wizzardz: completed.

[Jetrel]

I wouldn't worry about the 'ruddy cloak' thing. The cloak is ruddy, i.e. it is reddish.
It is a reddish brown or ruddy brown.

So this portrait matches well. And top notch work as always!

^ Agreed. "Ruddy" is a very broad term; including everything from orange to maroon. I deliberately put that in the description because it was vague.

@ theotherhiveking: could you elaborate a bit on *what* looks male to you? or do you just want every female figure in a fanatsy game to be mannequin like beautiful?

Ignore him. It looks clearly female to me, and I imagine it'll look moreso when the shading brings out some subtle cues in the face. I'm strongly in favor of the portrayal of women you're bringing to the game - it's a lot less one-dimensional, and a lot more interesting, than the standard cheesecake.

@ syntax error: thanks for the crit!
concerning the staff: i find it pretty near - only difference are that i left the crossbars out. i didn't even get that it is supposed to be an ankh (for ankhs have only one crossbar and aren't circular). and ankhs are part of a very different culture - what's the connection to wesnoth?

Ankhs have, for better or worse, become the standard "religious symbol" in most role-playing videogames and tabletop rpgs; apparently some people are ticked off by having characters that are essentially priests use religious symbols that are in major, active use in the real world (e.g. crosses - ironically this comes from both atheists and christians). I personally don't mind it so much - it does allow one to present religion in a game with a fresh slate; free of any of the negative or positive connotations present in the real world. Ankhs have their own history, but the reason that a lot of people see the symbol as workable in a game is that, at heart, it's a generic symbol of life, and their historical use has been relatively uneventful/unpolitical.

The ankh that you're seeing on the sprite has had its bottom serif exaggerated to the point where it looks like a crossbar in its own right. Personally, I'd slightly prefer if you added in one of the crossbars, but I'm not going to be heartbroken if you don't; you're the person making the art, and you get to decide on those things.

BTW, Note to the assembled forumites - we've beaten the topic of "religion in wesnoth" to death, and if you start it up again, here, I will start deleting posts immediately.

[kitty]

done with the shading as far as i can see...
(changed her facial features again, slightly altered the hairstyle, added crossbars to the staff)


EDIT: added a colour variant - i just started to hate the red parts (which are just tc leftovers...)
which one do you prefer?

[Sapient]

I love what you've done with the staff... but, I'm afraid she's a little bit too "manly"... the shading is a little bit too close to facial hair and the chest seems flat like a man's chest. The gray version looks nice, but they are both good.

[Thrawn]

I love what you've done with the staff... but, I'm afraid she's a little bit too "manly"... the shading is a little bit too close to facial hair and the chest seems flat like a man's chest. The gray version looks nice, but they are both good.

Yeah, the grey in the shading makes it looks a bit like that "sort of freshly shaved, but obviously has facial hair look" (think the officer from animaniacs)
re: the chest, I don't see it as being flat so...

[Kestenvarn]

Her expression is strange, doll-like. I can't really tell what it is supposed to be - what face is she making?

The grey leather is better. Nice hair.

[Urs]

Grey is better than the red, IMO. Also, I agree with Thrawn on the grey cheek shading - that was also my first impression.

That said, amazing as always. I don't see anything wrong with her breast size, either. Not all girls have big boobs, guys. Besides, they wouldn't be that noticeable under that relatively baggy outfit anyway.


Something I just noticed:
On the hand holding the staff, it weird how the top finger show the middle joint, while the others don't.

[Sapient]

That said, amazing as always. I don't see anything wrong with her breast size, either. Not all girls have big boobs, guys. Besides, they wouldn't be that noticeable under that relatively baggy outfit anyway.

Guess I was wrong.

But there has to be *some* way to tell, right?

[TL]

Hmm. I guess I can see the five o'clock shadow effect if I look at it, but it's not something that jumps out at me. At a glance she definitely looks more feminine than masculine now (I think I may have just been overreacting to the thickness of the facial lines in the un-shaded version). Awesome job, kitty!

