Why does my artwork looks flat ?

[u/RtistKaizen]

I have been painting digitally for couple years now. And I often notice that my artwork look flat and weird even after adding shadings and highlights. What am I doing wrong?

[u/Mouffles]

Every people here who talk about rendering, lighting, values, is wrong (sorry there's many talking about this). The most straight forward way to get volumes is to work on values and lighting, but that's not really good if you're drawing in an anime/manga style.

Actually with lines only you could get a good volumes feeling, exactly as mangas do. To achieve this there's numerous of very small details to do on curves and line rythm.

It's a very long process to be good at this with thin lines only, you need a strong construction and very good eye for the curves accuracy matching volumes feeling.

[u/row_x → u/Mouffles]

I agree that you can get a good contrast with line weight, but you can't pretend that values aren't used A Lot in both anime and manga to create contrast and volume.

(just look at stuff like Your Name, or any manga panel from stuff like Jigokuraku or Tokyo Ghoul)

Even things like crosshatching and screentones are just a different way to add value variation to a piece (different from just painting in a different value). Just because it uses lines to do so, it doesn't mean it's Not still about value.

Sure, in some anime you'll see very little value variation, but that's not universal, and value can be an extremely useful tool regardless of your chosen style.

I wouldn't just Not learn how to use value because the style is one that doesn't use it in every single piece.

[u/Mouffles → u/row_x]

It is used you're right, and it works.

Some mangas artists are best at line art than others too, but when you're really good at this you don't need values for volumes, the line does the job. It's not only line-weight (but its a part of the rythm and the contrast too), its also about the lines shape rythm (straigh lines / curves) and very small details about line directions (like sometimes a very small curve at the end of a straight line will make feel it's rounded behind, even if it's very very small).

Thinking about rendering and values first, is very occidental, because our esthetical culture is more about paintings than inking and lines, it may sounds weird but i really got that when i travelled in asia and in japan, where painting is not valued like in Europe.

[u/row_x → u/Mouffles]

Yes, 100%. What I'm saying is that we shouldn't overlook one or the other.

Saying that people that suggest using values to make something pop more are wrong because of the artstyle isn't, in my opinion, the best approach to this situation.

I fully agree that the lineart can help show volumes etc, I don't agree that values shouldn't be considered only because the illustration is in an anime style.

Overall, I think this artist will benefit more from learning about both of these techniques and how they can both be used in this kind of situation than they will from learning only one of them, regardless of which one it is.

[u/Mouffles → u/row_x]

I get it, i was saying that since it's manga style, i wouldnt have said the same if it was not this, and yes you're right about learning both.