THE Scribble Smorgasbord

[Lin Beifong]

Spoiler: Uniju

1. (Bridge)
2. (Frog leaping)
3. (Cookie ghost)
4. (rocket take-off)
5. bro dw im telling you

Another case with a clear favorite, but difficult second place. I really adore the shadow work in this picture, and the bold black shapes in the background cityscape. For the runner-up, I both like the frog and the cookie one a lot. I enjoy the theme and framing in the cookie one more, but the frog picture just uses its elements so cleverly, I feel like I'd be doing it a disservice not putting it in the second spot.

Spoiler: FWD

1. Parked in the Dark
2. "Adventurous, willing to take risks"
3. Commercial District
4. Lights out
5. Gorillas in the Crisp

Finally, we arrive at a set where I struggle to pick the favorite. I think in terms of composition and technique, Adventurous is the superior picture. But I just adore the framing device in Parked so much that it narrowly comes out on top for me. I know you personally would probably put Lights out at the bottom. I just like how dynamic the concept is, with the foreshortening, speed lines, and the dutch angle in the background. The pose is a bit wonky, but it's still an interesting picture.

Spoiler: YTSSM

1. Budget Star
2. Near the Dark Star
3. Going Live at Yoshi's Theater
4. Documenting the Fawful Express
5. Beachside Shore

I like the sense of depth in Budget Star, as well as the patterned tiles. Good job also with sticking to the Mario & Luigi RPG theme throughout all of your rounds.

Spoiler: GBA

1. Wandering the Mind's Forest
2. Hard to Reflect
3. Wildlife Montage
4. The March Concludes
5. Picnic by the East Sea

Call me biased, but the picture you put up for our match is my favorite. It is such a stellar composition, it is no wonder I lost to it. Here I struggled settling on a third place. I went with Wildlife Montage over the March because, while the latter is more impressive and spectacular, the former is something that isn't often seen during this contest. I really like the serenity of the raindrops and the texturing on the foliage.

Spoiler: Wogl

1. Today was a good day
2. Care for tea?
3. (stealth mission)
4. Bumpty dance
5. Sandy waters

Big surprise here, I'm really showing my bias. But even without the reference, this is a very impressive picture. They're all great, really. Care for tea looks like something out of a professionally drawn manga. I hope you'll join future iterations of this contest too; I want to see more from you.

Spoiler: Rose

1. No other path but forward
2. Leech Seed
3. Where the Poetry Flows
4. Late Night Hunt
5. "Feed Me Shroomour"

I picked this one because I really enjoyed the framing and perspective. It has a really cool vibe, with the cliff face in the background and the bridge coming towards the viewer. Struggled a bit to pick a second place. I went with Leech Seed, but I think had there been a long, moody shadow behind the figure in Poetry, that one would have gone in second place easily.

 

[BEEEEEAAARRRS]

Without further adieu, here are your Round 6 match ups. Bot will be ready shortly

Spoiler: check

If anything below is incorrect please let me know ASAP

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	Color Share, 4 hours #7E221F #2686B1​
	Tri Color, 3 hours​
	Color Swap, 3 hours #FF5700 #463159​
	Color Share, 3 hour #FF5700 #6495ED​
	Color Share, 3 hours #FEE0AB #FF912E​
	Tri Color, 4 hours​
	Monochrome, 3 hours, Four-way free for all, 1000x1000 canvas, No existing characters from any commercial or personal franchises​
	Color Share, 3 hours #009999 #800020​
	Color Match, 3 hours #2E6F40​
	Tri Color, 3 hours​
	Color Share, 4 hours #EE5921 #6495ED​
	Color Share, 4 hours, 1200x1200 canvas #214834 #E4415B​
	Vanilla, 4 hours, Solo entry​	​
	Vanilla, 3 hours​
	Tri Color, 4 hours​

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Submissions are due in Oct 18, 2024 at 1:59 AM

 

[Lin Beifong]

Spoiler: Steamlined

1. (large crash)
2. You have alerted the horde
3. (connecting to client)
4. (waluigi serve)

I think it's a toss-up between large crash and the horde for me. I ultimately went with the crash because I enjoyed the helicopter camera perspective. You might not know this, but helicopters are known for their propensity to elevate and descend. Meanwhile in horde I like the background work with the mountains. You also drew a plane, which, somewhat interestingly, is superior to helicopters in terms of horizontal acceleration.

Spoiler: Ninelevendo

1. One bike please
2. No Parallel Universe is too far to save you
3. Leaked Mario Wonder 2 Level
4. Securing the IT position
5. Extreme Duel Mode

There are some unique challenges when working with a very dark custom color, and I think One bike please makes the best use of it. It's also a good joke, and creative interpretation of the prompt. I want to specifically mention Extreme Duel Mode here though, because the rendering of the robot is actually pretty good.

Like, here, I'd like people to look at this with the color brightened a little, in case they might have missed it. The detailing on this is very interesting.

Spoiler: Koops

1. Finishing touches
2. tired
3. Thursday
4. Sustenance
5. At 3:00 AM

For me it came down between Finishing touches and tired. The former has some intriguing perspective work going for it, with the foreshortened pencil in the background. I also like the rendering of the ?-block. The other meanwhile is a very interesting composition. While I don't really have the full context, I understand this is a very personal piece, and it is well executed.

Spoiler: TPG

1. What Have We Unearthed
2. All For You
3. Brick by Brick
4. I'd Never Forget Those Eyes
5. The Standoff

Very clear winner for me here. The composition is phenomenal--the gargantuan skull draws your view right in. The lighting and color choices are excellent as well. This piece is immaculate, I cannot conceive of a scenario in which it could have been beaten. I am also still very fond of All For You, which in my opinion showcases some of the best color blocking work you've ever pulled off, even if you personally didn't seem to enjoy the result that much.

