Banj:
I've always liked the Guild Navigators from Dune in all their incarnations (even the older, cheaper VFX
) so I was glad someone had a go at doing something that captured the completely non-humanoid, pure alien-ness that made them so interesting.
The highlight of your pic is that amazing mouth with those gross, lurid lips and their vivid red colour showing the underlying blood. There seems to be so much layering and depth to that part of the image, I would love to have seen you have the time to develop that level of detail and attention around the other parts of the body with some more lumpy veins and creases, but even in this slightly unfinished form you've been very clever in the way you've presented it with the lighting and the text giving it the look of a minimalist concept piece.
Dragon:
After all the worries about the brightness of the lighting I was surprised how dark the final ended up. Although that may be down to our different monitor calibrations than artistic choices (I always like my screens dimmer than everyone else's to spare me the headaches
) But when I tweaked the gamma levels then your image really came to life in a way I didn't see at first, revealing all the detail of the background, the clothing and the map. And I do like that map with the rough edges and the holes revealing the hand behind it.
The smooth skin shader with the outline is very effective here and I like the way she gazes off into the distance as if comparing the stars to whatever is on the other side of the map. It makes me want to peep round the edge to see what's drawn on it.
Atto:
I enjoyed how your pic was developing with that familiar style and expressive anatomy.
It's a shame that pesky work stopped you from finishing but at least you've earned some money there. Votes and pixel medals don't pay the bills, so says the poor man.
As for mine, I actually don't mind it too much. I was just rationalizing the fact that it doesn't *really* look like an Old Master. And you're right Charlotte, the biggest weakness is the figure. That right arm is very questionable. I also wish I'd spotted all those tangents before posting and unlike Vermeer's work you certainly won't find any coherent vanishing points here.
But I think the pic was saved somewhat by the two last minute gimmicks of the noisy grain and the craqueleur. Even though they required no artistic skill they did seem to unify all the elements of the pic (good and bad) and that seems to trick the viewer's eye into thinking that the image is a bit better than it really is.
Votes, votes, votes… Or rather, vote, singular.
I think I'm gonna lean towards Dragon. I love Banj's alien with its Jagger Lips, and I continue to think that if you started your pics a week earlier you'd trounce us all every month with your 3D kung fu, but I think Dragon's image has a bit more narrative context to it and I like the way it suggests the possibilities of the character rather than spoonfeeding the viewer a more rigid story and situation (like …erm… mine.
) Is she travelling far away or finding her way home? Is she some kind of astronaut or astronomer, or even some kind of goddess figure floating in the heavens to guide her followers? This kind of ambiguous, thought-provoking storytelling seems more appropriate for this more open themed challenge. So … Dragon.