E.O.W Round #181: Centaur Rendezvous Point

[Vulgar`]

E.O.W Round #181: Centaur Rendezvous Point
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e181/chaosrocks/EOW2.jpg

E.O.W Round #181: Centaur Rendezvous Point

Brief:

In Greek mythology, the centaurs are a race of mythical creatures that are half human and half horse. They are depicted as the head and torso of a man with his waist joined to the horse's withers, where the horse's neck would be. The word 'rendezvous' means a meeting place, an assembly point, a place where centaurs come together. Whether it's for war, for hunting or for leisure is up to your interpretation!



- Please specify which image is final in this thread! I will post your finals in the Voting Thread myself.

DEADLINE: Wednesday, February 1, 2012

[Rob Powell]

May be interesting, I'll see if I can jump in on this one if time permits!

[Howie]

some sketches, pretty sure im gonna go with the first one

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[Damien Levs]

Howie - I prefer the second one. I think it has more of an epic feel with the aerial perspective. Also the curves lead my eye around the page quite pleasantly :)

I want in on this round...desperately need to be working on projects and want to build on my enviro skills...all the best and later guys :)

[Ragnj]

Personally Id go with the first one, love the silhouette of the trees and to me it feels alot more "centaurish". Maybe rework the stones/platform he stands on tho to make it more of an natural podium.

[MartinC]

hire is my WIP

starting from Alchemy sketch

[Howie]

thanks Damien Levs and Ragnj, really appreciate the feedback

I stuck with the first one just cause I thought it was a more interesting composition and I like subtlety more than epicness. Still trying to decide how many centaurs I want in there, I know there will be at least one more.

Love to hear what you guys think so far!

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[Pixeltuner]

Sketch/composition/colourkey thingie. Trying to get a bit more of a dramatic angle pointing at the sky like it's some secluded place of worship.

[Kvenh]

Sounds like a fun topic.

Was just messing around and tried to come up with something. I don't even know if I'm gonna use any of these as I haven't settled for an idea yet but figured I'd post them anyway, maybe someone finds them interesting. I kinda like the middle one but the composition is kinda uninteresting.

[Rano]

Interesting topic :) i'm in !

@Kvenh i really love your thumbnails. I found out that the middle one is pretty interesting. Maybe make a closer shot of the scene. The design is very cool.
But to my mind, if i was you, i'll go with the third one :)

[Kvenh]

Rano: thanks for the feedback! :) I did some more work on the middle one, I don't know if this is really going anywhere though. Seems like I got a little further away from the kind of feeling I wanted.

Might mess around with the 3rd one too as you suggested.

[xbert]

yeah the first and the 3rd thumb look promising kvenh - im curious how they will turn out!

[monkeybread]

Kvenh I like the 3rd thumb the best as well....That rock structure is cool and the sense of scale is neat...

[Rano]

@Kvenh no problem :) Your last thumbnails look cool too but the first one, i think, would be better to insert some characters and give a sense of depth to your design.

But as you probably see, i'm not the only one who love the "Third thumbnails" :p
You have a pretty strong design with this one, and if it looks epic at this stage, in color it would be a very interesting piece :)

Your the artist, it's your decisions after all so it's up to you.

[Pixeltuner]

Kvenh: Well let me chime in to say that I like the 3rd thumb most as well. Earlier stated reasons like the rock and the sense of scale are obvious plusses, but most of all it speaks to me mostly as a place where Centaurs would gather. They're kind of a nomadic tribe so a city or something with a man made structure would make less sense than an open place in the woods with a monolithic rock as some sort of recognizable (holy?) place.

[Kvenh]

xbert, monkeybread, Rano, Pixeltuner: Thanks for the feedback!

Pixeltuner: hehe I actually was thinking of more of a manmade city, not necessarily an advanced one but one build of stones and stuff.

