Eon (Illustration) Entry: Bronwen Wheeler

[GonzaloGolpe]

Hi there! the party scene looks interesting, with all of those strange characters over there. Use your imagination and go for it!:thumbsup:


Good luck!

[Nekomouse]

Thank you so much for noticing my little project ;P

Here are two more character sketches for today.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/8057/seatedwomanui2.jpg

A random seated woman with a cool chain bracelet and a stepped haircut.

http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/6694/mysticyj4.jpg

A sort of mystic/evangelist.

AND then!
I finally tackled a very rough group picture. I'm have been reading up a lot on composition and things like that. I'm quite happy with this basic composition, I think that the colours I choose will do a lot to draw the eyes around the page.

http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/1197/grouponexu4.jpg

[Nekomouse]

Today I worked on another scene of people.

http://img224.imageshack.us/img224/5571/grouptwoko4.jpg

[ChuckWadey]

Hi, thanks for the comments. I really like your professor guy. Are you going to put these people in an environment - saving the perspective fun for last?

I want to read the book before I start drawing, but I don't know how much time that will take. Maybe working from the excerpts is a better idea.

[Nekomouse]

Hi Chuck,
Thanks for dropping by!
As for the environment... well... I HATE working with perspective, but I think I will try something with it soon... yeah.. :argh:

[Nekomouse]

Okay... so as we say I have bitten the bullet and tried to work out some sort of perspective for my picture.

Because it is an interior I've used a basic one point perspective.
I have placed the focal off centre to make the image more interesting. I also divided the image into 5 vertical sections and 3 horizonal sections. I put the vanishing point on one of these focal points in an attempt to draw the viewer's eye deeper into the picture.

I want to give the impression of a really big ship interior, so I've made the perspective fade quite severe. Obviously this might change when I put in the glass windows I want to have along the sides. I also want to round out the edges to give the ship a more organic shape, but for now I am simply patting myself on the back that I got this far.

Basic Perspective grid:
http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/6512/basicperspectivepw6.jpg

Perspective with shading:
http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/3923/perspectivecolourmo8.jpg

Can anyone see any glaring problems or offer some advice?

[Nekomouse]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1160917616_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1160917616_large.jpg)

Just submitting this one as my first concept art picture

[Nekomouse]

http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/4460/perspectiveplanningmq0.jpg

http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/1184/persepctiveproblemsaa7.jpg

Well, um, as you can probably tell I am having some real issues with perspective at the moment. I can draw the environment, at least the basics of it. But...I have a few problems:
1.) How do I work out the sizes of the randomly placed lights (red)
2.) How do I work out the size of a person placed on the green line.
3.) How do I work out sizes for randomly placed people (blue dots)
4.) And finally, how do I deal with people who will be cropped?

I know all of this probably sounds incredibly stupid, but I've never done this before.
Nekomouse

[OZ]

UNUSUAL AND INTERESTING...keep it up..looks cool.

[ChuckWadey]

I like that your perspective questions are so specific. I'll try to stop back over the weekend and show you the solutions. I'm still reading the book...

[Nekomouse]

I would be most appreciative of the help Chad!
Thank you for stopping by...

[brrrhmmm]

Some comments.I really like your concept sketches,they look so refined.
Have you seen the the inspirational guide provided by the sponsors?I think you might want
to locate the scene in a chamber and design your perspective from there.For example
axis city, thistledown or outside the stone.With the context in place it is easier to design
the smaller characters .

[Nekomouse]

Hi Brrr,
Thanks for the advice.
I have looked at the inspirational stuff, and I was working from this quote:

Party in a Flawship
The flawship’s interior, crowded with privileged citizens and dignitaries, was even more free-form than Olmy’s craft.

The surfaces varied from oyster pearl to abalone gray, and there seemed to be no edge or corner; only one spacious, long cabin, wrapped around the three-meter-wide flaw passage and propulsion machinery.

People of a bewildering variety of body styles tracted from point to point in the cabin, exchanging picts or conversing in English or Chinese. Some sipped drinks from free-floating charged globules of fluid, which somehow managed to avoid passersby with both grace and anticipatory intelligence.

At the midpoint of their journey, after accelerating at just under six g’s, the flawship was traveling some 416 kilometers per second; it then began to decelerate.

