Shading statue

[ThreeOhFour]

I've been trying to figure out how to shade the legs on this statue and am not getting anywhere.



Every time I try I keep pillow shading the damn things. Any tips?

That left arm also looks a bit off to me, but I'm not 100% sure what the problem is. Could it be too long?

Cheers guys.

[cobra79]

Very nice pixeling but I also think his left arm is too long. It is accentuated because his arms and the arrow do not follow one line.

Some slight distortions.



On the right he is aiming a bit higher, but I still don't think that it is high enough. When I try that pose my left hand is a good deal above my head. You could also change his look to make it fit.
I also tried to shade it and the legs seem fine too me, but I gave up on his feet.
I also made his head a bit smaller.

[markbilly]

I agree with the head. Cobra's edit is very good!

One thing I would say though, is that this statue is very big, right? In a weird way it doesn't look very big. I'm not sure whether this is because the rest of the background isn't finished or not.

If it isn't because of this I would have coloured the statue in a greyer colour and then used the greens to highlight areas that have deteriorated, like a statue in real life. Then, maybe shadows need to be added to show the affect of a large light source like the sun. I think this would give the illusion of a much larger object.

P.S. Very nice as usual! How did that other background turn out, with the buildings and city scape in the background?

[ThreeOhFour]

Cobra - Thanks for taking the time to do an edit dude. I've tried to incorporate all your suggestions. Keep em coming.

Markbilly - I'm hoping that when the player character gets in there and is downscaled it will look big, and also will probably put little streetlights etc in to give perspective. The colours are meant to look like statue of liberty colours - the brown shadows are because its sunset coloured sky. I'm glad you like it, and the other background I am very happy with, thanks!



A couple of changes:

- Legs shaded. Pillow shaded. So what?
- Arm changed.
- Head made smaller. Well, actually, hair made smaller.
- I've left out the arrow because I'd like to make sure the arm is 100% before I put it in.

All comments very appreciated guys. Cheers!

[Stupot]

Nice pixel art, Ben.
Keep it up.  Can't wait to see the finished result.  And the game, if there is one. 

[pslim]

The statue rocks, and nice edits from everyone including Ben.

My only suggestion is that the elbow seems too low on the forearm on the left arm, to me. His bicep seems to take up 2/3 of his arm.

[Jens]

Also had a go on it.



Brought the ellbow into a line with the arrow (necessary for a straight shot) and did some other stuff as seen on the picture. I'm not good at drawing people and such. Posting it anyways - perhaps you can use something from it or at least see it as an example for how _not_ to do something

[markbilly]

Jens: I really like that edit. You have made it look a bit more like a statue than a giant green person. The body looks more in the right shape too.

Ben's colours suit his style more though... (judging by his other backgrounds)

[buloght]

I can't see your original image version, but I assume it's the one on the left of cobra's edit. I made a very very rough anatomy edit. I am by no means knowledged in anatomy (helm and big brother are the people to consult there). Anyways, I tried to give it a more realistic approach, amd give him some anatomy.

You may not want to go further with the anatomy, but I post it anyways . I focused on giving him some interesting (well a) position, as well as doing things with his cloth to make it more interesting. (archers back arms are generally higher with the hand near the mouth, but I assumed yours is more getting into his aim position)



You didn't realy do any pillow shading in your version. Don't be shy with your highlights, your lightsource is well defined and as an entrance into the building, he should have a large contrast between the highlights and shadows. (I might do an edit on the shading still)

[edit] oops didn't notice you meant sky, well still the same with sunset, sun is very low.

[ThreeOhFour]

Stupot - Glad you like it. A game?..... watch this space...

Jens - Thankyou for taking the time to do an edit. Definitely a couple of points there I can use.

Buloght - I should have known what to expect when I saw you'd posted here. Guess I'm gonna have to redo most of it. Thanks for the awesome paintover - looks like I've got a lot of work to do  .

[EDIT]: Changed the legs to resemble Buloght's version. Hopefully is looking a bit better:



More edits to come.

[EDIT 2]: A few more little changes (mainly the right arm):

[Tuomas]

well I can't really say, but we had a round or a go with my brother who knows something.


First of all, the left (from you) shoulder should be more specific, as in Jens's or Buloght's pic. Then, you must realise, that the man/statue must have more than just bones on his legs, (muscles) or so.

Also Now I can't help but thinking of Andail when I look at his face And whatcomes to mind, the right (from you) armpit should be an armpit, not a straight line, if you know what I mean. a human body contains very few srtaight lines or lines even close to straight.

