Master and Servant 2D Entry: Martin Constable


#10

Had a look round the forums. Some dam fine preparatory drawings out there. Never been much of a one for them myself. Prefer just to jump straight in. However, I attach one to to show the low expectations I place on my drawings. I placed it next to the source so people can see what bit of the photoshop it reffers to. Think it might not have been obvious otherwise! Bad though they are I am very fond of my scrappy drawings and keep all of them.

What the drawing is actually saying is that the three arrowed areas need working on. The cast shadow on the ribs need establishing, the edge of the hanging shirt needs lowering and the lung thing needs attention.


#11

Thank you for telling me. I have done everything wrong. Doh! Will re-submit stuff in proper way.


#12

dude haha,thats sick!

i think its against the rules to show this much gore!


#13

Well I hope not. Though it might look a bit extreme you will notice that the guy doesn’t look too concerned at his situation. This, for me, exemplifies the metaphorical nature of the image. In other words it is a state of mind that the thing is ‘about’ and not the situation itself.

I have thought a lot about what the image comes from. Though I am loathed to get personal I can tell you this: that some years back I was chronically sick. I could not work for about three of four years. In that time I was obliged to no longer take my body for granted and to treat it as a thing in revolt. I could only sit back and become a passenger to its dysfunction.

This was neither a good thing or a bad thing. Everyone will eventually face something like this in their lives.

That is where this image comes from. What do people think?

(PS I am better now).


#14

haha i hope u are better,i thinks its great,i’m just worried that it might conflict with the rules.

but lets hope its ok.its an interesting concept.


#15

Here is the image further down the line. In the forum I have posted a little thing on colour. For me it helps to separate the tone from the colour and to do this I use the HSL capacity of Photoshop 1 (other application have this like Apples Shake).

Looking at what I have done so far I can see that the edges are still too dark (especially on the left hand side). Also the specific light condition is still a bit primitive.

For the flare I used Knoll Lens Flare. This is a tasty little plug-in that was invented by the same guy who invented Photoshop (we are not worthy! etc).


#16

:eek:, well what can i say… is a very original concept i’ll never think i something like that.


#17

Wonderful work man. Quite a delight, something fresh and interresting.


#18

hey, great idea, so schizophrenic… keep up good work


#19

Well here is the image further down the line. The colour has been greatly rationalised since my last posting.

I have separated it into two to demonstrate the following:

Previously: most local (ie arm layer, head layer, chest layer etc) tone adjustments were done via a topmost adjustment layer set. This was uneconomical and confusing. I have now separated local adjustments onto local layers (seen in the left half) and the global ‘tweaks’ onto the topmost layer set (right half). It helps to keep a tidy file.

I have, in the process, tidied the file up visually. I shall post some before and afters in the forum to show what I mean.

I still have a long way to go. My progress is slowing down considerably (the last %10 takes longer than the first 90 etc) and I do not expect to have it finished until at least a weeks time.


#20

wow, i really like the flesh and organs:thumbsup:


#21

Here is an animated gif to show the last three stages I have been through. To stop the gif at any stage try click and holding your mouse over the scroll bar of the browser (works on a mac ;).

From 1 to 2 I have made many adjustments and refinements on the details, many of which cant be seen. The original image was put together in such a rush that I had a lot of shaggy masks to tidy up. The biggest change was in moving the shirt tail lower down so its edge did not coincide with the edge of the shirt roll. I do not like it when edges and points coincide without a good reason.

I also did numerous other tweaks like putting in that little triangle of light in the crook of the raised arm.

Also, as I mentioned in my previous post the tone adjustment layers were rationalised. A lot of this work is invisible, doing little more than making my file easier to work on. A sort of spring clean. Most of my tone adjustment is either by curves (for adjustments) or by multiply/screen layers (for invented tones).

3 is the final, top most, adjustment layer. This was no more than two curves (one to darken and warm the image, the other to enrich the organs in the middle) and two layers set to screen (for the flare effect). The flare was courtesy of Knoll Lens flare Pro.


#22

I’v been assembling all the images I posted here into a sorta online tutorial thing. Here is a set of mid stage ‘before and after’s’ that I knocked for it. Thort they were interesting.


#23

I’ve nearly finished now. I’ve worked on the tones, tweaked bits and pieces endlessly and tidied things up. Recently added / changed = a little bit of blue reflected light on some edges, the line of the lower shirt edge, the trousers sorted out, a final corner darken to the whole thing.

Watya think?


#24

your cloth is reallly nice. Nice textures. The rest is pretty slick also. man o man cool little details.


#25

Thanks! The cloth was a real frankenstein job. Lots of photos, some scans, some textures, lots of painting. No photographed clothes are ever excatly as you want them.

The details I always like working up. I feel they hold they eye.

Had a look at your space opera response. Heluva scope! Reminded me of Dune.


#26

It´s really a hand drawing image??? WOw it´s like a photo, you are a monster, original design mate. How many hours take to this point?.


#27

Actually a mixture of hand drawn and collage. The reference photos are page one of this thread.

Had a look at your page. Not for the first time I am interested in ZBrush.


#28

!!!??? I don’t know what to say: just that when I look at my entry, I wonder why I bother!!! :slight_smile:

It’s awsome, and can’t believe that you did that for the 2D challenge, when I saw it first, I thought it was for the 3D challenge! what software are you using?


#29

thank you!

Software used = Photoshop, also lots of Google searching (for reference material) and some plain old photography (again for reference photos). Some of my reference material can be found on the first page of this thread.