Comments: 17
GlowingSpaceMonkeys [2013-07-31 23:33:25 +0000 UTC]
The first thing that stands out for me about this piece is the use of contrast. You used it in such a way depicts the brighter parts of the canvas to really give an impression of bright light. I like this aspect. You used the brightness of the canvas to your advantage. The only critique I have about this as the amount of brightness. The upper-right portion of this seems a BIT TOO bright and empty. Honestly, cropping a portion off of the top would help a lot, I think, since there is really not much going on up there. If not, I would use that gradient that I see throughout the piece to unify that upper right portion. Perhaps add some to the literal upper right corner to bring our eye back to the focal point... which is Link.
I really like how you depicted Link in this. You didn't go overboard with detail, but at the same time, you gave just enough to give an impression. I especially like the shading you used on his face. It really gives his face a sense of three dimensionality. About his hair, to me, it seems to dark. It's competing with that extremely bright background to the point where they clash. Perhaps you could brighten up the hair overall so that we don't get that "competition" between the hair and the background. On the contrary, you could darken the background, and this will give the same effect.
I see you went with a color scheme using primary colors? Red, blue, yellow? Β I honestly like the color choice and the methods you used to depict the color. The blue reflected light on link's hair and shoulder is a nice touch. I think you should use it more, though. It's those little details that really help to make a piece of art stand out from the rest. The red is nice, but I can't really tell where the light source is. Is it coming from the sword or the shield? If this were the case, we would see more red on his neck and torso... perhaps even to the point where we get a slight glow effect on his torso. The one thing I think could be changed about the red and blue are the saturation levels. The whole piece itself kind of reads as ancient and serious. If you lowered the saturation of the red and blue, it would help to unify those colors with the very low saturated yellows and oranges you have... and it would also help with the overall mood of the piece.
Overall, I think this is well done. I give mad props to you because I, myself, am quite horrible at traditional painting.
Thanks, by the way, for critiquing my other piece. We could have a little ongoing system here where we critique one another... just for mutual benefit. The only REAL way to get better, in my opinion, is to have others critique you so that you can see your mistakes and fix them. But enough of that jazz... I hope I helped. ^^
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Missleepify In reply to GlowingSpaceMonkeys [2013-08-01 21:12:38 +0000 UTC]
Thank you so much for the critique!
Yeah, I'm Β quite the contrast-addict The cons with working with traditional media though, especially watercolours, is that it's very difficult to make the colours right when editing it on the computer. So I was worried I might have gone a bit overboard in some places with the contrast and brightness, so I was happy to hear a second opinion about that Β
I'll see if I can brighten up/darken some places, since it's for a contest I was actually thinking of revisiting it a bit to fix up some parts I didn't quite like, so I'll definitely use your critique as a reference if I do
The colours was a bit difficult since I didn't have a black paint, I prefer to mix my dark colours instead, but it was a lot trickier than I thought and resulted in dark greys with a lot of different colour temperatures and hues. I did, however, especially want a blue/red effect because I like how those colours work together, and how they remind you of the dark vs. light concept. The yellow hues was sorta an happy accident, and the result of the paper's slight coloring and how one of my greys were washed out, I think.
The light source is supposed to come from behind (you'll see how Link's shadow falls from the tree sorta), but I suppose it's a bit messed up
Thank you, but you should really try it out! Especially water colours, it's extremely difficult, but you really learn a lot from mixing colours. I bought one of these cute little setsΒ farm6.static.flickr.com/5023/5β¦ which easily fits in a bag or even pocket, and which comes with a great brush too. It's made by Winsor & Newton, which is my favorite brand when it comes to paints, and the quality is superb. It's around 15$, so if you have some money lying around, buy it and start practising! You'll learn things you never knew you never knew!
That sounds like a great idea, I'm more than open for some critiquing you know How often should we do it, though? I suppose you'd prefer to only get some serious critiques on "big" pieces like the one I critiqued, rather than having me spam everything you put up? Or what are your thoughts?
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GlowingSpaceMonkeys In reply to Missleepify [2013-08-02 01:34:04 +0000 UTC]
To be honest, I really don't have a set DATE for when my new pieces become finished... I just upload them when they are finished. Sometimes it will take 2 days... other times, 2 weeks. It depends on how busy I am.Β
Maybe we could come up with some sort of system? Like a back and forth system? I critique one of yours, then you critique one of mine, and so on. That way, hypothetically, If you upload a piece once a week and I upload one once a day, I don't overwhelm you... and one person doesn't have to critique more than the other.
As far as "big" pieces go... Hmm... If I upload something and it is featured, I guess I could consider that a "big" piece. Or, we could just link each other the piece we want critiqued IN the actual critique itself so that it's not confusing.
Does that sound fair enough?
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carrie-j [2013-07-25 09:59:04 +0000 UTC]
I really love the textures and the background detail in this, and the way you managed to get the shield to look wet.
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carrie-j In reply to Missleepify [2013-07-25 13:49:18 +0000 UTC]
just out of curiosity, what contest is it?
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Horodragon [2013-07-25 00:45:12 +0000 UTC]
Ah man, that's really good~
Which kinda sucks for me 'cause I've entered in that contest as well.
But seriously, the textures and colors are really nice.
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Horodragon In reply to Missleepify [2013-07-25 01:18:13 +0000 UTC]
Haha, no problem~
And thanks! Yeah, I figured a lot of people would do Dark Link, but then I started doing Fierce Deity, with all his irritating details (That armor, bleh) and I was just thinking "this was a terrible idea."
Good luck too you as well~ (But if you want my opinion, yours is the best Dark Link picture yet.)
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