Spoiler: LTQ

1. Night at the museum
2. King of Drifting
3. Wii are resorting to violence
4. Poltergust G-00 mk. II
5. Thanks for the 300 star bits

I still really enjoy the composition of Night at the museum. Making use of silhouettes was an inspired choice. It is the clear stand-out winner for me. Its runner-up is equally certain for me, with the very creative way to interpret the prompt and the killer joke.

Spoiler: Winstein

1. Wah-chelor
2. Mid-autumn festival
3. Setting a good example
4. Psychically-induced Vertigo
5. Have a blast!

One clear victor for me here: The way you've combined your usual strong detail work with a striking eye catch works really well to elevate this picture above the others. For the runner-up, I was once again torn between two. I think I slightly like the lighting in Good Example more, but the fact that you drew Festival on a single layer pushes it over the edge for me.

Spoiler: Wyvy

• Captain, our shields...

Possible upset here: I predict a lot of people will have chosen (starry sky), but as pretty as the rendering of that night sky is, I'm personally more of a comic/scene guy, so this is gonna be my pick. I really enjoyed the composition and the joke.

And let's have some fun while finishing up...

Spoiler: Gabumon

1. Clearance for the Company Van
2. Ad-break
3. Sand-Fishing
4. Trying not to lose it
5. Turning Point

I didn't really know what to do with Turning Point. I quite enjoy the amount of details and little jokes I was able to put into that, but I think Company Van is sort of the same concept executed better. I imagine if I tried to rank these within sub-categories the order would change dramatically. Like, Company Van is my favorite overall, but Ad-break is the best concept, while Turning Point has the best backdrop/environment.

Spoiler: Toadbert

He reacted to the thing, so I have to rank him somehow.
I guess let's rank the different comic strips.

1. Match 4 intro (Arriving at the landfill)
2. Match 3 intro (Office meeting)
3. Match 2 intro (Printer challenge)
4. Match 6 intro (Printer strikes back)
5. Match 5 intro (Employee dissatisfaction)
6. Match 1 intro (Fortune cookie)

I'm gonna be honest with you: I have no idea how to quantify any of this. This is just my gut feeling, you're gonna have to trust me on this. But really, the true winner is that scribble of Bob Ross painting roided-out Vegeta. It's a visual that's just so wrong that it cracks me up every time I see it.

 

[Waluigi Time]

Doctor Wactopus and the Scribbler Six - Bonus Issue

With the Scribble tournament complete, and their twice-adjusted goal achieved, Doctor Wactopus and his band of misfits left [UNDISCLOSED LOCATION] to wander the surrounding area for completely voluntary reasons that they chose all by themselves.

"See, what did I tell you guys? Basically ultimate victory!" Doctor Wactopus said, boasting to his teammates.

"Yeah, shame you got fired when they found out you were copying your ID and handing them out," Reznor replied.

"Well, you know what, that was a lousy company anyway! I don't need... funding... Hm."

Just then, a mysterious voice came from a nearby alleyway. "So, you're looking for employment, are you? You know, I'm something of a scribbler myself."

To be continued?​

 

[BEEEEEAAARRRS]

Some of these are pretty funny (again, saving my speeches for the upcoming finale)

Big thanks to Nine for subbing in for Snack on short notice

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And there you have it

 

[BEEEEEAAARRRS]

The last winners, enjoy your bragging rights everyone. There's a lot more to say later, but thanks to everyone for opting in. The long wait time for people to prep their matchups before this might've killed a bit of the momentum going, but I thought it'd be a fun surprise and worth it.

I'll do my best to get my finale speech ready, as well as all the tabulated data from the catalog ready, for Sunday but I might be a while longer (as seems to be a bit of a tradition)

---

Spoiler: good

After so many near misses in the past, the final 4-way round FINALLY gave me a tie. After some talk in the Discord thread people felt it was appropriate to just put both of them up. (I also caused TPG and Gabumon to tie in the same round)

 

[winstein]

This here is a compilation of scribble practice that I did. Of note is that it was originally 600x600 but given how I am not obliged to keep the canvas size as a practice piece, it was eventually extended in height by 200px, and then a further 100px. Note that for the second extension, everything else except the first was drawn after I submitted, only to fill the space:

Some of these are to get a feel of how to use the colour well (the portrait and trees scene in the top-right for example), some were attempted to imitate some other people's pieces on things I like about them (e.g.: the tornado is based on MrConcreteDonkey's spinning Wario), and some are to experiment (e.g.: the deer and the sea).

Of note are the movement ones around the top-left. I experimented with movement because I figured that it might come in handy, but I don't think the opportunity to use them had ever come.

Thank you for reading.

 

[Waluigi Time]

Since we've pretty much wrapped things up here, I want to give some feedback on some of the changes that were made this year while the thread's still open for easy reference in the future.

First, of all, I really liked the 3-hour time limit. I know it's been controversial and there's fair arguments on both sides, so I'll just stick with my personal experience here. I typically don't end up using the full time limit, usually my scribbles are done around the 2-2.5 hour mark, but when I sit down to scribble I do like having the full time limit blocked out with the expectation that I won't be doing anything else until that time is up. By nature in Scribble, you really don't know what's going to happen when you take a prompt - it could take longer to come up with a good concept, or the idea might take longer to work on - so I don't like to make assumptions there. So for me, 3 hours is a good sweet spot between 2 hours in Labs, which was a little too crunchy, and the previously standard 4 hours.

