Guardian of the wolf

[Eos]

Hello
this is my first posting in this forum.
So hi and hello to everyone here.

I am searching for critique on this picture cause I want to improve.
Hope anyone can help me, please :)?

[Eos]

someone suggested the wings might be to smal.
I changed that a little but I am still unsure. ;/
Any more suggestions?

[M_Cederstrom]

I'm liking how this is truning out, that front wing is great as for the back, maybe you could show a little of it on the other side of him not much, but just extend it out a little.

[gnome]

cool concept :)

The wing seems a bit weird, like somebody in school raising his hand. I imagine drawing it with folded wings (like birds do when they're not flying) would be hard - maybe the schoolkid look goes away once the second wing is drawn out.
Also, the muscle on with the horns on it somehow suggests that the bone underneath is attached to the side of the ribcage. And consider giving it slightly more biceps :)
I also noticed that the transition to the horns on the head looks a little strange.

keep up the good work!

[pitchus]

i like it. especially what work you must have had with the skin pattern lol. respect, i'd gave up after the first flake...

anyway, i think it only needs more contrast, you know.. darker shadows, lighter highlights... so it won't look so flat...
but keep it up! it's gonna be great.

[Freespace-3DT]

Eos, welcome to the forums. I like the drawing very much, I don't think the wing is too small ( keep in mind there's also part of the wing that goes on to the left and isn't in the image ).

But most of all, I like the wolf a lot. It looks like it feels safe. Great the way you managed to get that to show.

[Kitana]

It's nice you have details somewhere but you miss them in some parts... the right leg - no shade nothing???

[gnome]

the right leg - no shade nothing???

I think that's because it's still WIP :)

[Kitana]

Maybe but when i post WIP i want to hear all the things that not look good to kknow where to work more ;) - so nothing personal ( we are here to help each other )

[gnome]

yep, you're right about that. :)

And I just noticed this is the 2D forum, we don't have a distinction between WIP and completed artwork here anyway. :wall:

[Eos]

wow! thank you for all the replys!

I tried to use your suggestions.
I have drawn in the other wing.
And i tried to block in some more lights and shadows.
I also sketched the background in. The dragon is sitting at the entrance of its cave.
Beside that I think I failed with the lights and shadows ;/. It looks terrible wrong.

@pitchus: I am not really good at light and shadow, as you can see. Can you give me some more advices. Less shadows, more light?

Or can anyone else?
May be some good tutorials?

Also, the muscle on with the horns on it somehow suggests that the bone underneath is attached to the side of the ribcage. And consider giving it slightly more biceps
I also noticed that the transition to the horns on the head looks a little strange.

@gnome: Could you do a redline? I am not sure how to change that. I can not really see the mistake of the horns at the head. But I really would like to make it correct and to understand how and why it's wrong :)

@Kitana:
Please, don't panic. :) I just didn't do the details there because they might be covered in shadows and not visible - would be just a waste of time. But thanks for suggesting this. And yes, it's a WIP.

@Freespace-3DT and M_Cederstrom:
thank you for the welcome. Glad you like the work so far. :) That brings back my motivation on this. I started it spring 2007.

[gnome]

Here's what I meant about the muscle:

http://img68.imageshack.us/img68/5350/32954126ku7.jpg
red is what the lights and alignment of horns suggest, blue is about where the bone should be IMHO. I have to say I suck at drawing, but I've tried to see how it can be improved:

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/1069/80875167gk0.jpg
changed lights/shadows a little (you can probably see it best when you put the images over each other), added new horns. I think they should be more or less parallel to the blue line.


The horn thing is quite simple:
http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/462/hornsfl4.png
Your image looks like there is no space for the horn continuing under the skin, as sketched in the upper one.

Hope this helps! :D

[Eos]

thank you gnome :)
yes that helped a lot!

