GR#143 - Blacksmith - Sprite Process

[Ai]

Perspective looks sound now aside from some remaining furnace cleanup, and the new furnace's base colors are much more readable.

On a compositional note, I generally try to avoid having the bottom of posts and other stiff objects underlap a characters head, for basically the same reason that 'tangents' are a bad idea -- it creates a weird pattern where your eye reaches the top of their head and then tries to exit out of the top of the picture.

A few options:
* flip the character (and his anvil+block) in the X axis
* create some value separation by darkening the support timber. Given it's trapped in a corner with a large object next to it, and only candle+fire light, it should probably be fairly shadowed anyway, which would make it less eye-catching (good, since it's not actually important to the picture, right?)
* Shove the post around (Probably towards the right so that its interaction with his silhouette is minimal.


I only just realised he has a candle stuck to his hat. Doh. 

EDIT: When I think about it, the basic message I was trying for here was "a background element can either confuse or help define the silhouette of a foreground element, according to how you manage it." (for example, the furnace does a good job of helping define his shoulder.)

[Johasu]

I've been hammering on this quite a bit, although most of the work I have done isn't visible with this result.  I have played with moving things around and changed a lot of angles.
Several hours working on perspectives and color palettes have left me with a really bad wall (though it's grid work is what I am using to develop my perspective in an anchored direction.  I will probably return to a dirt or stonework wall after I have finished using it to layout the scene better.

The furnace isn't quite there yet on it's shape but it's definitely getting closer. The opening and bottom are both in line with the perspective and the colors are closing in on what I'm aiming to use.
I still need to round the top better and then spend some time laying out the bricks as I want them. I imagine that will be time consuming so I am trying to get the scene fully ready before really coloring anything with any dedication.

I realize now just how out of perspective the character is, particularly his hat and face which are/were created with a straight 2D mindset.      ~Learning~

[Decroded]

Haven't read so forgive any repeats.
Perspective issues aside, there is composition issue of how he is facing the outward edge which leads the eye straight out of the image.
Quick switch-around:


Background perspective still doesn't match subject.
You COULD easily change his hat, shoulders, torso etc. to fall into perspective but I wouldn't because background perspective is unnatural unless he's a dwarf and we're looking down on him.
Before you spend hours messing with perspective, simply imagine yourself standing in the room and sketch roughly.
Don't forget you can use a larger canvas to get a better feel for the surroundings, then crop out the bit you want.
Better to have the primary subject on a separate layer so you can move him around once you're finished drafting the background.

Also consider what you're going to do with lighting.
The obvious choice is harsh red and gold lighting from the fire and glowing metal with high contrast shadows.
Can always add some blue ambient backlight to balance things out, show part of a window or doorway if you want to make it obvious where the light is coming from.

[Ai]

^ I considered proposing a transposition like your edit shows, but I realized it makes the picture more nonsensical -- if he needs to keep the metal hot, then the hand holding it must easily swing to reach the furnace. In your edit, the only thing he can safely stick in the furnace is his hammer

[Decroded]

obvious solution is  to widen the canvas. cant hurt to see a rack of some of his previous handywork for example.

[Johasu]

Sorry for taking so long to reply.
I don't have a proper edit yet because I'm not quite sure how I want to proceed yet. I HAVE spent some time on your comments and considered my problems as they are.

First of all on the left:
I took some time to lay out my problems with perspective.  I started with the character from a primarily front on perspective. Then I screwed everything up by throwing this anvil in with a different perspective because I wasn't skilled enough at the time to draw it properly.

Then I continued to make mistakes by finding a way to jam a bar into his hand in a front on perspective to match his body that DID NOT match the anvil.  While this forced me to fix his anatomy issues substantially, it did not fix the image at all.

I used red lines to show how I have lined the room out with perspective matching the lines on the anvil. I was cheating and not using any form of real 2 point perspective, but instead just running parallel lines.

I used green circles/lines to show how his body plateaus are lined up straight across.  Looking at it this way I see that my image simply cannot work as it is.
In conclusion, I must either redraw his form or the room and the anvil upon which I rooted the setting's lines. 

Next, I considered your comments on broadening the shot and using the image to flow the focus inward on the character.  (Basics that I forgot as I struggled with my lack of experience on the perspectives.)
I used simple tools to mockup a new layout for the room.
I will probably pull the anvil across more and level it out to match his body alignment.  Then I will use a single vanishing point to make minor modifications on the layout and line up everything in a parallel room.  I put in some details on the furnace(which I pulled to the back wall.  A basin for an oil quench beside him, and a grinding wheel which I put on the other side to force attention inward.

I have a few open areas.  I think that with these items I can get away with using lighting to pull the attention onto the figure though.  Comments and criticism on this before I move forward to any sort of REAL heavy work on it would be greatly appreciated.  And thanks a lot for your time and patience guys!