# To thos the who have made sonas but no art skills



## Axtonished (Jan 1, 2021)

Hi all!

So I've recently joined here and have had a lot more time to think on sonas and what not now.

When I started I just picked an OC I like which was made on a whim. However I've been steering to the "it doesn't feel like me, just a character" sort.

I'm not the most artistic, and was wondering.
Where would be a good place to go to make a sona design (templates, ect.)
I have the species thought out, I'm just struggling to bring life to the fella.

Thanks!


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## Deleted member 111470 (Jan 1, 2021)

You can look up fur affinity main site, or deviantart for free to use bases, otherwise labeled as "F2U" as keyword for searching.


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## Deleted member 111470 (Jan 1, 2021)

Also - sorry for double post, but I forgot to add - the forums art trade section is a good place to see if anyone is offering free art. That's how I got many of my first pieces of my sona.


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## Axtonished (Jan 1, 2021)

Cheers,
I suppose thinking on it, going the way of paid work may be the better consensus in the way of general character designing route yeah?


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## Deleted member 111470 (Jan 1, 2021)

Tai Gha said:


> Cheers,
> I suppose thinking on it, going the way of paid work may be the better consensus in the way of general character designing route yeah?



It depends - I am very paranoid about how people draw my monkey's snout. When I pay someone, I usually have them remake his nose and mouth a few times. While, if the art is free, I don't do that. That said though, I do love all the free pieces I have of my sona.


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## Axtonished (Jan 1, 2021)

Rimna said:


> It depends - I am very paranoid about how people draw my monkey's snout. When I pay someone, I usually have them remake his nose and mouth a few times. While, if the art is free, I don't do that. That said though, I do love all the free pieces I have of my sona.


Yeah I totally understand the paranoia with styling and what not, definitely understand to not push on freebies since a lot of love and effort went into it.
Thank you though buddy! I'll have a browse around abit!


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## Yastreb (Jan 1, 2021)

My understanding is that there are basically three ways to get art of your character.

Use a free base. Easy and cheap, but the result is not as good-looking.
Commission an artist. Much better results and not much personal effort is needed, but it costs money.
Learn to draw by yourself. As much art as you want for free, but it obivously takes a lot of work.


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## Sam Wamm (Jan 1, 2021)

i used to draw pretty good but i'm my worst critic and now i haven't drawn in 10 years


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## PC Master Race (Jan 1, 2021)

I would recommend this https://www.heroforge.com/ if you haven't known about it yet, it's amazing. You basically get to make 3D models of any char you want, looking like action figures. Fully customizable colors, and a lot of models (head, body type, legs, even centaur too) and poses to work with.
Just for examples, here are mine :


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## Kinare (Jan 3, 2021)

So what I did when I first decided to get a visual of my sona done is I drew out a pretty shitty idea of what I wanted her to look like, then went to an artist who was willing to draw her based on that and an accompanying text description to explain the crap I was showing them. Many artists won't work without visuals or will charge extra to work off of text-only (citing it as they're making up a custom character for you), so if you can do the same as I did you may have better luck. It probably helped that all of my sona's parts relate to real life big cats, so even if I didn't draw her well the artist was still able to Google reference images of the real cat parts to use.


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## TemetNosce88 (Jan 3, 2021)

Definitely second trying to use a F2U base if you can, that's what I started off doing. I think it's a good option if you eventually want to move into doing your own art. It's easier to build some skills coloring or modifying existing line work and work your way up from there.


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## Axtonished (Jan 3, 2021)

Thanks all, I'll certainly keep all these tips in mind


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## zenmaldita (Jan 3, 2021)

I've made lots of characters based on the customer's text descriptions alone
and while fullbodies are expensive,

you can negotiate a bust/headshot/face design so you have some solid ground to work with later. it's a lot cheaper than a fullbody design
here's what I did for vaush's claude




lemme know if you'd like to do this
I believe this was $50 when I worked with him but that's a non-colored com.
welp, my lineart is clean af so you can color it by yourself if you like xD




Many Weapons Guy said:


> I would recommend this https://www.heroforge.com/ if you haven't known about it yet, it's amazing


ON MY WAY TO HAVE SOME FUN


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## PC Master Race (Jan 3, 2021)

zenmaldita said:


> ON MY WAY TO HAVE SOME FUN


Lemme see your wonders when you're done ;D


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## aomagrat (Jan 3, 2021)

Homer Simpson draws better than me.  So I asked the daughter of my best friend to draw a fursona for me. I told her what I wanted and she drew a few quick sketches, and building on those I ended up with a drawing that I really like.  All it cost me was a bottle of rum.


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## Starbeak (Jan 3, 2021)

Oh My!

I never new about hero forge

I will have to update my stock pfp now

There is so much detail and work that went into that site, I was stunned on how much the character creation depth is.

I hope this looks okay, but they didn't allow me to put actual hair or a wig on my character for some reason (This needed to be a thing)... But here is a makeover of my new OC made by Hero Forge

I may create an account and work on it some more as well as other OCs but this is by far the BEST free character creation site I came across yet.

Thanks much for this. =D

I am terrible at drawing, and my sona is still in a long description form so without further adu.



Spoiler: Hello you, it's me?


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## fernshiine (Jan 3, 2021)

Rimna said:


> You can look up fur affinity main site, or deviantart for free to use bases, otherwise labeled as "F2U" as keyword for searching.


Ooo yes!