I didn't see much feedback on the host-curated bracket one way or the other, and I don't know how other people felt about their own experiences, but I liked this too. I say this with no offense intended to any of my fellow competitors over the years, but in previous tournaments I've sometimes felt that the automation forced me into matches that were either not very challenging or felt way out of my league from the start (i.e. TPG level artists) based on the outcome of a single match. Here I felt pretty consistently challenged in each round, I'm not sure if there was actually any intention to the matchups beyond avoiding repeats but it was still nice having a more guided hand.

Finally, the bonus round. That was just really cool! I hope the idea of a bonus round where you choose your opponent and ruleset becomes a mainstay in future tournaments, or at least its own type of spinoff maybe, because I'd love to see it again.

 

[TPG]

I'm positioning myself as a higher authority than I truly am, but if you would like, I can evaluate your 5/6 Scribble submissions this year, and give my honest thoughts and feedback on your run as a whole. This will include an overall summary of your strengths and areas to look at in the future, as well as a look at how your art changed, both throughout this year and compared to previous runs.

Please react with a crying face if you would like this for your own Scribbles. If you would prefer an evaluation that focused on just the positives instead, please show me a laughing face.

 

[BEEEEEAAARRRS]

First, of all, I really liked the 3-hour time limit. I know it's been controversial and there's fair arguments on both sides, so I'll just stick with my personal experience here. I typically don't end up using the full time limit, usually my scribbles are done around the 2-2.5 hour mark, but when I sit down to scribble I do like having the full time limit blocked out with the expectation that I won't be doing anything else until that time is up. By nature in Scribble, you really don't know what's going to happen when you take a prompt - it could take longer to come up with a good concept, or the idea might take longer to work on - so I don't like to make assumptions there. So for me, 3 hours is a good sweet spot between 2 hours in Labs, which was a little too crunchy, and the previously standard 4 hours.

I know many people were upset by the reduced time, and I've said it many times but this is a reminder why. Some of us go in needing to block off that entire period because it's hard to know our schedules or what's going to happen during the upcoming creative process, and finding a full uninterrupted 4 hours is hard.

Naturally, people got used to having 4 hours to work with and losing an hour hurt their performance. There's not really any solution that's going to suit everyone, 30 of us are going to have pretty different needs. In deciding to try 3 hours for this whole tournament, I chalked it up as another way for everyone to adapt and improvise, which is just the entire tournament in general anyway

If it goes back to 4 hours next tournament I'll understand, but in my one single bracket drawing I made I really felt the load lessened with only needing to dedicate 3 hours.

I didn't see much feedback on the host-curated bracket one way or the other, and I don't know how other people felt about their own experiences, but I liked this too. I say this with no offense intended to any of my fellow competitors over the years, but in previous tournaments I've sometimes felt that the automation forced me into matches that were either not very challenging or felt way out of my league from the start (i.e. TPG level artists) based on the outcome of a single match. Here I felt pretty consistently challenged in each round, I'm not sure if there was actually any intention to the matchups beyond avoiding repeats but it was still nice having a more guided hand.

This however, was a little less intentional on my part. If you felt you had good match ups the whole way through that may have been luck because it was not something I overtly tried to do. My plan was just to do exactly what Challonge would do, but I would shuffle names as needed to ensure people who had never gone before would do so, as long as the numbers permitted. Some matchups in round 1 were pretty uneven, because they were completely random.

One of my big suggestions for next year is to maybe look into how bracket seeding works, to ensure matches can maybe stay more even during the whole bracket, but I don't know how any stuff like that works. I will also say that ensuring new match ups was fun, but is probably not doable as strictly as I was doing next year so a change will have to be decided there.



I'm glad Round 6 was a good surprise to you though because I enjoyed the build up to it

 

[TPG]

I'm positioning myself as a higher authority than I truly am, but if you would like, I can evaluate your 5/6 Scribble submissions this year, and give my honest thoughts and feedback on your run as a whole. This will include an overall summary of your strengths and areas to look at in the future, as well as a look at how your art changed, both throughout this year and compared to previous runs.

Please react with a crying face if you would like this for your own Scribbles. If you would prefer an evaluation that focused on just the positives instead, please show me a laughing face.

Whoops I got 18 of these to do now, so I'll just do a few at a time. It might take a while though...

Thank you to TB for arranging this year's Scribbles in a way that's super easy to reference. In these posts I'll be showing the R1-5 Scribbles by each player, but I'll have looked at your Freedom Scribbles + previous years too, especially the ones I hosted (I remember the submissions better and still have easy access).

I said in the Discord but for some of these I may end up making small edits to something you've done to demonstrate a point. If you'd rather I didn't just give me a shout here or on Discord (some of you have already, which I will abide by). I might also make references to other evaluations when writing these so make sure you read them all for some Primo Analysis.

(Also, some terminology - I'll be using the word "session" to refer to a single Scribble tournament, like Labs 2024 or Mainline 2023. "Round" will refer to an individual submission within that session.)

Spoiler: WT

First of all thanks for making that 2021-2024 compilation of your Scribbles. Makes it a lot easier for me lol

Your standout strengths involve your ability to come up with excellent, character-driven scenes and jokes. I don't think anyone else has that knack on the same level as you, so you're definitely the king of that niche. You always make creative, well-thought out responses to the prompts you get, and you draw them well, too. Your characters are always very appealing and just nice to look at - IMO the only time you drew a character a little awkwardly was when you had to cram a Shy Guy into the provided lines in Complete The Scribble. I think your history/practice with comic strips is relevant here - you never fail to make your ideas clear and immediately understandable, even when depicting more complicated setups (like your R5 or R3).

Even going from the start to the end of this session I've seen you make improvements to how you shade and detail your scenes. From adding the ground shadows in R3 to your rim lighting and dramatic shade in R5, you've been able to add a lot more depth and contrast to your art. It gives it a bit more gravitas and appeal, and can also help accentuate your silhouettes and general form.

