How can I help?

[MGoods]

I found this project a while ago and started playing, but I was pretty busy at the time so I didn't get very far or offer to help on the forums. However now I have more free time and so I'm up to helping out around here. I can only do 2D art, but there seem to be quite a few places where 2D art is used in game, and I could always do concept art for ships, it really depends on what is needed (just give me something to do and I'll do it).

I'm still on the learning curve skill wise (evey piece is better than the last, so this one (full view it before making any judgements), which isn't finished, is a much better example of my skills than the one before), and I haven't done much sci-fi art before, but it shouldn't be too hard to adjust from doing fantasy stuff.

Oh, and also I'm involved with a few other projects too at the same time (wesnoth, allacrost and galaxymage), so I'm not going to get things done particuarly quickly, so whatever it is you guys suggest I should do don't pick really large projects unless you don't mind having to wait a really long time for them to be finished.

[loki1950]

@ MGoods it definably needs to be full size nice subtle detail


Enjoy the Choice

[klauss]

Contact JackS (and read the info on the wiki) to know what's expected of ships and stuff - those could use detailed concept art before any modeller tries to model them.
Other areas that need 2D art... hard to come up with something... hm... I guess fixers would come in handy, but I'm not sure what's required there - fixers have to blend with the backgrounds, and backgrounds are... well... most are temp jobs.

[Shissui]

There are a lot of cargo items that have generic boxes for place holders. Although many of the finished ones use scavenged public domain photos, others use 2D art.

Again, I would talk to JackS for priorities.

[MGoods]

@ MGoods it definably needs to be full size nice subtle detail

Thanks

Contact JackS (and read the info on the wiki) to know what's expected of ships and stuff - those could use detailed concept art before any modeller tries to model them.

Ok, I'll pm JackS, see what needs doing concept wise. I know what the cargo items are, but what are fixers?

[loki1950]

I know what the cargo items are, but what are fixers?

the fixers are the guys that hand out missions and quests in the campaign just 2D sprites ATM

Enjoy the Choice

[MGoods]

I know what the cargo items are, but what are fixers?

the fixers are the guys that hand out missions and quests in the campaign just 2D sprites ATM

Enjoy the Choice

I thought so, they were one of the examples of 2D art that I mentioned earlier.

[MGoods]

Finally got around to doing stuff (combination of JackS being busy for a bit, and me having exams last week delayed this quite a bit), JackS suggested fixers, so that's what I've done, starting off with a bounty hunter/mercinary/pirate, mostly just a sketch so far, but I've only spent about 2 hours on it so far so that's to be expected.

Comments & Crits welcome, although in all likelyhood I know of the problem already and just haven't gotten around to (or worked out how to) fixing it yet.



by the way, I that the backgrounds that these guys are going onto will most likely change, and bases might even become 3D, but if the backgrounds change I can easily tweak these, and if bases become 3D then these'll make good concept art.

@funky lighting (because I know that somebody will mention it), I'm mostly just approximating the light source as the exact direction will change between bar backgrounds, so I'm assuming that one light source is close and up to the left infront of the fixer, and that there are multiple other light sources further away, up and to the right of the fixer, which is why it looks a little odd.

[Nózmájner]

Not bad, but his proportions and structure is a bit off. Eyes are quite misaligned, as the mouth, and the shape of the nose and mouth is quite strange too.
And he doesn't really have any distinctive character.

Some basic guides about the proportions of the face, if you don't know it allready:
- Eyes are on the horizontal bisector line. Between the eyes, there's about one eyes distance.
- The whole face's area is from the line where the hair (should) are starting to grow somewhere on the top of the head. Divide the face to three equal parts. The upper dividing line will define line of the brows. The lower one will define the nose's lower end.
- Also, these two lines are define the position of the ears.
- The nose's width is the same as the eyes distance from each other.
- The mouth is placed a bit upper than the lowest section's bisector, and it's width is equal to the distance of the pupils.
Of course, these are not mandatory laws, just some avarage proportions, and most likely you won't find any person who exactly has these proportions, but these will give you a good basis to start with. Also, these proportions are more or less affected by the ancestry (or what) of the given person.

I think I can help you whit these, as soon as I get back to my own machine and scanner (about tomorrow I hope).

Until that, here's some general hint: draw real faces, not from photo, but if you can lay your hands on some good realistic head sculpture, than draw that. Also if you can get some, draw skulls (a plastic one should be good enough ).

Anatomy books are a must too, so you can observe the skeletal and muscular structure of the body.

Edit: Also, you can use a mirror and draw yourself, if there's nobody you could draw. And another good use of a mirror is that it can reveal a lot of flaws of y drawing. Try to observe your drawing trough a mirror, and you'll se what I mean.

Also, sit out to some somewhat crowded place, like a square or a school hall, and draw quick sketches from people. Do them within a few minutes, like 3 or 5. Observe the structure and proportions of the body. When you've got the hang of that, start to observe the positure, the movement and the character more. Do not concentrate on photorealism or such, just try to catch the persons character, with some characteristic line. At first it might be hard to do a good one, but soon you will get the hang of it, notice that you've got some sketchbook and pencil along with you whenever you go somewhere.
(hope these are understandable, since my english is not perfect...)

Anyway, don't hesitate to contact me if you need some more help. I'm in an art school, so I thing I can give you some assistance and criticism.

[MGoods]

Thanks, this is just the kind of reply I was hoping for when I posted this

Not bad, but his proportions and structure is a bit off. Eyes are quite misaligned, as the mouth, and the shape of the nose and mouth is quite strange too.
And he doesn't really have any distinctive character.

