Campaign art - The Rise of Wesnoth

[LordBob]

Blah, Surely cute bat lines such as "MEEP" can be rewritten into creepy skull lines such as "CLICK CLICK"

The elf lord Aryad's fur coat is indeed inspired after Kitty's take on what elves could be in the future.
The "wavy lines" were developped after someone suggested earlier in this thread that elves could use geographic patterns : each one of the four lords will display some, as it gives an easily recognizable feature to these sligthly outlandish elves.


Preliminary shading for Logalmier.

[Kymille]

The bat familiar flies around outside and generally over the ocean... it's got to be windy. This is not a cave creature. I'm not sure the candle makes a lot of sense.

[Neoskel]

And there's no way that it could fly with only bare bones for wings, not to mention the lack of muscles and tendons to move said bones...

There's magic at work here, not a whole lot of it is plausible or 'makes sense'. What really matters here is whether it looks cool or not, which it does.

[Golden_Soldier]

As for the familiar... well, I guess I'd have preferred keeping it as a bat, but I have to admit that skull's pretty neat so it's fine by me. We might need to make a new unit type for that though, but I think I'll just make it a Soulless bat variant to begin with.

check this out

[xtifr]

Don't bats already have a decent set of animations? That may or may not be worth taking into consideration.

As for Logalmier, wow. simply awesome! The only quibbles I have are that the cloth in front of his groin seems to be hanging strangely. Plausible, but odd. I'm also confused by the stripe in the same area that starts on the left (our right) as it comes out from the armor, then suddenly becomes a middle stripe halfway down.

Also, though it's so minor I hesitate to mention it, it seems like the tip of his left ear (our right) is a little lower than the tilt of his head would explain. But I haven't measured to be sure, so this might be a trick of the eye.

edit: corrected sides

[kitty]

Much new stuff!


The Familiar takes some getting used to from my side. But basically a flying skull with boney wings is very cool! I'm not so much of a fan of the differently coloured glass eyes, somehow they are more cheesey than necessary - to me empty sockets would be more scary. And the candle feels like a strange concept put on top of a flying object? But that's niggeling...

While I like his snobby attitude Aryad's costume design feels a bit bland. A fur coat is very much in line with what I have in mind for the elves but in this case the silhouette gets very boring and undefined. Perhaps a cuirass with interesting pauldrons sticking out underneath?
And unfortunately the geographic patterns don't read to me as such at all - they make a very nice pattern, but if you really want the viewer to identify them as geography that would need to be much clearer.

Logalmier turned out really cool! Just his hair, especially the darker areas, could use some more detailing.

[LordBob]

The whole idea behind the familiar is to obtain a magical thing that's both creepy and disturbing, with a slight touch of cheesy - the very way Jevyan will look (and is written, based on what dialog I've read : he is a rather cheesy vilain). Hence the unusual features such as the glass eyes and candle. Judging by people's reactions, I think I'm exactly where I meant to be so I'd rather not change it for now.

I'll trying adding a cuirass to Aryad so as to remove that mundane look (he is an elf lord, after all), but nothing like logalmier's. It'll display a lot more embellishment and less functionality, since it has been earlier discussed than the elves in tRoW have not seen a great war for centuries and thus are a rather peaceful people. (Note that for this very same reason, I'm somehow inclined to keep Aryad's boring look. This requires some thinking... )
As for the wavy lines, geography was but a source of inspiration, not an aim. I just like them the way they are, whatever they might actually be. (maybe a symbol of dented automn leaves ? Go figure)

Until then, here's the final Logalmier.

[JackBarber]

Are his eyes meant to have white pupils?

[thespaceinvader]

Yes. Elves have grey or green eyes without distinct black pupils in Wesnoth.

[kitty]

Nope. No green.

[LordBob]

Rest assured, green isn't planned anywhere in my elvish eyes. Though it'd be nice to have some variation. Are different shades of grey acceptable ?

I've designed some manner breastplate for Aryad, rather heavily embellished : I guess you could call it the elvish equivalent of baroque.
I'm also trying a new approch for his colour scheme : instead of the usual brown-and-green, I've picked automn colours for his breastplate & clothes. These vivid golden and browns seemed the best way to have an elf sport a rich garment that still reminds of nature without going wild with gold inlay.

Not sure how it'll turn out though, so I might return to Logalmier's colour scheme in the end

Edit : and lines for the lady Dionli

Edit again : and revised lines and colour scheme for the lord Isothimir. Which means the elf lords are all ready for shading

Edit again and again : AND lines for the merfolk lord Typhon. His armour is light and his outfit rich : do tell if this doesn't fit the character

Yet another edit : switched sides & removed forehead wrinkles for Addroran, started shading.

[xtifr]

The portrait of Aryad, like the portrait of Logalmier, has the cloth of his tunic below the belt folding horizontally, rather than vertically as one might expect, for no apparent reason. With Aryad, though, the fold is so large and straight that it either seems like there must be another belt there, or...something else I won't name that could make him a huge hit with the ladies.

[kitty]

Nice stuff! Some quick comments:

Addoran's mirrored head works remarkably well! He seems a tiny bit cross-eyed. And I love how the real feathers on his helmet anticipate the metallic wings on the later loyalists!

Typhon's tail and weapon are very cool but I don't really like the vibe I get from his hat and face. He feels more like a strange old hermit than a mighty sea king I suggest tilting it up a tad and some completely different headgear. I'm sorry....

The autumn colour scheme for the elf lords is s a nice touch! The only thing I can find wrong about Isothimir is the way his ear connects, the lobe seems to sit too far back.
And Aryad's improved outfit is great! Very much ancient elvish!
Dionli is obviously meant to be very delicate, but her hands, especially her right one, seem a bit too tiny.
And of course different shades of grey for the eyes are very much acceptable. From white to nearly black I'd say.

[zookeeper]

Dionli could perhaps have a bit more presence and/or authority. Although it's not stated explicitly, it seems like she's the highest ranking one of the elf lords, and seems pretty well rooted in reality instead of being one of those elves who just daydream of faerie stuff and talk like a poet all the time. Maybe have her look directly at the viewer? Also, the positions of her arms seem very casual, maybe she could have one hand bent behind her back, hold a hand palm up and levitate a couple of leaves on it, or something. Just a thought.

[thespaceinvader]

I'm getting a very japanese feel off these elves, which I really like =) Nice work.