Feedback on my collective works.

[Godslayer]

http://photobucket.com/albums/b398/God_Slayer/?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ok, these are all my works I'm remotely proud of. What I'm looking for is a style critique, I need people to rip apart my art, and tell me what I need to improve on.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have a wierd feeling I had a bit of an artisitic burst in the last month,but I'm starting to stagnate. I need some help, so please, tell me what I have to improve on, I'm looking for some professional crits here, the more (longer) the better. Hopefully, by newer artists reading the critiques, they will figure out what to do and what not to do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also, heres something I'm working on right now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In a while, I'm going to make a 'foodslayer' mascot, for the Jeppoz :P .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(It's nice to get praise, but thats not neccesarily what I'm looking for, I want to grow as an artist, not wallow in an egotistic shell)

[terley]

All looks great, your style shines through each picture, the positions and colouring looks immaculate but I would still love to see more completed sigs from ya.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My advice would be to work on face detail, they tend to look faceless without helmets on, mostly with no eyes but don't go for manga/anime eyes they suck compared to your style.. But in some of your pictures thats the highlight, sorta adds mystery. I'd love to see you do a pixel of someone in almost complete darkness, you know, with the only detail accross a guy's face were the light shines onto him... now thats deep :wink:, also try not to go too mad on the contrast you dont wanna make your characters look too shiney.

[01whitec2]

I think you need to put more into the backgrounds. A lot of them are just plain mountains and Sky. Try putting trees or animals etc in the background..

[Godslayer]

*writes down* Eyes...and more stuff in background...Got it.

[djthemaster]

love your collection...

 

 

 

Would be nice if misterxman do this 2 because i like his work :lol:

[Godslayer]

Thanks, but I have to remind y'all this isn't a thread made to serve as eye candy, I genuinely need people to help me and give me massive crits. I'd rather read some stuff trashing my style and telling me how to get better than hear 'pmg, j00 r00l!!1'

[Lordliquid]

I've always seen your style as a very rough and expressional one, with a lot of power in them. That is.. in the characters. Your background are extremely simplistic and are therefor in contrast with the strong characters. I challenge you to make a scenery with a couple of buildings together, a village for example, with mountains in the distance, a river closeby (perhaps going through the village) and the same river far in distance. It would be great practice, and I will happily help you with it once you make that example :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A side-effect of your quite strong style of your shading mostly, is that *in my view* some of the characters get a little unclear by the shading. This was mostly on some of your older ones, and it's getting better now (Like with the quer vs. you sig) Not much more to add here then.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As terley said before, the faces on your characters don't seem to have eyes.. They do have great texture though! You can see the contours of the faces very strongly (Exept on that one guy for dithering practise) Just remember that a person doesn't only exists from the basic forms, but also the small things, like eyes. Eyes are actually a very important part of a face, since most eyes really seem to give life to people (in figurative art)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think you would greatly benefit if you looked at other people's works and tutorials to learn some techniques on scenery and colouring. Things you could learn are perspective (for great depth in backgrounds,) but also dithering, anti-aliasing and colour effects. And don't just look at pixelers (though mrx uses some great perspective in his later works) I think you should also look at some paintings from the romanticism period (late 18th century,) with which I personally seem to compare your work with :roll: Romanticism was all about well.. romantising actions, such as combat. But also other figurative paintings and drawings help. I think you could learn to add great drama in your sigs by studying these paintings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not only studying other people's works helps, but ofcourse also studying real life things can give a great boost to your skill. Go out some day with a sketchbook and perhaps a chair, and camp at a farm or somewhere in nature. Drawing after the landscape and animals, and also people (though they tend to move a lot) can give you all new ideas and views on how things work and look.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you understand all of my critics and my advices, and I hope they can help you get better, because you got a lot of talent :) Good luck, and feel free to ask things.

[Godslayer]

Now thats what I'm talking about!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

About the eyes: It seems as though their is never really any room for them, I guess I'm just trying to excuse some laxiness here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm strong in characters, mostly because I often look through the Internet for pixel art tutorials, and most of them deal only with people in pixel art, never backgrounds. When I do find a background pixelart tutorial, it oftentimes comes up to be a rpg tutorial, for how to make tiles of grass and whatnot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your challenge wouldprobably be the most difficult piece of pixel art ever for me, I would like to take you up on your offer of help, even before I begin on it, if thats all right. Mostly, I need to know how to make grass, could you point me to a good tutorial maybe? You had to have learned it from somewhere. :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I never thought of it like that, but yea, Romanticism seems pretty accurate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I do the sketch thingy all the time..But usualy I'm in an urban setting, sketching people. Do you think maybe you could give me some photos? I rarely have the opportunity to go out on my own, just because I'm in the heart of a city.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Everyone: That is what a good crit looks like, I feel I've just learned alot from him. By the way, thanks you very much Lordliquid.)