I think I've said this to you before but the most notable thing that you should work on (IMO) is your perspective/angles. With a few exceptions, you have a tendency to draw all your characters from the same 3/4 angle, similar to your NPC sprites for other games. Don't get me wrong, it's a great angle to rely on - you get all the interesting facial features in without having to wrangle with the awkward symmetry of a front-facing shot - but if you came back next year with some more dynamic directions, I would be super happy and impressed. You have some experience in 3D modelling and posing so I would suggest that as a starting point, since you'll be able to get whatever reference image you want.

Future Challenge: try and start with a black background. You did one for 2023 R2 with the Circinus picture but I'd like to see what you'd be able to do with your recent improvements in shading and scene building. Your typical palette creates good opportunities for great, moody contrast, like in Cut From The Team.

As a bonus challenge, draw a front facing Waluigi.

Spoiler: Flygon

The most impressive part of your run (and during Labs) is that you show a LOT of creativity when making your Scribbles. You've come up with ideas for composition and presentation that I would never have even thought of - mixing up how you do outlines, how you shade, how you use each colour to your advantage, it's all super punchy and unique. I think your R2 drawing in particular is a highlight - raw, well composed, and eye catching. I'll be saying this a lot but concept and composition are two massively important pillars for Scribbles, and I think outweigh execution in a lot of cases. You've consistently nailed it when it comes to deciding what you want to draw and how you want to draw it, which deserves kudos.

Over time, this may be cheeky to say but it looks like you've gained more confidence in your drawings in general recently. I know you said you weren't entirely happy with your R5 but other than that, each of your Scribbles feels entirely You, full of soul and character. You've developed a nice and recognisable style.

You regularly draw outside of Scribble so you get a lot of practice in between sessions. You have a good foundation in all of the aspects of art, and if I wanted to make a specific recommendation I would say try experimenting with your line widths. Changing the size of your brush whilst drawing is a good way to emphasise certain parts of the image and can give a drawing a lot of character. More importantly than that, I think you should just keep on making more art because I really like seeing it. If you're looking to train yourself, you should go out and try and find comics or artworks that you wouldn't normally see, figure out what you like about them, and try and replicate it.

Future Challenge: Maybe try drawing a character, and then changing the colour of the outline in certain parts. Experiment with what looks best - if you drew it in black, switch to a red outline in areas that would be better lit.

Spoiler: Uniju

I didn't know how much experience you had with art before you joined this session, so I have been constantly delighted seeing everything you've put out this month. You're able to capture that deep feeling of both solitude and warmth here to great effect, like in those anime screenshots I see online. It's very wistful. The presence of these people (and frogs) make your worlds feel so lived-in, which then adds a layer of mystery and attractiveness to the surroundings. Does anyone else live here? Each of the backgrounds you've drawn I've looked at and and thought to myself that I want to live there. Perfect balance of detail and empty space.

You're a newcomer to the format and have already proven yourself so I find it hard to come up with proper analysis for how your art has changed compared to before. My only note would be that, again, you seem to have gained a lot of confidence after R1. If I had to say something else; this is likely more due to you having only done 6 matches, and your portfolio will diversify over time, but you have relied on straight-edged, manmade environments a lot here. The beauty of nature is in its curves and organic form - I adore your R2 pond and think you should try and draw more natural environments in the future, which is harder but very rewarding. You kind of have to just sketch what you see instead of construct a grid or guideline to help you draw. It's good practice.

Future Challenge: Looking at all of these at once I also noticed that you favour a one-point perspective. You did a nice two-point in your R6 Turb drawing, so try doing more of those! Fuck it, why not go into spec mode on the MC server and get a nice screenshot reference of a few buildings from a diagonal angle...

 

[TPG]

Spoiler: YTSSM

First and foremost I love the level of detail you've put into each of these Scribbles. Each of the scenes feel packed with interesting things to look at, even in the backgrounds. If my memory serves me right you've gone with a Mario & Luigi theme this year, which also impresses me as someone who has tried to stick with a constant theme/idea for 5 rounds in a row and gave up after just one. You also seem comfortable with good colour-blocking - none of your Scribbles here are overwhelmed with a single colour, so you've been balancing your blacks, whites, and blues well.

Compared to previous sessions, I think you've improved with scene-building in general. In previous years the subject you drew would often appear on an empty or very abstract background, but this time round your drawings feel fully developed. The theme you've gone for has certainly helped with that, but even your R1 Fawful Express Scribble has a distinct foreground, background, and middleground. Compare this to your Observing Lightning Scribble from Labs 2024 and the improvements seem clear to me.

In terms of improvements, I assume you're still using MS Paint to draw. It's a fine art program especially for Scribble, but I think you would benefit from an art software that uses layers (which allows you to split your drawings into sections that can overlap). I say this because when you draw characters it looks like you are freehanding them, meaning you aren't doing sketches first.

Characters can be trickier to draw than backgrounds due to their complicated shapes and proportions. For me, it always helps to stop trying to just draw exactly what I see and to instead see the character as a collection of basic shapes. Take Yoshi, for instance - here I have included a reference image. The upper scribble was me attempting to just draw Yoshi 1:1, following the outline of the character. The lower scribble was me breaking Yoshi down into basic circles and ovals, and then drawing the outline on top of that.

This is where layers come in handy - on one layer, you can make a sketch of the character using the basic shapes, then use a new layer to draw your outline directly on top of that. Once you're finished, you can go back to the sketch layer and erase it.

Future Challenge: Try drawing a Goomba using the method I mentioned - break it down into simple shapes, draw those shapes and try and get the proportions right, and then, on a new layer, draw the character outline over those shapes. I would recommend Paint.NET if you're unsure of what software to use - it's similar to MS Paint, but it gives you more tools and freedom, as well as the all-important layers.

