The Journey Begins Challenge (2D) Entry: Michael Dashow

#541

wow! i see your last post after i pushed the post reply button and this window opened :slight_smile:
i liked the new hair, also new faces are much better even though i didnt think it was necessary to fix neck looks better this way too i liked the short hair one but im liking this one too

whichever you choose wont effect the beuty of the picture i think both will be very good.
althoug i sort of like the longer hair a little more than the other, the short hair feels like ‘aha that worlds women are short haired and men prefer long’ and feels somehow more natural for that scene.

so the better one is… i can say , short hair,no the long one, no maybe the short is better or long one can be better, long, short, long… :surprised

nevermind you have an award waiting piece

#542

Hi Walrus,
Firstly I looked at your picture with a surprise, I found 10 time better the design with long hair. It give another aspect to this illustration. Now she is more in harmony with the style of house. Congrats for the hair painting treatment, they are perfect.
What you reserve us as surprise now ?
-Friendly, David

#543

Hi Walrus ^^

I really love the way the pic is turning out. I especially love the expression on the creature!!

And I have to agree, long hair looks better then the short :smiley:

#544

Hi again :slight_smile:

After looking at the far away shot for a little longer, I wanted to make a suggestion. Maybe if you would raise the hollow in the column surrounding the girl just a little higher, it would frame the characters just a little be better. I love your composition and the way it leads the eye, I just felt that the hollow was just a little low. Just a suggestion though ^^

#545

:slight_smile: fantastic details Mike

I thought you had finished, but this is looking even better and I have to agree that I prefer the long hair.

Great work!! :slight_smile:

#546

really realy really love the it. i just saw the thumbnail in the forums and went AWWWWWWW already.

#547

Hi, all, thanks for the replies! I’m really glad that folks are liking this new hairstyle! (becuase I think I may have accidentally overwritten the old hairstyle’s file, oops!) It’s okay, it’s not like I don’t save off new versions of it every day, it wouldn’t set me that far back if I wanted to go back to short and spiky. But this one feels more right, i think.

individium - yeah, i know exactly how you feel. I get the same thing: “This new hairstyle really fits her! But I like the statement that short hair makes. But the long hair really looks good. But I’ve had the short hair for almost 3 months… Ahhrgh!” Good thing I can let some other eyes look it over!

deevad - 10 times better, huh? Wow, that is an improvement! I hope I don’t have any more surprises, as I’d really like to call this finished already! :slight_smile: Until someone points out something major to change that I agree with, it’s only small housekeeping items left.

sourgrapes - I’m glad you bothered to make that 2nd post. That’s a really good point, I’m surprised no one has spotted that yet. I think you’re right, I’ll have to see how it looks with a largerr hollow. Thank you!

MrFreeman, and taste - thank you both!

Almost there…

-mike

#548

Well, here we are with all of the recent changes… Plus more purple flowers added on the hillside by the fence and some of the left column shaved off to make the composition circle the main characters more. And that’s it for all outstanding comments about this piece. I’m completely caught up. So last call for things to change, or I’m going to pack it in!

-mike

#549

Nicely done Mike, Bravo!

#550

Ohh… nice nice nice! I think you are considered done here! No more crits, wouldn’t want to spoil it! The girl is a vast improvement now! The sense of depth is magnificent! Congratulations!

All hail the King of The God-Rays Club! :smiley:

#551

awesome job man, this is so great…i really feel inspired by you, that I even tried your style of coloring and line art, and actually had fun…considering im more of a realisim freak.

but this is so great, thanks for the inspiration and your dedication to hard work, i hope you make far in this challenge :slight_smile:

#552

This is a lovely piece Walrus. The cahracters are great and the landscape is spectacular.

What’s this about the ‘God Rays’ club. I want to apply for memebrship, my piece originates where the God Rays come from :hmm: You are right about Jerome and his faint attempt with his light house rays.

