Skeleton Warrior portrait

TERRMITh · Post by **TERRMITh** » December 18th, 2007, 4:30 pm

Hi,
what do you think about my portrait for skeleton warrior? Its not done yet, I would like to know if I should continue or toss it away and return to playing Wesnoth campaign since i suck in drawing

Post by **zookeeper** » December 18th, 2007, 5:11 pm

Ok, I'll be brief in listing the things which are off:

1. It's from the side, unlike (almost) all the other portraits.

2. You shouldn't exaggerate the proportions quite so much (the size of the teeth, the huge skull when compared to the arms and hands).

3. Would need a bit more shading on the arms.

That's pretty much all I can say.

It's not good enough as it is (unless some specific campaign author wants to use it), but I'd say your drawing doesn't really suck either. You could try making another one with a different perspective and less exaggerated proportions if you're aiming for a generic skeleton portrait.

It reminds me a bit of the TRoW portraits. That is, stylistically it'd probably be fine, but it'd need the company of other similarly styled portraits (like, for instance, if all the portraits of some campaign were in the same style).

Post by **Sgt. Groovy** » December 18th, 2007, 5:59 pm

What zookeeper said, plus the ribs are weird, there should be gaps between them. But do try another perspective.

TERRMITh · Post by **TERRMITh** » December 18th, 2007, 6:34 pm

Thanks for feedback, next time, Iĺl try it from different side. Didnt know that side look isnt alright, but youre right. Should realize, that there are no portraits like this.
Ive made several changes to the picture. What should I improve next and be aware of next time, except for the side-look?

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » December 18th, 2007, 6:44 pm

The head is oversized while the hands are too small. If you could fix this I think it would make a pretty good portrait.
The saliva is perhaps overdone though.

TERRMITh · Post by **TERRMITh** » December 18th, 2007, 7:11 pm

like this?

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » December 18th, 2007, 7:25 pm

Almost the hand should contain a weapon compleatly.
The cannon is still more fitting for a Neanderthal than a common human. Too exaggerated basically.

Post by **thespaceinvader** » December 18th, 2007, 7:27 pm

The had is in perfect profile, the top jaw doesn't need a shaded sillhouette for the further away half.

Yeah, a skeleton doesn't have salivary glands, so no saliva.

The bottom jaw looks much bigger than the rest of the head - i think it could do with shrinking a bit.

There's not enough contrast on the axe - it looks plastic.

And overall, it's too tidy and clean - you're talking about a long-dead-and-buried corpse, here. More cracks, more dust, more general dirt. Maybe some dangly weeds, spider webs, something like that. Also, it could stand to be darker.

The colouring technique's good, though. Nice work.

Darth Jordius · Post by **Darth Jordius** » December 18th, 2007, 7:36 pm

thespaceinvader wrote:The had is in perfect profile, the top jaw doesn't need a shaded sillhouette for the further away half.

Yeah, a skeleton doesn't have salivary glands, so no saliva.

The bottom jaw looks much bigger than the rest of the head - i think it could do with shrinking a bit.

There's not enough contrast on the axe - it looks plastic.

And overall, it's too tidy and clean - you're talking about a long-dead-and-buried corpse, here. More cracks, more dust, more general dirt. Maybe some dangly weeds, spider webs, something like that. Also, it could stand to be darker.

The colouring technique's good, though. Nice work.

Ditto.

Post by **thespaceinvader** » December 18th, 2007, 7:46 pm

Also, i'd be willing to wager that Jetryl would say that the line weight has not got enough variance.

TERRMITh · Post by **TERRMITh** » December 18th, 2007, 8:04 pm

alriiiiight, one more shot

Post by **thespaceinvader** » December 18th, 2007, 8:15 pm

Better. I'd probably go for a bit of noise in the colouring of the bones, and still more contrast on the axe, but it's getting there to my mind.

On the basics, i'm not a fan of the side-on pose either. But that's not massively important, here.

Darth Jordius · Post by **Darth Jordius** » December 18th, 2007, 8:22 pm

A little better, but it looks like he finished eating a mudball. And he looks more like a sabertoothed tiger than a human skeleton. Don't make the angle of his head so awkward. I really don't like the side profile either.

Post by **Sgt. Groovy** » December 18th, 2007, 11:12 pm

Didnt know that side look isnt alright

Totally profile or head-on usually (like 99% of the time) produce poor portraits. If you look here, or any museum where portraits are displayed, you'll notice that very few are frontals or profiles (and frontals are often non-usual poses or illuminated starkly from side). That's just how it works.

Post by **Jetrel** » December 18th, 2007, 11:24 pm

Sgt. Groovy wrote:
Didnt know that side look isnt alright
Totally profile or head-on usually (like 99% of the time) produce poor portraits. If you look here, or any museum where portraits are displayed, you'll notice that very few are frontals or profiles (and frontals are often non-usual poses or illuminated starkly from side). That's just how it works.

Agreed, and I've also discovered this tends to hurt sprites as well. This will heavily affect our efforts to make north-facing sprites (basically, we can get away with having a base frame for NE only, and in fact might do -better- having just a NE base frame, than having both NE and N.)

I don't know why this happens, although it might be how different these "corner cases" tend to be from the other 90% of possible angles a person can face from - especially when a person is directly side-on.