CGAN Feb 2015 - Letting off Steam - WIPS

I like how this is going Mr. Dave! It's solid and sharp. Are we going to see any colour?

I am a bit stuck with mine. I am struggling with the background, so I have been experimenting with cropping the image so that it doesn't really have much of a background. But that doesn't look so great either... So any feedback would be helpful.

Dom: I realise that I suggested this in the last challenge but I'm gonna say it again... you could blur out the background to create some depth of field. In fact this might work better now than it would've in the last picture because of the contrast it would make with the sharp hard edges of the foreground. Perhaps even a graduated blur from left to right so that it would distinguish between the distant buildings as they retreat back into the picture. Personally I really like the detail in that first building, it looks subtle yet really convincing.
On another note there are a few tangents elsewhere in the picture: the fishing line touches the wheel hub, the left "antenna" (?) lines up with a bit of detail on the building and the exhaust pipe aligns with that unfinished building. Also, what's happened to the other exhaust pipe, shouldn't there be two? I'm no expert on Transformers so feel free to chastise me on that!

Dom, you know I officially suck at backgrounds but I decided to give it a think at least. I agree with Valence with regards to tangents by the way, and using atmospheric perspective could also be good advice.

What I found when looking at the piece is that I can't make the current perspective add up. Also, I think the background is sort of crowding in on the characters - especially Optie there seems to have the building behind him very close. So I made two sketches to try and show what I think. (And I added in the two exhaust pipes in the position they seem to originally be, which is centrally on his uhm...biceps.)

The first image shows the perspective lines as they seem to currently be (I assume the horizon line is somewhere close to the kid's eye level). The second is a crappy sketch similar to your layout but attempting to give more room and show more scale. I hope it helps (and if it doesn't just igone them!)

Domtopia wrote: I like how this is going Mr. Dave! It's solid and sharp. Are we going to see any colour?

Yep, color coming soon. And if I don't have to go back in to work later today, I will probably be working on it some. Just got in at 4:30am, and it's blowing 40 to 50 mph, and is about -10 degrees outside. But it's supposed to warm up tomorrow to a balmy 6 degrees! So yeah, if I'm not having to work, I will be staying in! ... We are still lucky though. The areas just north of me are at it again, getting more the 6' of snowfall in the last few weeks, and it's still slamming them.

Also agree about your BG issues. Think Charlotte makes a good point about the perspective, and has given you a good option to change it up some. (I would think you could even just re-adjust your buildings you have now to match closer to what she has sketched out. ... Also like Valence's idea with the slightly blurring of the BG, which is something I've never done either. So will be watching to see how things work out.

That BG does look hard to pull off and it does look rather crowded. Just an idea, why not just put something simpler like a rural countryside with few buildings?

Outstanding feedback guys!

Val: The building have had gaussian blur applied to them already, but evidently, not enough! Plus I have painted in a light blue to give atmospheric depth, but again apparently not enough! The exhaust pipes need painting in, the pipe you see in the post is a residual sketches that will need to be removed eventually. So, yes you are right, there will be another one on the other shoulder. Finally, I had noticed the many tangents too, so I hope I can get some of them sorted out before I post the final up. Thanks again for spotting them and for helping me out!

Charlie: I guessed at the perspective because I was too damn lazy (and a bit unsure as to how to do it with PSE9) to check it! Thanks for your paintovers too, because I am struggling with the composition of the BG. I did try to crop it down so that the image ended just above Optimus, but it didn't balance well. I shall try moving stuff around as you recommend. Good suggestions there!!

I'd never have guessed that you'd already done a gaussian blur. Perhaps that's just because of the resolution of the posted version of the picture, or maybe I just go over the top with my blurs! But you're right to be subtle with it, if you go too extreme it can affect the perceived scale of the whole picture, like those tilt-shift photos where real people look like miniature models.

I thought that the atmospheric perspective was OK with the greys balancing against the warmer reds of the robot but now that Charlotte mentions it I notice that the most distant building on the right is the warmest colour of the three. Perhaps it is just the relationship between the buildings that is causing the problem rather than it being a background-foreground thing.

But whatever you choose to do I wouldn't obsess too much about it as the picture is definitely working. And I'd be reluctant to lose that work on the building to the top left, the detail and texture are very well observed and described.

Oh and I'm glad there are to be two exhausts. I thought for a moment that I'd inadvertently exposed my ignorance on Transformer related things!

Edit: Although I'm not sure about the latest version I think Artweaver (free!) has one of those fancy perspective guides function. My older version does.

Some good stuff going on here. I've been trying to join in but have been unable to work anything up that I like, lots of starts but nothing I liked. However in frustration I just smashed some colours together that I thought could work for a steampunk theme and I think there could be some interesting shapes that could work so here is my first post.

update from me

oaktree: When I saw the first picture this morning I thought to myself, "That would look great with some kind of ships flying across the bright area and perhaps some silhouette buildings in the distance." And when I logged on to type up the message this evening I find that you've updated the picture with exactly the things I was thinking of! Brilliant! And it looks just as good as I thought it would.
I like the way those colours are blending together in the distance in a painterly way. What software are you using to get that effect?

EDIT: And I like the colour scheme. The whole picture radiates with the hues of rusty metal which adds to the steampunk mood.