Anyway, sorry for posting so often, I was just having so much fun with these. I decided to work on the idea behind the 3rd thumbnail since most of you liked it the most. I'm not quite fond of that one as it is though so I tried to go a little bit further. Tell me what you think, I don't think I'm gonna do any more "thumbs" (I guess these are too large to be called such) so might just pick one out of these and go with it. The last ones definately have the most feeling behind them as my ideas started to get more solid as I progressed. I dropped few of the earlier ones but feel free to mention them too if you liked them more.

Not sure about the shape in the background of #5, I just tossed it in there, was just playing aroudn with the feeling.

[xbert]

yeah, they look great

[grenogs]

kvenh: really like the atmosphere you got going on the 5th image, but maybe try adding the stones from the 1st image instead of the one thats there at the moment.

[Rob Powell]

half hour of f*ing about, I like where it's going atm, may need to incorporate more colours into this though...
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[unruhe]

Another fun topic, great entries so far!

Sketching....trying to create a retreat area where they can recover/heal at the The bowl of Hygeia, deep in a forest. Dont know if ill keep this one....got several other sketches based around this theme, difficult to pick one...

[0Hayes]

Cool topic, here's my ideas so far:

[Wheeljack18]

Hey guys great work so far!
Here are a couple of comps I put together. Any thoughts?

[merl1n]

wow, nice skethces guys.
Kvenh, most of your thumbs can make it to finished piece quite smoothly. My favorites are 4 and 5.

and my 45 min initial sketch:

[Damien Levs]

Really good starts here guys...here are some thumbs. I like the first and the last one best. So I am going to try and get an image based on them both...

[0Hayes]

Three more ideas:

[Pixeltuner]

Little update here. Fooling around with some cloningtool stuff for texture and such. Hardly do that, but apparently it works ^_^

EDIT: even more updatiness

[Greggers]

Managed to get a sort of interesting sketch going.

[Damien Levs]

This is the one I wish to work up...crits, tips and tricks please :) would be very appreciated. I would love to get good with enviros through this year...

[deep_city_lights]

Thought I'd join in with one of these for once. Just a black and white concept at the moment.

[Kalumis]

Hey everyone :)

There's great things @_@

I try this one for my first EOW ^^" I'm a totally negative level in that discipline, so I'll work hard ! Please, be true critiques ;) Let's rock !

I choose to make a kind of... nest/nursery ? Female centaur come here when she's pregnant and stay until her baby can run with her. So, it's a place of tranquility and peace. They have the forest beside and the water at their 'feet' ;)

And sorry if my english is ... you know... french. :D I'm working that too !

[revenebo]

Nice stuff so far! Kvenh and deep_city_lights, I love your b&w sketches!!

Finally I found some time to sketch something for EoW!! It's just a messy sketch, but it was very useful to make experiments with a looser technique and a rather non-realistic approach to color...

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[Kino_PuA]

@Revenebo: O.o that is lookin FRESH! Idk why though but the trees seem to be flat looking, the green seems REALLY over-saturated but the piece's composition is intensely nice.

[Sean McClain]

Hey vulgar cool topic! I haven't made up my mind if I want this in the poll yet.
I just want to participate with the topic because it looked like a cool idea.

Revenebo I like it.

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[Penpoint]

@ Kvenh

Wow, beautiful thumbnails. Got me inspired to crank out a few sloppy ones before im off to bed. Should have some more cleaned up ones tomorrow.
Ive been kinda screwing around on the previous EOWs but going to give this one a sincere go around if i get the time. I cant promise that Ill render the centaurs in scene though. I kinda hate those ugly goons.

Been feeling feeling very influenced by Thomas Scholes latest enviro work.

who have you guys been looking at lately?

[Howie]

Awesome stuff everyone, can't wait to see them all finished

Still plan on working on it more, but getting pretty close to a finish
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[Pixeltuner]

Revenebo: Cool vibrant sketch indeed!

Howie: I really love the way you handled the rocks (lovely bouncelight) and the trees in the background. Looks really fairytaleish. Good job :)

[deep_city_lights]

Some awesome stuff coming along here.
Revenebo: Thanks!