Spoiler: Power Flotzo

The vibes on yours consistently deliver. You always depict funny, interesting scenarios where characters and actions take centre-stage. Your palette helps a lot here, adding a layer of cosiness to even the most violent of Scribbles. I've never seen a more delightful depiction of someone being electrocuted to death. You took on Gabumon's advice well here - From R1 to R5 the main focuses of your Scribbles have become better-defined, and your colour blocking has improved, too. I think Get That Money is one of your best overall.

I would echo my feedback for YTSSM here in that I think your characters would benefit from having a sketch done first. More than that, I have noticed that when you draw a character, your lines are always outlines, just showing the silhouette of your guy. To improve your linework, I would suggest having more lines that overlap, or break off, or taper out. This is hard to describe, so I've provided an example here, editing your R4 Scribble.

Your original Pikachu on the left. My edit on the right, which slightly changed the legs, neck, and ears.

By having your lines overlap, break off, and so on, you can create a better sense of depth for your characters, and now it is easier to identify which way Pikachu is facing, and which of his legs are in front. It's a simple change that can go a long way! This is why I bring up sketching - if you've already drawn the basic shape of your character, I think you'll have an easier time deciding where to layer in more lines that create a better sense of the 3D shape/form of the subject.

Future Challenge: Draw your OC, tentacles and all, using the layered lines method I've done here with Pikachu. Use images of cartoon octopuses for reference, and see how 3D you can make it look.

Spoiler: Gabumon

I've sung a lot of praises already, but I'm not one to shy away from reiterating - I think this has been your best session yet. You effortlessly combine detailed, artful backgrounds with high-quality character art, and can layer in an impressive amount of humour and heart. The amount of experience and practice you have as an artist shines through in these Scribbles. Your choices in composition have been ambitious and you've stuck the landing each time, especially the perspective work in R3 and R5. All in all a very good show - you have the skillset needed to commit to your impressively creative ideas.

You seem confident in adapting and shifting your artstyle to suit the needs of the Scribble - comparing the sceneries you've depicted in R2 and R4, there's clear changes in how you decided to draw your clouds and bodies of water. This shows a lot of versatility, a level that I myself aspire to, as someone who often falls back on tried and tested methods when drawing out of my comfort zone.

I'm in a position where I'm struggling to come up with any real, actionable critical feedback. Breaking a Scribble up into the three pillars - concept, composition, and execution - you don't have any identifiable issues with any of these. Anything that I would say is "missing" from your run this session would just be nitpicks, and likely things that just come down to a difference in artistic choices.

Future Challenge: Try making a Scribble using a max-brightness, max-saturation colour. You have gone for darker or less saturated tones historically so I'd like to see what you would do with a colour that deeply contrasts with both black and white.

Other than that, I guess I'm not seeing any reflective surfaces in your 5 main Scribbles this year. Here's an idea - try redrawing your 2021 R1 Metal Bowser Scribble, taking advantage of your vast improvements in texturing and rendering.

 

[TPG]

Spoiler: FWD

5 super moody, creative pics. You keep on finding ways to create new funny scenarios that ooze with style and character, and building up all of these misadventures and schemes involving your little man adds so much to your ongoing run of Scribbles. The way you detail your backgrounds adds a decent level of cartoonish realism to the overall piece - I don't know if you're using references or just making them up, but your worlds feel very lived-in, similar to Uniju's. I also personally really like Lights Out for it's super thick lines on the fist, as well as the motion trails. It does a great job of punching up (ha ha) the action.

Thinking back to your Unmasked Labs R1 pic, you've done a much better job at depicting your lights and shadows. Looking at R5 in particular, the way you've changed your outline colour depending on if it's in the light or not is great. The same goes for R3 (the car owns) - you're using lights to both set the scene and create depth and intrigue to your Scribbles. I think this is owed to your fantastic series of artposts for KG9, giving you a lot more opportunities for practice and experimentation.

As for feedback, I have to be careful with this because I don't want to come down on your personal style. You might read this and think FUCK This Guy I'll Do What I Want, which is fine. Anyway, your style makes good use of angular, jagged/sketchy lines to establish an almost gritty but very Cool vibe. I'd call it punk if I knew what punk was. It adds a whole lot of character to your drawings, so you should keep it up for sure.

BUT. But. Sometimes I'm thrown off by the jaggedness of your linework, more often with your backgrounds. Singling out Commercial District, each of the rectangular objects in the scene (posters, stock price indicators, billboards, windows) should align to indicate the overall shape of the building they've been placed on. I think in this case the jaggedness made things fall into a slight misalignment, enough to confuse me as to what you were actually going for. Maybe sketching a plain grid over each wall of the building would help you figure out the perspective and make each detail align. But, as I said, this may have been an artistic choice of yours, so take this with a grain of salt.

Future Challenge: Try drawing a horse. I'm not even kidding. See if you can adapt your style into something with a lot of curves and flowing hair.

Spoiler: MCD

First of all, what the hell, man. That wretched apparition in your R1 Scribble is unlike anything I've ever seen in this tournament. It looks masterful, seriously. It's a great example of your overall strengths as a Scribbler - excellent, realistic rendering and good tones mixed with funny, well-drawn cartoon dudes. I've seen a number of people struggle to bridge that gap without compromising one or the other, but you do it well. Between the immaculate vibes and shading of Fire Hazard and the great sense of motion without having to sacrifice the facial expression in Team Building, you are well-travelled in both worlds.

Your shading has improved recently. In particular, I'm amazed that you achieved all that detail and subtlety in your R3 submission using just green and black, and it's clear you thought about how the single lit candle would act as a light source for the rest of the room. That wood floor FEELS crunchy and rough, just like how that metal cockpit FEELS smooth and how those tendrils FEEL dangerous.

