Life Is Strange - Fanart

[Lakelezz]

Dear Pixelation-Forum

This thread is about the game "Life Is Strange" which definitely climbed my heart within seconds.

The concept for my fanart is the following: Providing an instant camera photo taped onto a surface. The photo features the main character in front of an environment.



The right white elements are pretending to be snow, nonetheless I am not happy with it at all nor have I clue how to make them working. Maybe they have to be removed though. As a result there are multiple attempts on diverse elements of this piece.

Any suggestions about the ocean? It is still work in progress but I am not sure whether I should use more colours to describe the highlights.
The surface on which the photo is also pretty boring, I might need to change that. Nonetheless it is much more neutral this way. Well, I will see.

I am looking forward for your ideas and feedback.


Ok, some snow edits.



Additionally I tried to change the secondary colour to some blueish tone. Though I had to add a new colour for this.

[CelioHogane]

I have a question, is supose to be her taking a selfie? because doesn't look like that.

[Lakelezz]

Nope, she is not taking a selfie. Somebody else is taking a picture of her

[Decroded]

some quick fixes:
lose the specular on the top lip because its making her look pouty.
under nose needs more shadow as the dark nostrils stand out too much and look a bit baboonish.
black around eyes is a touch too much for me try reducing it.
the blue of the iris feels too primary to me and the white is a bit strong especially on the left side which should be in shadow.

ocean texture not reading like water especially closer to horizon where the strokes should be smaller.
image is rotated but horizon water is not.

[Lakelezz]

Thanks Decroded! I tried to fix everything mentioned but the eyes. I will leave them as they are for now.

This update contains some very experimental steps. Focus onto the water of course:



I tried so many different ways of pixeling the water. Nonetheless they all were not that successful. It is hard to handle the spume and the snow, too.
Any tips for the water in general?

Additionally this version contains an update of the background and grass.
I might undo the grass edit though. Oh, and the lips are smiling a bit now


Update on the water - added new colours:



Updates on the waves and some smaller stuff:




Some super experimental update. I am not even sure if I like the changes or if the tree, and grass, and hills were better in the last few updates.
I am simply missing another person's view on this :/ Could somebody give me some feedback about that?
The dark part of the tree might be too strong, maybe I need a new colour for the green.



Additionally I am very unhappy with the ocean. Any tips for me?


Since I disliked the water I decided to redo it.
Here is my current version:



Sadly I am still not happy :/

Edit: Some cleaning on the last update.

[Decroded]

without seeing/knowing anything about "life is strange" i just wanted to adjust some things...


water was too bright, tried to imply subtle wave texture that wasn't too full-on/chaotic.
tried to clean up the face a bit.
a few ideas for snowflakes, if ur going to add more i suggest some are darker and only a few are bright ones, don't make them so big and round.
keep ur highlights few and small.
watch ur contrast. where we have highlights, we generally don't need darker colours right against them.
rough job on the hair is an example of using ur full ramp to imply texture with sparse highlights.
white shirt another example of toning down the contrast where u don't really want to draw the eye.

[Lakelezz]

I appreciate your feedback and did some edits in the last days.

This is just the current step and it will of course not be the last one. There are still things to be improved.



All the following perspectives are from the viewer:

- The horizon's colour order has been changed back (dark -> bright instead of bright -> dark)
- Nature in the back got changed
- Pine tree got changed and is my greatest enemy at the moment
- The left shoulder has now the same length as the right one
- Her torso and neck are now more detailed
- The bag's holder has a new texture/lighting
- The right eye has been updated and is brighter
- White dots were added inside the eyes
- Her clothes' lighting got changed
- Small stuff

Well the pine tree is my biggest issue at the moment : / I have no clue what I could do with the surface on which the photo is taped on. A texture would be too distracting but I might change the shadows in the corners.
Additionally in my opinion I have to improve the grass, too.




New progress which is still not fully done. One idea is to make the very far of the ocean brighter but the nearby water dark. Additionally I will try to make the waves smaller and smaller the more far the distance moves.
The shoulder got redefined in terms of lighting to reduce the perception of a flat character. Therefore I tried adding more volume to the face, too. Still not very happy with that.

The pine tree might be reworked completely soon. Though I have no clue how handle it. Right now it is just a terrible mess of unreadable pixels in my opinion.


New attempt on the pine tree.

I tried to clean up the tree and correct the shapes.
The old one was too noisy and uncontrolled thus I could not bear looking at it anymore.




New updates!



The ocean got changed again.
Trying to make them becoming smaller nearby the horizon. Additionally the very far of the ocean is now a prettier.

The grass area has been adjusted.
Flower pattern are more consistent and feel more organized to me.
Some small edits on the grass area, too.

I added a few trees onto the hills in the very far. Alternatively I tried using a darker brown behind them to indicate some more pine trees but I did not like it that much.

Max's hair has been slightly changed. Some missing AA was added, too.

My last point is the front pine tree next to Max. I changed a few pixels on it.




First of all I tried to increase the shadow around the nose!
Additionally the background on which the photo is being taped on has been reworked.
Last but not least some highlights on the ocean has been added.

Still not sure what to do with the shades in each corner of the taped background, though.




I call this done.

The reasons are quite simple: This piece taught me enough and I do not feel any progress neither in the piece itself nor in my development.

Thanks everyone! I appreciate your help

I uploaded it to the pixeljoint gallery and deviantArt already:
http://www.pixeljoint.com/pixelart/94644.htm
http://lakelezz.deviantart.com/art/Max-Caulfield-Life-Is-Strange-531640243

[Decroded]

There's a few pixels in particular that bug me.
The top of top lip in middle desperately needs 1 or 2 pixels of AA.
The single dark pixel nostrils.
I still think u can benefit from the right eye single pixel specular being brighter than the left one since theres no shadow there.

reconsider more selective hair highlights for future. imo you've over-highlighted too much of the hair which flattens and dulls the forms.