In another two hours, the flawship had slowed to what seemed a crawl, only a few dozen kilometers an hour. Below, many of the broad silver-gray disks flew majestically above the lanes. Four large twisted-pyramid structures were discernible in the distance: the terminals coveting the four gates to Tunbl.

I could probably work in a high-eyeview persepective of the city from the windows of the ship, with the pyramids?

[brrrhmmm]

Definitely Add in the pyramids but you have many windows lined towards the
vanishing point and have you considered making the flawship semi transparent so that
you can see more of the interior of the cylinder.And perhap throw in some weird aliens or make the humans more future exotic kinda like star wars return of the jedi aboard jabba the hutts
carrier.

[ChuckWadey]

Neko,

The most important guide you need in perspective is the horizon line. You'll refer to it again and again for vanishing and reference points. You could probably loose the rest of the grid as it adds a lot clutter that you'll have to work through.

Questions:

4) Cropped people. I started, in example 1, by drawing this person in full outside the border of the page. We need his/her height as reference and you can always crop back down later. Its easier to get a person's proportions right when you draw the entire figure and don't try to squeeze it all in before you run out of page.

3 & 2) The heights of other people. Once you know the height of one object, it's easy to project it forwards or backwards to others. In example 2, I drew a line starting at our guy's feet, hitting one of your random blue dots, and ending at the horizon line. The point where it hits the horizon becomes our reference point for drawing another line back to the guy's head.

When we draw a line straight up from the blue dot, in example 3,we know the second person's height when it hits the previous line from the first guy's head.

Example 4 repeats the process with figure 2 to find out the height of a third figure. You can repeat this technique for as many people as you want.

*note - this assumes that everyone is the same height and standing on a level surface. If one guy is a little taller, or standing on a box, you'll have to guesstimate up a bit and vice versa.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v692/ChuckWadey/crits/persepctiveproblems01.jpg

1) Randomly placed lights - same as randomly placed people. Draw one completely first, then a guideline from the top to the horizon, passing through the point of another light. Finaly place a line from the new reference point on the horizon back to the bottom of the finished light. A verticle line down from the point of the new light will show you it's height when it hits your last reference line.

I'm trying to be brief and complete in my explanation. This should help, at least a little. It may be worth checking out some books on drawing in perspective if you think there are many environments in your future. You'll be suprised how many neat little tricks there are.

One final thought about people in perspective: they'll all intersect the horizon line at the same point on their body (again, if same height and level ground). Take your red stick figure in the background - the horizon line is hitting him in the neck. If he was our guide, then every figure should hit the horizon on their necks. Instead I went with your blue figure in the foreground. The horizon line goes just over his head - so the horizon line should barely pass over the top of every figure in the scene. Now, imagine an entirely different scene with the camera placed near the ground: the horizon line may hit a close person in the ankle, so - you guessed it - every person in the scene should hit the horizon at their ankle.

Enough for now?

Good luck.

[Nekomouse]

Wow!
Chuck that is amazing! Thank you so much for your help. Suddenly it all just fits into place now, literally like a light went on in my head. I am forever in your debt!

I really do love how this community takes the time out to help us so much. You are a saint!
Thanks, I'll get back to doodling now...

[Nekomouse]

Okay.... so I just spent an hour and a half fighting trying to get the windows into the perspective. I can't tell if my eyes are playing tricks on me, but it doesn't look right and I can't figure out why???

Can anyone else see it, or am I just going crazy... I think I must be going crazy from all the pink ;Phttp://img169.imageshack.us/img169/1031/purpleperspectivedo3.jpg

[nwiz25]

the character sketches r really cool! plus .. seeing where u goin n all ... it builds up that curiousity a great deal! :p
really gotta hand to Chuck for the information he provided! very helpful indeed!


dont worry Bronwen :P ... at first .. everything wont be in view ... but wen u experiment with a lot of things .... u'll finally know what lies beneath! n thats exciting! :eek:

cheers! :beer: n good luck mate! :thumbsup:

[Nekomouse]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1161699750_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1161699750_large.jpg)

This is a -very- rough composition to check if I have the figures all in place.

