CHOW #307 - Raging Elemental Colossus

[Havok Reed]

I agree with Quinn, this is turning out to be quite amazing! I'm really glad to see the number of posts for this and it's only mid week!

@najtkriss: Dayamn! that's awesome man! Love it!

Some thumbnails to work on my composition and I think I found a winner.

Raging: check
Colossal: check
Element: wata : check

[Sanjo]

Thanks for the feedback guys I've decided to change the aspect ratio of my painting, thrown in some color to get rid of all the white... I still have to find a good design for my colossus and to detail the whole thing out, though :/

Edit: Another small update, threw some birds in there as a test, also added fire back in... Those will be in the final I guess, but reworked

[Havok Reed]

@Sanjo: I'm really liking where this is going! I would try out adding more smoke on his other side, on another layer in case you don't like it, so we can get more of an "emerging from the mountain" feel for it.

OOOOO great example. When the Balrog emerges from the darkness in Lord of the Rings!

[Havok Reed]

@Sanjo: YEAAAAA!!!! That's looking great with the fire now! So good, I love it. Try playing with the color to add some more hazy distance to it and see how that looks, I think it might help. I can just imaging looking off into the distance and seeing some big ass thing coming out of a mountain and being all like...what the O:IFRHNJKJSD is that!!!

Update on my first design.

[NickyBeats]

kingkostas - man thanks a ton for that! - i had to return the favor and do a paintover of your piece. i think i got a bit carried away ahah

[vatteh]

Here's some thumbnails I just finished. I'm planning on going with the top middle one. Any crits or ideas would be much appreciated.

[breistift]

I think you should go with the up-shot, as it describes the scale better. The angle you chose for that one is the most interesting out of all of them, but you drew him leaving the image. Usually you'd have more space in front of the subject. Also, i suggest a more vertical composition, again for scale. Did a quick paintover for you

[vatteh]

breistift - thanks for the paintover! much appreciated. Going into the sketch I picked previously, I realized how the side view didn't show off the original design too well. And like you said, It just wasn't that exciting. Now I have to figure out how to scale this giant. My only doubt with this composition was if it looked colossal enough in this point of view. It looks like it's as tall as the trees, which does not seem big enough for a colossus. Anyways, thanks again.

[panama66]

Added colour and more finish. Don't know how to take this further.

[Cameli]

Heres some WIP of the volcano colossus, some really nice pics till now

[Lewis]

Another elemental coming out of a mountain here

WIP 2

[takashmen]

think I will take part

was thinking about some kind of stone elemental, like golem for eg.
in scene he would confront group of warriors, maybe

catching my thoughts (alchemy)

[Varguy]

Very cool entries so far.

Working on a volcano elemental guy.

[Sillirien]

G@m, kingkostas, big thanks to your crits and advices! This is real reason why I'm here
There was the idea to show it half-formed but if it's not seen from first glance suppose it's not good one.

I tried another sketch and stacked with landscape, as always. Also I think that I make too much useless movements in my works, hope I'll get rid of it with time.
Also trying to do smthng with first one but still... Need to take a little break, for now I'm just spoiling them.


*Amazed by Sanjo, kingkostas, Varguy and G@m's works*
breistift's cutie reminds me of Harry Potter's owl

[Havok Reed]

made some small changes and going to start values. I'm trying to establish my for, mid, and background at the moment.

Not sure how I want render mine out though

I feel like I over do it all the time and it never turns out how I want it to. It always gets too smoothed out on all my work (plasticy) and I'm trying to keep it loose but detailed enough to read it. This is one major hurdle I'm having troubles with. Maybe I rely too much on my line work as a guide?

[takashmen]

Havok Reed maybe you want to keep the precise areas described in sketch you've done and that leads to smoothness, because you want to keep those areas separate?

ask yourself a question how do I paint and try to find the answer in your technique, what decisions make your works as you described

for learning clear way to paint, the method you can check this guy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NygkJ...iZ6S8242dJtKDm

cheers

[fdisk]

kingkostas: Thanks a million for your feedback. I can't believe you went through the trouble and time consuming task of giving us all those wonderful paintovers. I bow to you sir, bow! Also, your Tsunami is probably the best of thread right now. I don't know how I would go about fighting that thing!

