New Illustration

[saulone]

Here is one for a friend who is fairly into RPG's and begged me for a custom character image. A bit on the rough side, and the details i was given before starting were "half-elf mage" and "red-headed or blonde". She also mentioned something about "flame storm" or some such being some uber spell she tended to use on large parties.

Nearly all work in Photoshop with the base being a pencil sketch.

As always comments and crits welcome!

UPDATED VERSION - 3.0

http://www.danielgovar.com/linked/half_elf_mage_3.jpg

UPDATED VERSION - 2.0

http://www.danielgovar.com/linked/half_elf_mage_2.jpg

OLD VERSION - 1.0

http://www.danielgovar.com/linked/half_elf_mage.jpg

[Joeslucher]

The hand is really confusing and sort of ruins the image for me. On the other hand, I looked at your website and love a lot of your stuff. You should do some final colors to the medusa pic and the guy on the bird. I also liked the design of the website.

[MattVogt]

Make the eye closest to the viewer a tad bigger to fake some perspective. Not saying her's are bad or anything... I like this. The clothing looks great!

[saulone]

Hey thanks for the feedback Joeslucher.

I probably should clean the hand up a bit - The piece was kind of a stab into almost entirely photoshop pieces. Other than the hand being a bit rougher than other parts - is there anything in particular you find wrong about it - or just that it is so prominent? Maybe it's a focus thing- eye jumps around the image too much? Just trying to clarify. The more I look at it since I shrunk the piece down, it seems there is something off on the far side of her face...hmm will try and see what I can do about that and about figuring out the hand issue - maybe playing with the focus and lighting to make the hand work more?

Thanks for the comments and props on the medusa and thunderbird piece. I probably won't get to revisit the thunderbird piece, but the medusa piece I will have to post progress on in my sketches thread. (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=62691)

MattVogt - yeah - I think the perspective got a little fubar when I photoshoped this to death. I will go back into the file and see what I can tweak out. See above about focus and whatnot. Thanks for the crits and likes :)

[Joeslucher]

I think one of the reasons the hand confused me is that it feels so detached from the body. I think I expect it to be larger since it's her left hand, but since it's small my mind thinks it's her right. Plus it's coming straight up from the bottom and I don't know how the arms could allow for that with the way the shoulders are positioned. In the future I would suggest just drawing everything out, even stuff you don't plan on being in the composition. Then crop it down. This way stuff that goes off and comes back in feels believable and you never know, you might see a better comp.

[Mirana]

What confuses me is the highly rendered vest that's in the background, versus the sketchy face and fire in the foreground. Huh? Shouldn't it be the other way? It's very detached because of it. My eye goes straight for the lacings and then think the piece is unfinished because of all the sketch lines on her face. :/ Her forehead is also very high.

Like joeslucher said, I don't like this as much as some of your other work. :)

[saulone]

Thanks be to you both :) - I will rework this a bit tonight and try and post a new file - here is the sketch to see it's roughed out early stage. I think I might have spent too much time attempting to figure out some fo the details I should have worked into the sketch more before starting the Photoshop work. Here is the sketch to see it's beginings (I hate to say it but I like the sketch more as I look at it again - might do a rework from the begining on this one, as I really dig the expression and something in the sketch. :yayca: )


http://www.danielgovar.com/linked/half_elf_mage_sketch.jpg

[bdfoster]

I think part of the issue on the hand is that it's an awkward crop. You've got a tangent with the left side of the image, and the crop right at the wrist is really uncomfortable. The sketch reads a little better with the extra space at the bottom-- and would even more so if there were indicators of the wrist and part of the forearm showing where the hand is coming from. The other thing that makes the hand read better in the initial sketch is the thumb-- it's much more obvious and clearer to read in the sketch, whereas the painting it seems to get lost in the flame effect. I wouldn't even have realized that's what it should have been if I didn't compare to the sketch.

