NR wrap-up (finally)

[Valkier]

So I'll keep this brief.

Awhile back I promised to finish this. Life happened, school happened, and everything else that could get in the way did. I have a bit more free time now and I'm pretty tired of feeling bad about not finishing this campaign up.

So to that end, here's what I want to happen:

I have posted all portraits I have. If I recall, I am missing one or two, aside from the ones clearly not finished. I need to know what those missing portraits are.
On top of that, I need someone to critique or commit the remaining ones so I can wrap those up and get a better idea of how much is left to do. I want to do a good job here, because this stuff goes in my portfolio.

As far as critiques go, keep them simple, clean, and to the point. Bullet point the things if you have to, just make sure you tell me the right name so I can keep this all organized. I don't need a lengthy explanation of why something needs fixed, just tell me if Tallin needs a bigger butt or if someones arm is floating. Just be concise, as I'm aiming for a "one shot one kill" situation here.

If you feel it is a nitpick, let one of the people with a colored name say it first. I'm sure everyone who comes here has something valuable they want to add, but this is for the interest of staying concise. I have 11+ portraits here to go over so keeping the clutter down and the information easy for me to read (and subsequently remember) is important.

I'll give this a couple days to get comments while I wrap up some client work. After that I'll work on what is mentioned here or go based on my own standards (meaning: No critiques on a portrait but I'm unhappy with it anyhow). Whatever works best.

Thank you all for the help and allowing me a chance to finish this up. I owe it to you guys to do this right, and I hope you'll do me the kindness of helping me pull it off.

[Valkier]

Page 2, electric boogaloo.

[Valkier]

Should be the end of all the portraits I have at least started for NR.

[Lord-Knightmare]

Nice

The portraits are excellent! I can't a single fault with any of them.

But, I believe you have mixed up Elenia and Eryssa's portraits. Eryssa's the elven sorceress and Elenia's the druid; not the other way around.

[GunChleoc]

Nitpicks from the peanunt gallery - hope you'll find them useful:

hidellarge.png : Head and body have a different orientation, but the neck is straight and doesn't show the twisting.

Ro'Sothianlarge.png : The positioning of the floating thing above the staff isn't visually tied to anything - how is it kept in place where it is?

tallin.png : Something bothers me about his right lower arm and hand, but I can't put my finger on it. The way he holds hist sword it's about to drop out of his hand - is that intended?

camerinlarge.png : IMO his left elbow is twisted to far in - looks uncomfortable

Elenia.png : because of the positioning/patterning of the arm, her left hip reads lower than it actually is.

stalraglarge.png : check the perspective of the axe hilts / position of blade over his right hand

morvinlarge.png : The position he holds the book looks uncomfortable for the hand

[vultraz]

All nice, but I have a few issues:

hidellarge: eyes are too green and slit-like

Ro'Sothianlarge.png: has absolutely no neck

maforlarge: view through his mouth looks very unrealistic and is too wide

[homunculus]

Hidel: first noticed how his right side of chest looks strange under his right armpit, and then how his lighter colored clothing in front looks like it is asymmetrically balanced towards his left side.

Ro'Sothian: awesome pose for the character as I remember it (was some years ago when I played it, though), but looks a bit cartoony in the bones department. Maybe more realistic left arm bones, and making the bone highlights more specular might help. Also, the yellow thing on the chest seems to have asymmetrical geometry and impossible highlights.

Camerin: got the impression he should be more enthusiastic-heroic in a childish and naive way, rather than crazy-with-pupils-at-the-lower-edge-of-the-eye. Otherwise nice loose skin near right hand elbow, suggesting some age.

Tallin: the side under his arm does not seem curved. Otherwise, me likes, looks like a peasant enough, and determined, and practical. I think it is alright to open the sword thumb like this while making this gesture while talking. Maybe the side of his cloak could fold more at the elbow, rather than in the middle of the upper arm.

