Zeagull help

[Gnarf]

Created this for the Chimera challenge, but I stopped after losing motivation from its lack of interesting...I don't know.  I like how the wing turned out, but everything else, including the colors aren't working for me.  I certainly don't want to make it just a bland black and white (as most seagulls and zebras are.)  Any crits or suggestions would be appreciated; I always get a lot out of posting a colored piece for crits, and I learned some great things with my "zombie" piece I last posted here, as well as my need for help with anatomy (on the kaiser.)

[Draco9898]

If you haven't used up all the colors, try adding a ambient light shining on a particular direction.

Also, try giving it hooves on the feet. But that's just my personal opinion.

[AlexHW]

I like how this looks.
as for suggestions, if you are conscerned as to it being too black and white, you could try useing some yellow or blue tints on the fur and feathers.. perhaps aa the zebra stripes useing some yellow or blue colors..

[Ryumaru]

more interesting?


maybe this might give you some ideas. youre pallette needed some warmth imo.

[Gnarf]

Thanks for the suggestions guys.  As I said, it wasn't finished, so I was planning on adding hooves.  I'm going to keep in mind the yellow and blue idea, and I remember Tremulant telling me to do the same thing.

I appreciate the edit Ryu, but it sort of lost its cell-shaded look.  Either way still looks great, and you've given me an idea for the wings.

Thanks all!

Update:


My idea with the wings didn't work out quite well.  I really want to sort of cell shade it, but it came out blocky, so I'm still open for suggestions.

[Ryumaru]

didnt know you wanted to hold with the cell shaded look, either way the new color(s) bring so much more to the work!

[MrNormS]

That looks pretty cool.  I like the stylization.  Let's pretend that's a word.  Palette is very cool.

[Terley]

love it so far. is it gonna have eyes?

[Gnarf]

Yeah, I should have mentioned the cell shaded thing, heh.  Yours seems much more vibrant, Ryu.  Thanks, and yes, I will have eyes, but right now they're those unnoticeable dots.

Update shall come soon.

[pixelsforhire]

The legs seem a bit long to me. I don't know, I half thought I was looking at him from above when I first saw this. That would be a cool perspective. I love that hair, er... plume and I like the cell shaded look. If it weren't for that, I'd recommend shifting the hue from one side of the beak to the other. Maybe yellow to red? Oh well, doesn't matter. These colors would look great in front of a sunset background, but I guess that's asking a bit much. Keep it up!

[Lawrence]

Seriously guys, I know the word 'cel' comes from 'celluloid/cellulose acetate' but it's abbreviation doesn't have two 'L's.

This is looking marvelous so far .I would have it's beak cast a shadow though. I think it had a certain charm without the aa. I would say that cel-shading is to shading what aliasing is to a continuous signal and so leaving the aliasing would synergize both aspects. It doesn't bother me much though, I know it's good to mix & match, and something like this should be entirely at the artists' discretion.

I like the colours, they portray a sunny daylight environment quite well.

[Ryumaru]

damn, having actually done work on animation cels, i should have been the last one to make that mistake lawrence!

[Gnarf]

Okay, I did a quick shortening of the legs and added shading under the beak w/ and w/o aa.

w/ AA, w/o AA, short legs w/o AA


Thanks for the suggestions, I feel more satisfied with the piece too.  Heh, I remember someone correcting me when I said "cell" a while back, so I should have remembered.

[Godslayer]

Have you tried caricaturing  four striped horselegs on the underbelly? That might look cool.

Could you post your references?

[CrematedPumpkin]

I'd keep the longer legs, and the AA.
I like the design, but I'm a tad confused by the wing; the segment that looks seperated from the rest of the wing below it. If that makes sense. I don't get it.

[Gnarf]

References: http://www.kidsplanet.org/factsheets/graphics/zebra.gif
http://www.jaffray.org/feb2001-seagull/large/43-seagull.jpg

The segment above the wing was originally another part of the seagull on a reference I used, but I couldn't find it on google, which is what I originally searched for seagulls on.  I'm sticking to the longer legs, as well.  The underbelly (as seen in the ref.) has less stripes so I figured I would reduce them in that area.  Also, I don't quite get what you mean Godslayer.