One thing I would point out is that your scratchy way of shading is almost always aligned horizontally. This consistency can be good for establishing a style, but can also make objects seem flat, or lose you the opportunity to make things look 3D. Next time, you could try making the direction of the scratches follow the contours of what you're drawing. For example, the shading on your plane cockpit could dip in the middle to further imply the depth and roundness of the plane's nose.

Future Challenge: Uh oh, this one's re-used; like Uniju, you've been doing a lot of one-point perspectives, with the POV usually aligned parallel or perpendicular to a wall or main subject. Try going for a diagonal two-point perspective and see what you can come up with. A busy intersection, a hedge maze, whatever gives you the chance to try drawing new angles.

Spoiler: Koops

I've already said this a lot in these evaluations but I adore your style. I guess that speaks to the quality of Scribble as a format, given that so many different people have been able to carve out their own niche within an intentionally restrictive medium. Your use of silhouettes and stark, contrast-y figures elevates your art a lot, standing out from the crowd. I also really enjoy how abstract some of these are. Whether they're personal to you, or just creative ways of showing off your ideas, they feel very soulful - no one else does it quite like you. You use shading and hatching well to split the backgrounds from the main subjects, and your varied line thickness plays into this too.

Switching to the pixel brush levelled up your game massively. It's not just being strict about the guidelines - I think the pixel brush makes you think a lot more about your details and thinner lines. You can't taper or fade out, your line is either THERE or NOT THERE. It adds a certain... intentional..ness... to everything you do.

You've done plenty of unique perspectives and composition ideas, so I don't think you're lacking in the first two pillars of Scribbling. I remember you saying you typically spend less than an hour on any one Scribble. 3 hours can be a lot to schedule out for busy lads, but I think if you committed a bit more time to your work you'd be able to refine your details more. Take the big central circle in tired - it's loosely drawn, which I can tell was a purposeful, stylistic choice, but could it have been more visually interesting? Instead of a single line width, maybe the lines could have gotten thinner and tapered out as they got further away from the ring. Maybe the foreground mountain in Sustenance could have had more texturing. These missing details don't make your Scribbles bad (on the contrary, you consistently put out great work), but it might be something to think about next time.

Future Challenge: Your characters are often blocked out as single-colour silhouettes, or have rim lighting in a different colour. Try drawing a character making use of all three colours in the lighting process - green for the base fill, white for the highlights and rims, and black for the areas in shadow. It'll probably be less exciting than your usual style, but it might make for good practice. I know you regularly make art in your own time without the Scribble ruleset restrictions so, more importantly, keep that up!

 

[Lin Beifong]

Future Challenge: Try making a Scribble using a max-brightness, max-saturation colour. You have gone for darker or less saturated tones historically so I'd like to see what you would do with a colour that deeply contrasts with both black and white.

Other than that, I guess I'm not seeing any reflective surfaces in your 5 main Scribbles this year. Here's an idea - try redrawing your 2021 R1 Metal Bowser Scribble, taking advantage of your vast improvements in texturing and rendering.

Trial Turquoise​

 

[TPG]

Spoiler: Roserade

I'm throwing in your bonus round one since it makes for a good direct comparison to R2. Much better utilisation of the same idea - a dark open space with a solitary light source. To me your biggest highlight has been the variety and competency with your colour usage. In some Scribbles you've used colour to block out each part of your scene, making every element stand out, and in others you've been able to portray lovely, eye-catching lighting setups, using white as your light sources and pink/green to add detail to the darker areas. Your concepts and way of putting together a scene are excellent.

I'm not going to dwell much on the limitations of your medium because I think you are well aware of these factors by now. In fact, you have pleasantly surprised me this year by surpassing what I previously thought was the natural skill ceiling for making these on a phone with just your finger. You've been able to vary your line thickness, use hatching-like scribbles to indicate texture and make more use of your palette, and put in an impressive amount of detail. I've tried finger painting on a phone before and I really couldn't hack it, so the neatness of your linework here is outstanding to me, especially compared to years prior.

You clearly put a lot of thought into the context and settings of your drawings, even if, IIRC, you've said you struggled to fill in your backgrounds before. I think to take this element further, you should practice working with perspective and 3D space more - I'm nitpicking here, but the R3 bridge railings should get much thinner as they get further away from the camera. The way you have drawn them makes them look flat, like they're parallel to the bridge itself.

Stolen from Youtube. Look at how the rails get thinner and more bunched up in the distance.​

One-point and two-point perspectives are a good fundamental to learn. When your scenes look 'accurate' in terms of perspective, you add a great sense of depth and realism, which I think makes the viewer connect with the piece more. I think once you become confident with this, you can then go back and get more stylistic/loose with it. Like how some professional artists train to do still-life paintings and then progress to more expressive, abstract works.

Future Challenge: Try a different medium... pen and paper. That's right, big shocker. Don't buy lots of digital equipment just for an experiment! Try making a detailed Scribble - characters, backgrounds, composition, the lot - using traditional art tools, and see how it compares with using your phone.

Spoiler: Pitohui

I think you love to tell stories through your Scribbles. There's clearly a lot of thought and care put into each artwork that lets the reader piece a grander story together, whilst still leaving room for questions. Your titles, which I haven't talked about before, add a lot of intrigue and soul, too. Whether it's a story told by implication, like the moody, half-grimy, half-serene vibes of the broken down church in R3, or the mixture of tension and hope you've channelled into R2, you force the viewer to engage emotionally with what you've created. Your choices in colour and composition help significantly with this too.

