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Sapient
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Sapient »

I really like your fencer design. But... doesn't the head seem a bit too small? Also, fencers are evasive units who are weak against blade damage so I wouldn't give him scars. They survive by dodging blows and not getting hit.
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Turuk
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Turuk »

Sapient wrote:I really like your fencer design. But... doesn't the head seem a bit too small? Also, fencers are evasive units who are weak against blade damage so I wouldn't give him scars. They survive by dodging blows and not getting hit.
Agreed, but you could you not argue for one or two scars on the face, in accordance with the old custom of dueling scars being a mark of honor?
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Corvvs
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Corvvs »

(assuming you're looking for commentary)

1. His head looks, IMO, a teeny bit too small
2. The goatee and scarf line up in a funny way that suggests a strange long beard - I suppose this may be fixed by color.
3. The sword looks a bit short (the one he's holding), and it seems to come out towards the view on a plane other than that at which his right hand (on our left) seems to be holding it. (though maybe he's not intended to be holding it fully, just with his fingertips very lightly?)
4. His left (on our right) forearm seems to bend awkwardly to our right, but that may just be me - it almost seems to long, though all this might just be due to the odd angle of the saber.
5. his cloak (waistcoat?) seems to be glued into a rigid position away from his back - if it is meant to be blowing in the wind, it might need a bit of tweaking
6. about scars: I say keep them - a fencer could be scarred from vigorous but non -lethal practice or blows that weren't quite dodged properly.

Just my opinions - I'm not an experienced artist around here, just another newbie, so take it all with a grain of salt and ignore it if the more experienced artists say otherwise. All in all it looks really nice - I love the costume, especially the layers of shirts peeking out and the scarf.
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Sapient
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Sapient »

Corvvs wrote: 6. about scars: I say keep them - a fencer could be scarred from vigorous but non -lethal practice or blows that weren't quite dodged properly.
Presumably, all L1 units have some melee training, except for Dark Adepts. Fencers seem more like noble youths than professional soldiers, guardsmen, or street fighters, so you would expect their faces to be (on average) less scarred than a typical fighter.
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LordBob
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Re: Some sketches

Post by LordBob »

Fencer's weapons: regardless of the sprite, gifted fencers tend to combine a long rapier with a shorter left-hand dagger, which they use to parry their opponent's blows while striking back with their main hand. I'd personnaly suggest this choice of weapon as it suits better the fencer I imagine, but this is up to you.

Now to be honest, I feel the inked drawing doesn't do justice to your initial sketches. I'd rather see a scanned (or pictured) paper drawing, because whatever computer technique you use results in a rather rough (if not crude) set of lines and I really feel your hand's better than that.
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Mefisto
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Mefisto »

Re head - indeed, it could be slightly larger. I'm going to enlarge it and remove the goatee. I don't like it.

Re scars - it will be only one, fresh scar. I would expect that noble youth is all too ready to take insults and duel everyone. And thes scars are the results. I would expect also that more experienced duelist isn't such rash and doesn't allow anyone to scar him anymore.

Re weapon - after much consideration I will give him the rapier and the main-gauche. It was my idea since the beginning but I had a problem with composition of the picture: on the left the whole massive body and on the right only the long blade. But now I'm going to make him clean his blade with his cloak so the composition will be more balanced.

And no worries, I'm going to fine tune the lines. I just wanted to clear any faults that occurred so far, before starting the colouring.

Thanks for comments.
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Re: Some sketches

Post by zookeeper »

LordBob wrote:Fencer's weapons: regardless of the sprite, gifted fencers tend to combine a long rapier with a shorter left-hand dagger, which they use to parry their opponent's blows while striking back with their main hand. I'd personnaly suggest this choice of weapon as it suits better the fencer I imagine, but this is up to you.
Just a little piece of history (which might not be relevant to the discussion): the fencer's weapon was renamed to sabre several years ago because a lot of people constantly insisted that a rapier should do pierce damage.
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Mefisto
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Mefisto »

zookeeper wrote:
LordBob wrote:Fencer's weapons: regardless of the sprite, gifted fencers tend to combine a long rapier with a shorter left-hand dagger, which they use to parry their opponent's blows while striking back with their main hand. I'd personnaly suggest this choice of weapon as it suits better the fencer I imagine, but this is up to you.
Just a little piece of history (which might not be relevant to the discussion): the fencer's weapon was renamed to sabre several years ago because a lot of people constantly insisted that a rapier should do pierce damage.
Not a problem. I just read in wikipedia that in the Renaissance rapiers were as much thrusting as cutting weapons. Only later they lost weight and became spades.
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LordBob
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Re: Some sketches

Post by LordBob »

More comments after a second view of your rough.

