Dark Forest

[Corrick]

This is an illustration I started a year or so ago that I just recently applied the last few pen strokes to. It's more a pen-and-ink study than it is a heartfelt rendition of some event, but I thought I might post it here, see what everyone thinks. I may finish it out, I may not...



... and a detail of the riders...



... and a couple of prelim sketches to work out the idea...

[madster]

The values are too poorly defined, resulting in a loss of detail for all the effort you put into all those little strokes. It just reads as a vague, grayish mass. The different strokes for the grass do not go well, style-wise with the strokes for the trees.

This is a quick markup showing a bit more definition for the trunks, but overall, I really don't see much hope for this piece, sorry.

~M

[dogfood]

Just a tad more of the trees on the right would really make the dark seem to be the lack of something, vice some big, dark something.

So neat, though!

[Corrick]

- Madster

Pretty much the same thing I kept thinking as I continued working on it, which is why it more or less became wrist practice for the "little strokes" I wasn't seeing much hope left in it either, so I may revisit the concept with a little more depth. Or a lot more depth. Thanks for the critique... definitely something to think about for next time...

- Dogfood

A good point, given that balance is a good thing most of the time. I'll try to make sense of it and regurgitate something a little more coherent. Thanks for the crit and comments!

[Kveldulf]

i think this is awesome man! i really like the strokes, the style and the contrast, but i think if you do all of it , the piece will be too noisy and crowded, i like it just as it is, maybe round it off, but keep it simple to make the major inked sections work... i really like the trunks, great texture. i must say i really like the rough of the figures from the above perspective aswell, anyway good stuff, keep it up

[Flatuloso]

You've got this really nice vertical black shape that is obviously the central focus of the image, and then you really dull it down by throwing in all that gray tone on the left side. I'd start it over, and use a much lighter hand for the trees on the left side of the image, so that they give the impression of a forest but are predominantly white. Also, some indication of the path that the two riders are walking on would carry the shape of that void up and down the length of the page.

I like this a lot, and though you might have overworked this one to a bit of a muddle, I think it's definitely an interesting composition that could be worth revisiting.

Oh, and I'd say both your prelims are more interesting than the final. If you worked up one the two from the more extreme angles, you could get away with more abstraction in the woods and it would be far more dynamic over all.

[Ian Mack]

The bottom most sketch is a really nice shot.

otherwise Madster hit my crits too. lol I've done the same thing...using crosshatching for grass. I did it alot lighter with longer strokes and less variation in the angle and it seemed to mesh in a little better with the rest of the pic.

[Corrick]

Thanks all for the comments!

I'm in the process of sketching another few prelims, thumbnails more than sketches, and I'm going to follow both of the previous preliminary sketches. I'll post these in a new thread, as I begin the new pieces (The first of which being the lower angled shot, followed by the bird's eye view).

As for the crits on the "final" above, thank you for the suggestions. Yes, the crosshatching doesn't look like grass and clashes with the overall style, but I was filling space. I occasionally get frustrated and hurry through certain areas, especially with pen and ink, something I need to try to overcome as I'm going to make another pen and ink attempt with this next illustration.

Hopefully this will eradicate the deadly threat of the "brain trees"

[Ryan DeMita]

Hey! Nice work. It reminds my alot of the illustrations tolkein did. I also like the way you handled the trees. However, they seem to flatten out a bit. Maybe adding some shadows that define volume would help. Otherwise i really enjoy it.