Thanks so much for all the kind words everyone! gives me good motivation to keep going. Trying something for fun here, just a different cropping and a flipped angle, I’ll be going back to my other comp but its always fun to explore other ideas and experiment. Sorry to be so brief, not much time left now, this weekend is very important.
cheers!
-love
Hi Ryan, I have been trying to figure a suitable scenario for the characters you have created. The humans are wearing some strange armour that looks like armoured mole, so they could be miners on some foreign planet. Suddenly one day their mine caved in. So what happens in your scene could be when the planet’s native comes to their aid. That is what it initially looked like for me. What do you think, Ryan?
The humans’ suits are really unique!
That logo on his belt is great! and I prefer the lighting now.
Though I think the cropping is too tight now, I preferred the open scene you had before, the composition was better and the eye was drawn better the the tragedy of the human in the aliens arms as the rocks behind seemed to frame the characters well.
jeromoo makes a really good point though, how about some equipment or bags, or utility items. It would give the creatures in the scene a reason for being there.
This is still one of my favourite peaces in the whole contest, well done!
I agree with you the last picture take off some interresting relationship between alien and human.
May be you could move camera a bit to the left and enlarge frame. it’s not necessary to show the whole body of the human stand right side but a bit more could be better. So it’s my 2cts of advices.
however Very nice pict.
David.
Thank you all for the great feedback! I’m working on the story and environment hard this week. Trying many things with the background, nothing really fits yet to me so here just a shot of the characters in their current state, almost done!
-love
Some replies n stuff.
DaVee - Thanks for the words! I agree about the cropping, I’ll open it up for the final shot for sure.
Octostatue - ha! Thanks Surgio Thats a funny idea to caption the big guy with "I dunno man we we're just playin!" :D
dustbin1uk - Thanks so much for the support Mark! I will defiantly go back to a more open comp for my final. You need to finish your entry man!
jeromoo - Ahh great story there, thank you. I really like the idea of adding some equipment or some techy bits laying around, I may explore that, but time is short now.
JoPu, HornlessUnicorn, OZ, Marcial3D, Phill99 - Thanks so much for the kind support guys....to the end!!!
So its almost time to wrap this one up. Time for that massive render, hmmm hope it works :).
Some technical info. The whole scene is sitting at about 1 million polys in maya. I'd say over 10 million altogether in zbrush. I think 10 million polys to render in mental ray is a bit crazy so I'm using normal maps to transfer that detail to my (still very highpoly) render meshes. Ideally, I should use displacement mapping but was unable to figure out a good workflow fast enough and I'm a game artist after all. :) Normal maps are no stranger to me so I went with what I was comfortable using. All the main bodies have 2048 diff/spec/normal and most of the gear and background pieces are sporting 1024 diff/spec/normal. I think the biggest technical challenge will be rendering the very large final image, I may have to composite some of this together in the end.
cheers!
-love
The big guy’s expression is really puzzling. For me, it looks like the face of a child that’s just broken his favourite toy. It’s great cause it makes the viewer think and get involved with the picture. Great job!
I managed to get a decent size render off last night, here’s the small version. I’ll sit on this image for a day or 2 then see if i want to make any changes before final but I think its pretty much done for me.
-cheers
love
So much detail, excellent modeling and great texturing!
I really like how you bordered the image. This has a great surreal mood.
Impressive.
Hey Ryan, looks awesome, love the textures on your image! And the frame formed by the “alien” tree is really cool! Cheers mate! 
Woot! Ryan! I love it! It looks great! And you are still trying to improve it, which is admirable.
I love the logo and straps on the alien, they are detailed without being unsubtle.
Sigh, I wish I could finish mine in time for the deadline, but sadly bloody life gets in the way.
2 jobs to work and 5 websites to design, and I am stuffed for time. :argh:
But I am still going to finish it even if it doesn’t make the deadline. Thanks for your encouragement.
Anyway! Keep going mate, this looks great and I have now made it my desktop wallpaper to inspire me.
One other idea, what about a smoking building off in the distance? Gives them a reason to be there and tells a little bit more of the story. Nothing elaborate, just a small bunker that could lead down to a mine or something.
You could put it somewhere to the top left horizon line. That way you could keep the frame of rock/tree you have there, and not have to move the characters or anything else in the scene.
Just an idea.
It’s looking amazing… The framing is really cool. As it is, this picture reminds me somehow those old Richard Corben illustrations. I’d only say that a bit more of free space over his head might improve the overall comp? Just a thought.
Storytelling wise, I agree something like a crash site in the background would make much sense, but since the other human is kind of welcoming the alien, it might be that he’s found the carried in the middle of the desert too.
Brilliant piece anyhow!
This is looking great, I wasn’t sure what kind of background you were going to put in and I think it fits very well with the characters. Excellent stuff 
Thanks all for the fantastic support, arrg such great ideas you all have, I should have started this challenge earlier!! I will see what I can do with these ideas this weekend, maybe time for a small change. Heres a close up 100% view.
-love