CGAN Jan 2015 Challenge - White as Snow - WIPs

There you are Cherry!
The two kids makes your pic remind me of the HC Andersen story The Snow Queen (upon which Frost was apparently based originally though they changed it into unrecogniseability - however that's spelt!). I don't recall any dragons in that story but that's OK I'm looking forward to seeing this progress!

Great start Cherry! I was hoping that someone would do an icy, snowy dragon, I just knew that it wouldn't be me! Can't do dragons, so I'm filled with admiration for your effort.

Oaktree: I was going to suggest the big axe but you seem to be able to paint things faster than I can type them!

Dom the addition of the purple colors on the army guys looks great, you should put the same color around her hands to show shes using that magic to control them, also can push the colors around her to separate from the whitish background. Just thinking the guys at the front could be separated a bit from the rest by making them bit darker, looking great so far!

Valence the eyes are looking really awesome now, definitely a good focal point, the nose really works too, the skin texture looks really smooth and blended really well, keep going !

Oaktree, looking great so far keep going! The background really goes well with your character, the color choices you used for skin texture work, just need to work on the face detail more, raise his nose a bit, the axe looks awesome !

Mindbender coming together really well ! The red door creates a lot of mystery and stands out a lot against the background, look forward to see more done.

Looking like a cool concept Cherry welcome ! Dragon looks awesome so far, really digging the frost look !

Schizo... looking forward to seeing your update!

After seemingly breaking the world record for the sheer number of inept immature mistakes in the early stages of this picture I finally feel like I'm getting somewhere.
First mistake: I tried to paint the features light to dark, emerging out of the brightness which may have been a good idea in watercolour or gouache but is completely unnecessary when working digitally. Just paint the face then paint the light over the top!
Secondly I tried to paint the details too early and then got stuck in a loop of painting this eye, that eye, nose and mouth, and when it didn't fit I painted this eye, that eye nose and mouth again etc. until I was just chasing errors around four features. Lesson Two: Form first, details later!
The sad thing is … I already know these things, why do I have to learn them again? And again?? Art seems to be like that sometimes, it doesn't matter what you know, it's putting it all into practice that matters.
But lessons have now been learned for the millionth time and it's starting to look a bit more like the picture in my head. I rotated those features a little and then enlarged the canvas to paint in a bit of body. I wanted it to be a bit contrapostal (is that how you spell it? You know, face points this way body points thatta way) even though it's a bit of a cliche that's far too prevalent in fantasy art. I think the proportions are Ok and the neck makes a bit more sense now. I'm chuffed with the lips, I think that's the best lip texture I've ever done. I've warmed up some of the tones but there are still some more greys to hunt down. I also like the hood/veil-like fold to the hair (complete accident) but don't know if it'll survive the next detail pass. I also need to find some more edges (and some darks) in the body even though I'll probably crop it down a bit towards the end. And I'm now not sure how to incorporate the snowflake motif… Hmm, we''ll see.

Awesome update Valence Looking very nice so far! Her facial expression looks a lot more interesting now and I like the new pose, her body is porportioned a bit small for her head right now though unless you're going for an anime look.

I worked a bit on mine, I didn't really fine tune many details but I did work some color into mine. I like the story of the character trekking through the harsh snow until he comes across a door leading to spring!

Thanks a lot for this nice warm start
Valence - If you would have asked me at the beginning of this challenge if I would be the one with the dragon I would have laughed and said NO. It's my first time drawing one of those creatures so I'm filled with admiration for my effort, too

micro it looks really epic so far! I can feel the idea behind the picture. (and I really would like to be the character - just go through a door and there will be spring.) It reminds me also a bit of your first pic from the old IMFX challenge with the dog looking through a door to fairy land. So, what should this pattern say us about you? ^^

Valence when I first saw this pale face of the lady it reminded me really hard of Daenerys from Game of Thrones. I really love her facial expression and her eyes look so deep I could drawn in them. As micro said I think her head is a bit too small for her body, but I do always have the same problem. I always think the head is much more important than the rest of the body.

Mindbender this is really really nice so far, the colors are bright and the little reddish touch really helps keeping all together without being too harmoniously. Hope you'll put some more shadows in your picture.

oak good to see you again I really enjoy your progress at all. The face of the huntsman is interesting and I'm looking forward to your next wip. And I like your format, looks like a scene from a movie, just pushed the stop-button.
Will you put something more into the background?

schizo this was a good start with the fairy - so where are you now?

dom Oh I love your Elsa from frozen *_* her transparent shiny dress is great! And all of the icy men she controlls - really awesome!

yep yep it's decided, Valence wins again, boobs, pretty face, hair white as snow, done, succes doesn't need more than that. I realy love it.

CherryGraphics wrote: As micro said I think her head is a bit too small for her body

I think he actually said the opposite, that the body was too small for the size of the head

haha yes I meant too big. xD

SchizophreniaWolf wrote: yep yep it's decided, Valence wins again, boobs, pretty face, hair white as snow, done, succes doesn't need more than that. I realy love it.

Don't be too sure. Your fairy has boobs too.