Heir to the Throne: Portraits

[LordBob]

All looking great. Just a quick on the faces, as they're the key element of consistency throughout the series.
- Confused Conrad seems to have a narrower, longer face than other variants, with shallow cheeks.
- Glad Conrad might have his mouth a tad high (or a big chin) and his nose a tad short compared to other variants. I'd first fix the mouth, and then check the nose.
- Neutral Conrad has something about his nose (and eyes ?) that carries a childish look, compared to other variants. It might be that his nose is slightly smaller, especially compared to sceptre & angry variants. Note that this isn't necessarily a bad thing, both look fine, nevertheless consistency on such small details is what will make them really the same person.

Also, a couple details on the sceptre of fire:
- I'd check the perspective of the crown thingie on top of the ruby : there's a dented cercle there that doesn't feel right. (paintover to come later today)
- The upper branch of the bottom hook thingie seems a little thin compared to the rest of the hook.

Last, in addition to inverting the pauldron sides in Sceptre of Fire Conrad, you've also switched the glove which he otherwise wears on his armoured arm.

[Sapient]

I love what you did with the design of the sceptre.

Also, here is an idea for possible time saving. Holding the sceptre with the left hand.

[Atz]

I love what you did with the design of the sceptre.

Also, here is an idea for possible time saving. Holding the sceptre with the left hand.

Speaking of which, either his armour or his glove has switched sides in the sceptre portrait. In all the other portraits, both the pauldron and glove are on the same arm (our right / his left). In the unmirrored sceptre portrait, they're on different hands, and the pauldron is on our left / his right. Sapient's mirroring actually makes the armour consistent with the rest of the portraits...

[Sapient]

I love what you did with the design of the sceptre.

Also, here is an idea for possible time saving. Holding the sceptre with the left hand.

Speaking of which, either his armour or his glove has switched sides in the sceptre portrait. In all the other portraits, both the pauldron and glove are on the same arm (our right / his left). In the unmirrored sceptre portrait, they're on different hands, and the pauldron is on our left / his right. Sapient's mirroring actually makes the armour consistent with the rest of the portraits...

Yeah, kitty already said that in her post. I was just making a suggestion to reduce the time of redrawing it.

[Crendgrim]

I don't know if it's important, but it looks wrong to me that his hair is falling in different directions on the glad and mad versions.
Besides, in the mad portrait he's looking a bit feminine, I think. At least is that the impression I get from the portrait.


Crend

[kitty]

zookeeper: You're unfortunately right about the question of the use of the sceptre version. While drawing I imagined it used in aggressive situations but I guess he never threatens to burn his enemies with his magical sceptre if they don't clear the way... So this one will go to the trash and neutral Konrad will hold it relaxed in his front hand.

LordBob: Thanks for the detailed face-crits! It's really hard to make him look like himself all the time - I'll incorporate your advise in the next versions. And don't bother with a paint-over for the sceptre's perspective - the new version will need the sceptre at a completely different angle anyways...

Sapient: Yeah, that would have actually worked, I'm surprised! Thanks for the input!

Crendgrim: Hmm, long hair can fall in different directions... I actually see no problem with that at all. And about the mad version being feminine - could you be more specific?

[zookeeper]

zookeeper: You're unfortunately right about the question of the use of the sceptre version. While drawing I imagined it used in aggressive situations but I guess he never threatens to burn his enemies with his magical sceptre if they don't clear the way... So this one will go to the trash and neutral Konrad will hold it relaxed in his front hand.

All right. The front hands are the same in the confused and glad expressions though, so unless I'm missing something we can make scepter variants of those as well without much extra work, right?

Also, just to make sure it's not forgotten: Li'sar can also get the scepter so if Konrad gets scepter portraits, she needs them as well.

[TheSigil]

LOOOONG time lurker (years), finally registering/posting for the first time - really excited to see new HttT portraits. Admittedly not much of an artist myself, but hope this is given and received in the right spirit, as I can't wait to see Kitty's finished work.

This is perhaps a niggling complaint, but the ears seem to be slightly moving relative to the eyeline from pose to pose for me. In "normal and confused" drawing a line through the eyes and extending to the right ear has the line extending just above the top of the ear. In angry/determined, it crosses the top of the ear and rests just above the "ear hole." In scepter of fire pic, the line looks to me to go through the center of the ear. I'm trying the attachment feature and hoping this comes through all right.

Eyelines

Poor artist myself, but my understanding is that the eyeline should line up with the top of the ear.

