Comic covers

[Simonl]

Work for submissions to 2000AD and Marvel. Tear 'em to shreds and tell me what I'm doing wrong :teeth:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v429/SimonPrime/DurhamRedA4.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v429/SimonPrime/Hulk.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v429/SimonPrime/SpidermanA4.jpg

[Chuck,mate.]

very very cool work. the first piece is marvelous.
only real BIG problem for me is the faces.
on the 1st the features are way too small, and oddly positioned.
on the 2nd again features too small, eyes in particular.
on the 3rd the eyes on spidey`s mask are too low, and that makes the head look alien-ish.

really great colors and light and shade. well done.
:)

[Simonl]

Face drawing practice coming up! Cheers chuck! I'll post revisions as they're done.

[SKarr]

Hm.. the muscles and all are terribly wicked, but there is one little thing I'd like to point out.
You did a nice job on coloring the skin in the first pic, looks smooth, but you didn't color that way in the other two pics.

Coloring wise, maybe you should try to use more varied colors to shade and highlight with instead of using on linear gradient (light green to very dark green for ex.) So I would add a bit more variety in it. The way it is now looks kind of ..stiff. I see you used other colors in coloring to highlight mr.Green-o Hulk from behind, but I think its way too subtle. You can bring it out more :)

[King Kull]

The first piece is so nice, (evil tongues would say because heroin has shaved kitty) especially shading, that it looks like raytracing.
You have fantastic gift & developed technique in presenting leather and metal.I wouldn't change anything in that one.
Considering other two pics, I generaly agree with former replies and wish to add that the background on "ultimate spiderman" piece doesn't look to convincing in a term of distance between objects.
It seems (to me) like that first distant building has to be painted with lighter hues.

[spudstudios]

I agree with most of what has been said. For the durham red pic her glasses take the focus from her face. Maybe they need dulling and her blood red eyes picked out more. Nice colouring style. reminds me of the marvel trading cards. Spidey is the weakest. I'd almost say you were wimping out a little on the backgrounds. Not to be too harsh but when you get a review you should be showing all you strengths.

[rogfa]

I think the second piece is the strongest. The first and third would benefit having the characters look at the viewer. I remember reading somewhere that it's a marketing technique to have the cover "look at" the potential buyer. Also, you may want to have a piece in your portfolio of a color job over someone else's pencils. Be sure to give credit and show what you started with. Seems like every painted cover at Marvel is done by Richard Isanove but over another artist's pencils or roughs. It may help to show your versatility.

Good Luck!

[Simonl]

OK, so to sum up;

Chuck - Work on the faces
Skarr - bust up the colours a bit on the Hulk and Spidey pics
King Kull - Work Spidey background a bit more
Spud - How am I wimping out on the backgrounds? Not enough detail, too plain?
Rogfa - She is looking at the viewer. Maybe the glasses are interfering?

Any more crits are welcome. C'mon, there must be some more shredding to do!

[zerbetron]

great colors and grasp of light on all three images. I have to agree with chuck about the faces, id just try to use photo reference, and just sketch as much as possible. Faces are always what makes or breaks a piece for me. It really makes something stand out as professional or amature. Your work is great, and keep it up.

[Eric Lofgren]

Generally, I think these are pretty good. At least signifying some heavy duty talent at any rate :)

Some of the things that stick out for me are anatomy. I think it would be prudent to double check the anatomy on a few spots on these such as-

-the inside of the upper arm where the muscles from the body and arm connect, for the images that show that area.

-The hip area of the women. I'm not fully convinced it's correct.

-The hip and leg areas of the Hulk. It looks for all the world like you really wanted to get the Hulk's knees in the shot so you shortened his legs to do so and stuck 'em back on :) I would seriously revisit that area and maybe just put 'em even more in shadow for show.

-The Hulk's zombie head. I think there is a definite difference between the rendering of his head compared to the rest of his body. Most notably in the way he looks like an old man or a zombie, colored green. And the hue is just a little too different from the green of his body. The torso and arm (with the exceptions noted above) areas are fantastic. But they could stand with a bit more contrast. Especially the underside of the arms. Those are mighty big planes that make up his arms and they would cast some mighty shadows. The contrasts might help pop that area out a bit more too.

-On the woman, I think some depth is missing which I'm attributing to the flatness of her hair. There's some very nice coloring and dimension going on there that's missing a final level of highlight that I think would help pop her out even more. And I would suggest that you try a version without the glasses. Or at least make a solid effort at referencing how they actually sit on a person's nose. It's generally accepted that things like faces, hands and feet make or break an image. I would suggest that you could take that further by saying that if you plan to embellish those specific make or break areas with adornments those same adornments had better be at least equal to what they are sitting on for believability.

-Finally, Spidey's head is just to large. Or at least his cranium. I think it needs to be lessend in size quite drastically. And the shading on bottom side of the upper leg area closest to us looks very hastily rendered. In fact, the whole femur area needs a lot more attention. Same to with the knees and upper calf areas. I'm not fully convinced that these are accurately rendered. And I think the little touch of rich highlight that you have towards the top of the thigh could be applied to more areas down the legs as well as it looks a little too flat.

All this said, these are just my opinions. For the most part these are very nicely rendered images. But with a little tweaking here and there they could become quite a bit more :)


BEst of luck on your efforts!

[Dile_]

nice, I like em, but yeah, most problems would already be poninted out i guess so I just be quiet :D

[Simonl]

Thanks for the crits and comments, Eric. Greatly appreciated. I'm reworking Spidey and the Hulk at the moment and will hopefully have some revisions up in the next day or so. Red may take a little longer though.

Keep the crits coming people, make me cry!:teeth:

[Simon Boxer]

A lot of points have been raised already, but beyond these I'd suggest the following:

-As Eric said, the woman's hair is very flat, but it also looks unnaturally organised - looks stiff like a helmet of some sort. If the left half flopped down as far as the right it'd cover her eye. There's multiple ways you could fix the hair, but at the moment it doesn't look like it complies with gravity.

-Backgrounds - mainly in the spiderman one, but also in the first to a lesser extent. They seem a bit too clinically repetitious and bare. I'm not sure how much type, logos etc would go over these so the first one may turn out alright. However, the spiderman one could use a handful of spice. I'd get away from the grid buildings and reference some more modern skyscrapers. Also, it seems odd that the building in the distance isn't blurred while the sign is. I imagine you're going for a sense of motion, but since the blur on the grid isn't so noticeable it seems a bit strange.

Other than that; very smooth, visually-pleasant rendering - I especially like the woman's outfit.

[King Kull]

to simonl (the author)

You obviously respect other people's comments and that is great but I suggest you to prefer YOUR own original ideas and thaughts.
This thread developed nicely in a various opinions but I think that if you listen to all you'll lose yourself.
Maybe I'm wrong, but when I look at your Spiderman pic it seems like typical "ULTIMATE SPIDERMAN", Marvel series with unique design where every figure has larger head and painted in very vivid unusual colors than natural humans.

[Simonl]

Fear not, Kull, I will be running all crits and suggestions through the Simon filter. Finding out what other people think is an incredibly useful exercise. The piece I did over in this thread http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=62741&highlight=ultramarine is living proof of the benefits of exposing your work, and opening yourself, to feedback.