Let's talk about perspective again. Your R3 one is really good - you have a well-constructed room that makes physical sense, with a good amount of detail and a clear light source. Similarly, what you've done in R2 is wonderful. It's a super ambitious shot with a lot of care put into how it's composed. Breathtaking stuff. For a shot like this I would argue that the perspective doesn't NEED to make sense, as each element of the Scribble is in service of the main structural idea. However, it is good to have a solid foundation in perspective anyway, and there are a few errors in your R6, R5 and R4 that, if fixed, would elevate the piece by a lot. Let me know if you want the specific errors pointed out - I'd be happy to go through it in detail once I finish these posts.

In my opinion, it's much better to bend the rules once you've learned how to follow them. That way, whenever you break away from traditional art conventions or principles, you're doing it as an artistic choice, rather than due to a personal limitation. I'd echo this sentiment for basically all aspects of Scribble, actually.

Future Challenge: I'm going to recommend a specific exercise in perspective that my art teacher did with me once. It involves constructing a scene IRL using whatever you have on hand - bits of paper, blocks, anything with a simple form - and drawing it as accurately as possible.

Let's do that R5 Scribble. Ignore the characters for a second (because I think you are actually pretty great at making characters fit into your ambitious perspectives), and build that background. On one bit of paper, draw the floorboards and mushroom logo, and draw a window and clock on the other. If you're able to prop the 'wall' up and add any small block or cuboid object, you'll have your basic scene! Take a photo if you can.

Then, it's as simple as practicing drawing that photo. I would even recommend tracing the photo you took first, just to get a feel for how the 3D world accurately translates to a 2D canvas, and then drawing using that trace as a reference. Keep at it until you get a good feel for it, and then you can try taking a photo from a different angle, or building a new scene.

Spoiler: Lakituthequick

I really like all of these. You're very good at coming up with creative twists on the given theme - Gooigi blasting out of the Poltergust to manhandle a ghost is a highlight for me, as well as the Joycon Bike. You can decorate your scenes well, too, with a good amount of detail. R3 is a personal favourite, with the darkness around the edges making it feel like the night is physically closing in on Luigi. Being able to combine these funny ideas with more casual workplace scenarios like in R5 adds a unique appeal to yours.

One thing I think you could work on is your shading for characters. Look at R3, Night at the museum. Those tiny highlights on Luigi and the enormous skeleton behind him really elevate the whole thing. You can draw characters, objects, and backgrounds very well, but you often fill them with solid colour. I think the next step would be to emphasise their depth in 3D space by showing how they react to light. You definitely have done some good things with lighting here, like the monitor in R1 lighting up the room around it, or Luigi casting a long shadow in R3. Take that further, make the light and shadow affect everything - maybe the keyboard, mouse and Bullet Bill in R1 should cast a shadow on the desk, too?

Future Challenge: Hm... ok, hear me out. Focus in on the Bullet Bill decoration in your R1. I believe this is a real gizmo that you crafted for yourself, right? Try drawing just the Bullet Bill, using the real life version as a reference. Then, try shading it, trying to get the curvature correct. If you would like, you could also try adding highlights in white if you have a strong enough light source.

Spoiler: Turb

In general you're able to come up with great ideas for your art, and your palettes work well to emphasise the tone. The chaos in R1, the darkness in R1, the clean elegance of R3. It looks well-planned and highlights your skills as an experienced artist. Your last two Scribbles are magnificent. Especially R5, the amount of energy and expression you've put into that one owns. The cartoonish expressions, the lines of action connecting the bros, the dynamic camera angle, it's great. You're able to combine that energy with appealing, high quality character art and get some truly great Scribbles done.

So, your concepts are good, you have proven yourself to be very competent with composition, and you have enough experience to execute whatever ideas you have successfully. That being said, I still have two things I'd like to point out, mainly about what you choose to draw.

You draw a lot of Mario. That's not a bad thing - this is a Mario forum, and it can be hard to establish clear characteristics and ideas for original characters, especially under such a strict time limit. In that sense, drawing things from Mario is a strategic, smart move, as you can be certain the vast majority of voters will be able to connect with and understand your subject material. But at the level you're operating, I think it'd be nice to see you get out of that comfort zone again and draw a greater variety of... things. I tried to do less Mario this year and it turned out OK, and it was a nice opportunity to harness my creativity.

Secondly, and this is more of a nitpick (and one that I think I saw someone point out already - was it Yap?), but your choice of line style can be confusing sometimes. In R1-3, what I assume should be the focal points of your images use thin, scratchy lines, like a sketch layer, with bolder lines in the background. It draws my eyes away from the things you put more effort into drawing - the R1 map, Mario in R2, and the skeleton in R3. This isn't a problem in R4 and onwards though, so if you deliberately had a change in style then all I can say is that you should stick to it.

Future Challenge: Try getting out of your comfort zone and draw a natural landscape from reference. Pick whatever appeals to you the most. No characters allowed, just draw what you see.

Spoiler: GBA

While these are just generally amazing, you have two key strengths that inspire me.

Your ability to attribute texture and 'feel' to the elements in your Scribbles is outstanding. That Biddybug shell looks so smooth and shiny, I feel like I could stick my hand through the screen and give him a squeaky rub on the head. I don't know if you are just a champion at utilising image references, or if this is just something you've been able to pick up through lots and lots of practice, but it's great nonetheless. Especially the choppy water in R3, man. Perfect blend of realism and style.

Secondly, composition. Do you have experience in storyboarding? Each of these pictures are expertly crafted, just considering how the elements are laid out. Lines of action, letterboxing, blocking, it's all there and utilised to draw your eyes towards the central focus of each image. In R3, the way the dip in the clouds and the rising waves create an X shape to guide the viewer towards the lady. Jesus. More of that, please.