Continuity - Mad and leading portrait: where did the sword scabbard go? (And on scepter portrait, shouldn't he still have his sword and scabbard?) In addition, belt buckle seems to change from pose to pose (not a problem that his elvish buckle gets dumped when he goes to human armor, but we have the belt knotted around the buckle in two of the six other poses - "mad and leading" and "scepter" - but a knot offset from the buckle in the "angry/determined" pose and "not clear if there's a knot offset due to perspective" in the other three); not sure if this really matters, though.

Also, to my untrained eye, something looks a little off on the angry/determined pose hair curvature at the back - I think the hair should extend a little farther - to me it looks like a skull would cause the head to seem to extend farther back from the ear at that angle... but it may just be the angle I'm interpreting things at.

[Sgt. Groovy]

Poor artist myself, but my understanding is that the eyeline should line up with the top of the ear.

That is true, but the eyeline is not a straight line, but a circle around the head (its "equator" if you like), and would appear curved if you look at the head from above or below (as is the case with some of the Konrad versions).

[Crendgrim]

Crendgrim: Hmm, long hair can fall in different directions... I actually see no problem with that at all.

Well, afaik (but it may be that I'm wrong) every person has a certain direction in which is hairs tend to fall. It depends on how the cortex* is.
IIRC, that's the reason why some people have their hair comb their hair to the right while some do it to the left. I never saw anyone having it one day this way and the next day the other way.
Does anyone know more about this than me?

* My dictionary tells me that this is a word for german "Scheitel"; I'm not sure it's the correct word here. I speak about the center of your hair. Too bad I never learned anything about this..

And about the mad version being feminine - could you be more specific?

Sadly, no. I cannot really tell what makes me feel so; I hoped for anyone else to see that and to be able to tell what's wrong (?) with it or my view.


Crend

[Jetrel]

Nice work on the "angry+leading" expression; it might be useful to say that I don't see any of the inconsistency/oddness on that open mouth that I do on the glad expression.

I hope this nitpicking on the faces isn't irritating, but as lordbob says - if we can get them all perfectly matched, it'll really take this set to the next level.

All looking great. Just a quick on the faces, as they're the key element of consistency throughout the series.
- Confused Conrad seems to have a narrower, longer face than other variants, with shallow cheeks.

I would almost be in favor of bending the "neutral konrad" towards the confused one - there are (slight) anatomical differences between them, but I kinda prefer the appearance of the confused one, since he looks slightly older. (Also, huge props on the expression there; I love it!)

- Glad Conrad might have his mouth a tad high (or a big chin) and his nose a tad short compared to other variants. I'd first fix the mouth, and then check the nose.

There's something about glad konrad's mouth that still doesn't look quite right. Some detail about his face looks like a different character.

- Neutral Conrad has something about his nose (and eyes ?) that carries a childish look, compared to other variants. It might be that his nose is slightly smaller, especially compared to sceptre & angry variants. Note that this isn't necessarily a bad thing, both look fine, nevertheless consistency on such small details is what will make them really the same person.

Likewise.

[TheCripple]

Crendgrim: Hmm, long hair can fall in different directions... I actually see no problem with that at all.

Well, afaik (but it may be that I'm wrong) every person has a certain direction in which is hairs tend to fall. It depends on how the cortex* is.
IIRC, that's the reason why some people have their hair comb their hair to the right while some do it to the left. I never saw anyone having it one day this way and the next day the other way.
Does anyone know more about this than me?

I can verify that longer hair can fall in different directions, if I ever don't comb mine for two days in a row (e.g. camping) some sort of new, weird hair line appears with a rather different shape than others left to their own, and I can certainly change the style on a whim and move the hair line with it.

[tr0ll]

There's something about glad konrad's mouth that still doesn't look quite right. Some detail about his face looks like a different character.

maybe:
- hair falls down forehead instead of brushed back square to show right corner of forehead
- neck looks thicker even accounting for turning to the side (but thinner again in mad),
- above two combine to make his face look slightly longer/narrower compared to neutral and angry portraits

[kitty]

Thanks for all those niggling pointers about his face - I'll incorporate most of them when I get around to the actual painting, continuing to fiddle around with the lineart and then have him look differently anyways after the painting costs too much time for now... So here are his two neutral versions. Next in line are confused and scepter - both will only require rather small changes from this one.

[artisticdude]

Very impressive! For some reason though, I get the feeling that the chainmail sleeve in the loyalist version of konrad_neutral needs more contrast. I'm hardly an expert on these matters though, so feel free to disregard this nitpick if you feel it isn't justified.

Again, very nice work, as always.