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Baying of the core hounds
Grimbro
Registered User new member
Registered User new member
Long time lurker here. (But hey thats what the rules suggest right?)
The new comic storyline is killing me. Longtime WoW player who has since left but is always tempted to come back. Damn PA for waving the card game in my face now too. I am only human!!!
Been thinking about posting art. Never really had any piece I felt appropriate for the forum until now.
The Baying of the Core Hounds card art reminded me of the piece I had done for the Blizzard fan art contest.
I have been thinking of doing some more game related art. I f I do I will be sure to post.
Crits and comments always welcome unless you are going to be a stickler about equipment and weapons :P
Cheers to PA Community
Grimbro
The new comic storyline is killing me. Longtime WoW player who has since left but is always tempted to come back. Damn PA for waving the card game in my face now too. I am only human!!!
Been thinking about posting art. Never really had any piece I felt appropriate for the forum until now.
The Baying of the Core Hounds card art reminded me of the piece I had done for the Blizzard fan art contest.
I have been thinking of doing some more game related art. I f I do I will be sure to post.
Crits and comments always welcome unless you are going to be a stickler about equipment and weapons :P
Cheers to PA Community
Grimbro
Grimbro on
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Posts
Also Core Hounds have 3 toes (http://wowhead.com/?npc=11673, click on View in 3D on the top right).
welcome
Is that an oil painting or a photoshop piece?
I think you're spending too much time on the details. This leads to a weak image.
You need to spend more time on the basics: value, composition, perspective, and color.
Block everything in before moving on to specific details.
The big blue light on the bottom right is very distracting, it's taking away from the big lava monster which is obviously you're focus but is getting lost by that big bright light.
There is some great things going on though, just loosen up and think more about the whole image rather than in specific elements.
Right, but certain areas look unfinished. Focus is good, but I am eventually going to look at other parts of the piece.
I like it quite a bit, but I think it needs more tightening, especially the characters fighting the core hound. That is the focus, correct? The fight between the heroes and the monster?
Well of course the rocks in the back shouldn't be completely drawn out to show every little crack etc, but there's a big difference in general quality of the rocks and the core hound. The core hound looks like it's carefully etched out and the rocks are more Bob Ross "well-lets-put-some-happy-rocks-over-heeerrreee".
I'm not much of an artist, but if I may I'd like to chime in with my opinion. I liked the bright light and kind of secondary focus (or whatever you pros call it) on the priest, and I thought it was intentional. The first thing that got my attention was the core hound, then my eyes went where the core hound is looking: the priest with the bright spell going on. I immediately thought "aha, the tank has lost aggro and the dog is about to go for the healers", which brought a sense of story to the picture.
I dunno, maybe I only had this reaction because I'm a long time WoW addict myself, and I was there in the early days of Molten Core, playing a priest no less, which makes the situation familiar.
This is all good advise^ but I still think this image is worthy of praise.
I think the blue light in the bottom right adds a lot to it. I interpreted the it as the monster being the focus, while the people are there to add action. They're definitely secondary, but the blue light makes sure you notice they're there right away.
The only real problem I have is with the top left; there's just not enough there. The top right has those lines and everything to make it look like an unfocused backround, but still finished. The top left looks like you stopped caring and just put some smudges for shits. The area is much too large, though I do like the dude with the shield up.
All in all, good stuff, just pay more attention to your empty space.
No seriously, great stuff. There was something that was bugging me about it, but it doesn't seem like a big deal anymore. The background. There is such great detail in the corehound, and the heroes, and the ground, but the background just doesn't pop like the rest of the piece. I think if you're going to place a lot of detail in it, the background shouldn't suffer either.
Now, for more serious crits, I'd like to start with the claws. In their current position, the paw shown would be useless for mobility for several; reasons, the least of which is that the pressure on the body weight would push the tips back into the paws.
The heads are uneven.
We should see some of the neck behind the collar of the second head.
The shield of the closer knight is way too low (and his sword hand is slightly oversized), while that of the farther is too far up the arm.
We really should see more of the belly.
I'm not sure I've seen flame behaving remotely like that.
People are so passionate about games and art. I think that's great.
I am still blown away that I managed to inspire a Bob Ross comment! Happy Little Molten Core.
Victor15b- Just a quick note to you, this is all digital and done in Corel Painter.
I apologize to the purist for the wrong amount of toes on Magmadar.(That's the character there)
I would have loved to have known of that site the The Laser linked to when I was gathering reference for the piece.