Malifor: lower yaw seems too smoothly curved (but maybe it is OK), but eye socket highlights don't seem to follow the upward direction of the head (could be lower in the eye sockets) making the whole affair look flattened, and there could be more red highlight inside the eye sockets rather than outside it. Awesome fur, though.

Your right sides of body often seem strange under the armpit/pectoral.

The more completed portraits look better (with the exception of the beard and the apparently glowing tattoos of Stalrag) so you would probably invalidate all the crits mentioned anyway if you refined them.

[LordBob]

Ok, this is going to be a long list, so please bear with me.
I'm also including paintovers wherever I feel a quick sketch will better carry my meaning
Note that what follows doesn't guarantee I won't have other critics in the future, neither should it be a list that limits your effort: it's been a long time since you started NR, and maybe there will be many more things that you want to change about these portraits because you have progressed as an artist. I'm pretty certain the next pass will look quite different, and I'm looking forward to it.

Hidel
* the twin neck muscles (sterno-cleido-mastoids) should join top of the sternum, i.e a little more to our right given the suggested angle of his torso.
* the hair on top of his head lacks the volume & deformation that his heavy braid should cause: as a result, they feel independant
* the arm on our left is too long compared to the other arm
* the biceps+triceps bulge of the same arm should be higher, as a result
* the folds of the shirt on our left should hint at the body underneath and how it tenses the fabric.
* the whole lighting of this area should be revised: the shadows make it look like the chest underneath is very flat,almost shalllow
* the fist on our right should rest more frankly on the belt. the movement lacks strength.
* altogether, the pose would be more expressive if there was some movement in the hip region.

Raksha (my favorite)
* with such a strong neck, the shaft of his cleaver should rest higher
* the tangency between left pauldron and blade tip doesn't work.
* exaggerated swelling of the biceps on our right: in this position, the muscle is actually rather relaxed
* the cleaver's blade could get some more love

Ro'Sothian
* the anatomy of the forearms looks approximative and doesn't give the feeling of an arm
* the hand on our right is very small, perhaps too much so
* the elbow of the arm on our right is placed too high
* another facet of the same problem: the distance between head and shoulders looks too short, as if he was missing a few vertebras. The hunched silouhette is great, so I would rather change the elbows and keep the upper chest as is.
* the lower robes aren't quite finished
* the material of his shoulder piece is unclear. Solid gold ? Cloth ? We must be able to understand what it is on the first look.
* the shading of the leather & bone cap on our left is difficult to read.

Sister Thera
* still the scale difference between her two arms. The arm on our right fits with the size of her head, whereas the one on our left looks too large.
* the upper arm on our right looks a bit short, compared to the lower arm (they should be roughly the same length
* her hair could have a little more volume to reveal the skull underneath
* the hand gesture touching her hair is a nice detail, but a little vague: is she playing with a strand, is she passing her fingers through her hair, toying with jewellery... You can draw the hand in a more explicit posture
* the perspective on the belt pouches doesn't follow the overall shape of her belly
* a design nitpick: she seems to wear a leather bodice, which suggest a rather practical woman who might be used to rough situations. However, her leather sleeves leave the elbows uncovered, which sounds like the opposite of practical. Her gear and clothes should all work together towards telling her character, and such details will matter if you want to present your portfolio for character design positions.

Tallin
* because he is seen from profile, his buttocks and the thickness of his waist should be visible. Men have them too.
* the sleeve on our left should be rounder, judging by the thickness you gave to the cloth.
* the wrist of his swordhand is bent at an extreme angle, which implies tension in the forearm and contradicts the relaxed gesture
* in such a position, the sword would be pointing away from us. The perspective on its blade must suggest this.
* the golden elements look more plastic than gold, because their shadows are too bright

Elenia
* the black holes in her armor, where a glimpse of her underwear/tunic/skin is expected, suggest that you removed/hid a layer
* the glow of the fireflies should illuminate the parts of her that are in shadow for a better integration in the portrait.
* the forearm on our left very simple and tubular in shape: it doesn't feel quite natural.

