I'm not sure if this helps or not, but denials are normal when you're just starting out. Getting your style to match what Subeta considers its style takes a little bit of time for everyone, and all staff is trying to do is help you learn how to do that. I promise that the longer you stick around to do CWs, the easier and more second nature it becomes.

Now, onto assisting; it will be a little hard to assist without doing redlines to kind of show you what I mean, but hopefully I can speak well enough.

(I am going to skip the original CI because you're no longer using it)

Compass: Lines are looking much better! The shading on the metal around the compass looks great! I think the shading on the compass face looks a little bit flat as most of it is kind of parallel aside from the shine. I also think the shading could be a smidge lighter, as the contract gets very light and then very dark. ((I can't tell, but if you're using the program's text feature, you need to redo the letters in your own hand writing, as using fonts isn't allowed. If you already did that, just ignore this comment though, as someone with sloppy handwriting it shocks me when people write pristine lol!)

Eye Compass: I think this one needs a little more work than the last one. The line art looks distorted, which leads me to believe that you rotated it? I personally recommend when you need to rotate things, to make those adjustments at the sketch stage, so that it doesn't translate into the finished product or distort your line art and shading. It's a little hard for me to see the rest because of the distortion, but I think the shading on the iris and the outer rim of the eye look good. The sclera (whites of the eyes) look like they were shaded in parallels though, like I mentioned on the previous item.

In general I think you're really close and doing a good job. I think your new items have already shown a leap in improvement (not just in technique, but also in creativity! I really love the eye compass!) from that first item. :)

Thank you for the encouraging words! It's well needed. Apologies this took so long to get to, I haven't been home to open Photoshop to convert everything into .GIF form. I honestly have a very little grasp on redlining, therefore if you need to do it then feel free to do so! I'm perfectly alright with it after reading.

I added a bit more shine to everything and hopefully it's okay? Totally not familiar with directions in items as I specialize in portraits typically. The directions are written by myself because MediBang Paint mobile doesn't have a text feature to begin with I think? Even so, I rarely use it for anything lol. Thank you! *I may also lighten the face of the compass a bit because as you said, it's looking parallel and I'm trying my best to adjust it in two different versions, as being shown in the spoiler.

SPOILER (click to toggle)

1:

2:

I'll leave the eye compass on the side for the time being because I'm getting somewhere with the chained compass with just the lighting seeming to be a minor flaw but I will definitely take all of that into account when I get to it! Thank you so much.

For this item I don't really think you need a redline honestly. I personally like the first one a little more, because you can still see the letter through the shading.

I think all that really needs to happen is maybe a little adjustment to the contrast of the colors. It's very super dark going to very super bright, and it's making it hard to see the details. (This contrast looks nice on the metal I think, but it's a little much on the compass face since it's eating the details / making it hard to see the work you put in there.)

Also it's NP. Denials can be a lot when you're just starting out. I remember getting them nearly every item and it felt terrible at the time. Now though, I'm realizing that without them, my art wouldn't be where it's at and I wouldn't have learned as much as I did in the last few years.

I fixed it as best as I could and submitted it when I had the chance on Monday night, fingers crossed that it'll be passed. If not, I'll turn back here if that's okay? Thank you for all of the help, truly!

I'm glad I'm not the only one who has felt that slightly overwhelming feeling of being denied, lol. Was a little distraught at first with the effort and excitement there was, but overall I'm more confident in my work this time around and will more than likely be more understanding of it. Because you're definitely right there, learning is key in a way. Your art is stunning by the way!

Yes, please come back if you need additional help! Obviously we can give you input, but since we're not staff, we can't promise the input is always 100% correct. When you get another denial, it'll give us more insight on how to help though, through our experiences. :)

Hi again! , I'm so sorry for pinging you a lot but I'd like to update you on what happened. My CI was denied again and this is what was included in the denial:

ITEM: Ambiguous shading/light source unclear ITEM: Gradient or soft shaded instead of cel-shaded

These are the notes:

Here's the denied CI:

Here's an updated version I just did, it's a lot more dull than the submission but I can definitely fix that: Edit, this one's a tad lighter:

Thank you again! Please feel free to redline if needed because I'd greatly appreciate any advice right now since it was mentioned that I'm really close!

It's np! To start though I want to let you know that this is just how I would tackle this denial, and this is not like 'the only way' to work on it.

