C.O.W. - #048: Beauty And The Beast - VOTING!

[Mighty5cent]

Voted for Mike. I really like your palette, with that mother of pearl looking shine going on. And your textures rock as always.

Jakkas, your execution is amazing, but like Mike said, the presentation would be way more effective in 3/4 view. Looking into that gaping maw would be cool. It's a gorgeous piece.

Tom, I really like yours, too. This may just be personal preference, but I'm a little bothered by the way the bottom of the pic cuts off right at ground level. Because of the angle looking up, I know you wouldn't really see the ground, but I don't know, something about it... I like the pic, though. I feel sorry for the little beauty.

[MasumiX]

for me it was a hard tossup between kyi_72 and Neorepto, while perhapse the depth of their rendering isn't as "fantastic" or perhapse alien as they should be, the creature symbiosis seemed both plausible and yet alien, with the Beauty and beast being less traditional concepts that predominate the entries.

All in all the entries were all fantastic, I'll deffinately put much more effort in my next joining m(_ _)m

[surfacemonkey]

voted for Jakka.

the presentation looks so complete and effortless.

Seeing this drawing is just like surfing, when that guy paddles past me seemingly effortlessly, smiling even, while i'm getting slammed by waves, paddling my heart out and not moving forward at all.... yes, just like that.

[redehlert]

Whoa! I got a vote! Thanks 2Medusa!
Cheers,
Dave

[xyfzc]

went for JakkaS. dunno why but now im really seeing those "Glishuks" wandering on the dark side. and thinking bout those "Coreillos", they r of realy beauties. love this piece so much.
MIKECORRIERO, good as usual, just love ur style. but yeah, it's like after JakkaS's descrpition i found every creature living on the dark side...... and it'll be perfect if ticona is as beautiful as in the text, so wanna see the colors and light......
good lord, last exam next monday and im free for everything! been so long time from last entry, though as lame as any one......

[2medusa]

You're welcome, red! Lovely line work and shading on your entry, and the concept is a killer (hahahaha...I kill me). Great work.

[Oddo]

The finalists on my list were JakkaS and MIKECORRIERO .

Both strong works, Mike's beast was more interesting and.. beastly but the beauty.... didn't find it quite beautiful enough....

Had to go with JakkaS since he head both a beastly beast and a pretty beauty


Many solid works all around.

Cheers!

[carotello]

Voted for Jakkas. I love the concept, the design of both creatures, excellent presentation, and I really respect the fact that he improved it after being critiqued.
Mike Corriero would have probably been my next choice, but it doesn't look as finished...I know you didn't have much time, Mike, and I feel like an idiot saying this anyway, because as unfinished as it is it still kicks any of my creatures' ass...
Bruce, I love your piece too, especially the concept. It's original, and somehow melancholy. Beautiful colors, and execution. My only crit would be that both creatures feel a little stiff, slightly unnatural pose... but it's minor, and it doesn't make me love it less.
Those were my top three. It was a great round, I wish I had had time to participate. Next time!

[Bruce Jensen]

Neorepto: Nice concept. I like the angel tear illustrations best. The colors in the sky are a bit raw, maybe knock the yellow down some. The texture starts to get overwhelming in the branching portion of the seraph whale. It's your best entry as I recall it.

Mighty5cent; I enjoyed seeing your WIP. You're playing it straight, so it's pretty easy to offer up some suggestions. Your hi-lights look pasty. It's most evident in the branch and horns. Decide on a warm or cool light source and shift your colors accordingly. A little more gold in the hi-light colors would have made a world of difference. The anatomy is a little bulbous too. Some could be just taste, but the muscle attachments at the knee/elbow joints aren't convincing . It looks a little too much inspired by superhero anatomy. Not saying it is, just that it looks that way.

Tom Garden: The perspective cues in the beast don't quite match the background. He'd be more impressive if the same perspective used everywhere else were used on him.

Goertz. Great job with the anatomy on your beast. I preferred the pencil sketch. Your final got a bit blurry, but there's a nice drawing in there.

redehlert: (Thanks for the enthusiastic vote! I'm mixing personal work with COW. I'm not doing it as practice for work in the entertainment design field, so I know it's a bit off-center for this forum. While I'm not 'playing to win' it's really heart warming, and encouraging to see this stuff get a positive reception)
On to yours: Nice pencils. If it were a painted, I'd like to see a watercolor approach that would preserve it some. The only suggestion is that I'd lower the POV- move the tail portion of the beast down to make him more imposing. Poor vain fish.

JakkaS; Really nice color palette. I like the generous use of grey. What I like most though is this odd character that you can inject your faces with at times. It's in this entry too. Rather surreal. BTW- I liked the eye you had in the 1st version better.
Another vote for you!

MIKECORRIERO: Note my favorite of yours (but so what). Your firestarter and mover spoiled me. Not keen on the gross-out factor, but that's so personal. There's a good "I smell a victory" pun there if it should happen. Lovely colors- another nice use of grey, all done in the last few hours too.