- with elbows at waist level, both his upper arms are longer-than-life. If you consider your own body, the distance beetween your elbow and belt is roughly the width of a hand. Here is a reference picture for arms proporption

The following comments are more subjective and bear my own interpretation of the duellist: take them with a grain of salt.
- the scarf itself looks short, or ripped. I found a picture which might help, but I'm not sure it's the kind of ornament you have in mind. :?
- when replacing the second saber with the main-gauche, bear in mind that a dagger is much lighter than a sword and will not require its own separate shoulder strap. Instead, it would be attached next to the rapier, or somewhere else on the duellist's belt (often in the back). I'm sorry I couldn't find a convincing reference picture about that, though. :(
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Mefisto
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Mefisto »

LordBob wrote:More comments after a second view of your rough.

- with elbows at waist level, both his upper arms are longer-than-life.
Right. I made the arms slightly too long. Or the torso is too short.
The following comments are more subjective and bear my own interpretation of the duellist: take them with a grain of salt.
- the scarf itself looks short, or ripped. I found a picture which might help, but I'm not sure it's the kind of ornament you have in mind. :?
Rather this one

Still the scarf needs improvement.
- when replacing the second saber with the main-gauche, bear in mind that a dagger is much lighter than a sword and will not require its own separate shoulder strap. Instead, it would be attached next to the rapier, or somewhere else on the duellist's belt (often in the back). I'm sorry I couldn't find a convincing reference picture about that, though. :(
You meant something like that?

Essentially I pictured the fencer as somebody from the XVII century, with some artistic interpretations.

Many thanks. The work is going on. I hope to finish the inked picture tomorrow.

Edit: it's done.
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kitty
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Re: Some sketches

Post by kitty »

looks like a nice start and your lines look a lot smoother than in your last version!

his left forearm still bothers me, it looks very long and something confuses me about the folds.


and does it is done mean that you won't colour him?
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Sgt. Groovy
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Sgt. Groovy »

If the version you posted is lower resolution and quality than your working version, then please discard the following.

The line quality is now better, but it is not as good as it could be. I traced your drawing and rerendered it in the same resolution for demonstration purpose. Because of the low resolution, some changes in linework occurred, but you can clearly see that in comparison, your version looks only half-antialiased (click the image to see the difference better).
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Tiedäthän kuinka pelataan.
Tiedäthän, vihtahousua vastaan.
Tiedäthän, solmu kravatin, se kantaa niin synnit
kuin syntien tekijätkin.
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Mefisto
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Mefisto »

- Kitty

I meant that the outline is done. I hoped that everything was OK, but today I see that there is much to improve. The sleeves are strange and I don't like the row of buttons and the shirt going out of fencer's doublet. I'm going to change it.

When I'm done with the outlines (I assume that this is what is called inking?), I'm going to start the colouring. I made a test version already but I've found many stray half-transparent pixels, so I won't post it. I'm trying to follow your Tutorial here, step by step.

I wanted to see other persons' opinions on possible faults of the outlines before I start to give colour and shading to the picture.

- Sgt. Groovy

I like your tracing very much. This is the effect I hope to achieve in the end. I'm still learning GIMP. What technique did you use?

The pictures I've posted in this thread are of lower resolutions. The originals have dimensions 1200x1200 pixels. And they have a white background on a separate layer, I just merged the layers together before posting because I wasn't sure how the transparent background would be displayed here. Maybe it wasn't necessary.

Thanks for comments. I'm going back to work.
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TheJM
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Re: Some sketches

Post by TheJM »

Transparency will probably work, depending on how you save it and what browser people are using. I see you're saving as a png, which has really good transparency because it supports alpha transparency. The only thing is that IE 6 doesn't support it. Although I suppose you could just point them to getfirefox.com.. ;)

I really like how the portrait is turning out. Can't wait to see how it looks colored.
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Mefisto
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Re: Some sketches

Post by Mefisto »

Transparency test:
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