here's the next incarnation of eldred. he isn't completely finished, but pretty close. i still don't know if i like him... on the one hand, i think he works if i just look at him, but i spend the last hour staring at johann's work and trying to understand it. and i have to admit that i'm just not capable to produce anything near his luminosity and softness.
i'm so frustrated! bah!


@ groovy: point taken! you're right about the pattern. i will see if i find to revise it. on eldred you're right again - the cape makes no sense at all: it's rather a reference on the story pics...

@ santi, thumper: thank you for the encouragement!

Johann postet a describtion how he colors his work on conceptart.org.
If it helps you.

Personal I think the armor is too shiny.
Especially for leather. A bit dirt and earth tones perhaps?

i know his sketchbook but thanks for the link nevertheless. it's not so much how he applies the colour but his understanding of it...


and that's exactly what frustrates me - i don't even want it to be leather
does anybody feel qualified to do an overpaint?

So for me it is the other way around.

I don't feel qualified though but the question is what do you actual wanted to achieve? Some kind of bronze? It is difficult to give advice if we don't have your intentions.

I agree with Kitty. Leather is for Crelanu, the north elves and other kinky types....
Eldred is too young and too pampered for that...
Seriously though, I feel the armor Kitty did is very appropriate for a heir who has visions of
greatness(also fuelled by Asheviere)

I think the issue is that your colour is too saturated. Knock the saturation down a lot, and you'll have something that looks a lot more metallic, i think. Maybe include some brighter speculars, too.

The opposite double lighting on Eldred works really well. I agree about dropping the saturation on the armour, and sword too, to make them more metallic-looking.

The one thing that bugs me is that the sword seems to be at the same depth as his far side shoulder (or at least it should be, unless the crossguard is stuck between his ribs), but the lower hand seems to be around the centreline of the torso.

ETA: Actually, the sword is not held like that anyway, so changing the position of the sword will fix this problem. When you grab the sword, the crossguard should align with the arm. In your picture, the crossguard should not go parallel to the canvas, but in an angle of about 45 degrees.

(ETA 2: To be exact, the position of the lower hand is wrong, in a two-hand grip the second joints of the fingers of both hands point to the same direction (forward) and there is a gap between the hands)

And please redo the cape (or remove it altogether), now it looks like The Blob is making a sneak attack on him from behind.

and here we go again...
i've just given up to imitate johann on eldred and shaded the way i normally do it. that has to be enough.


@ shadow: thank you for the support. i originally intended the material to be a special purple-ish kind of metal. but now it's just a bit darker than normal.

@ spaceinvader: yep - that's exactly what fixed it.

@ groovy: thank you for the analysis. i removed the cape. after i read your post i had to think of the evil blop all the time
concerning the sword position, yes, after thinking about it, it is a bit strange. i believe it is anatomically possible if the sword was bend a bit more backwards. but that would mean i had to redraw his arms, part of the torso and the sword completely. and the value between effort and effect wouldn't be worth it.

Rather gorgeous as always.

Just a minor detail: he's holding the sword in a funny angle. In a normal grip the crossguard would be aligned a bit more like this (in line with the knuckles highlighted in red). Although arguably it's not really noticeable in the scaled-down version.

The darker purble works better.
Such light refelctions work better though in an illuminated enviroment against the black backround it looks a bit lost.

I hate to nitpick such beautiful artwork, but I'm not certain that the beard works. Examining it closely, I believe you intended for it to start slightly above the jawline and cover to a point below the jawline. Unfortunately, this has the effect of visually foreshortening his face - it looks like his jaw begins where the beard begins.

This illusion could be solved by changing the style of his beard slightly. My recommendation would be to change it to the beard illustrated in this reference image from HttT.

Kitty's picture is believanbly close to the HttT reference. In Kitty's portrait Eldred is suppose d to be significantly younger.

It's pretty obvious to me that they're the same person. As for the beard, well, my beard looks like the one kitty drew, so it looks right to me ^^; Perhaps it just needs a little bit stronger shading to indicate the jawline?

I agree, Kitty's Eldred bears a very strong resemblance to the HttT story art. Changing the beard was just a suggested fix for a perceived problem with the jawline; I'm sure there are plenty of equally valid solutions.

Incidentally, Kitty, this seems a good time to mention how awed I am by your prolificy. We've got lots of talented artists who contribute to Wesnoth, but I've never seen anyone churn out so many great portraits at such an amazing pace.

i had some spare time today and did young delf. i really like the outcome - but is he delfadory enough?


@ zookeeper: thank you for the comment. but i think groovy's analysis on the sword / hand position is even more correct.

@ shadow: thanks! and the black background looms larger than i thought for the johann kind of lighting...

@ sangel: you may have a point with the beard. it does look a bit strange with the jaw line. but if you look at the httt story pic with eldred and his father standing back to back you can see that he has this kind of beard. i don't know if i will change it.
and concerning my prolificy - it's just like turin hates stupid people. i hate slow people.

@ megane: that's what still confuses me about the internet - because of your avatar i assumed you were female and now you have a beard ...