CHOW 149, female sith lord

[ludwigwennerholm]

Hello! This is my contribution to last week's character of the week, but it was unfortunately rejected for a number of reasons.. Anyway, I'd like to get some constructive criticism on how to make it more interesting or anything else that comes to mind.
Cheers!

[Kiera]

I really like the upper part and the skindesign
The cloak hides her (probably alien) anatomy and this gets the viewer who doesn't know her body confused - for a human the legs had to be much lower.
Is that a glowstick?

[6ideon]

I definitely like your style, I think at first glance it's a little hard to figure out whats going on, maybe define the legs a little better so it's more obvious what they are? I think if the painted the thing she is crouching on, it might clear it up a little bit. Maybe just paint the top and then have it fade out towards the bottom where it gets dark. How small is she? Maybe give her a little bit ore of a hunch in her back to show that she is crouching. I'm loving that hair and tats, i'd throw a lightsaber in there but that's just me, maybe a bit cliche no doubt lol. If you make the lightsource stronger it will help make her stand out more too, instead of kind of fade into the background. I really like it though, well done.

[kaktuzlime]

Hai Ludwig!

Thought I´d throw in my 2 cents, just cause you´re swedish ;P

What could use some improvement:

- Background. As it stands, presently it looks like a poorly manipulated photo, dyed red. Make it lose the photoshop filter feel. Perhaps redraw it from skratch, or simply make it a gradient. Also, it´s relative complexity steals focus from the main subject, the character.

- The lightsaber looks like a dildo. That´s bad. You should design the grip better and IMO, add the lightsaber light itself, since it´s such a strong icon for the whole starwars/sith IP. You´re missing out on a very strong design element there.

- Overall too mach black. Tone it down. You can always wotk on it more in greyscale to get the values down better.

-You´ve given the face focus! That´s great! However, I think you could improve the focus even further by a means of several other methods, including but not limited to, like blur and local colour contrasts (i.e, add more warms and cools to the face).

- Her skintone is dead. Remember that the halftones gets a higher saturation, and the colours of ccertain materials affect each other. So Echo the red from the hair, and the green of the coat, in other places of the character. Where does the red light on her feet come from?

-Hands! They´re too simplified. Hands are great to show mood and character, dont overlook or neglect their importance. Their pose is nonsensical, make it matter.

-Great job on the tattoos! You´ve made them follow the form!

-The lines you´ve left everywhere makes the image look scribbly and unfinished.

-Study up on how fabric works. I can recommend looking into the 7 principles of folding by Glenn Vilppu.

- That´s a tough pose. I think you could benefit froma simpler, more revealing pose. As it stands, relevant details are being obscured by the fact that she´s hunching. You can keep the same expression, which I guess is something along the lines of dexterious and mystical, in a standing pose. You´ve got many nice designelements going, that could create an awesome silhouette!

(personal preference - Add a strong backlight!)

Those were my spontaneous reactions. I´m looking forward to a revised version.

[ludwigwennerholm]

Kiera Thanks! I'll try and work on the anatomy. It was supposed to be a lightsaber but I didn't feel like I had the time to work too hard on it. Definately will now though!

6ideon Thanks! The platform she's standing on was left without any work due to lack of time, but I'll try and make something of it! And the "closed" lightsaber was intentional, didn't want it to be too cliché

kaktuzlime Wow, thanks a lot for taking the time for that in depth analysis and criticism I really appreciate it! Was thinking of just scrapping this picture but after all those suggestions I feel I just have to try to fix it. Tack som fan! Hope to see your reactions after the revised version. Cheers!