Added some colour, might populate it a bit more with some more centaurs watching the one on the outcrop.

[albino-Z]

Great work till now by all. Thought I'd take a shot at this too... I might be not be able to update, so please accept this as my final if you do not hear from me till deadline. It's been a hell of a week. :/

[Wheeljack18]

Here's a couple more WIPS. Any thoughts on how I can push this one further?
Cheers

Albino-Z: Wicked Stuff!

[merl1n]

Albino-z: great entries. I would just calm some areas down so the important ones can stand out.
Howie: Your entry is one of my favorite so far.
revenebo: great composition
deep_city_lights: very pleasant image, I love the almost too much mysterious feeling of your image.

and my progres:

[revenebo]

deep_city_lights cool!!
albino-Z great mood and atmosphere!

Update! (it has become a rendez-vous point for centaur couples... :D)

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[neutral.]

Quick stuff before morning class. Total cheese.

[GEB]

Albino-Z: That is awesome!

Ravenebo: Also very good

[Wheeljack18]

Here we go with another revision. I think I'll call this done and move on. Any thoughts?

[Jamesy]

Nice wips so far :D

This probably needs some more centaur bits lol. . . . . .and better perspective :O

[revenebo]

neutral sweeeet!
merl1n nice, very traditional looking.
Wheeljack18 I like the desert setting, but I think the centaurs are too defined and take away attention from the environment and they hide it.

I'm working on another version, more epic and videogame-like (maybe I just needed to draw lots of centaur statues...), hope to finish it in time.

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[Incinerated]

My screen is screwing with me... hopefully this isnt totally f***ed

not final... WIP

[udonhead]

Revenebo Great Progress Just lighten the highlights more to attract the eye to focal points it look a little dull if you are going to contiune with the first version as for the second one so far so good
Mer1in Great comp I cant wait to see what comes next

Incinerated It looks decent but not a lot of things that are interesting yet try adding a little more to the enviroment
and I wish your luck on the drawing and getting a new screen

[revenebo]

Second version refined. It lost some of the strenght of the sketch and looks a little cartoony...
Now I'll go back to tweak something in the first concept too...

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[Luis Gama]

Great stuff guys! This is my 1st time in here so hello everyone!
I decided that my centaur rendevouz point would be this rooty environment that randomly formed what looks like two centaurs and that being the centaur clan decided to use it as their meeting point. Had lots of fun!

[neilpa77]

Hello people, great work by everyone so far!!!

Here's my first WIPs, very rough at mo. Basically two compositions of the same image. Personally think the sky needs more going on in both, the space it creates seems a bit to big and blank. Any input/ideas on improvement would be very welcome.

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[merl1n]

revenbo: nice
Luis Gama: excelent idea

I wanted to make the scene as if it could happen in real world. The terrain is pretty much typical for Greece. Composition should support the feeling of meeting place with all the shapes and lines leading to the center, where centaurs gather.

*EDITED* after reading some comments

My FINAL:

[MeteorCat]

What a beautiful and great idea, Luis Gama. I'm looking forward to seeing more of your work.

Welcome aboard!

[revenebo]

Luis Gama great!

FINAL

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[albino-Z]

Wheeljack18: that's great! More on the illustration side but no problem for me. Maybe desaturating the surroundings a bit and increasing color variation and contrast on the focal of the entrance could help pointing that out. You could also try to push the perspective of the door a bit, its more of a frontal view while the rock is not. I love your centaurs!

Howie: great entry, I love the paintery look and the centaurs look really well done. You could try to vary color saturation and hue a bit around the canvas to enhance your focals. The light coming from behind the trees in the background is dope.

deep city lights: Great texture and atmosphere. I miss some unified darks and some hard edges to bind the piece up a bit.

Kvenh: Really great thumbs, I hope we see some more of your progress!

