightly more to the right (though between the freckles and the front part of the garment I dunno how you'd do it, elongate the neck or something? Lol)

Anyway, marvelous job, thank you for making this

StarGureisu responds:

Thanks to you for taking the time to closely analyze my work. 💙 I deeply appreciate your feedback.

[Kill La Kill 10th Anniversary]

Very friendly and pleasant shapes and some well measured use of space in the disposition of the characters and their size and position between each other (I'd personally enjoy more room for the background but I believe that's a stylistic choice). An engaging use of color in the contrast between the lighter tones on the left side (with blue being notable) and the darker ones on the right behind Ryuko (with red calling attention); I'd perhaps consider placing Mako and the family on the left if a heroes x villains duality was a part of your vision but naturally that would mean a whole set of implications for the whole picture, so I don't know. Anyway, also perhaps due to the aesthetics of the source material but I appreciate the simplicity on the texturization or even barely any at all depending on where you look, I think it emanates some calmness which fit nicely with the shapes (funny that I usually suggest more texturization on reviews, today's an exception). What would take for me to give it a 5/5 would be some very detailed and expressive linework, something deeply tied to your personality, because you have the skills but I humbly believe something like that is the only thing missing. That's it.

[self destruction]

Spectacular use of light and shadow in my opinion, creates a contrast that highlights each of the two characters but also intricate details of the drawing and meaningful elements. Ok lines, perhaps I'd appreciate more firmness, but I'll attribute that to style rather than quality; vivid colors, notable specially in conjuction with the aforementioned light and shadow and a balanced ammount of details, think it wouldn't take too much to make it perhaps polluted or lose a bit of clarity but I think you managed to not get there. I'd perhaps appreciate a background, think it could fit nicely, but oh well.

Also, is this a fandom reference or an OC? If it's a reference and I knew it I would have liked to talk a little bit about it considering that, but maybe some other time.

[Mr. Dark]

The joviality of the style hides an elegance in the cohesion between shapes and colors that I hadn't noticed at first, astounding. Also great work on the curvature of the lines, smooth yet firm; the use of light, clear and guiding the focus to characteristic traits; the expressioness of the characters, vivid while not exaggerated and finally textures that, while not the focus of the piece to me, look carefully done. That's what I would say.

What would make this a 5/5 to me would be more intricate and worked on textures, but maybe I just like textures a lot because I keep recommending that in reviews often.

Bundeluxe responds:

Thank you for this review, it always puts a smile on my face when someone puts this much thought into describing something I made!

[METROID PRIME versus JIGGLYPUFF]

Wow, such quality on the details and careful use of lighting, also veeeery smooth animations, specially for pixelart.

[Terra the Vampire of Lucid City]

Omg, this is so cool! The way I see it, love how the thickness of the lines harmonize with the solidity of the colors, your style, as always. Solid use of light and shades too. Loved the sharpness of the shapes of the background also, think it expresses some personality; although I'd perhaps appreciate some curviness to those lines, like claw marks or something similar. I do think the drawing could make use of some elaborate textures on Terra's clothes, skin and hair, if you could maintain that with the balance of color and your overall drawing style. But anyway, great job!

CacklingPumpkins responds:

I'm glad you like it! And thank you for the constructive comment. These go a long way to help me grow as an artist so I appreciate it.

[Iverrian, Forsaken Rose main cover art]

I really liked the angles, the ammount of detail, the use of light, the character pose and the atmosphere, perhaps created with help from the background and whatever she is sitting on. I'd perhaps suggest trying to use on the petals lines and shapes that convey more gentleness, as the way things are I get more feelings of presence and/or size from them; but honestly I think that's a matter of personal preference, as far as quality goes I'd still call it rock solid. 5/5, thank you for this.

[GAMBIT | KANTO!]

In this art I really like the shapes for their solidity, the colors for their vivacity, the lines for their confidence and the character pose/framing for its dynamism; the whole thing is also full of personality, I'd say, and I also like that.

My only concern is that some details on top of the forearms and legs seem to me to blur a little the other strong aspects of the drawing, namely the lines and shapes, or at least distract me a little from them, so I'd suggest IMO to try to harmonize them all better.

The whole thing's still awesome, however.

[Killer Kid]

Good job with the shades and textures of the hair, I appreciate them also in the background but I feel they needed some more work as to convey the appearance of (I believe) vegetation and a hill; some stronger and more vivid colors would also help on that, I feel. And very nice details on the rifle. I can't help but to feel your art could use some more pronounced shapes...specially in the arms, legs and torso, something I'd say you already pulled off in the face and hair. I feel that it could give the character a little bit more individuality. I'm also thinking you could add a little more texture in the kid's skin and clothes but very little, since you already have a degree of detail and too much could make it visually loaded. Also, cool logo. Well, I think that's it, nice job and thank you for making this