Thread NSFW
I'm neither dead nor dying (sorry to disappoint) but after being a little burned out this past fall (I blame stupid commission work), I'm getting back into gear. Been frequenting CA a lot lately but I figured I'd come back to my art forum roots and dump all over you guys, with the usual critique du jour, verbal abuse served cold on a hot plate. If that made any kind of sense.
Anyway, you know who I be, here's some art.
Amaterasu, the sun goddess
The least successful of them all I think...
I could have done some more work on the coral on this one, but I was rushing.
The challenge was 'hot male vampire,' to which I rolled my eyes
out of my head, and cursed the name of Anne Rice and all her ilk. To make it kind of fun, I made a self portrait out of it, because I have at least as much vanity as every other artist out there. Sigh.
And the next three are from a 'seasons' project I just started for fun, still haven't done Fall/Autumn
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might wanna tag it nsfw though
However (and you knew there was gonna be a however) you still haven't nipped some of the issues that you've been railed on about before, and since it's been awhile I'd figure I'd do yet another paintover to get on your case about it yet again. You know I think I do more paintovers on your stuff than other people's because it always just so damn close to being so damn awesome but it's always missing just that one little thing. That little thing, in this case, is tonal contrast.
I went with this one because it's hot and I like it. I like the idea, I like the composition, I like the figure. Nice stuff. What I don't like is how flat it is when you look at the tone.
Look at the 2 greyscale images here: these are the two versions when stripped of saturation. In the original you can see that the form is getting lost, and everything starts to kind of blend together into a grey mass. In the second I've made an effort to make sure that the forms still read without color. (not as perfectly as I would like, mind you, but hopefully it's good enough to serve as a decent example). It feels like you get so caught up with all the finicky details in the leaves and tattoos and feathers and all the shit you stop thinking about how to organize the space visually through contrast, making the finished piece lack the kind of three-dimensionality and drama it feels like you're shooting for.
Now, on the other hand, you could go the complete other way with it- pull an Alphonse Mucha and make it all about 2-d design and detail by going for a more overt stylization. That would work too, probably, but being stuck in the middle between those two poles doesn't seem to be as successful as a full-on commitment to one or the other would be, or at least currently it doesn't.
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Another amazing critique AoB. Well done man.