[Ampa]

OK I posted the lineart for this a few weeks back, but after Chapel's encouragement thought I'd post the work-in-progress version.



This is my first reall attempt to colour in this way in PS. Quite pleased with how it is going, though I am having a lot of trouble with the hand (hence it is missing) and the boots (which are supposed to be shiney leather / latex)

Still a fair way to go I feel (have spent somewhere in the region of 12 hours on it so far - much too long... very slow as I am still getting familliar with PS and the Wacom)

Comments / suggestions / crits / praise / any kind of reasonable response lapped up with enthusiasm.

Hugz Ampa.

Grrr - why does posting images have to be so hard! =P

[This message has been edited by Ampa (edited December 22, 2000).]

[Chapel]

Not a bad start. Just a few things though. spooge told me once that the painting is really only as good as the underlying drawing. (and it has stuck in my head ever since) In your pic the painting is good, but there are alot of anatomy problems with the figure. Are you using any guidelines or blocking the figure out first? 3 things that stand out are her torso, hips and legs. Her breast are parallel with the ground but her ribcage and tummy are curving away. The breast should follow a simular curve. The hips are at a pretty odd angle.. if you were to straighten them out her legs would be uneven. I'm not trying to be harsh.. just giving you an idea of what to look for in your pic. Keep painting.

[Flinthawk]

Nice work so far, Ampa. Chapel's right on his observations so take them into account. What might help is to get reference of a skeleton and see how the rib cage and the hips work with each other. It'll help when positioning the upper body in relation to the lower body and knowing where to show that little protrusion of the rib cage we should probably be seeing on the left (our left) side of the image.

As for things like the hands I'd try and block them in thinking in terms of simple geometry such as cylinders or even, at first, rectangular solids. Paint them in using as few sides as possible and then blend between two adjacent planes to get a closer representation of the objects shape and lighting. Do this with the rest of the geometry in the body as well.

The painting is coming along well overall...keep at it until you're finished with it or until you think you've learned enough valuable things to make an even better piece the next time 'round. The textures are coming out well and the latex of the left boot seems to only need some minor tweaks to bring out the fact that it's shiny. Make sure to add some hot whites inside of those highlights. Also, for black objects I find it best to start with a very, very dark gray and adding the highlights and then the shadows using your darkest blacks. Right now you didn't seem to leave too much room to add a bit off shadow into the boots so you may want to add some slightly brightened black tones to the mid areas of the boot. Hope this helped in any way, keep up the good work.

-Flinthawk

[Frost]

Ampa, nice.

Things I'd have to say on this are the following: Having these lines from nose to edge of mouth ages a woman. Young/thin women have no such traits as their skin is very elastic and there is less fat and broken down muscle tissue as you'd see in an old person. The nose width at the level of her eyes should be made a bit thinner so the nose doesn't look so tubular.

The comment on the breast is dead on, and should follow the ribcage, so her right breast should be lower... however, a bit of influence should be given on it from her shoulder which is pulled higher. Had she been naked, you'd see that her right bottom would more or less be at equivalent as her left one, but because the skin is being pulled up a bit by the shoulder, it would lift the skin from the underbelly of the breast to the shoulder, this raising the nipple some amount... I guess I'm going a little overboard (or am I?), but it's these small things that make an image more easily appreciated and easier to beleive.

Her right foot is VERY thin and long. Women generally have small feet, but the boots she is wearing should have some free toespace as it becomes pointy at the tip. At any rate, there is a lack of volume at the palm of the foot.

Nice work so far. it's coming along nicely! Hope my comments help.