An art critique is described as a strategy used to analyze, describe, and interpret works of art. With students, or those artists who are looking to improve, a critique can be a great way to find out what you already do well, and what you can work on. Sometimes they can be incredibly harsh as some people who critique believe that negative reinforcements may push someone to do better, but over all, a more positive tone is far more likely to make a person more receptive to future critiques.
For a formal critique, which you're rarely going to see in the furry fandom, the first step is to describe what you see. This seems moot when you're commenting directly on a piece online, but there are situations where using this step may still be of use, like if someone makes a thing of reviewing art pieces in the fandom. And typically this stage may also include the artist, the medium, the size, etc before moving on to describe the piece itself. Moving on to analyzing, this is when you're going to talk about the elements like color, shapes, values, texture, etc, and the design of the piece like space, balance, contrast, patterns, movement, and so on.
The next step relies on the previous two, which is to interpret the artist's work. This can include what you feel in regards to the piece, what you think the artist is trying to say, what the piece reminds you of, how it makes you feel. It's a very subjective part of a formal critique. As is the last, judgement. In this part, you're describing why you feel a piece was a success or a failure with reasons included. Sometimes this can even come into how much you feel a piece is vaguely worth and why. This is the area where your own feelings really come into play.
Now that is an outline of a formal critique. What most people expect to give and get when talking about critique is much more simplistic and helpful to the artist and can be broken down in to two parts. 'What is good about the piece' and 'What can be improved upon and how'. Which, means it's example time....
This piece comes from Dogsoul on FA
http://www.furaffinity.net/user/dogsoul
With permission, I have chosen this piece from Dogsoul's gallery for the following example.
What stands out so much with this piece first off is the movement of the piece, this wonderful flowing leap, mane and tail flying upward giving it that sense of being in motion, the forelegs and depth not feeling the least bit stiff. It's a wonderful capture of anatomy as well, overall, with nice shading for muscle definition. The slight hinting of the grass unifies with the green of the eye. In it's simplicity, it's a lovely piece overall. There are a few things that do stand out, the chestnut (the tan mark) on the inside of the right foreleg that doesn't fit with the rest of the colors, not sure if that was a stain or meant to be there, but if it was muted with a grey it would fit in better. The shading does seem to have two modes, smoother on the legs and a little more gritty on the body. I think smoothing out certain areas on the body or holding the grittiness throughout would have made the piece feel more consistent.
Now, let's talk about what critique ISN'T.
Critique is not saying "this leg looks wrong" and leaving it at that. Artists usually don't mind you telling them something looks wrong if you can explain how and what they can do to fix it in a polite manner. But if you can't tell them what to fix, they're not going to know what to do, and it's just going to lead to frustrations on both sides. If you don't know how to fix something, it's better tojust keep quiet.
Critique is not saying "this would be better if ____ was _____" or "it would be better if you added ____". Art, first off, is subjective. One person may love a piece while another thinks it's terrible. That's the way art goes. Comments like these, are not only completely unhelpful, they can also easily be seen as a way to try and manipulate an artist into drawing what the person wants, and most artists aren't going to take kindly to that, especially if the piece in question was a commission. You could end up rightfully blocked.
Critique is not saying "this sucks", "this is terrible and you shouldn't be drawing", or generally just picking a piece a part. This is unnecessary commentary that serves no purpose but to tear an artist down, and can cause harm to the artist's drive to produce. If you're doing this at all, you shouldn't be commenting on art. Don't like something? Move on.
Comparisons can sometimes have their place in critique, but it's rare to see a circumstance in the fandom where this is done, or actually makes sense to do. Typically, a comparison would be related to feel, method, techniques, with why's and how's involved. It's something that is left more to a formal critique than a general one. Most furry artists do not appreciate their work stated to look like someone else's.
Critique is not saying "this leg looks wrong" and leaving it at that. Artists usually don't mind you telling them something looks wrong if you can explain how and what they can do to fix it in a polite manner. But if you can't tell them what to fix, they're not going to know what to do, and it's just going to lead to frustrations on both sides. If you don't know how to fix something, it's better tojust keep quiet.
Critique is not saying "this would be better if ____ was _____" or "it would be better if you added ____". Art, first off, is subjective. One person may love a piece while another thinks it's terrible. That's the way art goes. Comments like these, are not only completely unhelpful, they can also easily be seen as a way to try and manipulate an artist into drawing what the person wants, and most artists aren't going to take kindly to that, especially if the piece in question was a commission. You could end up rightfully blocked.
Critique is not saying "this sucks", "this is terrible and you shouldn't be drawing", or generally just picking a piece a part. This is unnecessary commentary that serves no purpose but to tear an artist down, and can cause harm to the artist's drive to produce. If you're doing this at all, you shouldn't be commenting on art. Don't like something? Move on.
Comparisons can sometimes have their place in critique, but it's rare to see a circumstance in the fandom where this is done, or actually makes sense to do. Typically, a comparison would be related to feel, method, techniques, with why's and how's involved. It's something that is left more to a formal critique than a general one. Most furry artists do not appreciate their work stated to look like someone else's.
With all of this said, there's a lot of artists who generally just don't want any critique unless if they ask for it, if they even do. It's important in a fandom that is built around personalized art to keep good relations between customers, potential customers, and the artists. People in each group will fail, but if we want to see artists be encouraged to improve and accept the critique to help them faster, we must provide the knowledge and understanding to how to do so correctly.
For more information on formal critiques, which are good reading to get to know some of the concepts of how to critique, please have a look at the links below:
ProArt Critique Samples
Four Step Art Critique
How To Critique Artwork Like A Pro