Also, raise the underwear, they look like he was a she and a hooker. Then at the same time, lower the ribs. Also, notice, when you really extend your arm to raise a bow and grab the string with your hand, the hand that pulls the string isn't at about your chest but round your breast the one that's closer to the pulling one. Does that make sense? I hope it does. If it did reach up front that much, the elbow would not be so far from the shoulder. Simple anathomy, I might say, I think you should consider on just simply checking out, that the left and the right arm are as long as the other. same goesto feet. even better, find  huge mirror and do the pose yourself. For what I know, the picture has a lot that is just wrong, and I might just probably suggest starting over, but if there's something to change it, I tried writing it here.

[InCreator]

I like the statue. All I can recommend is making statue shading colors more contrasty.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Here you go.  What I did here was look up some reference photos for bronze statues as well as images of people using bows in a pose like the one you want.  The ones I settled on were:

http://www.ancientarchery.com/Resources/FBFull%20Draw.jpg 

and

http://web.uvic.ca/grs/bowman/myth/images/57.jpg

and here is the result of a bit of work

1.  Darkened the darkest shade and lightened the lightest shade to increase contrast.

2.  Shortened the torso, it was way too long.

3.  Lengthened the legs.

4.  Adjusted right arm to arch upward as in the reference photo, while trying not to obscure too much of the face.

5.  Reshaded body with a more top-down light scheme.  This made for more visually pleasing highlights.

6.  Altered shape and angle of bow and right arm.

7.  Made torso somewhat wider and increased the build to look more heroic like most bronze statues.




Hopefully this helps.  If you want to make objects like this it might be better to draw them separately from the background once you get the scale down so you can focus on them.  The added bonus is you can add them as objects to ags later and not have to worry about making walk behind masks.

[markbilly]

ProgZmax: That is depressingly good. As are all of your edits!

I think unfortunately the best course of action would be the start again. I think by drawing out the shape and outline first... and then Ben's shading seems good. Maybe if the colours are changed a bit. And ProgZ edit could be used as inspiration for the shape, etc.

[ThreeOhFour]

Holy damn.

Tuomas - Thanks for the pointers bro. I'll be taking them into account (and starting again  :'() on this fella.

InCreator - Glad you like it. I wanna keep the background objects a little less contrasty so characters stand out more. But I might give an experiment.

ProgZmax - Of course, you are right. Thankyou for the lovely redo - I shall be restarting and taking into account all you have said and demonstrated. I appreciate this man.

Markbilly - Yeah. I'm starting again brother. I'm glad you like the colours. Watch this space.

*sigh* 

[Andail]

Progz, not that I mind, but why was your latest picture named "Andail"?
Is it the heroic posture?

Edit:
Also, about your archer: I think he's excellent, except that his right pec (or our left) should be "lifted" a bit by the raising of his arm. Right now it hangs too heavily, a bit like a female breast. The muscle in there should be attached to above the armpit. Just a minor thing though.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Tuomas mentioned that the face of the original looked like you and after my edit it seems to have reinforced the point.  I recommend you use it as your avatar.

Edit:  looking at it the pec should probably be a bit higher, though it is somewhat higher than the other already.  Not sure what you mean about the muscle, though?

[loominous]

Think he means something like this (I've always found anatomy studies incredibly tedious n boring, so it probably contains many errors):



I think Prog introduced many nice things, but the lighting is kind of all around the place.

What I did was to restrict the light from coming from a single direction, and only allow the bright values to areas where unscattered reflections of the lightsource would bounce directly into the camera.

I also made his legs longer (they're still short compared to the upper body), plus made the shadow values closer to eachother in brightness, in essence, reduced the contrast of the shadow values.

These statues are rarely very bright, especially after several years, so I made it less bright n saturated over all.

(The lines on the left indicate the upper n lower body proportions. Ideally, they will be equally long. As can be seen, the legs, even though extended in the edit, are still too short for ideal proportions.)

Edit: btw, I also changed some of the other anatomy, though I have no idea if it's more correct or not.

[ThreeOhFour]

Loominous - Thankyou for you redo. I can see that I still have a lot to learn. I think that with your alterations, the statue represents almost exactly what I'd pictured in my head when I thought I'd like to have a big statue.

I shall be studying these edits - going away for the weekend, and I only have 35 minutes left of my lunch break to muck around with redoing it, but I hope to redo it completely by myself, using tips that you guys have shown me, and make the statue look something like Buloghts, ProgZmax's and Loominous's version all mixed together.

Yes, I'm an idiot for hoping to draw something that good. But its worth a shot - I've learnt a LOT already just from looking at these edits.

Thanks a million, all.

[Andail]

Yes, Loominous, that's exactly what I meant with his pecs. Very nice edit.

My only gripe now is his head, which I think is too stretched, or too long, sort of. Maybe there's no point in arguing about how it's held; it's after all a statue and doesn't need to be very natural (although a real archer would probably hunch a bit for his eyes to come in level with the arrow, or at least tip his head slightly towards the string, not stretch away from it).