This is something I have struggled with for a loooong time. Too long. And via this forum, I hope I can finally find a way to draw manes and tails that fits my awkward and unique style. As I've struggled with them for so long, I have kinda given up on adding them to my art, as I've gone through 3 different mane and tail style so in the past 4-5 pieces.

Whenever I try to shade and highlight hooves with my style, I believe it always looks super awkward. Like I've just drawn a white line of the hoof, or there is some weird-ass, black and mouldy hoof.

3. Honest Criticism

Go ahead. Be brutally honest. I can take it. I will take every single bit of criticism I find relevant, legit and useful. I will take it all into perspective, and use it to better my art, to the best of my abilities.And no, saying "This and this looks bad" isn't going to cut for me. Why does it look bad? How can I make it not look bad? Honestly though, a dried up, single sentence saying something looks wrong is not helpful. I don't understand why people can't get a grasp on why statements as such don't help the artist at all?

4. Tips
Now, if you don't have anything to criticize, cool. That's awesome, less work for me :b But, if you do have some tips for me to improve my art, I'll take them! Lighting, proportions, eyes, etc. If you believe that you have an idea or two on how to make any part of my art look better, than go ahead. Let's hear it! I'm always interested in, and on the lookout for tips and tricks to beautify my art .

Program: ibisPaint X

Stylus: n/a I use my finger for now

I only have one piece that I am willing to show to the public right now.

https://i.postimg.cc/Pq7Xsgxb/382-BA781-251-C-4-ECC-B682-D710986793-B4.png

Start by just tracing the old mane with a size 2.0 Hard Dip Pen at 50% opacity, (paint your own if there is none.) And then use a large dip pen at a low (low) opacity to fill in any blank spots.

After that, use a size 2.5 Dip Pen to add highlights and shadows :DD

Your shading and highlights look great, and I like your hoof style <3

1st: I draw my own manes and tails and what I do is first make one huge blob of the color roughly where it is going to be, then use the brush tool on a super tiny size and roughly draw out some hairs, then finally I use the smudge tool on like size 2 or 3 and strength 75-85 and just keep using it to smudge the hairs out in the direction you need them. It takes a while but its worth it!

2nd: For hooves i make them the solid base color, then where the highlight is i make a new layer and make it into a clipping mask and draw on the white then use the blur tool to smooth it out and finally turn down the opacity of the layer until it looks how you want it. I do basically the same for the shadows but I try to use a darker shade of the base color instead of black or something to make it look better.

3rd: I think it looks really good the only thing i would change is the eye is a bit low, and also it helps if you use very thin black lines to separate some parts of the body, such as the legs from eachother and where they overlap the body but dont attach, and the ears, just to seperate them a bit so they don't mash together, and you can also add very thin white lines around the edges of the body where the light would be hitting it, this just adds more detail to it and places like the front of the front legs instead of using black use white for the light and it helps seperate it like i said

I hope this helps! If you ever need any help with anything you can always pm me :) I am always happy to help!

im pretty sure somewhere in the art help thing i have a mane tutorial. for the rest like shadows how to pick stock smudging highlights shading and eyes and everything id watch manduhs video on youtube

(I use my phone for ibis too!)

Draw the basic shape with no fly aways or shading,obviously ad smooth and tapering points (Eg like 3 or four split of sections)click one of the boxes at tge top,you will find force fade ,turn it on so its a 40% for both (once tou get to highlights set that to 80%)and then use a hard pen (the second option on the pen type)at 1.5 px and draw small strands of hair,then go down in size but NEVER go lower than 0.5 px unless you are maniping.for the first colour,use a darker version of the colour you want,once you've done this,run alpha Lock on.go to the color you want and draw sooooo many strands (but so you can still see some of the darker bits in areas)then go to your colour,sliders,and add 40 to each level ,and draw lines (1 px) for highlights,do the same but ad 100 to the colour now draw fewer lines but in the same spot with 0.8 px,for the last step,on you color wheel go straight up yntil it's nearly white ,and draw a couple of lines at 0.5 px

I will be updating this for you ^-^

I love lineless art as much as the next guy, but it takes a good bit of practice. Yours looks fantasic! But there is a spot on the hind legs that makes them look a bit conjoined. I'd put a line there just to separate them a bit more.

As for hair, I had to study Jello's tutorial a bit, and it really helped! I used to start by leaving most (if not all) of the original hair and just adding highlights and flyaways.

Hope this helps some! <3