Like with Gabumon, I find it hard to point out any real flaws. You clearly have such a breadth and depth of artistic knowledge that anything I could point out as a missing element is more likely a deliberate choice on your end. Like, I might have put some foliage in the background of your R2, but would that just add unnecessary clutter? Negative space is a hard thing to wrangle, but you've nailed it.

Future Challenge: Fish-eye lens perspective with characters interacting. I know you can do it. Add a bicycle.

Spoiler: Wyvy

First things first, the starscape you made for R3 is fantastic. Everyone knows it. Everyone loves it. If there was a medal for most exciting new thing that hasn't been drawn this well before, you'd probably get it.

Anyway, it's good. That's not to say everything else is mid by comparison - you have a clear talent for funny and original character scenarios, with plenty of energy. The choice of poses for each one is also very good, lending a lot of character to each guy. Comparing the pose between R3 and R5, where there are some similarities at a basic level (arms raised, body straight), the detail and care makes it clear that one is relaxed and the other is triumphant and energetic. The same goes for all of them - Captain Mario's effortless composure and confidence next to Luigi's more tense attempts to be authoritative. The regal nonchalance of King Cuppa and the nervous cowardice of the infallible Koopa Troopa.

All in all a great set of Scribbles packed with heart and humour. I hope to see you again next year.

 

[Lin Beifong]

I'm positioning myself as a higher authority than I truly am, but if you would like, I can evaluate your 5/6 Scribble submissions this year, and give my honest thoughts and feedback on your run as a whole. This will include an overall summary of your strengths and areas to look at in the future, as well as a look at how your art changed, both throughout this year and compared to previous runs.

All right, I promised you in the chat thread that I would attempt to give you an evaluation of your own, so I guess we're doing this now.

Spoiler: TPG evaluation

Let me start by saying this: Whenever I enter this tournament, I find myself face-to-face with a lot of scary opponents. Even a comparatively less-experienced adversary can (and often will) be terrifying to face due to the nature of the format. But out of all the opponents that await, I often find that you are the scariest. The reason for this is what I believe to be your greatest strength: Your range and versatility.

See, there are some very strong artists in this mix, each with their own respective areas of comfort and expertise. This makes them a gargantuan challenge to match with, but it also means that I can make a reasonable prediction of the nature of the insurmountable obstacle I am going to face. I can make assumptions like "this person will do a joke setup", "this one will have great spectacle", "this one will have a relatable vibe", etc. While they will still very likely kick my ass, I can take comfort in knowing in advance how this kicking of the ass will commence.

But with you, I never know what I will get. You could hit me with a great joke, a spectacular explosion of effects, something surreal, something sincere, , thought-provoking, or horrifying. You could do all of these, or neither, or something else entirely, and I'll have no idea. And in all of these areas, your execution will be confident and skillful, like you have done this new thing you just pulled out 100 times before.

There are few things more intimidating in a format like this than an artist who thinks quickly, draws with unshakable competence and confidence, and does it all while being unpredictable.

As for your run this year, you started strong and only picked up steam from there. Once you eliminated that minor issue with the contrast in your first picture, you didn't show any perceivable weakness after. You always strike great color balances. This is especially apparent in your second image. The color blocking in that one is nearly immaculate. If I had to make a statement on your line-up here, I would say that your third picture (my favorite) is an evolution of everything you did right in the second, but elevated with a great concept on top of that. Your third and fifth look like spaces I would like to explore. They look like real, tangible places. The locations you chose to depict also show great variety, with natural landscapes, man-made structures, and a combination of both (in the giant cave).

If you take one thing away from this, let it be this: Please never stop experimenting and trying new things. Keep reinventing yourself. Never become set and predictable. This range is your trump card.

Since you are drawing at such a high level, it is difficult pinning down issues where I can give you actionable advice. Most I can do would be nitpicks. But I guess there is one technical mistake I spotted in your second picture:

It's barely noticeable; I daresay it's invisible unless you stop and really think about it. But the hand grabbing this microphone is misaligned in 3D space. The angle of the grip and the rotation of the hand do not match, giving the impression that the microphone bends. I also think, since the fingers stay even throughout, that the grip is travelling through the entire fist, and thus the butt of the microphone should stick out at the other end.

Otherwise, one or two of the fingers should dip, as they have nothing to grab.

This is genuinely the only real issue I can identify in all 5+ of your images this year. One minor alignment error. Everything else is drawn to perfection. I am excited to see what you're going to come up with next.

---

As for your personal challenge... your range and versatility make it exceptionally difficult to find an appropriate vector to test you. When you can reasonably be expected to do 1,000 things well, I struggle to find the 1,001 that'll make an appropriate task to throw your way. But maybe I have found... something...?

You don't really have an immediately evident "comfort zone" per say, but a thing I've seen you do a lot is take concepts that others would perceive as "odd", or "homely", or "misshapen", and incorporate these into your works to great effect. You conjure this kind of grungy feel, with characters that have traits outside the usual range of conventional attractiveness, be it like crusty and out-of-shape old men, scrunkly monstrosities, charming little robots constructed from trash, etc..

If I had to come up with some kind of asinine way to describe this vibe, I would say... "The way a location feels 'lived in', but applied to a person instead of a place", It's a kind of relatable quality, taking something mundane that people aren't really inclined to look at, and elevating them into something noteworthy. I hope this description makes some amount of sense.

Anyway, it might be interesting to see what will happen if you can't do that.

Future Challenge: This might be daft, but try drawing something that is conventionally "cute". Something that makes people on the internet go "awwww >w<" I'm not going to be sadistic and make you draw saccharine anime, but it has to be adorable in like a mainstream way (so no ugly-cute). I want to see how much of your own unique essence you can put into such a limiting framework without exceeding its parameters.