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Griatch-art β Christmas card 2010
Published: 2010-12-02 20:59:18 +0000 UTC; Views: 12926; Favourites: 148; Downloads: 0
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Description
Good NeighboursIn old Scandinavian lore, mythical creatures like giants and trolls where not necessarily evil creatures. Rather they roamed their respective domains of the forest or mountains and could even be helpful if humans just respected and kept up good relations with them.
Here we see a family doing the rounds through the landscape to visit their neighboring giant and spread some Christmas spirit!
This is my Christmas card for 2010. I'm putting it up relatively early, in case someone's interested in getting one to send.
An early Merry Christmas to you all!All done in open-source programs GIMP and MyPaint on Linux. I aimed at getting a style closer to the 19th century landscape artists for this one.
I won't be changing much in this at this point (my cards have already been sent off to the printers after all), but I am as usual always interested in feedback and critique anyway.
Older Christmas cards of mine:
2009 (Surprise gift):
2008 (Night in the troll forest):
2007 (We're THIS tight!):
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Griatch
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Comments: 50
You have the best Christmas cards. e.deviantart.net/emoticons/s/s⦠" width="15" height="15" alt="
You have really outdone yourself, this time. Your technique is wonderful, and I think the end result has a beautiful, realistic-yet-painterly feel.
Three things stand out to me as particularly worthy of comment.
1) The frozen stream is beautiful. It has the combination of shininess and solidity that I expect from ice like this.
2) The humans are very well rendered. The trick of creating a believable and seemingly detailed human figure from a few colored strokes is impressive. The children and the Mom seem particularly well done to me.
3) The giant's head and face. You have stroke a very nice balance between humanity and accessibility, and strangeness which shows us this isn't just a great big human being. The kindness and happiness of his expression is well-captured as well. (Is he giving or receiving that gift?)
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Cool, glad you like it! I tried to aim at a brighter style of image than my previous cards here, which meant more details being visible.
1) The stream worked out decently. I hear some has interpreted it as a "ice-covered road" instead though-
2) The trick for making high-res humans is that this is infact a HUGE image, almost 8000 pixels across. Then one can afford to be a little sloppy even when making small details and it will look ok anyway.
3) It's interesting that you should question the direction of the giving. So far most commenters seem to assume the giant is giving a gift to the humans when I infact put a lot of effort trying to convey the exact opposite. I picked a left-to-right orientation just to enforce the fact that they are giving him a gift (the fact that they have a whole cart of gifts tied to the horse is another hint). In the end I guess I'm happy with it being possible to do both interpretations.
Thanks again, your critiques and feedbacks are always well thought out and most welcome.
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Griatch
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I was leaning towards the giant receiving the gift, for the reasons you mentioned.
I think the size is part of what made me wonder. It's an awfully tiny present for that giant, and at the same time a very BIG package compared to the size of the people - so again, it could be going either way.
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Yes, I agree it's hard to choose a package size that fit both scales.
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Griatch
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The concept is beautiful. The warmth and happiness is portrayed in this painting. The people look happy, not afraid of the giant and he himself is giving them gifts. The colors well match the scenery, and it looks so lively. Even though, the whole scene is covered with snow, it is warm. The melted ice on the slippery road looks so lively, and the textures are well painted. This work is amazing. It is filled with happiness and joy. It is worth more than a thousand words. It makes me wonder about the present inside the red box, it is probably hope.
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Thanks for the thoughtful comments. I'm glad to hear you like it and that it conveys happiness despite all the cold and snow. Merry Christmas!
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Griatch
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i often find it funny how modern interpretation of the giant, trolls, and dwarves have been flipped to the negative, while faeries' have been flipped to the positive side. anyways, lovely painting!
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Yes, I suppose it's mostly from Tolkien as well as Dungeons and Dragons, where trolls and giants become monsters and bad guys. Back in the day they were often feared but stories are pretty diverse as to what characteristics they actually had. Thanks for the comment and fave!
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Griatch
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Alas, I don't have step-by-step images stored for this image, so I cannot do a tutorial for it. There is a video for the 2011 Christmas card though which uses pretty much the same techniques as I used for this. I also have a bunch of other tutorials on how I work. Hope that helps.
Thanks for the comment and fave!
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Griatch
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Jag tycker mycket om denna bild. Trollen har mycket trevlig ansikte
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Tack, kul att hΓΆra!
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Griatch
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Haha, yes I did, pretty cool film! It did remind me a bit of this image (although those trolls are certainly a lot nastier and more animalistic).
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Griatch
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No Christmas bounty from them to be sure.
