CGAN Jan 2018 - The Kingdom

The Kingdom *

Brief: I have no idea what kingdom we're talking about... Do you? Good, show us then!

Deadline: January the 31st at midnight GMT

This is where you post your Works In Progress. Final entries should be posted in the thread over here: cgartnexus.com/index.php/forums/current-...jan-2018-the-kingdom

Challenge rules and guidelines:
challenge rules

Rules in brief:

• All challenge entries must be your own work.
• You should post at least two WIP images that are clearly different from your final entry and each other.
• Your final entry should contain your image (inserted so it shows up full size) and at least two links to your WIP posts on the forum.
• No chatter in the finals thread – if you have questions, post them in the WIP thread or PM an admin.
• Feedback is allowed & encouraged together with the voting and in the WIP thread.
• Deadline is given in UK time (midnight GMT) with a grace period of 5 minutes for getting the post sorted.
• Each member may cast one vote.
• No cheating! Admins may decide to disqualify an entry that does not adhere to the above rules.

*Banj might think elves rock, but... uhm... er I just wanted a different emoji.

Hi all and happy New Year.
Back from a long haitus and I'm loving the new topic. I'm going to try and put down an entry for this one.
I've wanted to do a landscape image that plays with scale for some time and my wife came up with the fantastic idea of a kingdom on a snow flake.
Not sure my skills are up to that but it started me along a line of thought about permanence/impermanance that I quite liked so I'm busy gathering some refs for a new piece. Hope to see some more of you enter but I'm hardly one to shout about a lack of contributions.
First sketch in a few days I hope.

Good to have you back and "challenging" again, Atto.

That sounds like an amazing and imaginative idea, way better than the obvious thing that I failed to draw the other day.
Really looking forward to seeing it.

Thanks Val,
I hope I can do the description justice.

So I've put down a few sketches and kind of settled on an initial idea of a Clockwork Kingdom. I like the idea that the city is constantly rotating and that only certain areas of the kingdom are accessible at certain times of day.
The city sits within the large cog to the left. Its gateway rotates and at certain times coincides with the pathways (in white). The whole structure will be embedded into the surrounding landscape but right now I'm just trying to get all those elipses looking right (or at least not horribly wrong!).

A very interesting concept and the ellipses look decent enough to me (I always find them tricky too...)

I think I'd have nightmares if I tried to do so many ellipses!
I was pretty pleased to recently discover (completely by accident) the ellipse guide stencil in ArtRage but even with that help, they're still evil.

Doesn't seem to be bothering you, though. It looks wonderfully intricate so far, Atto.

there's an ellipse guide stencil in ArtRage?
Maybe I can remember that next time I need it...

Yeah, they have those French Curve things too. But I've never known how to use them.

well those I have seen. I used to have them in plastic too (might still) but I don't really know how to use them either

I hated using those things at uni - luckily everything I designed was straight lines and proper circles. I should really learn to use a 3d programme at some point but who has the time?

Started to throw down some colour - I tried to work loose across the whole canvas at first but I just can't relax when everything is in that early messy stage so I delved into some details to give myself an emotional cushion.