GR#156 - Gothic Dieselpunk - Gameart

[Cyangmou]

current work - look at site #2

finally decided to switch to 1920-1960, Dieselpunk scenario in a patriarchal society
core parts of architecture are gothic related with some more modern elements (mostly art nouveau floral patterns and & wrought iron structures)
I also decided to bring in quite some pieces of symbolism and use a lot of gargoyles and other sculptural elements to make the city more interesting.

Still want to keep the earnest more realistic anime direction for characters - mainly that it's easier to get their facial expressions and emotions across in the big sprites




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I created a more detailled artwork of one of my earlier designed charakters.

the scenario is the same as my house piece (some of you might know it). It should be dark, oppressive and the universe has some parallels to our worlds 1900.

I am trying to achieve a steampunk style with gothic elements, but I want to take distance from the generic fantasy and steampunk illustrations we all know.
So it's a special kind of steampunk (but more or less inspired by Jules Verne, R.L.Stevenson, Bram Stoker... and similar books out of this epoque, not the fancy gear stuff).

For the artwork style I went with a realistic approach, although quite flat shading with a fair amount of black and adjusted proportions. Another important design choice was to put the artwork just a little bit in the anime direction, while keeping most western art approaches I usually love to a certain degree.

first version:

[Helm]

Well, that's wonderful, really.

Few things that niggle at me is that I feel he's too squishedm horisontally. For the arms he has I'd have expected a bit more chest and more of a pelvis for those legs too, but you can chalk that up to anime-ness.

Stronger shadow under the chin? You have all this black elsewhere, at least try it.

I am neither convinced by the cloth folds on the pants/boots nor do I think they're the best solution for your image. I think you should reference more on this, and also simplify a bit. Visually speaking these lines confuse the form a lot and do not add anything swooshy to it either. If you're using reference for those folds, can I see it?

Crotch area, where the pant legs meet, also not very convincing, somehow. Can you see it? Reference pants more!

Otherwise, wonderful. Pixel tech is rock solid as far as I can see.

[kriss]

This art is reaaly amazing !
"but I want to take distance from the generic fantasy and steampunk illustrations we all know."
I understand well but i'm thinking the arm could be more "jule vernes" than this: it's look like cyberbunk, not steampunk

[Vermolius]

This is awesome, but I feel like the angle of his torso doesn't agree with the angle of his hips and legs. I think the problem resides in where his right hip is versus the entire right side of his torso within the context of his chest and arms. His right side is just bulging for some unexplained reason!

Here's an amateur edit:


I'm an anatomy noob at best, but that side is really bothering me.

[wolfenoctis]

Some really rough thoughts:


How about making the folds prominent at the joints and more subsided where the cloth and skin connect ( even smooth on some places)

[AlcopopStar]

The pixel work is technically just about flawless. But the base picture has a few problems, namely gesture and character.

His stance is extremely stiff and his face very blank. This is a shame because the design, colouring and costuming speak a lot to his character. I feel you should put the same attention to detail in the way he holds and expresses himself. Try loosening up the pose, and then adding a degree of emotionality to it; be that relaxed, cool, angry, mysterious whatever. A subtle or strong emotion mixed into the heart of the pose through gesture will do wonders for this picture.

In real life we never see people absent of the moment or emotion they are occupying. I feel it should be the same way for characters in art.

[Cyangmou]

@kriss
The hand of the arm is like a knight's gauntlet, the lower arm is designed like an engine part with some ventilation slots and the upper part like stylized anatomy.
The designs you brought up are nonetheless the imagination people have of steampunk, but I rather want to go with my own solid and more minimalistic approach and keep the sensitive mechanics inside the chassis.
The gauntlet form is also a small hint to the "sir" knight.

@vermolius
Thanks for mentioning, I applied it.

@wolfenoctis
Thanks for your thoughts, also thought about some things, maybe I will come back to it later on

@alcopopstar
I wanted to achieve a reserved and supervising mood for him. For me it was rather more important to build up an eye contact with the viewer instead of distracting from that with a very dynamic and explanative comic-book pose.
The idea behind it was that you should look in his face where he don't reveals anything, while the clothing gives hints and that should create some kind of true-to-life tension which I prefer much more for this charakter than an exaggerated exhibition of mood. Although I dunno if it works how I imagined. But I won't majorly rework the pose aside from details.

@helm
Thanks for your observations.
I thought about the proportions and shortened the legs a lot. I think it's now more appropriate than before but still looking enough anime like. One observation I made is that most animes use very long legs and big hands - Although I don't have a concrete idea so far what's exactly behind this proportion choice.

The point with the chin-shadow is valid, although black felt too much and destroyed the form - I darkened it a bit that it recedes more.

I removed all the folding sof the boots, since as you mentioned it I also thought that would distract a lot and it's too much detail in the wrong spot - it hurted more than it helped. I also reworked the trousers once more, although I am still not too confident about them.

The design choice I am struggling with is if I should leave the length of the boots as they are or if I should let them end beneth the knee - although I fear this might hurt the verticality of the design so I am unsure.

For the first attempt I don't referenced, now I searched some pics of first worldwar soldiers:
The boots (if they have one) also end below their knees, so this might be a more intelligent solution.



the new version:
-adjusted the proportions of the legs
-adjusted the hips
-changed the shoulder line
-simplified the boots
-changed the drapery of the pants
-gave the chassis of the lower arm a tilt
-added some holes in the belt
-modified the collar of the coat
-modified the length of both lower parts of the coat (they were really different before)

[AlcopopStar]

I wasn't so much talking about making him dynamic or comicbookish, just adding a degree of purpose to his pose. He doesn't currently transmit anything to me in either his face or pose, not even a sense of intensity or passive mystery. to be perfectly honest all i'm getting from this is "wax works". Perhaps this in part because his eyes look a touch unfocused.

Honestly no matter what you do with this guy he is going to turn out great, because he already looks great. I just think that for an artist of your considerable magnitude paying attention to these things in an early stage and pushing a pose as far as possible, including an inactive or passive pose (if that makes sense), is going to improve your work more then any minute detail I could possibly point out.

Something to keep in mind for next time. 

[Cyangmou]

I will =)

focused mainly on the pose.

any thoughts so far?

[T-Free]

First off, great work on this character design, this is really one of the best detailled pixel works I have seen so far, especially regarding colors, lightsource and details.
But there are a few things I have noticed, too. Most noticeable for me was that you actually have no clear horizon line determined. If you look at the upper body you get the feeling that you look down on him, but if you compare that to the legs and boots and how they are placed, it looks like they are almost on eye level. Try to make the vanishing point more obvious, that would help alot.
Furthermore, the chest seems too flat compared to the pelvis and belly, a more round form ending in the throat would be nice. In order to make the character more lively, I think you should also help the viewer pay more attention to the head via more obvious highlights (hair?) and real eye contact. Regarding the right eye, you can see both sides of the sclera (the white part) and this looks strange in this small scale, as if the character was tired and liveless.

I have done a quick edit where I applied the things I have criticised. In my example, the horizon is far above the character, which is the easier method to go about it. I might have exaggerated slitghly with the leg, but you get the idea, haha. If you were aiming for a lower eye level and keep the boots as they are, you should definitely change the upper body, especially the shoulders so that you actually look up on them a little.



New design looks great so far!