[walnut]

Neorepto: Your concept appealed to me the most, so you got my vote. Not the tightest render of the batch, but the beauty of the idea mad up for it.

MasumiX: Spend more time shaping the creature. You could have gone further with the design. Don't be afarid of shadowing.

Might5cent: Cool creature, and good render. BG and composition are static, and the difference male/female could have been bigger. Really like the head design.

newmanhyde: Freudian jokes aside, it ain't bad. Everything's rendered the same and your beast critter looks too much like an existing species, but still.
I'dhave loved to see some, um, interaction between the two. : lewd grin :

Tom G.: Why the cut off man? I wanted to see more of your creatures.

Goertz: Beast is sick, beauty looks more like an afterthought. Wish it had a BG.

redehlert: Neat pencils, neat concept. I'd love to see this rendered in colour.
The beauty's design is a little bland however.

Jakkas: I like the changes you made, really ties the whole thing together. Definitively worth voting for, good idea and execution as always, but neorepto's idea was better. Sorry man.

kyi_72: That's a twisted idea there, makes me shiver to think about it. Watch your shapes: your creature looks pressed-in.

Mike C.: Damn that's an ugly mother! Neat as ever, though the ugly one's kinda anthropomorphic and the pretty one could have had it's design pushed more into elegance, IMO. I wonder if you're gonna work on this more, cause right now i find it very charming, with your linework peeping through.

Bruce J.: Another close contestant for the vote. I love the "cute and cosmic" look and the extradimensional angle. Great lighting btw.

Plate: I knew someone would come up with that one. It's ok, but there's soem crits: first off, bad lighting. Tope side of the fishes should be e bunch brighter than the bottom side. Secon; loads of empty space. You could have doen with half the canvas, or at least a tighter composition.

[Michael Jaecks]

Guys: Thanks for the votes and especially the crits. I need it. I'm glad though that the concept is reading in a nice way to people. It really went through an evolution as I worked on the piece, including the writing. At first the Angel's Tears we're going to be much more profound and weighty, something on the order of the Spice from Dune. But close to deadline time, I figured... why not just make the humans interested in them because they look pretty, like seashells... and then the whole thing clicked. Just a little bit of beauty on an otherwise inhospitable planet.

Bruce, you're right about the yellow. Someone needs to calibrate his at home monitor. I think its me.

Thanks again for the feedback, guys. I really feel like I wouldnt be as far along as I am without your help, whether its directed at me or just stuff I pick up from other's discussions.

Michael

[Mighty5cent]

Bruce, thanks for the crits & insight. I'm working on improving my color theory, so your comments about the highlights won't go to waste. I've been fighting between getting more color in the light and getting more contrast, and I keep ending up pushing them to white. I'll work on it.
Walnut, thanks for the comments. Wanted to get something going on in the background, but I thought I was out of time.
And thanks for the coupla votes to thoras and haika! Being only my second week, that puts a smile on my face!

[Goertz]

Thanks for the crits, they're more than welcome..!!

Bruce. Working with pencil more what i'm used to, tablets and PS being a new world for me..

Got some of my "traditional" work here:
http://www.epilogue.net/cgi/database...l?gallery=8634

[Trashy]

Interesting!

redehlert- Great overall drawing. Your concept is pretty neat and I think the creatures are pretty unique. I'm aching to see what that would look like colored though.

Bruce Jensen- Another really unique design. Your mix of colors work great in this. What I like the most is there is certian similarities to these two creatures that show that they could definitely be companions or that they live in the same enviroment. You get my vote!

Jakkas- Bah! That is so good looking...as I'm starting to learn thats always the case with your pieces. Nice work man! I gotta say the slug strikes me alot with those colors.

*sigh* I got to get back into these. Thanks for choosing the topic Fozzy.

[sbn..]

[B]not accepted entries:
[...]
sbn..
no 2 separate creatures! sorry...

Heh. I was too busy reading the first post and following the link to the guidelines to actually notice the second. I kept wondering why noone had done a combination of the two concepts - now I know. Well, it was fun anyway.

I woted for Goertz due to the concept. It seems well thought out and realistic. The image, though nicely rendered, could use some background. Just a midtone grey with a hint of a shadow under the beast's feet would have done it for me, the white is just too bright. I also definitely prefer the beast to the beauty. Seems like a lot more thought went into the beast.

Other comments:

Tom Garden, redehlert both have strong concepts. I like the way you two approached the creatures in a narrative way, giving them a more "human" feel. Natural stories there. Red's is just sick, though . Nice mood in that one, and a lot of personality in the line art of Tom's. Was it done on paper?

My actual favourite image is MIKECORRIERO's. It's got a lot of mood, the creatures seem believable (more so the beast), it's a very compelling image. The reason why I didn't vote for it was the symbiotic relationship in the concept - the Beast is essentially eating itself, if I understand correctly. Doesn't really make sense to me.

Sorry I don't have time to comment on everything else, but some pretty good stuff there as well.