Cabin Picture

[WarGolem]

Hi! I'm new here and I'm also new to drawing bg's. So I thought I could use some outside criticism to help me improve. Heres what I've made so far(not finished, by the way)



I'm going for a cartoony look with my game, but not too cartoony. Any suggestions of what to add to this pic? Even little things to give it some life would help. I've also considered myself a failure at drawing, so I'm trying to improve 

Thanks

[aussie unplugged]

Hey, that's not bad at all for someone who claims to be a failure at drawing.

Personally, I don't like the reflection of the sun or the weeds. I would get rid of the first, and give the second a "weedy" look.

[Andail]

Hey, Wargolem

A few things;
1. The composition is awkward...the picture could be cropped just beneath and to the right of the house.
2. The ground is too flat and uninteresting. Note: Don't just add a texture - never touch the texture functions - just add some minor details, some shadows, some shapes
3. Some parts of your image have outlines, some haven't. Go for one style.
4. The beach/sand ends where the sea ends.  Do some distant hills to break up the horizon.
5. When something is as stiff and linear as your house, you need to get the perspective right. Either fix the perspective, or loosen up the lines.
6. Don't mix gradients with flat fields of colour. This and #3 are your most important rules.

Try to fix these issues and show us what you got

[Bombadil]

Welcome WarGolem,
A little perspective might be useful for the shadow and the house..

[DontTreadOnMe]

To me it doesn'tlook like it is meant to be perspective its erm... i should know this... not oblique, not isometric... that other one.... i forget what its called, but everything is drawn front on and "extruded" back at 45 degrees. It makes for a quirky style (at least i hope) im using it to create my game for this months MAGS.

The only reason the background looks uninteresting is the lack of any other objects, just chuck in some floatsam and rubish an sea weed washed up on the beach.

Also some of the lines for the shadow have specks of white along them, this is because you havent turned off antialias.

With a little improvement it will look good.

Great atempt - Rich

[Khris]

[...] but everything is drawn front on and "extruded" back at 45 degrees. It makes for a quirky style (at least i hope) I'm using it to create my game for this months MAGS. [...]

Cinema 4D calls it Gentleman perspective.
However, when using this perspective, you don't/can't see the horizon. Ever.
So the roof is way off.

The sun's reflection suggests the ocean is as flat as a mirror. Even then the reflection wouldn't be oval but a circle, too. And the reflection has to be at the same distance from the horizon than the sun itself.
But every ocean has ripples, so the reflection would be longer and rippled, too.
Check this pic for reference.
And I doubt that the sun's reflection would be seen that clearly at that daytime.

[WarGolem]

GAH! My head hurts after reading some of this . I don't know what a lot of terms you guys are referring to mean, but what I could decipher I've taken into consideration.

Still working on it though, but I'm a really bad artist. My hand is soooo shakey.

I'm trying to go with the outline style, but with the program I'm using, I can't make shapes and have them automatically be outlined, so its really hard for me to trace around and it looks a lot worse after I try to trace it.

Thanks for the info guys! I'll post the next take soon.

[InCreator]

Oh, a few suggestions. Not so much for the bg but getting "into background drawing business"...
I'll give a Suggestions, followed by Explanations to avoid confusing you more.

start

S: do not work with a big picture - work with pixels
E: Start out with 320x200. With lower resolution(smaller image), you have less control over/room for -- the details and this makes things a bit simpler. Also, if you work on every pixel, you'll get experienced better and faster. Don't try to make a big colossal scene, just try to draw a plant or house - for example... and work on every bit of it. Detail windows, doors, walls and so on. If you study to make separate things so they have a "look", it's easy to combine them all into a scene later, because...
...currently, your bg isn't bad - but it's all some colored geometry - and not much else. Even if perspective and coloring was perfect - it's still a bunch of lines and rectangles.

S: Avoid BLUR at any place and cost. Using blur demands lot of skill and careful approach.
E: Very often starters make their pictures super blurry - which really doesn't do or look anything good.

S: Careful outlines usage!
E: Drawing shapes (outlines) first and then coloring space inside them later is quite comfortable and simple. But using black for everything ruins the picture. If you have to draw a red wall, make outlines with a little bit darker red. Foo a green cactus - a bit darker outline, and so on.

further - the checklist / what to expect...

* you will study coloring.
* then - shading
* then you spend a millenia trying to understand perspective and methods to get it right
* ...getting shadows right
* and in the finish - you will develop a style - a style of your own, which may be absolutely unique and interesting. And then - as long as you keep on drawing - your style gets better and more polished with every picture you draw.

Well, long way to go. But I see potential and "hopeless" would be last word I'd use for this background.
Keep on working.