Looks like you and Jerome will be on the winners podium and Theresa to if she gets her act together.

*Ed

#553

last call?

one thing could be to fill the surrounding with live by showing some flying birds/creatures in the background/middleground or some people on the road wich is a bit empty currently although it depends…the flying birds maybe give the image an icky touch.

However - it was a pleasure to watch the progress of this artwork. My congratulations for this faboulus thread and have fun adding the finishing touches.

best wishes
Fahrija

btw - I´m a big fan of the clouds. they look very epic.

.

#554

Wow, dude. This must be your best piece yet (at least for me). Fantastic! Very pleasing to the eye and the landscape looks wonderful. (It’s great to see how your art improves over the years)

Congrats, Mike!

#555

somehow, everything in this image draws my eye ecxept the main characters. this may very well be tht my monitor is too dark. but i seams as if, while the layers of depth are nicely separated in value and saturation, the objects whithin these layers are all a relatively simaler value. i.e. not very much contrast in the objects. don’t really know how to fix this except to maybe break up the eveness of the shads a bit and maybe give the main characters a bit stronger rim light to make em pop. i’m a huge fan of your work, btw. which is why i expect it to be flawless. :slight_smile:

good luck man,
~B

#556

Tis nitpick time!

The perspective of the door seems somehow off…? I also think you should put some little flowers on the ground (buttercups?) around the choconobo and the chicken!

God-Ray King…


(by ingres, I saw the original in Rome!)

#557

I love when people give me crits by asking for things which are already in the picture, it makes life so much easier for me! :slight_smile: Theresa, it may not be illediately obvious in this really low-res shot of the image, but there are poppies all over the ground the girls and the birds’ feet. (there’s clover, too.) And Fahrija, the birds have flown all over the sky and noy they are flying over the right side of the village in the back right. (check some of the earlier posts that zoom into just that area.) I tried having them larger and in the sky but they were just distracting. There’s actually not a lot of sky that’s not taken up by columns, save for right over our main characters’ heads… and boy were birds distracting up there! And there’s even a cart full of people being pulled by a StriderBird on the road. Beelow was asking me before for people in the town… didn’t realize that there were tons of people there, they are all just drawn to scale, making them very, very small!

Ed - all you have to do to be in the god-rays club is to ut some god-rays (see Jeromoo’s earlier post) in your picture. The irony of the thing is that neither Jeromoo nor I are even really members of the club - mine are too faint and his come from a lighthouse. We sit upon a shaky throne indeed!

Anzibon - I appreciate the feedback. But, imho, if anything makes the characters stand out, it’s the value contrast of them being dark on a light backdrop. Adding more of a rim-light only helps if they were against a darker backdrop, otherwise, it’s just fuzzying the border between them and the nspace behind them. I’ve already added as much rim light as I dare.

Theresa - So why does the “god-ray” picture you posted have no god-rays in it?! What is this blasphemy? sheesh! As for the door, it looks fine to me. And certainly better than when I had the hinges on the outside but the door swinging inwards. But hey, no one noticed that I redesigned the hardware on the door to look like long birdy-claws! More work wasted, sigh. :frowning:

Andreas, Cliff, Jerome, and Adonihs - thank you all, my friends! I’ve really appreciatd your support over these past couple of months (okay, well, Andreas, you just got here, but if you had been here earlier I know I would have had your support!) Anyhow, thanks everyone!

-mike

#558

He’s a selfish god and he’s keeping all the god-rays in the golden casket that he’s sitting on- he only beams them down onto people that he’s particularly pleased with (like people who finish the cgchallenge!)…so there’s your explanation. Yes, we all do sit on a shaky throne! Is there actually anyone in the challenge with proper god-rays?

#559

Always a great pic, the atmosphere is really great, one of the best pic of this challenge:cry:

#560

looking better every day. Infact, it looks completely finished. Great painting and amazingly detailed. Good stuff