[Archived Class 1] Week Four - Principles of Design

[chaosrocks]

giggle OMG they do look like drunk ducks

[robmorfin]

Ok, way far from done, but want to start participating, hopefully tonight I can have something much better; the steep hills on the back will have castle walls and structures all over as well, I want the whole port to be a magnificent castle, an expensive idea but heck, they can triple the taxes.

[Agustin Poratti]

drunk ducks ROFL

[robmorfin]

Update; Need help, what should I add, make or consider to give balance to the composition, I still don't understand it very well.

Thanks.

[Gundersen]

chatted with you on msn about it. Like the sketch, but I think you need to define foreground, mid and back to establish your image here. And also define a focal point ... Told you more on msn ... cant remember all

Thanks for critts on my work people ... you are so hard ........ :o

[robmorfin]

Again, Gund, thanks, you also told me there was no space to breathe on the left side and that it was too heavy on the right side, you also suggested adding a secondary focus in the front like a man looking at the main entrance.

Will work on it, will definitely add a drunk man in the foreground, thanks a lot.

[Gundersen]

yes that was it The scale factor. The man will add some scale to your picture! hehe

[Gundersen]

hmm Form was very mean today ... hinted to my image not being too good, so i had to work hard

Here is an update on todays work. Have changed the mountains slightly to make the perspective look better, added more elements in the front to make the castle seem like it goes behind rocks instead of just stops on the canvas. have added the "Templar" force on the left side ... by force i mean the croses going from front to back. Sort of to contrast the evil side up against the wall...

Hope you like it.. AND give me constructive critts people! And not only negative

[chaosrocks]

IM onthe wrong monitor its all washed out.. notyour fault
BUT i wasn't mean
I was constructive
I toldyou the part that was bugging me
if you want ass pats
here "it's stunning!"
Im lieing but it might make you feel better...
now
I hate the cross and the whole trite knight thing. cant you use something more interesting as a foreground figure?
the flag is blowing the other way now but his robes are still made of lead

and the ducks Are drunk ..so there

Show me some thing new! what haven't I seen?

[Agustin Poratti]

gunn that perspective-less cross, and the guy are fighting for the focus with tee castle, and the topic is castle. something different happens at daaldbatars one, in wich the figure is dwarfed against that huge keep.
i get this feel you're tryng to polish something that doesnt need polish, but serious redoal. and this is not being negative, is just what i see . if you ask me what'd i do, id start from scratch, and get something fresh. sometimes we struggle with crappy paintings. well founded ideas develop very quiclky almost on their own.
i dont know dude... theres still that huge mass of white to the left. the castle is still too much to the right. what the right side trioes to establish as rythm with that perspective, the left side nullifies, with that 90° lines. (cross, ground line, flag, guy)....
hope you get something neat in time!

heres a crappy op i did with the mouse, trying to show you what i mean. (and failing to do so)

[Earendil]

Which comp is better? I'm thinking the larger sized one, but I wanted to get your guys' thoughts.

[jodali]

Earendil - I'm liking that larger one too, the smaller one looks a little off balance to me.

Gundersen - i wish i could give you some constructive criticism, but I just dont know what to say about it. whats good about it.. the perspective on the castle seems good. The ariel perspective with the mountains seems good to. honestly, I dont think that the cross and the knight look good, it doesn't seem like they fit there. sorry man I wish I could help, but I'm a noob at this composition thing. the only thing that i could say is to take your current image, start a new document, and just scribble all kinds of stuff on the left side and see if anything looks interesting. spend about 5 min or so on one, then move on to another layer, try a few of those, thats what I do, i must of had like 10 different ones that I scrapped before I posted my thumbs, and went through a few more before i came up with this one

robmorfin - its starting to look good, thats going to be fun putting in all those details.


D.Labruyere - I like it so far, interesting way of going into the painting, cant wait to see more.


this is another speedy that I liked, let me know what you guys think about it, I'm really liking this one, small river on the right with a water fall in the back..



smiley rides horse through flame!

[Earendil]

You need to find something to balance the left side, there's a lot of dead space.

[jodali]

do you think that just cropping that part off would help?

[jodali]

[robmorfin]

Update, need ideas on what elements to use on the left side to create balance;

Thanks for the advice on MSN Chaos.

[robmorfin]

Ear, the first composition

Jod, looking good, just a bit too centered element

Gund, I really like it, avoid using pure whites, get rid of the cross, angle that flag, again, you are using the same colors on the foreground hills and the castle walls, change that, add some clouds to balance that empty area, I like the castle and the perspective is fine, add an element in the main center part of the bldg. (top wall) it's a very big empty space right now.

Chaos, your colors are looking better on last asignment, the pillows and wine glass need to be smaller to haveright proportion with structures; in your castle, watch your perpective, every line has to come from the same vanishing point.

[Gundersen]

Thanks for comments and critts guys. I know the painting needs alot of work

Here is an update ... gonna work more tonight (this was a quick 30 min update)

[Gundersen]

I can see now the white stuff on the left side ... Its these damn old CRT screens, on my macbook its a nice cool blue colour ... gonna try to change it later today........