Pixeltuner: Color and texture that excites the eye. Lovely wips, the perspective of the centaur is a bit off compared to the mushrooms there but easily fixed!

merl1n: I love the traditional look of this. The blown out warms on the bottom right corner attract the eye away from the focal. Pushing the warms on the totem(?) would create a very interesting contrast with the cools of the sea and background. Very good sense of value on the background islands btw.

revenebo: I love both your entries. The second one would really benefit if you used some atmospheric perspective to wash out the tones of the repeating elements that go to the horizon line. The first one is very detailed and well done. You seem to have treated every element like a separate object and that gives great edges and detail but could end up confusing the eye and make the image look more collage-like and not unified.

Luis Gama: Probably my favorite entry this far. Very nice atmosphere and masterful play with texture and warm-cool proximity. The sense of depth on the sides is very strong and diminishes in the middle where the image looks more flat. Not necessarily bad, since it gives the piece an animation feel that I find quite pleasing.

I hope those crits were constructive, keep in mind that I commented on the pieces I really liked to begin with.


Managed to invest some more time on this one too:

[Rob Powell]

Awesome stuff guys...

still a wip, those rocks are bugging atm, though they are just kinda slapped on there with no compositional, atmospheric depth. The God beams are sort of a placeholder atm.

Dunno if I'll finish, but I'll try.
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[unruhe]

Another great round with lots of entries.

My final.

[Incinerated]

Cairn I find the middle one most interesting

Sean Mclaine looks alright, still feels alittle blurry... but maybe thats part of the process you're using

Howie the trees in the back are too uniform, perhaps add some interest or slightly change the hue of some of the trees

Rob Powell change up the hues abit and provide some overlap for those stones and finish that image it's a goddam order!

albino-z pretty, could use a centaur or 2 just for the hell of it... but mostly because it doesn't scream meeting place to me.

All Eow is looking good of late... keep working on it you'll get there

[neilpa77]

Decided to go ahead with the vertical composition. Added more elements to bring the eye towards the tower. Still lots more to do, not sure i've got the time between now and the deadline though.

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[tsabu]

Good works everyone!

Trying to finish these one EOW either, i didn't paint any enviro for a loooong time already- hope it won't looks as a total poo at the end :D

[Migsta]

Had to try this one, FINAL.

[Jamesy]

Almost done :D Just realized we have til Wednesday (thought it was Monday lol), so I'll try to do more with it. I'll make comments soon too, but I gotta go run and catch the bus now haha

[AdrianNagorski]

I love everybody's work thus far!!!! Honestly! :hugsmile:
HiimIwGVAQQ
since this topic was posted last week i;ve been trying to figure out what to do,
its funny how most of us have the same ideas and decide to deviate from our first instinctive trail of thought, constantly evolving.

so finally i started today, about 6+ hours so far, yeah i'm slow LOL
wip1:

[Wheeljack18]

Here is my final. Thanks to everyone for their helpful feedback.
Cheers!

[revenebo]

Migsta cool!! That roof/canopy/sail on the right is a bit graphic compared to the painterly style of the rest but it's just my taste...

Jamesy nice cartoony style

I post my finished second entry just to have some feedback... (I like the concept in this one but design and execution are poor)

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=1411781&d=1327961453

[albino-Z]

revenebo: the palette shift is very sweet and the atmospheric perspective gives depth. You could push the statues at the back and the corridors end a bit more to lighter values using fog, but the overall effect is very good. Two notes:

1. Try checking your values once every now and then using a black layer on saturation mode so that you actually see if your light sources are "actual" light. The sky is, but the lanterns(?) could use a little push towards white at their center.

2. Using a single layer can simplify things and let you focus on painting vs management, but in your case having the statues on different layer than the background (or masking them) could help you achieve continuous flow to the cloud lines. Now your strokes seem to "hit the brake" before reaching the statue contour and kill depth a bit. I hope that made sense.

unruhe: Great entry. Masterful color balance, especially with those easy-to- become-cheesy tones. But yours do not. The flow of the branches is fantastic. Only crit would be that you could give the image a tiny bit more space at the bottom, the centaur form would benefit from some more space, but that might be just me. What kind of brushes do you use?