Also, The mouth is rendered a little too sharply, and the shadows on the right (our right) are actually inverted for the light source. The bottom lip would have more core shadow on it than the top lip given the strong light from the flaming hand. Overall I think the structure of the face sould read a bit better given the light source as well-- a little more push and pull in your shadows and highlights to define the form better. Maybe shooting some reference with a similar light source (even an exposed light-bulb from a table lamp would work) to really pick apart how the highlights and shadows on the face will read?

I think you've got the start of a great piece-- the color, the mood, general composition-- I think adding some space at the bottom and left and then refining some of the elements will really make it sing.

[saulone]

bdfoster - thank you greatly for the crit. I see what Joeslucher and yourself are saying now about the hand. I will give it some tweaking this evening, expand the space to make the cropping work better, deal with the lighting and hand issues, then repost.

You all are the best!

[`rawr]

nice. I prefer the pencils more. The face structure seems a lot better.

[bdfoster]

Daniel--

I admire your ability to take crits and remotivate yourself. It's a skill that's becoming all too rare. I can't wait to see how the final comes out.

-Ben

[saulone]

Thanks for the encouragement and notes all :)

Here is a revision based on a lot of what you were saying. As always - crits and comments welcome!

http://www.danielgovar.com/linked/half_elf_mage_2.jpg

[biscuitninja]

He he, Playing with FIRE are we?? My one small suggesting are the fingers. The index and middle finger are the same length, the index throws me off quite a bit as well as a nuckle in that thumb.

[bdfoster]

Daniel--

I still think you need to show more of the wrist to make me believe that it's the left hand. Also, the thumb is waaaaaay long for the position of the hand. hold up your left hand, and move your thumb around to try and get it in that position. It won't happen. If your fingers are straight, then your thumb naturally falls between the first and 2nd knuckles of your index finger. In order to touch your thumb to your fingertips, you actually bend your fingers at the first knuckle. That means you need to show more of the depth of the hand between the first knuckle of the index finger and the base of the thumb. Also, if you're looking at your hand right now (do it, I dare you!), try facing your fingers so you're looking at them square on. See how little of the thumb you see? For readability, I would rotate the hand slightly, so that you're looking slightly from the side (ie, move the landmarks of the knuckles and fingernails more to the viewer's left.)

Aaaahhh, screw it. Pardon the craptacular paintover. I'm still at the corporate drone job and all I've got is a mouse and MSPaint, so bear with me.

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b368/bdfoster/CAOrg%20Activities/half_elf_mage_2.jpg

I didn't play with the fingernails at all because I knew it would just make a mess, but I hope that's a little clearer than some of my rambling.

Oh, and I knocked the highlight out of the knuckle at the base of the thumb. It was way too bright and distracting.

[saulone]

*kicks dirt off to the side and goes off to make a few more edits (JK :D)

I actually extended the piece by almost double it's hieght and roughed out the rest of the arm to see if it did work - and it by my estimation...(few of you commented on that). Having it in the foreground and just the hand does detach it, and with foreshortening and perspective it really doesn't help matters. Also - where the armpit bend happens is precisely on the crop.

As to the hand - I have no excuse save the only reference I have was that dinky sketch, and I admitedly didn't bother to glance in the mirror when making the modifications. Nothing gets by you guys - I love it. :)

I will do a bit of reworking in the next hour or so and post what I have then. I appreciate you all hammering through this with me, and having my own corporate America job to deal with...well the garbage that is MS paint doesn't phase me - I appreciate the time.

[bdfoster]

When I say show more wrist, I don't mean you need to extend the composition. I just mean in your latest update it still kind of fades to smoke as it hits the edge of the canvas. Define it better right there, and show the angle gowing off towards the viewers right a bit (I tried to indicate that in the awful paintover). It's looking better and better, though.

[saulone]

http://www.danielgovar.com/linked/half_elf_mage_3.jpg

I think this kind of has it now... or at least I might be spent on the piece and need to step away from it for a bit. Let me know what you think!