[Nekomouse]

Yeah... so..it's late, but I wanted to get something done today. So I tried to put all the figures in place. I think I have it. Tomorrow I'll work on the view from the windows and rounding the windows up, maybe put in some lights if I'm feeling particularly creative.

Sorry for the mess, I know that it is very rough, but I didn't want to do too much work in case I have to change it because I've majorly screwed up somewhere.

Thanks again for all the help guys!

[brrrhmmm]

Don't forget to add in some itsy bitsy figures to give a sense of scale.Lots of entries have them.

[Nekomouse]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1162459582_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1162459582_large.jpg)

This is my basic lineart that I will be using as a guide for my painting.

[nwiz25]

cool lineart man! :bounce: waiting to c whats next :P

cheers dude! :beer:

[Nekomouse]

Here Nwiz, just for you!

Here is the tonal values.
http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/8503/tonalsba8.jpg

And the colours. I researched tons and tons of fabrics and tried to take the basic colours from them. I used contrasting colours towards the front to make them 'pop' and then used more toned down colour for people further away. Still fighting with the view out of the windows but I'll get to that.
http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/1040/colourflatsiv8.jpg

Well, there you have it. I must say that I am proud of myself up to now. I so would have dropped something this difficult a long time ago if it wasn't for the contest.

Can anyone see any glaring problems before I begin shading?

[Nekomouse]

http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/5359/flippeddy7.jpg

Woh! Major brain flash. I flipped the image to try and find out what was bothering me about it and I realised that big window! I put in a view of Axis City. Do you guys prefer it flipped like this or back the other way?

[fO_o]

hi. You might wanna work out the floor abit more. Right now it doesnt fit in with the perspective of the scene and....it looks too photoshop-filtered. Also... the description says "there seemed to be no edge or corner".. now the interior looks too stiff and rigid because of the hardlines and corners. I would make the walls to the side curve..and add thickness to the walls to add a bit of depth. Just some of my ideas. Good luck

[Nekomouse]

Thanks f0_0,
At the moment the 'ship' is still kindof in a placemarker phase, but I suppose rounding it all off is the next step. Thanks for the hints.

[chrismoose]

Hi Neko,

good work. deffinatly do something with the window view aswell:). it will add a great sense of scale to the piece and a bit of an alien backdrop never hurt anyone:)

regards,

chris.

now...if i could just re-figure out how to link to my eon wip...:(

[mmoir]

Hey Bronwen,


Nice looking bunch of characters in your scene, nice job on the linework and faces. I did notice the floor not matching the perspective like someone else said and I would definitely do the window view showing the city. As for the flipped views , I think they both look okay.

[KarelFourie]

Great concept. I really think that you get the diversity spot on with the differnt people in the ship. Good luck with your perspective problems !

Karel

[OZ]

Again cool work! did you know? looking to your work i decided to put the party scene into my eon trailer! YOU INSIPERD ME!:)

[Nekomouse]

CHRIS => Thanks, I'll definately be doing the view. I'm gonna grab some reference pics first ;P

Mmoir => Thanks for pointing out the floor. I didn't really notice it before. As you can see I've gotten rid of the floor and ceiling lines. I'm still not sure how to shade the interior but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Karel => Thank for the help with the perspective. I tried it out on the windows and it worked pretty well. I've tried to round them off. I'll remove the lines in the corners though. At the moment they are just their as reminders for shading.

OZ => Ozzie! I'm and inspiration?!?!? YAY! Can you point me to your trailer once it's done?

So... my latest innane update. As you can see I decided to stick with the flipped image, and I worked on the windows. I roughed out the view from the ship, and added some other ships in the 'shipping lane' so to speak. I'm just working on things little by little and seeing where I get. There is so much here that I have never even tried before. It's so confusing!

Any advice?

http://img383.imageshack.us/img383/9033/sculptinglf1.jpg

[KarelFourie]

Hi !

Looking good ! It looks like you got the perspective issues sorted, just one thing: Could you try and make the room slightly wider ? Maybe its just because im a claustro but it seems a little cramped :) Other than that I realy like what you have done with the colouring.

[Nekomouse]

**GRINS** Thanks for the idea, but I like the jam-packed feel. I was running with this quote
"The flawship’s interior, crowded with privileged citizens and dignitaries, was even more free-form than Olmy’s craft."