I had some pretty vague screenshots fired off in the heat of battle. Apparently none of them captured the proper toe count.
I have been put to task over the equipment enough to know that if I am ever foolish enough to attempt another Wow piece I will consult this forum 1st. I just wanted to capture not only the creature but the frantic action of the moment.
Thanks everyone for the comments
Cheers
GRimbro
I love it.
i didn't notice this before, but that's actually a really good point.
if some dirty ass mage rolled on my benny piece, i swear to god i would have shot them in the face
not that they could take the thingy anyways
but still
But I think cropping the image may illustrate people's points:
I've basically taken out everything that doesn't feel fully rendered (or rendered enough, since some areas really don't need too much more attention). This image feels very strong. The contrast and lighting create interesting, dynamic focal points. Make the rest of the image on par with this section and you'll have a real masterwork of gaming art.
Again, though, right now I already dig it as is, so doing any more would really be going above and beyond.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
WetbackMcMoneyfingers. Or a Mexi-Jew. - awesome!
I never got the chance to get my benediction
I love the art though, good job I say! I actually like the unfocused parts of the work personally.
My Portfolio Site
To me the piece has very little flow or balance because you have all these characters on a really unsteady plane, and I can't tell between the floor and...the walls? I don't even know. Where is the entire back half of the creature? It's as if it is emerging from some sort of portal and the rest is missing. Also, if you completely desaturate your colors, you'll find that your contrast could be much higher to make the whole thing pop more. I would be able to say more if I saw more of your work -- which I would like to see.
Anyways...I thought I'd balance out some of the "This is awesome!" comments...
Or alternatively it would have to be moving fast, taking a turn to the left right now. I think it looks like it's going to leap for the priest, but the rest of the picture, especially the flames on top, don't really support that idea. If there was a stronger sense of movement, maybe the beast's pose would work better.
And it definitely is a priest. A mage couldn't wield or even own Anathema, but a priest could wear gear that looks like mage gear. I think. That arcane spell glow is Inner Focus. It's blatantly obvious.
Ok...who the fuck cares?!?!
Please give crits that will actually matter.
OP: It doesn't matter what concept is behind your piece, it's from WoW...we get it...who cares. If the piece is weak, saying "but it's world of warcraft!" that doesn't make it better. I really don't understand all of the "critiques" this piece has been getting...where's the AC i know and love?
The more i look at this painting the more i find that i have a problem with. First there's the depth issue, which i previously stated, everything looks like it's on the same plane, the ground is very unstable and the background is lazy.
The overall composition isn't very good either, it's really unbalanced and seems haphazardly put together.
I don't care what that blue light is, if it's detracting from the great detail you have in the subject...i don't really want to see it!
Where's the creature's ass by the way? It unbalanced and precariously perched on one leg, about to fall over; i also get a sense that this isn't a bipedal monster. I want some indication of this being what i think you think it is. And this was brought up but i'll say it again, the two heads are different sizes, not because of perspective, if you put them next to each other the left head would be much smaller.
All your figures are static and lifeless...
Work on human anatomy for your figures and animal anatomy for your monster. Study life! That can't be stressed enough. You're depicting a made-up monster but if you plan on making a semi-realistic painting you need to pull some things from life.
You need to calm the fuck down and realize AC isn't about making fun of people's work if it isn't perfect. You can go ahead and be a bitch about not liking parts of his work if and when he ignores your criticism, don't expect everyone to go jumping down his throat about it for no reason. Forumers are allowed to comment on pictures as well, chief. Get off your high horse and stop trying to order people around.
Also, repeating sizzy's comment doesn't make it any more right.
This is how art forums are supposed to work. I do not come here to hear "Oh, you're so great, you're awesome, good job," or get random nitpicks about the accuracy of the fictional details in my work. If one wants to hear some untainted praise which will in no way support them becoming better at what they like to do, they can go show their pictures to their mommy.
But my mommy is one of the harshest critics I know, i'd rather show stuff to you guys. :P
I'm sorry. I didn't realize making less than serious comments in an otherwise on-topic post was frowned upon here. If you thought my crit was useless, it would have been proper to quote the actual crit instead of the side note. I apologize for the intrusion and will steer clear of the AC from now on.
The OP never said ANYTHING resembling that. He said he didn't want people commenting on the WOW- specific gear and such, which no one paid any mind to, but he never said that.
It is not forbidden to simply comment on a picture, or state your opinion of it. Full-on asspatting is generally frowned upon, but there's no need to explode on someone for a comment or joke.