[Lordliquid]

Your welcome, If I remember I'll give you some tips on the landscape tomorrow, because I'm really tired now (And addicted to forums, hence why I'm still here :roll:) Sending photo's would make the going-out-and-draw-things useless, because it won't be something life your drawing. I'm sure there are some trees around, even in a city. A museum about history (of war - hoozay!) is also a good place to get some inspiration. Don't forget your sketchbook :)

[Godslayer]

Now thats what I'm talking about!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

About the eyes: It seems as though their is never really any room for them, I guess I'm just trying to excuse some laxiness here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm strong in characters, mostly because I often look through the Internet for pixel art tutorials, and most of them deal only with people in pixel art, never backgrounds. When I do find a background pixelart tutorial, it oftentimes comes up to be a rpg tutorial, for how to make tiles of grass and whatnot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your challenge wouldprobably be the most difficult piece of pixel art ever for me, I would like to take you up on your offer of help, even before I begin on it, if thats all right. Mostly, I need to know how to make grass, could you point me to a good tutorial maybe? You had to have learned it from somewhere. :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I never thought of it like that, but yea, Romanticism seems pretty accurate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I do the sketch thingy all the time..But usualy I'm in an urban setting, sketching people. Do you think maybe you could give me some photos? I rarely have the opportunity to go out on my own, just because I'm in the heart of a city.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Everyone: That is what a good crit looks like, I feel I've just learned alot from him. By the way, thanks you very much Lordliquid.)

[Lordliquid]

lag Godslayer? :) I forgot to say that to find a good background tutorial, you don't have to look for pixel specific, because drawing tutorials learn you the same basics for it.

[Godslayer]

Whoops, gotta stop doing that! Thanks for the extra tidbit though!

[terley]

I could never find the time to write as much as you Lordliquid, but thats one hell of a crit. Just posting to request for some sort of scenery tut, maybe you could put together a guide on how to build up a picture, nature textures, colouring, skys etc.. it would be a lot of help to even the most talented artists here, dam why have never thought of that! im always too caught up with characters and spend like an eighth of the time on a quick background, im sure some background practice will help not just Godslayer but would help 98% of people here on the forum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A quick bit of advice to Godslaya, try use not just different shades of the same colour for each part of the body.. For example for a face try add touches of other colours to bring it to life, in dark spots dont just use black, add purples, browns to add a deeper atmosphere.. I gotta admit pixeling is hard, It might suprise you but I specialise in still life painting, but when it comes to pixeling I revert to my classic cartoony style which Ive grown used to over the years.. Maybe I should interpret some more lifelike features into my pixel art?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I suppose I just prefer recreating the atmosphere of my childhood cartoons, it much funner to simply stick to what your good at, though to be more open minded seperates you from an everyday artist.. So my advice would be to not be afraid to try new things, don't just learn from people better than you, cus you can gain a much broader knowledge of art techniques from the newest of pixelers aswell.. Backgrounds seem to be your downfall GS, so I'd say take Lordliquids advice but also be open minded to other artists.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry for the second post just hit me that I didn't add everything that I wanted in my first, Good luck with pixeling rip busta. :D

[Godslayer]

Life = My favorite.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for the good crit though, I especialy like the reminder on using differant colors :wink:

 

 

 

 

 

 

(heh, rip busta...Now I have to pixel him too! Along with foodslayer of course...)

[monkey_933]

Nice selection, especially on the 2 that were done for me :lol:

[Godslayer]

To get a bit more convo going, here's what I'm working on as we speak. I'm finding antialiasing and dithering to be quite useful here :wink:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Aleksandar]

Dharok's Helm has a normal nose covering with the rest of the face being open like other medium helms. Torag's Helm, however, is accurate. I'm no artist so I can't critique your work, but I must say it's rather easy on the eyes. :)

[Godslayer]

I try and stay away from what rs looks like as much as possible, as long as it can be recognized. Thanks for the compliment, well worded.