Thank you though!

[element5]

Great progress Nekomouse, thanx for the visit to my thread :-)

[chrismoose]

Hi Neko,

good work!!
i would suggest darkening the interior a little bit so that you can divert some attention towards the windows and whats outside.

bye for now...
chris.

[shattered-fx]

Hi Nekomouse,
I like how your work progresses, cant wait to see further developments:bounce:.

my EON entry

[fO_o]

hey. its getting better. i think wat u need to work out now is the value. right now everything still looks kinda flat. Darkening some areas and giving highlights will help give a sense of depth.
deciding on where ur main light source is coming from could help. in this case i would imagine its the ceiling light. :)
Peace.

[Nekomouse]

Hi all,
THanks for the wonderful comments. As you can see this weekend was pretty non-productive. I darkened the interior and I do think that it works much better than the light version (thanks chris ;P). I also worked on the background.

I started shading the Indian woman in the front but I have erased the shading twice now. I'm trying to use texture brushes which I have never used before and I don't think I'm quite ready for them yet. I think what I am going to do is paint it using soft brushes and then work over that with texture brushes. Yay, another first in this picture. Wow...this is getting difficult and very complicated. But as we say in Japanese 'Ganbarimasu!' 'I won't give up!'

http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/9297/sculpting2cs5.jpg

[LostPen]

kisses to the lovely japan from the UK

the only Japanese word i know is baga=idiot (hehehe)

i really like your concept

it is relay different from all the other i have seen

in my opinion i believe you must alienize the characters more

hope to see much more

yours

Lostpen

[chrismoose]

Hey Bronwen!!!Your welcome:)
are you going to do more of the interior shading? to perhaps give some definition to the ceiling and tops of the walls?
That way the texture wont look so flat, perhaps some uplighters on the walls.
other than that, keep showing us the texturing progress shots as they appear, the people are looking good.

all the best,
chris.

p.s. whats the time difference over there compared to ireland/uk?

[brrrhmmm]

Like your latest milestone update.Very nice party scene.Throw in a few aliens to
add interest.The characters scene seems to a bit crowded.You may want to edit and show more of the city view.

[brrrhmmm]

Side by Side comparisons So that you know who is doing

what in the illustration category of the eon challenge only.

Classifier followed by artists.

: Strong/Beautiful Foreground Potraits with EON elements in the background.

Movie Posters theme.

Characters in dramatic poses.

Characters have detailed skin,muscle and skeletal structures.



Radu Bogdan Boeru

Tiberius Viris

Sacha angel diener

Niklas Frostgard

Michael van den bosch

sandra bott

michael dashow

nabil hamadi

alwyn talbot

timur kiryashov

damir g martin

Nathan L Bachelder

Daniel lu visi

Maurizio Manzieri

dale thomas

ego lataire

rune rask

guo jian

hugo araujo

: massive architectures,detailed cityscapes,plasma tubes,huge eon elements viewed in the distance in the style of grand space opera with miniscule,faceless,diminutive men ,women and all terrain machines reacting and responding to the environment.

Tiberius Virius

remko troost

tolgahan gungor

torsten wolber

nathaniel west

ramy badie

bryce smith

martin nielsen

emrah elmasli

mauricio alvarado kladt

prabath wijayantha

maciej frolow

nilesh ambekar

constantinos krystallis

greg kaperski

adrian fekete

reinaldoromero

marcin j. nikiforuk

james nelms

maurizio manzieri

jarek sznytzer

Derek wilson

Nazirull Safry Paijo

Daniel justin bird

dale thomas

erik linden

rune rask

david freeman

ori arad

markus graf

ali jalali

raffy encarnacion

alex kelly



: air ,sea atmosperics featuring natural elements of islands,skies blend into a grand sense of scale.Includes Tree elements.Gaia oriented.Mountain views and Spectacular chamber vistas. Sky atmospherics

adrian baluta

gonzalo golpe

gunilla elam

jonathan colvin

guo jian

oscar jostedt



: party scene with the character interacting and gossiping

Parties gathered at gate opening

Radu Bogdan Boeru

nekomouse

: wonderful sense of humor even black humor and caricature

Torsten Wolber

per trystad

mark david

: action packed conflict with eon elements in the backdrop and lots of machines,ships,cities and soldiers

thierry schiel

paul hume

: entire cities,planetary bodies,asteroids,weather systems,gates,singularities,flawships and space vehicles in awe inspiring perspectives with large scale explosions.Ships have beautiful designs.Space Atmospherics.