This is just ridiculous
this isn't even a crit, and you're telling him its a bad crit.
Edit: SPEAKING of bad crits:
I was always under the impression it wasn't very helpful to simply repeat what someone said like 5 posts before you
but hey, who the fuck am I, right?
Shut up with the stupid fighting.
Dismissing the positives in a piece for the sake of critique is stupid. The problem with posts like Dee's (btw Dee, this isn't meant to be anything against you personally, I'm just going to use your post in this thread as an example) is the overbearing focus on the negative. People can learn just as much by hearing what's good about their piece and why. Futhermore, this is an internet forum, not a workshop or a professor's office (and even professors are generally more positive than Dee is suggesting this place is). If you're giving critiques, don't try to sound like the end all authority on everything art related. You aren't.
The OP's work clearly has some very finely rendered details and an overall sense of aethetic that is pleasing to the everyday eye. This, when it comes to most game-related art, is usually enough to get by. However, to go the extra mile and produce something that really wows people, definitely flush out the rest of the piece (as has been stated already) and work on the composition (make sure every element is interesting in some way, or contributes to the overall interest of the piece).
I definitely disagree with the sentiment that you should remove the blue light, it's the most direct form of conflict between monster and man right now and bridges the gap between the two nicely. It also makes the piece feel more kinetic.
Our first game is now available for free on Google Play: Frontier: Isle of the Seven Gods
Bliss: I'm sorry if i was harsh. I don't play WoW so i guess i just don't respect the specifics of it.
RubberAC:
I was only saying that no matter how strong a concept is the piece will rise or fall based on the execution of the piece itself.
If you put a random line on a huge canvas and say, "it's a treasure map to a magical land in a far away galaxy where elfs and faeries have unprotected sex all throughout the kingdom, and everyone died of aids," that doesn't make the careless random line any more special. You may have a grand and complicated concept behind a piece but if the execution is poor, the piece is still bad.
Gee, i never realized that reinforcing something made such a negative effect on people...i will cease to do so immediately.
I don't claim to be a big authority, but if two people notice something about a single work that doesn't work...something is probably wrong.
Srsizzy:
Why are you giving a critique on their critiques!?
Just because something is overloaded with flash and spiffy detail doesn't mean it has good execution, or is even good itself for that matter - it just shows he knows how to render in photoshop and he needs to go back to certain basics such as those deelock and srsizzy have mentioned. So what if the most important pieces of advice are repeated five or six times? Sometimes they need to be overemphasized because otherwise they'll be drowned beneath the plethora of shitty concieted posts such as yours.
OP, while your painting does have its many faults you do show some seriouse potential. Just imagine the stuff you would be doing a few months down the road if you practice the things that need to be done. I will say, that while its cool and all if game-art is your thing, originality is far more admired.
"I was born; six gun in my hand; behind the gun; I make my final stand"~Bad Company
I thought everybody did this
oh god i've been doing things all wrong
And that's why Da Vinci should have put dragons in his portraits, because simply drawing a woman is too boring. And why isn't there a burlesque show at the last supper?
Guess I should have paid more attention to the thread.
I once again thank everyone for your thoughts,comments and criticism. They are all appreciated whether or not certain members think otherwise. Not really sure my picture is worth that argument.
DeeLock/srsizzy-your crits are appreciated and many of them are quite good and observant. I have taken them into consideration and I will decided whether or not to make changes if I agree or not with them.
So understand you have been heard and you made a good argument.
I would hope people feel like they can make comments about image, how ever stupid others make think they are, without being attacked. This is Penny-Arcade Artist Corner and from many other posts I have read there are a lot of people who just like to celebrate games and the art they inspire. I would like to think that they are free to have a voice without being shouted down.
If you think the criticism is from others too harsh just let it go. It is in the end a critique. I have posted art many times on a variety of forums and you build up a tough skin. I would warn against anyone posting art on a forum seeking only approval or affirmation.
There are a lot of great forums out there to give great feedback on art and its processes. Conceptart.org is one of my fav's. As a matter of fact I think I posted this image there ages ago. Some liked it, some didn't. Oh well, move on take the crits seriously, see what you can learn from them, and do better next time.
Anubis09- Thanks so much for the card art. It made me laugh out loud. I really liked the text. I did find it upsetting that you worry you would get "raped" for posting it. But I am glad it inspired the card and really glad you posted it
So once again I appreciate everyone for taking the time to post on this piece.
Cheers
Grimbro