[revenebo]

albino-Z thank you very much!! Your comments are always spot-on and very useful. I hope I have time to correct the second image.
(btw, I actually use a desaturation adjustment layer to check values but I missed the lanterns part this time...)
About my first entry I think I over-rendered it (as usual) and actually it looks a little like a collage.

[AdrianNagorski]

This will have to be my final for now,
me gots PC trouble windows 7 has so many compatibility issues somethings corrupting all my files!

[Pixeltuner]

I hope I can do some more on this.
Cheated my way to the end with a lot of atmosphere, magical fairydust and some vignetting :P

[Rob Powell]

Adrian: There are a few issue with your piece atm, one is atmospheric depth, way too with objects and negative space in the background, and desaturate the sky, perhaps make it more of a grey colour, cuz remember the sky isn't always a bright blue, two that purple horseshoe just doesn't fit into the image as well, and three centralize a focal point and build around that, your image looks quite busy so nothing really stands out as a focal point.

Awesome stuff the rest of you.

Blankstate was kind enough to drop by my SB with a paintover of my wip so far, and so I pretty much gave my entry a total makeover cuz it gave me some more ideas of what I should do with my entry, still some issues here and there, but it's coming along.

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[Howie]

thanks for the feedback guys, I think this is going to be my final...didn't change a whole lot but I have no more time to spend on it

FINAL

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[neilpa77]

Hey People!!! Heres another WIP update...
Brightened the background and sharpened a few things up. Think the foreground may still be lacking.

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[unruhe]

Albino-Z:
Thank u for the feedback, its always nice to receive some input, after finishing a picture where one has been working on and staring at for hours, that could improve the picture a lot. Appreciate it.

About the brushes, Its a combination of twitchfinger inkbrushes, custom mades and switching between the old/new photoshop brushsystem.

[Luis Gama]

Hi again guys!
Everyone is doing great!

I`ll just leave a few words for AdrianNagorski: i like your idea of this centaur complex with all the buildings and structurs etc, but right now the image is kind of hard to read, mainly because you are using the same values all over the place.
Try to brake the image into zones and in each zone you have a value. For example: Stuff closer to the viewer is darker and as it goes away in distance it gets lighter.
Try to apply this method. If you cant manage to do it on this piece try in the following ones. Have fun.

Rob: you have a lot of green going on, and thats great but if u mix in there different hues of green the image will look much better!

Neilpa77: much better now for sure. I have two other ideas for you. If you place those birds half-overlaping the "portal" we instantly get another depth cue, and...thats cool :).
Also you could create kind of a curved path in that midground area that would connect the centaur to the portal, therefore adding some interest to the midground area. Keep rocking!

Based on the crits i got, i decided to make some little changes on my image. So here`s my final.

Thank you very much everyone and excuse my english please.

Cheers!

[RoboMat]

Wow I love to browse through the EOW threads. Amazing to see how you guys approach the final image!

merl1n - Your image instantly reminded me of Titan Quest and I guess that's a good thing :D I really dig the colours.

Luis Gama - I love the idea of this one!

[Incinerated]

Final :) would have done centaurs better but ran out of
time.
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[neilpa77]

Tried to link the foreground with the mid.

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[Trespasser]

First post there (: Just thought that I need more practice with environments (which I do rarely), and the topic attracted my attention. I don't think that my work is 'environmental' enough, though. But at least I tried (:

I thought of centaurs as of nomads, living somewhere in sandy desert. So this is their camp with white striped tents, where centaurs rest while it's too hot outside

[Vyse]

Great entries everyone! Really busy round.
Albino-Z is my favorite so far though =)

Escaped from work and sat for some time, here´s my entry:

http://img854.imageshack.us/img854/78/centaurrendezvousplaces.jpg

...any suggestions?

