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FenneArts — Shattered
Published: 2013-03-13 20:32:46 +0000 UTC; Views: 2110; Favourites: 77; Downloads: 0
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Description
[ Facebook profile: digital art and photography ]"Sometimes being hurt too many times doesn't make you stronger, it destroys who you were, who you wanted to be and makes who you are today."
Rafael Prado
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Thank you for all your favourites and support! 
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Credits
Model: faestock
Bg: my own resources, some of them available here: feainne-stock
Mirror&tree: xXtimeless-stockXx
Broken mirror: lildragonKaida-Stock
Veils: farmerstochter
Tree hollow: TatteredButterfly
Mask: lured2stock
Heavy Vines: MaureenOlder TinusDream
Crown: ValantisDigitalArt
Paper Roll: anettfrozen
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:thumb315444676:
© Copyright, do not use it without my permission!
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Comments: 50
Good job incorporating my stock, I didn't even spot it right away 
Since you asked for a critique... I really hope im not too harsh, it is not my intent, you did a good job, this is only because you asked, I wouldn't have said anything otherwise, esspecially because it isn't something that really needs it, do you know what I mean? Here goes, I hope my insomnia doesn't make this hard to understand, or even worse, sound mean...:
You did I good job lining up the direction of the light source of your girl with the background light source, however, even though its the right general direction, shes still meant to be in a dark forest background, but her edges are saying she was either cropped from, or cropped out while over, a light background, which is why her top edge looks too bright for her surroundings.
A trick I (used to, health issues make it so I cant anymore) use, is when I go in for the detail croppings, I make sure if I am going to be using a dark stock background, that the background im cropping over in photoshop etc is also dark.
Because if you crop over a light background, an edge that looks smooth then, will actually be edged by the lighter coloured pixels of that areas colour variations (because we all know even the most solid looking colour zoomed in on looks like multi tonal confetti that is only kinda close to the colour it looks like normal sized, and sometimes there are pixels in there that aren't even close to the same colour, especially around the edges and shadows and nooks and crannies), so any artists eye will naturally try to eliminate the pixels that stand out, which means that you will actually be shooting yourself in the foot, because once you put it onto a dark background image, suddenly it will look like a harsh bright edge, and it wont be because you did a bad crop, it will be because the pixels that worked next to white will be light, and the pixels that work next to dark would need to be dark, know what im trying to say?
So you can do your rough crop on whatever your programs usual background is (usually white or checkerboard etc), but once you go in for the detail, make sure your background layer is as close in tone to your background stock image as possible, and idealy, do at least the final cropping over your actual background stock, it will make a huge difference.
Another thing that can sometimes help, especially on hair (but since you did such a good job on blending her hair you may already know this trick) is using a fuzzy brush to do a bit of strategic cropping/erasing to blend your foreground (ie girl) into your background a little bit.
But when I say strategic I mean strategic, if you crop a whole image with fuzzy it will look awful lol, if something isn't supposed to be seethrough (unlike hair or sheer fabric or glass or water etc) then it will look totally wrong if its solid everywhere but the edges lol. So basically you have to experiment and see what scenarios it helps and which it hurts, and develop an eye for it.
If you did that, this next comment may be almost completely fixed, but just in case: The part of the girls hip and leg that is "behind" the white curtain should actually be in shadow, even though the curtain is sheer, there would still not be a bright edge between it and her, it would be lightly shadowed in the parts of the curtain that are the sheerest, and more shadowed by the thicker (aka whiter) parts, but if that crop line were darker it probably wouldn't be noticeable, so that might be redundant.
Also the curtain furthest to the left has a tree between it and the light source, so it should be darker than the other curtain (which also needs to be a wee bit darker too, to fit into its shadowy surroundings a bit better), and that could probably be fixed by making that more seethrough because it would be darkened by the background, and since it is sheer that should also work with it just aesthetically as well.
And lastly the mask in front of the mirror has a light source that is coming from above and in front of it, when based on its location it should actually be in darkest shadow almost exactly where it is brightest (what bad luck), this might be helped by painting very sheer fuzzy edged layers of medium dark grey/blueish grey over the brightest parts most, and then gradiating (aka gradual fading) over the whole thing, along the angle of the logical shadow (you should be able to see the general idea once you start, sorry I cant be more specific without doing it myself when im this tired), so to speak...
But that might just end up making it look muddy by doing that... Its so hard to say without playing around with it... especially since conflicting light sources are a very tricky thing to overcome for anyone... So youll just have to dive in and see what works...
An out of the box idea could be to add an open smash to the mirror just above, and possibly partly behind, the mask, to introduce another lightsource from above and behind it by the background light. It wont actually be quite right because the 'real' angle of the masks light is above and infront, and the background lightsource is too far to the right, but it might be close enough to trick the eye of most people into not noticing the discrepancy, and it would be closer to being plausible than it is at the moment...
But that would cut out some of the reflection of the red fabric, and it would also be a fair bit of work... And without actually seeing it for myself I cant say that it might not just make another odd thing to draw the eye to that spot... But its just an idea for you to play with should you want to...
