A New Order units and pictures

[Jetrel]

Another few of the million things you need to watch out for, based on my looking at your female mage image:

1] When drawing faces, make sure that parts are symmetrical - this is difficult in non-straight poses, such as what is typically called the 3/4 pose, however this is rather straightforward in a pose like what you've drawn, where the character is facing straight at the "camera".

Just watch out for mirrored parts, such as eyes, that are not the same distance and offset from the centerline as their twin.

2] Space the eyes with approximately one eye's width between them, where the bridge of the nose is. This, unlike most "ideal" proportions, is almost more of a rule.

3] The lines you drew for the cheekbones don't follow the shading pattern of cheekbones - there wouldn't be a shadow there, or at least certainly not at that angle, so don't draw a dark line there - it suggests a shadow.

4] In lines, such as those of the jawbone, there needs to be a reason for indentations or bumps. Ones that have no purpose make the character look lumpy.

I've attached an image that shows what happens when I apply these rules to your female mage image. You're improving rapidly, my friend - keep working at it.

[szopen]

Thanks Jetryl.

1] When drawing faces, make sure that parts are symmetrical

Yes - this is what is MOST difficult for me. I even thought that I will draw one eye on paper and then simply mirror it in gimp, but of course, that way I will learn nothing, even if the pictures themselves would look better.

2] Space the eyes with approximately one eye's width between them, where the bridge of the nose is. This, unlike most "ideal" proportions, is almost more of a rule.

Yes, I know. There are variations from that rule in my drawings only because I still can't measure with just looking, though I start to improve. I made errors in about 3-4mm from actual measurements - the problem is, that in many of my portraits this is half the width of the eye

You're improving rapidly, my friend - keep working at it.

You should take a look at those drawings which I NOT publish here
For every three-four my drawings only one i consider good enough to use.

And Loomis is great - I mean, the drawings in those all books. From the rest, Well, I think he talk too much. Also, since I was learning anatomy from Dziedyszycka "Anatomia dla plastyków", it's hard now to use English names. Especially since English names for bones are so unintuitive.

[szopen]

King Buffin of Okladia, the country east from Vakladia, who is somehow related to Gawen

[Jetrel]

King Buffin of Okladia, the country east from Vakladia, who is somehow related to Gawen

A quiet, but momentous occasion.

That portrait you just posted passes my threshold for decency. It is, albeit just barely, good enough to be what I would accept into mainline. This is the kind of quality I would expect/require from a mainline campaign's portraits.

I can tell, just by looking at it, that you are lucking out on a number of things, but you've really gotten better. Because some of this one rides on luck, don't be discouraged if some of the ones that follow aren't so good, that is natural, and the exact same thing has happened to me before.


But really, good show. Feels good to make something nice, doesn't it?

Edit: it seems that that was more than just luck, from looking at the other thread...

[szopen]

This is the kind of quality I would expect/require from a mainline campaign's portraits.

Now I would have to be able to produce that in series instead of once in a dozen of others

Because some of this one rides on luck, don't be discouraged if some of the ones that follow aren't so good, that is natural, and the exact same thing has happened to me before.

Thx, Jetryl. I am experiencing this for quite a long time: a one better image in dozens of ones I would be ashamed to show to anyone. But I hope the average quality of my work is improved, and my worse now are at least comparable if not better than say my best ones a year ago. The problem is that I don't know how much of this is related to me really improving, or just I know know better how to handle tools, learned few tricks improving scanning and coloring and similar. If the latter, then I'm affraid I will soon face another wall.

Feels good to make something nice, doesn't it?

You bet it does.

But right now I willt ry to made another mage attempt, and then I will return to the basics: I decided that I will need now to repeat few dozens of studies of hands, shoulders, and similar.

[szopen]

be warned that this image may contain spoiler for people who has not yet finished A New order campaign. Those, who already played it or do not intend to play it, could you comment on this:

http://www.cs.put.poznan.pl/adanilecki/ ... erless.png

I won't actually correct this image, but I want to know whether there are any mistakes I did I should avoid in the future. I think I messed the perspective badly, and Lorin's eye seems strange. Any other flaws you have noticed?

[szopen]

I've been working on A New order portraits and this are some effects. I even thought about redoing older portraits, but since I based also story images on the old portraits, it would mean redoing the story images, which is insane amount of work.

[szopen]

And now a SKETCH, that this, a drawing when I try to plan the composition for story image. I want to ask for advise on COMPOSITION (do not look on the proportions etc because this is sketch i did in few minutes, not "real" work)

After many, many hours I plan to turn it to image illustrating the deorien story about how Akladians revolted against their creator and master...



In other word, is this dynamic enough? Is the image composed properly? Any advises at adding some more life into it?

[Neoriceisgood]

That looks like an A.I v.s A.I battle I've witnessed once; a troll was duking it out with 2 dwarves and 4 different outlaw; it took them around 9 turns before they finally got him to the ground; if it had taken one more turn, he would have leveled to a troll warrior, it was great to watch