[albino-Z]

Vyse:I love the texture of the swamp water surface(edit: I realized it was snow and centaur tracks!). Since you asked for feedback and given the tight deadline, I would go for 2 easy mods: 1. add some moon rim-light to the rocks on the right to make them pop out and let the eye "slide" down and hit the water then the centaur silhouette and lock into a loop. I am talking about very subtle higher values.

2. I would also go for one or two complimentary color highlights here and there. Maybe some yellow orange fireflies and some of their light bouncing on rock?? Again very subtle.

I think that both those easy fixes could enhance the piece quite noticeably. That said, being a desaturation junkie myself, I also enjoy the piece as it is.

[0Hayes]

Hey all, fantastic entries as usual! I haven't managed to get this as refined as I'd like, so anyway here's my final =]

[Jamesy]

Howie- I like the lighting a bunch and the rock formation is pretty cool.
Deep City Lights- Whoooaa that moon is HUGE! You've got a nice dramatic night scene :D
Albino-Z- Really love the atmosphere and execution of the piece dude. My only crit is that it doesn't totally read as a Centaur Rendezvous point because of the lack of anything Centaur-y. It's still a totally rad piece though :D
Revenbo - The first piece is pretty hilarious just because I'm curious as to what's actually going on. It's a mating area with two Centaur lovers with each other, but then there's another Centaur looking down at them. He could be some a jealous Centaur furious at an ex-lover or he could just be a perv creepin in the background. I dunno. Either way it's pretty interesting lol
Unruhe- Love the colors and brush strokes :)
Pixeltuner- I really liked your initial sketch with the nice saturated colors and angle of the scene. The final piece loses some of that blue that I really in the beginning which complimented the reds/warms.
Luis Gama- That's a pretty slick composition and idea. I like the lighting and how the colors where handled too
Neilpa77- This is pretty nice so far. I think the one thing taking away from it though is the Centaur. I like the Centaur being there, but it's kinda standing there in a near static pose. . .needs more action and emotion methinks
Merl1n- I reaaallly like your image :D The colors are super awesome!
Incinerated- Pretty interesting idea. It seems pretty rough and I'd like to see it fleshed out more.
Rob Powell- Every thing is reeeaaaally green. . .Try weaving is some reds and oranges to bring out those greens
Trespasser- Nice mood and color. I'd like to see the actual environment fleshed out more, but this is a great start :D
Vyse- Nice eery mood and atmosphere!
OHayes- I like where the piece is going and would definitely like to see more put into it :)
Adrian- I'm not too sure what's going on in the piece. . I'll write some mo' tomorrow cuz I gotta go catch my bus again. . .

Here's my final :)

[Pixeltuner]

FINAL FINAL

Thanks for pointing out the drabness my final was drabbing in. Back to colourful lsd-centaur country ^_^

[CyrusD]

The artwork here is amazing!

Very inspiring I hope with enough practice my work can look as good !

PS: This is my final.

[Rob Powell]

I'll call this my final unless I decide to tweek a few things, wanted to throw a centaur in there but got a bit lazy, but still quite happy with the outcome, learned a lot this round I'm happy to say. Good luck to everyone else, great job overall!

FINAL

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[MartinC]

Final :teeth:

[tsabu]

Final

[Urötskidoji]

Really cool work! This wasn´t a very easy subject, but some of you really pulled it off. Interesting round!

[neilpa77]

Ran out of time to add any colour, oopps!!

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[Rob Powell]

got this piece crit'd so I decided to take some of the advice given and added some detail here and there....looks better, probably won't work on this anymore
FINAL FINAL
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[Ethax]

Hunting meetup (final)

[MatejaPetkovic]

@Rob, man i see allot of improvement in your work, keep pushing it

M

[Pixeltuner]

@Rob, man i see allot of improvement in your work, keep pushing it

M

Seconded. You're rocking it. Gogogo!