Another option thats always in the photoshoppers toolkit... is add something to cover that part up lol... But im not sure yould like that idea very much, I know if I went to the trouble to add in a mask that obviously wasn't part of the original images I was working with, it must be for a reason, and covering it up would very likely be the last resort. And it honestly isn't so glaring an issue that I think you need to do anything about it if its important to your piece...
And im also in the boat of "as long as you like it who cares" when it comes to art, so don't feel obligated to use anything ive suggested, I am by no means an expert and my health hasn't even allowed me to do a single piece in years, so just take it as something you could muck around with if you felt like it one day, but don't feel like you "should", ever, change something because someone else said so, ok?
And lastly, you did a really awesome job blending the bottom edge of the girl and her hair into the background, I wasn't sure at first if she was even added to it, if it wasn't for the slightly conflicting light source I might have believed she was actually laying on a bed of dry leaves in a dark forest
I hope I wasn't too harsh and nit picky for you, cause I treated this as though I were giving a critique for myself, what would I like to know, and want tips on how to do, if I was younger (im not saying your nessasarily younger than me, but I knew less than I do now when I was younger, so it would be a younger me who would want these tips, know what I mean?) and if, of coarse, a younger me was even capable of receiving critiques because I had horrific self esteem back then so I could not have handled any critiques, so the fact you asked for one, made me raise your hypothetical self esteem to what I could handle today, and hoped for the best... fingers crossed I made the right call... If I made you feel bad in any way, go take a look at my crappy photomanipulations from back in the day and know that yours is better and I would have to write waaaaaaaayyyyyyyy more than this if I was going to critique myself lol, but if your self esteem can handle, this, then spare yourself lol, and just dive into your next project
Ps, my appologies if this was difficult to read, I am so exaughtsted I keep dosing out, but I wante to finish this for you before I forget, cause I would have, my brain is messed up lol, so sorry in advance... although this is at the end... so... ya... lol!
Good luck, have fun, and don't worry about getting better, just try to learn new things along the way, and your work will just get better on its own eventually, so have fun "practicing" because even geniuses practice, its just called creating art
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Oh wow... Thank you very, VERY much for taking time to point all those things out! That's the very reason why I always turn on the critique mode - cause it's only when someone points certain things out that you're able to improve and work on something
I examined closely your comment and one general thing that I should work on is the lighting. As I look at my piece right now I can definitely see that in some places it's not logical (the mask could be an example 
If I find some more time, maybe I'll try to fix some parts. So thank you very much for your remarks. They're very instructive 
Have a nice day!
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thank you very much, I'm glad you like it!
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Life dear is full of disappointment and mostly is never what we dreamed...I do actually agree with that comment
"Sometimes being hurt too many times doesn't make you stronger, it destroys who you were, who you wanted to be and makes who you are today."
Rafael Prado
we are too in many ways are our own jailer with things and we are very good a keeping our self prisoner to our own pain
Sure circumstances and the situations we find our selfs in can add or be the catalyst of that and some things can be changed by us, other things are immutable and cant
but how best to deal with those ?
I do think life is change and that even thought things can remain the same they do change, aspects of them
probably the hardest thing for us to do is see things from a different perspective and thats what we need to do at times to formulate the change we need
Usually for us we can get pretty comfortable with the demons we know and something new is quite frightening
but to progress I guess we need to go into the unknown (note to self) so to achieve our dreams or break a cycle we need to take small steps in those directions like moving chess pieces to bring about the position we want to be at
sure there are pitfalls, it wouldn't be life other wise
I guess at the end of the day we are really the only ones that can resolve the situation by the action we take from the thoughts we create about how best to deal with matters
the hardest thing is not to give up the fight and although I agree with the words above, what you are today you wont necessarily be tomorrow if you draw your breath and change your tactics
but life can be hard and our resolve can faultier and yes we do need our moments in the corner to gather our thoughts and renew our strength before we step back into life's ring
of happiness and pain
Have faith in yourself dear Judyta
let no one and nothing take your beauty
cause from my perspective of you
you are beautiful sensitive human being
and I am happy to call you my friend Dear
To your art dear
even thought it is of darkness the strong use of colour I think is the Hope..I love the more hidden things
I think this is so true of us and life
Take care dear
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wow - strong emotions lead to a strong image, very very impressive!
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thanks a lot, I'm glad you like this one
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thank you, I'm glad you like it!
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This is stunning!!! Really an amaing artwork in all aspects.
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thank you, Ana, I really appreciate that you like this one! 
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thank you, I'm glad you like it!
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Interesting composition, I like the idea with mirror and the citation represents very well the meaning of the work. Stunning emotional artwork
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thank you for your wonderful comment, I truly appreciate that you like this one as it's a very personal piece... thanks once again 
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thank you, it means much that you like it!
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thank you, I'm glad you like it!
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You've created a wonderfully atmospheric piece here. Great work !!
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thank you, it means much that you like it!
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I love all your works Judy...you are a wonderful artist
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