I found a shadow tutorial :) so you can see the result here. I think it's much better. I tried to pay attention to secondary bounces too. My first time ever. :)

And i changed the "uperarm" but the horns just a little. I simply didn't want them to have this space under the skin, i wanted it to look like it was grwoing from out from the scale (sorry for the bad english x.x)

And more of definig the BG.
More suggstions?
You are great so far. It gets better and better and I learned a lot more. ^^

[M_Cederstrom]

I can't wait to see the final. :D

[aby arty]

eos nice work but i feel that his hips should be touching down cause ,currently it goes against rules of wieght and balance ,and otherwise also , his current sitting position is not a guarding stance .

and yes kitana is right ,u need to shade the other leg as well .
and the tail doesnt look dragon ,it has to be hair less and more spikes if u want but no hair . it makes it look like a lion.

[Eos]

eos nice work but i feel that his hips should be touching down cause ,currently it goes against rules of wieght and balance ,and otherwise also , his current sitting position is not a guarding stance .

and yes kitana is right ,u need to shade the other leg as well .
and the tail doesnt look dragon ,it has to be hair less and more spikes if u want but no hair . it makes it look like a lion.

thank you
hum, i think i can not change the hip anymore. but i will change the BG so that it will work :)

Yeahm the leg. I see how much I it really needs. I think it will do when i only do the light parts.
I am sorry, but I think the tail works very well for me :)
A dragon is just fantasy, so it can have any form. I saw a lot of very very fuzzy ones :) But thank you for suggesting.

[pitchus]

looks damn nice mate. about the lighting; yep, definitely better, but you could use some more defined or lighter highlights.
it looks so, i dunno, dreamy..

something like this.. maybe it's bad but i see it that way ;)

[Eos]

sorry for not update some time.
Studying stuff was heavy on my timetable :)

Thanks a lot pitchus.
Looks very helpfull but I am sorry, i didn't see your entry.
I worked more on it and that's how far I am:

I think it turns much too dark by now?
Critique very welcome.

[gnome]

Looks nice! Good job on the scales pattern :)

I do have some crits, though. First, the clouds suggest that the sun is right over the horizon, near the right edge of the image, but the dragon is lit from the right side (except for the tail - which is another crit). Although they don't match the dragon's lighting, don't completely throw your clouds away - they look pretty good imho. ;)
minor assorted stuff:
- The dragon's left leg and the toes below the tail seem to be lacking some details.
- I think you can do without the rock in the upper left corner, at least not that nutant (german "überhängend", kinda pointless to use a translator if you may have to use a translator to translate it back to german :crazy:)
- Add some shadow to the ground ;)
- Scenery becomes more desaturated with increasing distance.

peace & keep up the good work! :)

[M_Cederstrom]

nice work there. :D

[Eos]

Thank you for the help and comments.

It's the WIP 299 :wall::wall:
I changed a lot of things. Now the ground has structure too.
The other leg as well. I changed the eye a bit- chnged the rocks.
edit: - desaturation of the BG- done
missing:
- shadows :dunno:
I removed them again.
I like the outcome of the clouds. but if I leave it like that the dragon will become very dark.
I think I should not have taken so much effort in doing all the details if they are hidden because of shadows.
SO what shall I do?
At the moment I think I will make the shadows very light and remove the sunspot from the sky. .. to let it at least not look like it's a totally "WTF- light situation"

[Eos]

SO I think it enouh.
This is the FINal version of my little dragon.

At first of all.
THANK YOU!
Everyone that replied to this posting. You really were a great help and I learned a lot especially about light and shadows.
THANK YOU AGAIN!

So here it is.

[Sky_Eagle]

Everything looks very good but there's a problem in the drawing.
Since you've added your dragon in an open enviroment the dragon should have reflected light from the sky and sun on him. now it looks that dragon and background are two seperate paintings. I suggest to remove the sun from your drawing because the lighting from the dragon is on the opposit side. Allso add some blue to your dragon as reflected light from the sky. Am sure that if you do these changes it will look awesome.

[Sky_Eagle]

lol it seems that you just posted while i was writing the comment above. Well it's a good thing you've changed the lightning so you can keep the sun but i would suggest to still add some skycolor onto your dragon to make it blend more into the enviroment.

[Eos]

thank you Sky_Eagle.
I will keep that in mind for the next picture :) I promise