So the first thing that really pops out to me is the compass face's shading. I think there is a little too much emphasis on the darker part of the shading on this. The face is supposed to look inlaid / sunken in, but your current shading is more so making it look like it's shaded from another direction because of how dark the shadow cast from the metal ring is. So lessening that, I really think would help.

The second thing is the highlight color of the glass and how it's interacting with the object. For mine I used a solid white (you don't need to do this if you don't like using solid white) to emphasize it's glass, and I also had it interact with the compass needle to show that it's above the compass face / not shading that belongs to the compass face.

Lastly, I added two other small, minor tweaks that I think would just help your item a little bit:

1. I added some lighter highlighting on the opposite rim of the metal ring. Keeping it less bright than the upper high light I think would really help. I also added some highlight to the knob above the compass, as it should have light hitting the top of it.
2. The last thing I did was use a light color for the letters. When I was looking at references of compasses, I saw a lot of them had a dark face and light letters so I just wanted to see how it looked / show you in case that might be something you liked.

LMK if anything doesn't make sense or you need more help. :) (And again, it's not 'my way or you're wrong' so feel free to use my help as an inspiration rather than as the exact method you need to follow.)

Thank you for everything. I followed what you said but I didn't use a totally solid white, rather an off-white on an ADD blending layer rather than NORMAL to avoid any grey highlights, something that was a problem in my first submission. I tapered off the white a bit with a tinge of orange as seen here:

Now, I'm extremely hesitant about the brighter orange/brown at the bottom right of the compass in your example and I'm unsure whether or not I should add it. I think I should but at the same time fear another potential denial over it, but I do think that portion of the CI is a bit bare. That could be me and my preference though!

*My reference of a compass is yellow and has black letters, hence my usage of black but I do genuinely like the idea of lighter letters and may consider that down the line.

Thank you again, all of this help is greatly appreciated. I probably would've given up entirely without you, lol. But I'm glad that I'm almost to the end hopefully.

It's looking a lot better! I like the changes you've made so far :)

Also shading flat objects is really hard. That's why I was looking at references to see what I needed to do for the compass face's shading. x'D

Sometimes it helps me to take a break and walk away for a bit, let my brain catch up to the process before I proceed. IDK if that'll help you but maybe worth a try? :)

I decided my art warmup for today would apparently be throwing together a whole CW overlay despite not being in the CW game, so I've meandered over here to see where to go from here.

Username --- Link to the overlay(s) --- dressed up / just leggies on white bg / just leggies on dark bg Link to the CI --- no CI yet

What do you need help with --- Something looks off to me about the legs and I'm hoping an outside eye can help? I might tweak the proportions later but I feel like that's not the only issue here.

Was there a denial --- No

Optional Can we take a look at the PSD files --- I'm using SAI so converting it to PSD would break it lol Can we redline --- yes

I think the art looks fabulous! Most leg mods extend a little farther than the HA's feet so in that sense they seem a little short, but honestly they look good to my eyes. The only thing I would reconsider is the vertical line/seam in the crotch area of the legs - until I noticed the belt loops at the top of the mod I did not realize this was meant to be pants, hahaha.

Thank you! <3 I made a CW like... once, five years ago, and it was a disaster so I'm highly doubting my ability to create anything of that nature. That helps to hear! Do you think buttons would help down the front of the pants? They're based off an OC of mine so I was just going straight off his ref, but I also want to make sure it's readable on Subeta. I'll consider making the legs a little longer too-- I want to see how compatible it turns out with say, ground items, so I'll have to do some testing on that.

Aww, I'm glad you came back and gave it a go! 5 years is a long time and I'm sure a lot of art improvement. ^_^ It looks good to me so far!

Buttons would definitely made the item more readable as pants. Also great plan to test with some ground items, I've definitely encountered many leg mods that don't work well with ground and foreground items. I've actually started making companions and similar items positioned much lower on the canvas to accommodate.

I have some more quality tweaks to add to the actual legs, but I have made it more apparent that there are pants there, and I now have a (questionable) CI image! Two options bc I'm unsure how readable the original is.

Username --- Link to the overlay(s) --- dressed up / just leggies on white bg / just leggies on dark bg Link to the CI --- full colour / muted colour

What do you need help with --- I restored the legs to their original darker colouring that I initially drew them with, and now need to decide if I leave them and the CI the way they are, or if they should be lightened a little for clarity. The lightened CI image looks a little too washed out but aside from completely changing the colour scheme I'm not sure how to make the features pop more.