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This work would be published!
Thank you so much again
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Lovely snow and ice texture, I'd love to receive a Christmas card like that
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Thanks! Spent a lot of time with that snow, so glad you like it. 
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Griatch
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This is beautiful, Griatch, love the style you applied to the scenery. Very crisp, yet inviting and warm at the same time, very fitting for the holiday season indeed! Again, beautiful ^_^
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Thanks a lot Gaeva! Glad you like it and that it does have a warm feeling despite all the snow.
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Griatch
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Merry Christmas to you as well, Griatch, enjoy the down time! ^_^
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I love the style you're developing. Great work!
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Thanks a lot!
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Griatch
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Great work on the landscape, love the colours, you actually managed to capture that 19th century feel you aimed for and the mood is captivating. I'm not so sure about the troll, maybe his right leg is too short. Maybe some more contrast on his face would be beneficial, just to make it a focal point of a picture because now the first thing I see is the river (bottom left corner) and trees (in the upper left corner).
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Thanks for the feedback! I don't think his leg is too short, but now that you've mentioned it I'll take some long looks at it again to see if there's something that jumps out at me after letting the image rest for a while.
You are right in that the Giant is quite thoroughly blended into the picture. This was intentionally so as to make him as "natural" a part of the scenery as possible. Again I was inspired here by 19th century artists - they focused on the landscape, and one gets the feeling that there only happened to be some people caught in there sometimes. In the same way I picture this as a landscape painting - there just happen to be a giant and some folks there in the background.
Thanks a lot for the valid feedback and critique. I much appreciate it.
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Griatch
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I'll second everything Songwind and Elemental-Butterfly said, and add the following.
1) I really like the way you handled the snowy landscape. The snow on the trees looks perfectly natural, and the background trees fade into the near distance perfectly.
2) I also like the hoarfrost on the giant's limbs. It emphasizes that he is an "other." (To borrow a term from the movie "The Nightwatch")
3) And his expression is very well portrayed. He's obviously pleased and touched by the gift. (An perhaps a bit amused too)
VERY well done! Hope you make a bundle from this!
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Thanks for the kind words! I appreciate that. I worked a lot to try to make the giant (which is, by its very nature a strange sight in this landscape) fit into the scenery, to make it stand out less. The hoarfrost was the final solution to make him properly affected by the cold surroundings, I'm glad it works out outside my own head too. 
And yes, 'amused' is probably a good way to describe the giant's expression.
Thanks again for the comment, and fave.
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Griatch
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Welcome for both!
I don't know if he's a "frost giant" (not that familiar with Viking mythology my only reference is a Conan the Barbarian story) But, making the frost part of him makes perfect sense if so. Probably means he'd be migratory and go up the mountains in the spring.
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Aww, I love it! I like that you actually featured on of the classic trolls instead of the coca cola santa. He looks really friendly. The landscape is also really good, it looks exactly like the countryside in sweden.
God Jul!
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Yes, lots of good ol' Scandinavian mythos to pull from.
Tack fΓΆr de vΓ€nliga orden och God Jul pΓ₯ dig med!
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Griatch
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Thanks! And thanks for the fave!
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Griatch
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love this card. looked through your older pices as well, but particularly liked this...it feels so 'normal' and non-fantasy in an odd way. not very articulate, but definitely a fan!
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I do try to put "fantastic" features into realistic environments when I get away with it. I tried hard to make the giant fit into the image (as much as a giant can fit into any scene) without seeming to stand out too much from the scenery. Therefore I'm really glad that you feel this looks "normal" and "non-fantasy in an odd way". Thanks a lot for the comment and fave, greatly appreciated.
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Griatch
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Best of my Christmas cards? Thanks!
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Griatch
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Wonderful!
I love the trees with the snow and atmospheric perspective. The snow drifts on the frozen river look great too, and I like the horse and cart and the footprints.
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Thanks greentunic! Lots of work in getting those snowy details right, so I'm glad you like them. Thanks for the fave too!
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Griatch
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I think this one is my favourite piece of art of yours! You've shown plenty of style change over the years.
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Wow, that's high praise! It's interesting that you should say style changes, because it's really quite hard for me myself to notice such things, one turns blind I guess. Here I did change for a much brighter style compared to earlier cards.
Thanks a lot for the comment and fave!
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Griatch
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This is beautiful, once again!
I love how there's no fighting involved, that the spirit of the season of giving still matters, even if you ARE a giant.
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Thanks! I know my Christmas cards are not really using the standard motives, so I try to get that Christmas-y spirit in there in other ways. Glad you like it!
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Griatch
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