Eryssa
* the shoulder on our left is messy: armpit too high, muscles misplaced, uncanny armpit volume created by the lighting
* the head is too small because it lacks cranial mass
* the folds of her trouser in the crotch region hint of a pelvis that is too high
* the speculars & highlights on the leather could be more convincing
* same for the tree bark texture on her armor

Hamel
* the shoulder and upper arm on our left connect in a weird way with the armor. You can draw more skin, or a leather sleeve, to fix it
* the head should be a little more on the right in order to follow the position of the chest
* the arm in our right could hand a little lower since it holds this big hammer and doesn't look bent like the other arm

Malifor
* the costume has some interesting parts (I love the masks) and the attitude is great, but the bones are cartoony again.
* the whole backbone & chest are drawn straight from the front and do not flow with the body movement
* the glow of the eyes doesn't feel as bright as the light reflected on the bone suggest it is.
* it's a nice touch that we see his spine through the gaping mouth, but the lower jaw gets kinda forgotten in the process. Play with the lights & darks to bring it back forward.


I won't comment on Stalrag, Camerin and Morvin, however. They are very much below your standards, and as such I would rather wait until you've seriously worked on them. It might even be worth considering a complete startover


One last sidenote:

I want to do a good job here, because this stuff goes in my portfolio.
(...)
Just be concise, as I'm aiming for a "one shot one kill" situation here.

If I may, anything you choose to show in your portfolio should be of outstanding quality, and sometimes this will require several passes. Good art demands time, period. One good thing about Wesnoth for us artists is that the game won't urge upon us the rush of a production deadline. So, don't feel pressed and give yourself the opportunity to bring out your best

[Valkier]

Been looking at suggestions off and on throughout the day while I finish up some other stuff. Just let me say thank you for everyone giving me a hand here.

So far here are my thoughts:

Some of these simply need redone from the ground up. While some are passable (Rakshas, Elenia, Thera) others are down right terrible (Eryssa, Hidell, Stalrag). Of course, I believe all of them, including the passable ones, need various tweaks. Some more than others.

The terrible ones I'm thinking I'm just go to scrap entirely and start new ones. I think Elenia is closer to what I'd like the elves to look like in this. Less leaves, more studded leather and flowery perhaps. I have messaged Jetrel asking if elves are using metal armor these days (I remember seeing the alterations awhile back but I don't know if that's a thing now) so Hidell will largely depend on that.

Keep the crits coming.

[vultraz]

Well, if you're redoing some, I suggest completely redrawing ro'sothian and malifor. They just look way to off to me to fix.

[Valkier]

Well, if you're redoing some, I suggest completely redrawing ro'sothian and malifor. They just look way to off to me to fix.

I'll probably end up doing them at some point.

[vultraz]

Nice, looking good Few comments:

His right shoulder (our left) should probably move back a little, unless he's thrusting his shoulder forward. His left (our right) arm seems joined too high up, maybe push it down just a little. And possibly give him an angrier expression. Right now he just looks like, "I'm fabulous"

EDIT: oh hey, 400th post

[Adamant14]

The pose is amazing.
I like the face, but the ear is too big.
With the giant ear he looks somehow orcish.
(an Orc with long blond hair )

[LordBob]

Sooo much better than the previous Hidel...

The pose is great, but three 'buts':

* you need to work more on the expressiveness of hands. Here, this could mean -for example- more twist in the front wrist so that we can feel how firmly it rests on his hip; and a more relaxed/twisted pose of the rear forearm so that arm, hand and sword don't end in the exact plane of the canvas
* both forearms could afford to be a little longer, even if you account for the foreshortening
* the hilt and pummel of the sword aren't uninteresting, but they're don't feel particularily elven either. The sword, and all his gear as well, should cooperate to tell us a silent story of who he is. (Unless it is meant not to look elvish, of course. I don't know much about the NR characters)

[vultraz]

Hm...I think maybe it's not the face, it's the pose that makes him look like a model for elvish battle gear