Zodiac: Tiger General

[Cobol_Yu]

Hi, my first post here.
This is part of a Chinese Zodiac series I am working on. Armor design is mainly inspired by the Tang and Ming dynasty. I am a huge fan of Magna Carta style of art and I was sorta going after that look. This drawing went through alot of changes and editing but I never seem to be completely satisfy with it... mostly due to the (lack of) background and weird lighting. I guess its time to move on and just say its done for now.
Please leave any crit if you can spare the time.
Thanks!

[fantasyartist]

Nice design. I think you could work more on the hair and give it more
strands and volume. It looks kinda flat to me right now.

[Infinit]

things I like about it:
- the design
-the BG
-the green fabric

things I don't like about it:
- the hand is WAY too big (both actually)
- the fur looks very flat, focus on volume first then on texture
-the lighting on the "leather" looks like it was done with the dodge tool
doge/burn is your enemy, avoid them
- the feet are missing

[Fellah.]

Nice design.
Yup, never crop the feet like that!!

[Cobol_Yu]

Thanks for all the comments!
I knew those hair looked bad but didn't know how else to approach it, if anyone can point me in the direction of some good tutorial for coloring hair and fur that would be great.
- ya those leather are done with dodge and burn.... I will make a note to avoid using those tools in the future.
- feet are missing because I was original too lazy to draw them in since the paper wasn't big enough. I heard other people telling me to add the feet in but I find it kinda hard since I have some trouble drawing straight onto photoshop with tablet ( I usually draw on paper and scan it instead). For future drawings I will defiantly try to include the feet.

[elpez]

you´ve got some nice rendering skills, and a fabulous tiger pattern design!
but I think the problem of the character is in he´s attitude. He doesn´t seems to be a tiger, he doesn´t inspire fear nor respect. he doesn´t have a tiger pressence. his face is the face of someone too distant from the things that surronds him to be alert of them. I think his face should transmit the essence of a tiger. Always alert. His face and his pose. Now is a very static one, is like a stick. I would try to bend his limbs and lower his gravity center in order to make him ready to react quicker to the danger.

In other order of things, I think that in the actual image the blade should be in the front part of the character, not in the back, at least with the arm position it´s drew now. I made a paint over and a sketch to clarify me. hope it helps.

cheers

[Infinit]

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthre...hreadid=259468
for a hair tut

[Cobol_Yu]

wow thanks for the pointer elpez, I was planning to redraw this anyways and that really does give it alot more attitude.
Infinit, thanks for the link I will give it a try right away.