Was there a denial --- No

Optional Can we take a look at the PSD files --- I'm using SAI so converting it to PSD would break it lol Can we redline --- yes

I think the darker color looks great! The CI looks good as well, though I'm not 100% sure it "represents the wearable," so it might be denied for that. I think you're ready to try submitting and see what staff has to say about it. :) And if you get denied, don't be discouraged. We all do from time to time! Staff usually gives pretty good feedback on what you need to do to change things, and that's the best way to learn what subeta expects as you do more CWs over time.

Thank you! I went ahead and submitted it and it seems the CI is okay, but I got some feedback on the overlay to work with! It's kind of funny because I guess I overdid it on the shading haha!

Not tooooo sure how to make it look more like cel shading though, I had 5 layers of shading/lighting (which is the max recommended) so I turned one off, but I'm not sure if that helped or if I need to turn off another? Or just rework it altogether?

Username --- Link to the overlay(s) --- original shading / new shading Link to the CI --- CI

What do you need help with --- Making the shading fit Subeta standards better!

Was there a denial --- Yes

Optional Can we take a look at the PSD files --- I'm using SAI so converting it to PSD would break it lol Can we redline --- yes

From what I'm seeing, it looks like the problem is that you're shading in 'steps' or 'pillow shading'.

If every single level of shading follows the same shape as the level of shading before it, it often makes the cell shading look soft.

This is an older example I did for someone else, but it applies here too; LINK

As you can see in the example, each layer of shading is a different shape on the right, making it look more detailed. You can also see this in the items in your signature, especially the flag. The shading shapes could all be the same as the one before, but because they're different, it makes the shape of the item more interesting.

Username --- Link to the overlay(s) --- click click Link to the CI --- n/a

What do you need help with --- How to make it more 3/4 angle? I already tweaked it a lot before submission but it still wasn't enough. The first picture is how it looked submitted (on top of the av) but the second is how it's meant to be (layered behind the av) and I thought it looked fine there but now I'm perplexed. I fear that I may have to completely start over 😅 Also what does it mean by "over-sharpened"? The lines were thinner before but appeared gray as a result and I was trying to avoid the gray lineart denial haha

Was there a denial --- OVERLAY: Over-sharpened artwork

OVERLAY: Overlay perspective conflicts with the 3/4 angle of the avatar base

NOTES: We know it's only the one wing, but it is very front-on, especially from the angle we'd be seeing it from!

Optional Can we take a look at the PSD files --- no Can we redline --- yes please

thank you

I don't know how helpful this will be, but here goes nothing!

I think the wing looks very straight on because the lines are indeed, very straight/horizontal. On the HA, the left wing would be pointing off not to the left, but to the left/top. The lines of feathers should be a bit more diagonal, I think. And because of the perspective, I think the top layer of feathers (closest to the body), should take up a bit more space on the wing and cover more of the middle section.

As for over sharpened look, I think you're using too hard of a brush to ink with. Try using a slightly softer brush. OR, you might be able to duplicate the lineart, blur it, and set it as a very low opacity beneath the entire wing artwork to help soften the pixels around the edges a bit.

I am not an expert on wings, so I cannot really give you any advice for the perspective issue.

However, I think I can help with the over-sharpened artwork.

This is coming from having so much detail packed together so tightly. Your working size piece is inked and shaded as if that's the size we're going to be viewing it at. When working with something that will be resized, you do sometimes need to omit some details, or even enlarge some details to make them view better when compressed. I think it you got rid of maybe even 1-2 feathers on each row and made the current feathers a smidge wider to compensate (so that the overall size remained the same) it would really help to spread out your detail a little more evenly.

If your program has access to a feature that allows you to view your piece at 'final size' at the same time you're working on it, I highly recommend using it, as it's a really useful learning tool to get used to seeing very quickly what is working and what is not working. If you don't have access to that, I instead recommend constantly checking your piece zoomed out so you can see which steps are starting to look hard to see.

[edit] Seeing s post above mine, I ONLY agree with duplicating a line art layer if your brush is SUPER soft OR if you're going to go back in and personally fix edges. If your brush has any hardness at all, duplicating the layer will only amplify the hard or pixelated edges, even if you don't keep the second layer at full opacity. (I used to do this when I first started CWs and knew a few other artists who also did it, and all of us constantly got denials until we stopped. I'm sure there IS a way to do this and have it work well, but it would probably take experience with knowing how exactly to achieve it.) I work with a fairly soft brush myself, and I double line by hand. Here is an old example I did that illustrates what I'm talking about at the bottom; (Drag the image to your top bar to view full size)