[Jodwin]

(You may ignore this post at will)

She does look masculine to me as well, more accurately she reminds me of middle age Finnish couch potatoes down to their last bottle of beer while watching ice hockey world championships from the television. Seriously. I can't really narrow it down to anything particular, but I think it has to do with the more dreamy/less focused look in her eyes, reddened and round cheeks together with a gaping mouth.

But like I said, feel free to ignore, since if most people don't have a problem with it it's probably pretty minor anyway.

[JW]

The red mage is awesome, as usual.

The WM though, I agree about the face. It looks like stubble beneath some rouge. Also, the entire chest region makes no sense to me. It's thicker than it should be, but it's not because of the breasts, which don't seem to point in the correct directions. One hangs lower than the other, and they are too far apart.

To correct the thickness issue, simply move the backline closer to her body. The breasts don't need to get bigger, but they should be slightly tweaked in position.

[Sangel]

Ah, excellent. The shading worked a treat.

Personally, I'd keep the red, or change it to some other saturated colour. It offsets the lack of saturation in the rest of the image. That's just one man's view, though.

[Sgt. Groovy]

I agree that the grayish shadow, together with the fairly robust shape of the nose and the chin give a bit too masculine impression. I think tweaking one of these features would be enough.

The thing that bothers me more, though, is: What the heck is keeping her right cuff suspended like that? The fabric seems to be fairly thin and flexible, so it should settle down on the wrist.

[kitty]

omg- that are a lot of complaints!
to be honest i just don't see most of the issues you have problems with... and thus have big problems fixing them...


i saturated the shadow on her check/jaw a bit more and softened it (how do you even get the idea it could be a stubble??? )
about the breast positioning/size i disagree - they are rather big, normal positioned breasts. i attached a rough linedrawing to demonstrate that. it's a thick fabric being pulled over them. (when did you guys see a nude woman apart of the plastic internet babes last time? )




@ thrawn:

@ kestenvarn: she is supposed to calmly, intospectively pose for a portrait - but i fear you're the minority, you're the only one who thinks she's too doll-like, all the others call her too manly (even if i would rather agree with you)...

@ jodwin: you have a really strange fantasy! shouldn't she wear a patterned cardigan in this case? but i closed her mouth on your suggestion.

@ jw: i hope the drawing explains the breast thing...

@ groovy: the cuff... i don't know what i thought while drawing it. it makes no sense at all. don't know if it bothers me enough to get back to it. but thanks for pointing it out!

[turin]

Her left hand still bugs me, and I think I've figured out why. The way the cloth on her elbow folds, it looks like her hand is closer to the camera than her elbow is, but the way her wrist and hand are drawn, it looks like her hand is farther away. Perhaps this drawing will clarify it a bit.


I think this could be easily fixed by changing how the folds in the cloth are drawn, since it's mostly those that are giving this impression...

[thespaceinvader]

I think one reason her body might look a little thick to some is that it's easy to read the flare of HER right sleeve as the line of the back of her robe, which would make her body look almost 1.5 times as broad/deep, and take away the impression that she has hips. A fix would be to move her arm slightly one way or the other - either in towards her body so that the line right down from the shoulder is broken a bit, and the sleeve doesn't seem to be part of her back, or outwards so we can see a bit more of her hips in the gap between her arm and her body. Personally, though, i don't have a problem with her appearance. She looks feminine, though not hollywood perfect, but who can expect that from someone living before skin cream and plastic surgery...

The lighting effects on the staff are fantastic, by the way - i really like how the symbol's ended up, too - it reminds me of a stylised sun rising over some landscape, which is a perfect symbol for the white mage. I think her fingers come a bit too far around the staff, though - maybe they're a little too long..

I prefer the reddish belt, i think - it's a nice contrast to the overall white/grey colouration, but i think the white trim looks better than the red.