I used a base to create my recent sona, Raven, for reference for myself and others. Then I commission others or I just draw my own art. Even if one's art skills (like my own) suck, it's good to draw your sona for practice.


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## PC Master Race (Jan 3, 2021)

Starbeak said:


> Oh My!
> 
> I never new about hero forge
> 
> ...


It's always fun to explore it for yourself, but I have a few tips for better colors if you'd like.


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## Axtonished (Jan 5, 2021)

Many Weapons Guy said:


> I would recommend this https://www.heroforge.com/ if you haven't known about it yet, it's amazing. You basically get to make 3D models of any char you want, looking like action figures. Fully customizable colors, and a lot of models (head, body type, legs, even centaur too) and poses to work with.
> Just for examples, here are mine :


Hey mate, I had a browse on the hero forge. Bloody good suggestion! Many thanks haha


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## PC Master Race (Jan 5, 2021)

Tai Gha said:


> Hey mate, I had a browse on the hero forge. Bloody good suggestion! Many thanks haha


You bet it is. I've been having too much fun with that, that's for sure.
Thanks to it I've been bringing back all the chars I made back when I was 17, and they all look amazing.


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## Axtonished (Jan 5, 2021)

Many Weapons Guy said:


> You bet it is. I've been having too much fun with that, that's for sure.
> Thanks to it I've been bringing back all the chars I made back when I was 17, and they all look amazing.


I'll have to show off a new char I've made that I'm..  growing attached to very quickly.


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## PC Master Race (Jan 5, 2021)

They look great, but I know some tip to make the colors look much better, if you'd like.


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## Axtonished (Jan 5, 2021)

Many Weapons Guy said:


> They look great, but I know some tip to make the colors look much better, if you'd like.


Sure mate, lay it on me mate


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## PC Master Race (Jan 5, 2021)

Choose a color (unless it's skin, anything goes ; even fur, leather, scales, etc) and put the "roughness" slide at half (5.0), then check the "metal" box. The color would look darker and much better.
If the color IS metal (gold, brass, etc) then put the slide all the way to the left, at zero.
That's how I colored the ones I posted above.


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## Axtonished (Jan 5, 2021)

Oh snap! I'll definetly give that a try! Thanks a bunch!


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## PC Master Race (Jan 5, 2021)

Tai Gha said:


> Oh snap! I'll definetly give that a try! Thanks a bunch!


You welcome. Lemme know how it turns out for you.


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## Axtonished (Jan 5, 2021)

It would seem the phone client isnt as detailed as the PC mixer unfortunately. But I'll be sure to give it a whirl when I get my PC again.


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## PC Master Race (Jan 5, 2021)

Tai Gha said:


> It would seem the phone client isnt as detailed as the PC mixer unfortunately. But I'll be sure to give it a whirl when I get my PC again.


Yeah it's not good on phone. But, if you feel confident, you can share your model to other people and ask them to help you with it if you're unavailable.
Like, the actual file, not just the pic. With the colors and poses and weapons etc that you picked, all load up.


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## Sam Wamm (Jan 6, 2021)

my oc






hero forge attempt



close enough


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## PC Master Race (Jan 6, 2021)

Sam Akuchin Wamm said:


> my oc
> 
> View attachment 98037
> 
> ...


I believe there are models for bovine head, and hoof legs. Just sayin'.


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## Siinna (Jan 6, 2021)

Many Weapons Guy said:


> Choose a color (unless it's skin, anything goes ; even fur, leather, scales, etc) and put the "roughness" slide at half (5.0), then check the "metal" box. The color would look darker and much better.
> If the color IS metal (gold, brass, etc) then put the slide all the way to the left, at zero.
> That's how I colored the ones I posted above.


This Hero´s Forge thing is so awesome! Such a great way to get refs


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## PC Master Race (Jan 6, 2021)

Siinna said:


> This Hero´s Forge thing is so awesome! Such a great way to get refs


I know right ?
All thanks to my dad @Underlord Veles for introducing it to me.


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## Paws the Opinicus (Jan 13, 2021)

In my experience the best solution to having no art skills is to find good affordable people that doooooo! (technically HF does kind of fall into that category!)






I tried HF but it seems their birb heads are limited to ravens, or non-modify-able owls and eagles (as they are 'hats' rather than heads)


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## PC Master Race (Jan 13, 2021)

Paws the Gryphon said:


> In my experience the best solution to having no art skills is to find good affordable people that doooooo! (technically HF does kind of fall into that category!)
> 
> 
> 
> ...


More stuffs are being added though. Check it every now and then and you may find stuffs you like.


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## DrakkenWulf (Jan 14, 2021)

Many Weapons Guy said:


> I would recommend this https://www.heroforge.com/ if you haven't known about it yet, it's amazing. You basically get to make 3D models of any char you want, looking like action figures. Fully customizable colors, and a lot of models (head, body type, legs, even centaur too) and poses to work with.
> Just for examples, here are mine :


Oh my word thank you for this! This has been a fantastic way to make a starting point for a ref, and it's in 3D which is how I think.


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## PC Master Race (Jan 14, 2021)

DrakkenWulf said:


> Oh my word thank you for this! This has been a fantastic way to make a starting point for a ref, and it's in 3D which is how I think.


Heh, no point in stopping there now is it ?
Introducing to you, my trio of sonas : Dawn the monkey, Star the leviathan, and Cosmos the mammoth


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