orb-i-licious.

[Atomick]

Been home sick from work, so I whipped this up. Would love your collective thoughts!

http://www.atomick.net/conceptArtForum/mage_w_orb.jpg

All Photoshop except for the arcane pattern (Illustrator).

Best,
-Atomick

[blackhand]

The right hand in general looked a bit weird to me at first, but then I tried posing my hand and discovered that I could get it in the same position--it hurt, though. I thought the finger, particularly the pinky was a bit long, too...but then I looked at my hand and it looked about right.

The effects you have around the orb are really nice. I think the green you used for the reflected light on the man's right side is a bit too garish.

I find my eye constantly drawn to the hands--they're drawn very well.

[R_M]

Hi Atomik,
the light on the skin is very cool, well done!
I think the hands are to big compared to his face, and the right forearm is to long.
the illustrator pattern fits in the picture pretty much, how did you do it exactly?
Roberto

[nardfrog]

Hey cool work.
A few tips to rember on the lighting though. First, the reflected light off a surface can never be brighter than the light itself. In this case the highlights on HIS right hand (our left) are too intense. I suggest makeing the orb brighter for a quick fix. Next is his arm area. The highlights on his arm are a bit too saturated. Take the hue more towards grey (slightly) and also I would make the trasitions less extreme. In other words instead of his arm which is close to the orb being blue with green highlights, I would make it blue-green with green highlights. The further away from the light, the less the color of the robe is afected by it. Same for everything else.

Hope this helps.

[bOne]

good idea, to draw a believable old sorcerer, not with big beard and hair !

I have the same remarks that nardfrog, I just think that you could use another color than violet in the background, perhpas something more red...

[theognis]

cool picture. i like the style. but i dont really like the coloring. but its still good how it is. just looks like a disney cartoon :-|

I dont really like hard light stuff. I liek etchy shit lol but still great!

ill shut up now ;-)

[Atomick]

Thank you all for pointing out the (of course) now-obvious problem areas! Quite helpful and much appreciated.

Here's a quick update, and a closeup of the pattern for R_M:

http://www.atomick.net/conceptArtForum/mage_fix.jpg

http://www.atomick.net/conceptArtForum/pattern.jpg

R_M, After I made the initial Illustrator pattern, I used a spherical gradient to displace the pattern several times, then stitched it together (rubber-stamp love). And I'll get to the hands later, that'll be just a tad trickier to fix, great observation.

blackhandnardfrog, bOne - thanks, y'all are right about the colors. Hopefully this update starts to address some of those issues.

theognis - style aside, thanks for the encouragement!

Best,
-Atomick

[blackhand]

Atomick, your refinement is a marked improvement. The colors and the lighting are more subdued and believable.

I'm glad you took the initiative to make improvements to the piece.

Now the only suggestion I have is perhaps to use a different color besides black to outline areas of the figure--to give a more painterly look the piece. There's a stylistic contrast between the figure with the black outlines and the wall right behind him which has no black outlines to mark the bricks, etc.

[R_M]

that's a good trick! thanks Atomink.

Maybee you should do something outside the window, it is a bit sparse at the moment. Some clouds, a full moon, or some animal siluette, don't know it is just a bit to clean.

[ELWOOD]

nice testing 1 2 3