Sanjo: I love it! It seems a lot of us are going for the Lava/Volcano theme, which is cool. I love the use of the smoke clouds!

ArtbyAntB: I love the concept, the trident, while very maritime makes me think of Neptune/Triton so I would maybe turn it into a more organic, less man-made trident.

Here's my progress so far along with one more elemental:





I am planning to add a background to my elemental in order to convey some scale. Perhaps a burning town, if I have the time.

[JakeB]

Hi all, awesome work so far. Pretty inspiring .

This'll be my first CHOW . Decided to do a kinda ice colossus. Big rocky thing that lives under the sea with a glacier/icecap on it's back. And as we know, the ice caps are melting, and that's making this colossus very angry. That's the idea anyway .

[breistift]

More progress on the walking glacier.

Varguy: That's already a great image. Can't wait to see your final!

[kingkostas]

hello mates, here something quick from me in terms of feedback and i have to go do some stuff. This thread is beautiful with bunch of work and improvement. I wish i had more time.
did some paintovers because the questions made me want to do.

nickybeats-thanks for the paintover and for the goodwords mate!!!
carnifex-thnx for the crit mate, i will try it.
cameli-hehehe epanhlthes e? ante keep up
jakeb-love the idea mate!!! and great light

Thanks all for the support and i am glad they could be somehow useful.

lets keep up mates!!!

[panama66]

kingkostas - Wow, thanks for the critique. I really appreciate the time and effort you put into it. Will definitely keep them in mind.

[Havok Reed]

Thanks Kingkostas! Your paint over showed me a lot, especially where I need to work on my lighting more. Because that's where the problem lies for me. Everything gets a plastic-y look because it's incorrect lighting. Unfortunately, you posted this after i got pretty far in my rendering. It's okay though, because I want it to look good, so I'm going to start over and adjust the arm as well. I wasn't going for the point of impact, exactly. I wanted to capture the moment of where it was about to whap the ship out of the water. But your suggestion makes more sense.

gotta meet with family for a while. Will update later.

[eago]

Hi
Here is a rough sketch for my concept

The most powerfull lungs in the universe... and the worst allergies known to man

[Sanjo]

Yet another update There's still a lot of work to be done, but I added some falling rocks, broke up the pattern of the birds, detailed out the trees in the foreground and changed some other minor stuff. I also reframed it once again, to avoid too much empty space on both sides. Kind of took out the massive scale of the last version for the sake of not stuffing too much clutter in there. I guess the midground needs some more love, as well as the colossus itself and the smoke around it.

[G@m]

little update, haven't worked much on him yet since i've been spending time studying how to render clouds but i took the time and sketched a rock dude and a water guy, i'll probably finish the storm titan but it was fun to sketch out the other types

btw does the 3/4 rule still apply?

[Dayle]

Kingkostas, man I owe you a beer (or two!). I went back to greyscale, adjusted the anatomy, thought about the lightsource (well, just looked at how you did it really) focused on those edges and making the piece feel whole, not character stuck on background like before. Also changed the horizon to emphasis scale (really liked your mountainous bg but wanted to connect with the trees) and tried to make it a bit more dynamic, by adding the rocks / dust. There is no chance I'd have been able to do this without your crit / paintover, thanks, so I guess the real challenge will be to apply those techniques to the next piece. Thanks again.

[Quinn Simoes]

G@m Yes, at least 3/4 of the character must be visible. Hope that helps.

[Havok Reed]

Ok, this is where I'm going to leave off. I got work in the morning AND I have MORE family to visit on Saturday! Hope I can finish on time, I'll be staying up late tomorrow I think.

Did a little curves adjustment to it, I think my screen is too bright or something. I've never calibrated for this monitor before, I think it's time I look into it.

[Shorinji_Knight]

Ok, I wasn't going to do this round, but you've guys have been throwing out some epic stuff that got me excited. Here's a sketch I did of a shadow colossus... not sure shadow counts as elemental. I started out as fire but it felt stonger this way. Still haven't figured out what I'm going to do to show scale.

BTW. I'm glad the character sheet is gone! It was a pain because there wasn't enough time to do a good entry an then do a halfway decent turn around.

[meeatu]

Skeetch. Still doing some more exploration before final design.