[Earendil]

Rob> Make sure your lines are aligned. Right now some of the verticals are tipping over to the left and right, and a few lines aren't going to the vanishing point.

Gund> Looking better!

Jodali> It might, or it might be an opportunity to put something there.

Here is my latest WIP. Hope to have all the structures and value relationships setup up soon. Then color and refine.



And there will be two more bridges on the right, stacked on the right vanishing point, I just haven't drawn them yet. It took forever to get the one on the left working perspectively. O.o

[Agustin Poratti]

and, this is for thursday, right? - i think we're all in a hurry. weve got put a lot of detail and rednering today and tomorrow

[Agustin Poratti]

ear i think the tree on the right is too strong. i'd also add more canvas to the left of the áinting.

[Earendil]

Maybe just bring that tree forward? Yeah, it's saying it's ok to look to the left, and that isn't where I want people to look. Thanks Agustin.

[Agustin Poratti]

gundy, isnt that too many crosses?.just a thought. lol. try not go insane

[Earendil]

Rob> On second look, I really like what you've done to separate your values into chunks. Brightest/lowcontrast in the distance, and coming back darker towards us. It's a good way to start I think.

[rvdtor]

well i haven't posted any and its Wednesday night here so whatever input i get i will make sure to do well with it. so its still wip but i need to fix it up.
initial thumbnail wanted a really different angle than just forward. also i know its a bit unbalanced cause most of the bulk is on the left but i was hoping the structure itself creates a sort of path to where ur eyes go,, you see the castle first then the deep valley.


refining

even more refining and worked out the horizon points.


damn i NEED to learn textures it would make working go a lot faster...i keep repainting an area over and over cause it doesn't look like what its supposed to be. hopefully the shapes read well. and i pass to make it to the next..i'm learning lots with u guys.

D labruyere its very nice i like your textures and ur coloring and how it defines your form...does it take you very long to get it consistent like that? i waste a lot of time working and reworking cause the textures aren't right.

Earendil i like the style of your castle and u got the right thumbnail to use. the tree is very strong a but then thats probably only because its full black just to give the distance im sure when its painted it won't be as bold and it'll mesh well into the picture. the bridge and water is a nice touch.

Jodali ur castle is very far so making it stand out from the rest of the other environment will be good, as is it stands out well because of your values , its very shiny. on the left the most obvious thing to add would be more mountains but then maybe u dont want to have it TOO symmetrical. tho the shape of the castle itself could offset and compliment it. i dunno just thinkin.

Robmorfin wow i like how you lay down ur basic colors and already u get the impression of depth and distance. the castle takes up more than half the screen unbalancing a bit, i dunno what u could put on the left that would balance the right a bit, boats as i see there are practical but they still dont seem to counterweight the enormous structures on the right. maybe extending the canvas more to the left and adding like a whole fleet of ships hehehe im kidding, but still wow nice work.

[Earendil]

Robmorfin wow i like how you lay down ur basic colors and already u get the impression of depth and distance. the castle takes up more than half the screen unbalancing a bit, i dunno what u could put on the left that would balance the right a bit, boats as i see there are practical but they still dont seem to counterweight the enormous structures on the right. maybe extending the canvas more to the left and adding like a whole fleet of ships hehehe im kidding, but still wow nice work.

I think rob beats us in the "number of polygons" category. So many buildings O.o

rvdtor> I think you can bring that mid-ground mass a little closer. That'll help sell how high the view is I think. Right now the far background and midground both look the same distance.

[robmorfin]

Rob> Make sure your lines are aligned. Right now some of the verticals are tipping over to the left and right, and a few lines aren't going to the vanishing point.

Will do, thanks, I've noticed it on the tower, but will do a checkup all around.

Ear, your composition is nice, but I feel the building corner line is right in the center, should move it to either side or enlarge your canvas, just a thought

[robmorfin]

Rob> On second look, I really like what you've done to separate your values into chunks. Brightest/lowcontrast in the distance, and coming back darker towards us. It's a good way to start I think.

Thanks, will try to create the same effect with clouds on the left.

[robmorfin]

damn i NEED to learn textures it would make working go a lot faster...i keep repainting an area over and over cause it doesn't look like what its supposed to be. hopefully the shapes read well. and i pass to make it to the next..i'm learning lots with u guys.

Very nice castle design, simple and clean, nice angle as well, it reads very well, I think you need to play with atmospheric perpective and bring the values higher for the middleground, maybe even create some hills or some kind of element that overlaps the background to create more 3Dmensionality, also, make a gradient in the roundness of your roofs, they look kind of flat.

Robmorfin wow i like how you lay down ur basic colors and already u get the impression of depth and distance. the castle takes up more than half the screen unbalancing a bit, i dunno what u could put on the left that would balance the right a bit, boats as i see there are practical but they still dont seem to counterweight the enormous structures on the right. maybe extending the canvas more to the left and adding like a whole fleet of ships hehehe im kidding, but still wow nice work.

Thanks, I need to start adding different elements and see what works best, I didn't think about the structure being more than half the image, good point, will play with the canvas size as well, I can try ships, airplanse, islands, rock, tornados, clouds, birds, zeppelin, will play with it at lunch time. Thanks a lot.