A couple of line arts

[Billie Bonce]

I suppose that they are right from a realistic point of view - the perspective of the beach and boats should mean that we can see the surface of the water. But I accepted that as an intenional bit of creative license rather than a mistake.

That is exactly what I tried to explain them.

In fact, they are not quite right about what we should see if the eyes of the viewer are at the same level as the eyes of the kneeling girl. Due to the laws of refraction and reflection (including total internal reflection) from that point we wouldn't see the body parts that are above the surface, they would seem to be cut off (yes, the head, too). The surface would mirror the bodies, but as the surface is rippled the reflections would be all messed up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Total ... mydas_.jpg
Also, we would see the shore, including the sand and the boats, but due to refraction it would seem to be risen up high. And again, because of ripples it would be all distorted and partially messed up with a bits of reflections.

Seriously, that would be a very interesting picture, but rendering such a picture is far beyond my current abilities.

Sounds like they expected you to draw your picture the same way a camera takes a picture, that is the area of importance is all sharply focused and the "unimportant" areas are out of focus to take away attention to them.

Yes, I just made the colors less bright. Otherwise the background seemed to be closer than the girls.

I'd say you have an appreciative crowd here that respects the intent and preference of the artist versus impacting the artist's creativity through negation of personal abilities and imagination.

And this is what I praise very high!

[water_bug_62208]

And, if I may go one step further... the beauty of drawing, painting, computer graphics, or whatever your choice of media, is the ability to "make up" for what we perceive as being "missing" from the real world. For example, the way I draw a woman is very exaggerated from how a woman would naturally look, or the way I draw a woman viewed from a certain angle is certainly not how she would look in real life. Also, the way I draw or even write about how mud or quicksand would react to the efforts of the woman trying to escape it's grasp does not happen in the natural world. Through art we "fix" what we feel is lacking in reality. For example, yes, quicksand does not suck people down to their doom, but it's so much more interesting when it does, thus that's how we depict in through art whether it be through drawing, computer animation, photography, video, or literature.

Anyway, I say just keep doing what you've been doing, Billie. Obviously, you love what you're doing, and we love what you're willing to share with us.