Kitty's random stuff: The South Guard

[SFault]

In the mad picture the cheek guard is clearly bigger than in the neutral. I don't if that is the cause, but the head looks narrow on the mad pic compared to the neutral.

[Jetrel]

Oh my, it's been two months since my last post in this thread… Feels like forever since I painted something for wesnoth but I finally found some time to start finalizing the lines and starting to shade these guys. So here are neutral and mad Deoran. Again, I'm unfortunately not sure how quickly I'l be able to return to the rest of the South Guard's cast.

I know the feeling.

Nevertheless, here's a word of encouragement; these are absolutely stellar, and this is a great thing since TSG is one of our flagship campaigns (since it's loosely considered "the" introductory campaign).

[LordBob]

They're absolutely beautiful, and I'll add congratulations on how you were able to give each portrait its very own character while recycling most elements

I hope we still get to ear from you soon, the entire series was quite promising and I'm really looking forward to seeing them done.

[kitty]

Thanks for the comments! And due to the holiday season I had some spare time today and did some shading on Gerrick

[Reepurr]

[peanut gallery]
In some places you can easily see 'stripes' of shading. This occurs especially on (our) left side of the collarbone area armour, as well as (our) right side of the breastplate, and the two gauntlets.
Sorry if this is intentional, and also for not being able to name the pieces of armour correctly.
[/peanut gallery]

[LordBob]

I believe it is intentional and quite representative of how light reflects on metallic surfaces.

However, having lighter tones on the lower body plates doesn't feel right. Given their angle, I'd expect them to look more like the pauldrons.
Same goes for the hand of (our) left gauntlet

[StDrake]

probably intentional indeed and it looks good to my eye, just the (our) right ..erhm, how to call it..thighpad? looks strange with it, not to mention the shape of shading there suggest a shadow cast by the hand nearby, but then there being two strips of shade ruins the effect

theres also that area on the chest where the shading make a few turns with very unpleasantly visible angles

[mameluke]

the blade looks like pointing backwards

[StDrake]

cause it is? that's why we see it's back wide-end

[kitty]

Some shading fixes on Gerrick, I darkened and smoothed parts per your comments - he should be finished now. The angle of the blade should be irrelevant - he could point it in any direction in a resting position.

[artisticdude]

Looks awesome! I love how much detail you put into your portraits, the etching on the blade of the glaive really gives the portrait added life and depth.

the blade looks like pointing backwards

cause it is? that's why we see it's back wide-end

I see it as facing forward, with a sharp edge all around the blade rather than a 'back wide-end'. And then I see it as facing backwards. And then forward again. But as a wise man once said:

Visual inversions are fun.

And like kitty said, it doesn't really matter anyway.

Again, great work on this, kitty!

[kitty]

And here is a first pass as Hylas...

[bigkahuna]

His cloak gives the impression that his shoulder is very, very large. I realize that this intended (the cloak draped over the shoulders without the arms being through it) and is quite common, but to my eye it looks a bit overdone. Also, the brooch on the cloak does not look like it attaches to anything (I assume that is what is keeping his cloak wrapped around his body).

EDIT: Wow, just noticed this. The way he is holding the staff is really awkward. He would have to twist it in a 180-degree angle under his cloak, which would definitely explain the awkward shoulder but would be extremely hard to carry. One more thing - his arm goes straight out and looks a bit tiring.

[King_Elendil]

His cloak gives the impression that his shoulder is very, very large...

I may be mistaken, but it looks like his cloak is lined on the inside with some kind of animal fur, which would explain the "very large shoulder" as actually being a normal shoulder surrounded by thick padding. In my humble opinion, I think it looks fine, but of course I'm no artist (at least not in this way) and my thoughts don't matter much. But I really can't comprehend what's going on with his hands, it looks... well, confusing. It appears that he has two left hands instead of one right and one left. But other than these nit-picks, this is another one of your stunning-quality pieces that remind us all how blessed we are to have someone with this much talent working, without pay, with this community to make the best free open-source games available.

[Atz]

EDIT: Wow, just noticed this. The way he is holding the staff is really awkward. He would have to twist it in a 180-degree angle under his cloak, which would definitely explain the awkward shoulder but would be extremely hard to carry. One more thing - his arm goes straight out and looks a bit tiring.

That hand does look odd. It looks almost like a left hand to me, which is problematic since it's attached to his right arm. I think the thumb is supposed to be hidden behind the top of the hand, but that's not really the impression I get just by looking - I have to think "Well, if that was an extended pinky, and he was holding the staff loosely... hmm...".

Other than that it looks great. I think the shoulder is fine - it's a big, heavy, fur-lined cloak. Of course it looks a bit bulky.