sacha angel

neville de souza

prabath wijayantha

greg kaperski

mona eriksson

attilla kurt

vladimir davidenko

paul b castillo

juha kamarainen

mauricio alvarado kladt

joel carlo

shawn andrews

matt benya

Derek Wilson

blaz porenta

oscar jostedt

pavel elagin





: detailed explanatory tutorials

sacha angel

matt benya

[Nekomouse]

Okay. *shew* Last weekend I just sat and stared at my work for several hours...think 'zombie'. I was paniced about painting the skin, I was paniced about the hair, I was paniced about the interior. Hell...I've never done anything like this before!

Realising that this is the most hours I have ever put into any work I've done, I decided to step back. A trick my father taught me. He would let his painting sit for years sometimes before going back to them. Luckily, for me, it was only a week.

I spent most of this weekend trolling for hair and skin painting tutorials. I can cell shade skin fine, I can soft shade skin fine, but can I paint it? Well, I never tried! Same went for the hair.

So I bring you a first ever painted skin and hair from ME! (Please note I haven't touched the eyes or stuff.)

http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/2513/sculpting65298rb2.jpg

AND a close up...though it looks much better above :P
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/9177/sculpting65298detailbn1.jpg

[Nekomouse]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1164620217_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1164620217_large.jpg)

This is my first colour pass which I forgot to send in before I started shading.

[chrismoose]

Bronwen,

I think you did a good job on the hair and skin. it just stands out because its the only one done right now - so go do some more :):)

I should talk; i need to get on with it...

all the best,

chris.

[abscnth]

Hey Nekomouse
thats a heck of a lot of work you have done there, nice concept and the darkening of the walls definately gave the characters more WOW factor. I remember my first fears on using texture brushes but once you start to figure out what works you cant resist em!

Keep up and best of luck at the finishing line :)

Sean

[Nekomouse]

EEEEK So much to do and so little time!!!
Well, I have spent weeks fighting with this. Eventually I found a new reference and redraw her face, it was really bugging me. I like the way that she looks out at the viewer now as if to say, "What the hell are you looking at?"

I also got rid of the lines! (WOw...major big step for me.) I've never ever painted without outlines before and it is absolutely petrifying. I also think that I'm getting this whole concept of 'painting' digitally as opposed to just colouring. Her hand is still an absolute mess, and let's not even start on the jacket, but I'm running out of time and I have to move onto the others so for the moment she is as she is.

Thank you both for your awesome comment!

http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/936/butchsn2.jpg

[Nekomouse]

Merry Christmas all!
You know that you really don't have a life when you spend most of Christmas day working on you EON project :scream:

The last two days I worked on this dude... ignore the missing bits and little overlaps (there are other people in front of him)
http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/4995/greenmanjp9.jpg

And just to see how eveything is coming together...
http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/4687/progress3dr6.jpg

[Thaldir]

Glad to see this piece progressing, Nekomouse! :)

One thing, if I may, the man's left eye (monitor right) is bigger than the right one (that's just a pointer, unless you meant the asymmetry, of course. I know first hand how difficult it is to 'see' a character after working on it for a couple of days).

[nwiz25]

hey buddy! wishing u and ur family a very merry christmas! :bounce: :love:
http://nwiz25.cgsociety.org/gallery/444492/

cheers! :beer:



> i really love the hair details mate! waiting to c the final result! :thumbsup::bounce:

[Nekomouse]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1167647661_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/14/12170/12170_1167647661_large.jpg)

I'm almost half way through my people, with only 15 days left. As most of you know already, learning to do skin and hair has been a tough time for me, but I think I'm getting the hang of it now.

[abscnth]

Hey Neko, jst a quick line to say hope you get there, and thanks for kind comments you left on my thread.

Best wishes
Sean

[CGTalk Moderation]

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.