BACKGROUND BLITZ: No Place Like Home - WINNERS ANNOUNCED!

[Tycho Magnetic Anomaly]

swoon! ...  sublime nixxon well done .. how do you get such clean lines, is this illustrator? (if so are you using beziers or stylus perhaps?)  and while I am asking, have you got a background in graphic design/illustration for print by any chance? Superb work.

edit:  Just watching your time lapse now.. doh missed the link

[Nixxon]

Thanks mate!

Wouldn't say a "background" *pun* professionally in illustration, but it's definately the end goal god willing.

Everything (bar the original crude sketch) was done on the iPad Pro. I've used wacom tablets over the years but the iPad has been a game changer. Unfortunately it's not much use for anything else :p

[Mandle]

Amazing treehouse! Especially so after watching the timelapse...

[Danvzare]

That second version is so perfect to my eye that now I want to play that game!

Also, the objects in the room now look like that are actually solidly resting on the surfaces. For me, in the first "smoggy" version they look to me to be floating a bit, especially the box, laptop, and ashtray.

Absolutely agreed. The second version is just so much better. The first version looks like it belongs to someone with a really large bong.

[Mandle]

The first version looks like it belongs to someone with a really large bong.

Cops will never pull over a man with a really large bong in his car. Why? They fear this man. They know he sees further than they.

[DBoyWheeler]

Wow!  That treehouse is spooky (but in a cute way)!  It almost reminds me of the Ghoul Kids' Pumpkin Treehouse from King's Quest 7 (and that's a good thing, I assure you).

[SilverSpook]

Awesome work all around! 

@Nixxon: I always liked the art in The Aftermath, and this is top notch as always!

[dactylopus]

Good stuff in here so far.  I really like Tycho's background.  It has a Blade Runner vibe.

[Dream]

Welcome to the Sleeping Owl Inn, where weary travelers can warm up by the fire and rest for the next day's adventures.



(Full size image here)

Gif of the process:

Spoiler

An explanation of the process:

Thumbnail Sketch: Just a tiny 2 inch x 1 inch sketch in my sketchbook. Scanned, cropped, lines isolated, adjusted to fit a 16:9 aspect ratio, increased the size to fit 8.5 inches x 11 inches, layered over a 50% opacity grid of 3 horizontal lines and 3 vertical lines evenly spaced to help with straightening things, and then printed on regular 8.5 inch x 11 inch printer paper. It looked horrible and blotchy in an only-know-what-that-is-because-I-drew-it way, but still useful.

Pencil Sketch: Using a light box with the printed thumbnail sketch under a blank piece of regular 8.5 inch x 11 inch printer paper, I drew the room in pencil. Lots of erasing here, and all the details nailed down. I then inked this pencil sketch and erased the pencil lines.

Final Inked Drawing: Next step was to use the light box again, with the inked drawing under the final blank paper. The final paper is 8.5 inch x 11 inch Hammermill Color Copy Digital Cover paper, a thick cardstock that's extremely smooth. The pens I used are Sakura Micron pens in sizes 01 (0.25mm) and 005 (0.2mm). This is where I drew the ink drawing that would be painted. Wood textures and small details were finalized.

Final Watercolor Painting: This cardstock is not meant to be watercolor paper, however it can work if you are careful not to use too much water (which causes lots of buckling). With a dryish brush, I painted from light colors to dark colors. The paints I used are liquid paints called Dr. Ph. Martin's Hydrus watercolor paint. When it was finished, I scanned it and touched it up in Photoshop. "Touching up" included increasing contrast (the scan was washed out), fixing a few spots where paint went slightly off course, fixing the weird white spot the scanner decided was on the rug, adjusting to make everything straight, and resizing to 1920x1080. Also, this is when I added in the foreground which was painted on a separate paper using the same methods.

[close]

[Nixxon]

Wow very nice dream!

I love that traditional application and result, very impressive indeed.

[Tycho Magnetic Anomaly]

wonderful background, lots of character too, really well done
I love your method, its amazing to see from such a rough sketch what can become. You and Nixxon have both inspired me to pick up a pen (or stylus) at some point and try physical drawing.

Nixxon I had tried a few apps with my pretty bad android tablet in the past, even tried out a couple of cheap stylus's for it, but the latency.. arg. also the stylus was no more precise then a finger.

What is the latency like on your ipad and what sort of stylus are you using?
(I was also looking at your other timelapse video on your youtube, very impressed, asides from game art there would be work for you within the illustration industry for sure.)

[DBoyWheeler]

@Dream Kinda reminds me of either one of the castle rooms in the King's Quest II remake, or Castle Borgov in Quest for Glory IV.

Either way, really neato job here!

[Mandle]

I want to stay at The Sleeping Owl! It's so charming!

[Misj']

[Tycho Magnetic Anomaly]

omg, this contest...

stunning Misj, just stunning, I would love to know what your material/software/method was on this., it looks like a frame taken straight out of a top class animated short, or animated feature film.

People, keep posting your amazing works!

[Misj']

Well, the process isn't very difficult. Basically it comes down to: lot's of layers.

The process itself is fairly simple: line-art -> flat coloring -> shading -> masked layers for the color-effect of a partially lit room. Most of this is the standard approach using is comics (rather than paintings). The painterly look itself is something I still experiment with, but I haven't had enough time to really practice (and it takes a lot of practice) since I started my new job.

As for my tools, it's done entirely digital. I still draw a lot on paper, but I knew where I wanted to go, and I knew which tools I wanted to use to achieve that. I paint on my desktop (running Windows 10) using a Wacom Cintiq tablet/monitor; and my go-to painting application is currently Corel Painter 2016. But all of this can easily be achieved using ArtRage and/or Sketchbook Pro (or Photoshop if you happen to have a huge budget)...at a fraction of the price.

[Dream]

Thanks for the comments!

I'm impressed with all the talent here in this thread.

Thanks Nixxon, I appreciate that. I'm loving your distinctive style that's so clean and exaggerated, with colors that really pop. The time-lapse is great to see how you work.

Thanks Tycho! I hope you do end up picking up a pen/stylus sometime, I'd love to see what you make. Your time-lapse video shows how much detail goes into your pixel art. I think the post-processing effects add a modern look, which reminds me of Hyper Light Drifter's art style. Now I want to make something in a sci-fi setting.

Thanks DBoyWheeler, I love the idea that it might be part of a larger castle structure.

Mandle, haha! Thanks Me too, but they only take silver or gold coins, which means I'll need to go on an adventure to find treasure first.

And oh wow, I agree with Tycho, Misj's work really does look like it's straight from an animated film. Excellent dramatic lighting, too. Is your profession related to animation, Misj'?

[Nixxon]

@Tycho, Thanks mate. The Ipad Pro 'pencil' is very very nice to use. Almost no latency, it feels very natural once you get used to drawing on the glass. To compare it to traditional passive screens with generic styluses is apples/oranges in my experience. It performs far better than my Wacom digital tablet/PC combo did and can handle very high resolutions with multiple layers without a hitch. Plus it's super portable and just generally awesome. I would very much recommend trying one first if you have the opportunity (apple store maybe?).

@Misj. Jesus that's nice! Very Disney esque. The lighting is beautiful. I especially love the character

[Tycho Magnetic Anomaly]

Thanks for the info there Misj', would love to see you apply that skill to a game!

Nixxon, also thanks for info, I do now intend to get sorted out with a system for freehand drawings, getting an ipad pro now seems like a better idea for sure.

[Rocchinator]

WOW So many amazing entries love them so much, I'm trying to finish mine today hope i can make it