Concept Arts Thread: WIP and Finished Works Thread

Ninjadave wrote:

Very weird and abstract. It was originally 'normally' colored but I went with off tones instead.
Also was experimenting with photos and blending. Didn't turn out as I wanted it too, but its fine I guess.

looks good, but try to use lead the next time you do lineart. The ink looks good for the mood, but it easily kills the detail. Btw, should I do some concepts for the ghillie and the other guys or is it overly ambitious at this point?

I took the time and I did this in 52 minutes, so that's the first legitimate speedpaint I post here. Could be better, I got a bitout of proportion in places.

Tacoo is doing it wrong and you are actually doing it better. You don't do lines and paint in the colors later, except if you'r doing Donald Duck, or some comic-style. You can render a whole image in graphit, that's what's cool about it - that it does lines and shades, opposed to ballpen. However, you have to learn to draw lines to establish your sketch and then you use value to create depth on an other sheet.

If you look at my images you will notice that I never use lines and still the difference between colors appears to be sharp-drawn. This happens, because our eye "creates" borders between different values. You can easily see this, if you look at the 10x greyscale (the shades between blackand white). Between the 10%s there are sharp lines, but if you put them at a distance to each other the neighboring greys will look much more similar to each other.

One thing I can learn from Dave is to paint more texture in my stuff. I always use very flat-looking brushes without much structure, but I'll try to add some texture to surfaces, next.

Too true.
I noticed when I draw with a mouse, I still try to use the same stroke movements. So if I was to re-draw that hallway, the strokes will be similar. Just sloppier and more time consuming.

Though poorly done in my last concept, I can create a certain amount of depth with a pen using repeating lines that get closer as the object gets farther.
The problem is pen is very dark, and unless done very lightly it turns out kind of funny looking.

I like that concept though. Depth without lines. I think I'll sketch something later and attempt that technique.
I think the best way to tackle is to draw out a scene, then paint it out in another layer on photoshop using depth, tones, and shading.
'Then' take away the pen completely to get a line-less look.

Somehow that reminds me of spray-painting with stencils.

You need to get a grip on color theory, then it will be radically easy to paint almost everything. I'm still bad at materials and the different reflections of surfaces, but that's just a matter of practice and photoshop brushes. Learn the basics of color theory andabout bump lighting that will help a lot - at least it did a lotof good for me. It wasn't that I couldn't do it before (technically), I just didn't understand my colors very well. It you draw something inside an environment, e.g. "woods" then you surrounding instantly determine the quality of the light and color. So a wood painting will be yellow, green, brown range and nothing else (except desaturated versions of those colors for rocks, etc.)

I did that guy in 42 minutes not 52, miscalculated that. He has a stupid scare, but I'm really amazed at the speed you paint in with PS. If you can afford it buy a Wacom - it helps. If not work like other painters - they sketch first and paint after the sketch later, too. It doesn't necessarily have to do with using just Photoshop, that's just the easiest way. Every traditional artist makes sketches (often greyscales), until he is confident about his composition, and then he starts to repaint on clean canvas.
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I should probably do some more about the stupid looking guy (eyebrows+eyelids, e.g.), but I am painting one of our robot scribbles (courtesy of Robomaniac), in values. Not finished, but this is a WIP-thread, after all. Now that I finished our screenplay's final revision and the design document is complete, I'll have a lot more time for paintovers of any kind, maybe even to learn some ZBrush, finally!

Edited by: SinKing

Painting is good, Martin, but I definately expected Char to look more brutal!

Thanks all, it's still unfinished, because I can't seem to render light and color at the same time (am I a game engine???) I have to do it bit by bit, so this robot will receive some lighting and be put in a scene, if I'm not too tired, tomorrow.
That's right Gibberstein, Char is the first of a new type of robot, but he's been finished under difficult cirumstances by his creator, who had to use a lot of scrap metal in the process. He is not a military design, although there are some surprises hidden under the hood. The fact that you don't spot the weapon sockets can either be attributed to my bad painting or to the good design of it .
If you want brutal power wait for EQL (or Equal), which is the antagonist to Char and has a purely military look and design. I'm sure most people will say EQL is cooler, in the end. However, even they won't be disappointed.
Char needs new boots and the perspective is pretty off in a lot of places, but hey, I'm just a man doing ten jobs at the same time, here...
here's the next day

Edited by: SinKing

Are you using Bokeh for the depth of field effect, or is it just unsharp? This guy is very short-sighted, I think, but I get the point and it looks quite cool actually. You are doing a flat coloring, which is not my cupof tea, but does appeal to most Anime fans and fits a cartoon very well. The render texture of the environment is one you use for the game? I just wonder, because i didn't see it anywhere yet, but it looks very nice. I think if you use Bokeh you can get a better depth of field effect.  It makes no sense that it is so irregular around the corners and the transition is very harsh.

I'm doing some value study on an armor we might use for Mech Override (for just one old and rough soldier). I'm not content and I don't understand too many things in the concept. It also doesn't look modern enough for my tastes. We'll see what I can make from this in the future. Most of the time I am working on storyboard now and I try to get three pages done a day. More than it seems that is...

Edited by: SinKing

Wow, that looks really good! I like the second one especially. I'm into strange environments and color-scapes.

Looks good, but try not to use to much blur in your image, unless you are trying to put focus on something (ie if you are looking over the shoulder of a person, looking at what he is looking at, then he should be blurred, or stuff like that.) Whenever I create clouds or smoke in photoshop I like to use the smudge-tool.

A little digital painting I just finished. I just wanted to paint something in photoshop and a beach was the first thing that came to my mind. I realized that creating water is really the hardest thing I've ever tried to paint (which isn't hard because I'm a complete newb in painting). The water still sucks a lot but I already learned a few little things about it. Also, I am another step further for creating good-looking clouds which I also had a lot of trouble with in the past.

At all it is just a picture put together from random stuff

It looks pretty much ok from a certain distance, so the overall feeling can't be completely wrong.

cheers

ps: (I know that there are some mistakes in there, like the proportions of the city and the flying ships is off and the reflection of that city is kinda weird, but this is more or less the 2 second digital painting I did and I just wanted to create something - getting more used to work with my wacom)

Edited by: iQew

Agent 8427
"See Johnny Zombie, See Johnny Zombie Start to Mutate, See Johnny Zombie Mutate into a Weird F***ing Creature"

Edited by: NightRage

some thumbnails... crits are encouraged as im trying to improve and i know the first 3 have very bad contrast...

decided i had to throw some more down...

of course i used brushes, there just thumbnails and im going to use the tools that are there... thats what there where for but this was more of a composition and value thing