I hadn't noticed any problems with the eyes, but now that i look at it again I can see what you mean, I've shifted his left eye a bit and I think that it fixes the problem. The mouth, will always be a problem unless i get spectacularly better at drawing them some time soon (suggestions welcome), and the nose was modeled of of my own, (mirror used), but I couldn't get it to look right, I've had a crack at it again and it's gotten better, I've also shortened it as it was too long. I'm also aware that the ear is really wrong, I just haven't fixed it yet out of lazyness, it should be above where the jaw ends, and in line with the heights that you mentioned on the face.

Not quite sure how I would go about giving him distinctive character, but I'm inclined to leave him without any, these guys are just background characters afterall, only main or important characters need a really distinctive cahracter.

@the face proportions tips, I've heard these enough times that I should be able to recite them backwards, unfortunately it doesn't seem to click while I'm actually drawing (I'm working on it though, this face is much better than what I could do only a month or two ago)


and yes, I already use mirrors, and spend alot of time in public places simply observing people and how their faces work (unforuntately I can't use a pencil to save my life, so I can only observe in public places, not sketch), and I have some drawing books called "the art of drawing" by Giovanni Civardi.

EDIT: Opps, forgot to upload the pic, and I've got to go, I'll upload it in about half an hour.

EDIT 2: As I said earlier I haven't fixed the ear yet, but it's on my todo list.

[Shissui]

I look at the butt of that rifle & it seems out of place --

Why would he bother with an antipersonnel weapon if he didn't think he might use it. If he thought he might use it, then why not also some flavour of self protection?

Perhaps some light chest armour? Or a latice frame for a personal shield generator (assuming they can run on portable energy supplies) ?

[MGoods]

Why would he bother with an antipersonnel weapon if he didn't think he might use it. If he thought he might use it, then why not also some flavour of self protection?

Perhaps some light chest armour? Or a latice frame for a personal shield generator (assuming they can run on portable energy supplies) ?

My origional thoughts on this guy were lightly/non armoured pirate/bounty hunter/etc, the weapon is there to identify him as a fighter of some kind, but he is armoured so that you don't think of him as a soldier/mercinary. My basic thoughts on the kinds of guys you might meet (who are "fighters" and therefore have weapons) are: (note that this is just pure brainstorming, I haven't talked to anyone about it, and some of these guys wouldn't be fixers.

Soldier, heavy insignined armour. These guys work for governments and governments are rich enough to pay for good ships and armour for their people, armour wouldn't be battle worn because the governments would just replace/repair their armour if it got damaged. Or they're off action and in uniform (not off duty, but just not likely to need to shoot anything any time soon).

Mercinary, armoured but no specific insignia armour could even be obviously from different sets of armour added together, more succesful mercinaries have better armour and probably no patchworking, worse ones have rubbish armour and more patchworking, both types have battle worn armour. These guys pay for armour because they expect to fight both in their ships and on ground/on board ship.

Bounty hunter, light/no armour, these guys mostly just blow up other ships, they might fight on space stations, but mostly they wouldn't because most of the time they'd be fighting in single man ships against single man ships (or sniping if they're on land/space station so they don't need armour, they need to move fast)

Pirate, these guys would be very similar to the mercinaries, or the bounty hunters, depending on weather or not they're in single man ships, or largers ships that have many pirtaes for boarding parties, etc.


The previous three would probably always remain in combat stuff as they might need to fight at any time (they make plenty of enemies afterall)

Of course, a bounty hunter could still get some armour if he wanted it, but it would make more practicle sense to upgrade his ship or sniper rifle.

Anyway, a shield generator of some kind wouldn't be a problem with any of these guys, non of the reasons mentioned above would stop them getting shield generators (unless they decided to get a shiny new plasma cannon for their ship instead), but I'm not familiar enough with Vega Strike to know personal shield generators would be allowed with the kind of technology that is in Vega Strike, I'd assume that they are (otherwise youd wouldn't have mentioned it) but I want to check before I go ahead and add one (bear in mind that I mean small shield generators, not massive things that you lug around on your back and are the size of army backpacks)

[Nózmájner]

A bit better, but it's still not perfect. And on a secont blink, the shape of the eyes could use some more work. I can't really explain it, but the shape should have a shape like an almond. Well not exactly, but I can't find another good analogy. Look up for some eye photos o the net and you will se what do I mean.
The area around the eyes are looking a but like if it was made of plastic. It does not have the feel of a real forehead or temporal for example. And his face is like if it's almost completly flat, but it should be a bit curver, especially on the lover arreas, but the forehead is'nt flat too. And the whole face seems to be a bit displaced to the left. Try to move it a bit to the left. Or change the angle of the whole face, so he's looking a bit more to his left thnn front.
His nose seems to be in a more frontal alignment than the face itself. (Well it could be like this if he's got a nosehedge-warp, which might be plausible for a guy like him, since he's a combat person )
Apart from the alignment, it's shape is a bit odd also. A general nose has much more details.

Mouth. Yes, it can be hard at first, but some lineart pratrice, and you will got the hang of it's structure. In fact I've got my issues whit it, but now I think it's one of the most interresting and funniest part of the face to draw.

The basic setup of the body looks good. Only his right arm should be in a bit more relaxed position, because this way it looks kinda uncomfortable.
And you should review that band of the weabon. It shouldn't have too look exactly same wide on every point of it. And the weapon could use a bitmore depth, since it now looks quite flat and like if it was made of paper.

One other sidenote: I think it would look better, if that headset's microphone was a bit shorter (apart that it looks quite ugly, it would pick up more noise if it's that close to the mouth, but i'm not technically certain about that).

Edit: Eh, back on my good old monitor, that's why I've got some new points.

Anyway, here's a quick and dirty head proportions reference I've made a while ago.

It's not perfect, for sure, but it might be helpful. It doens't have too much detail, I didn't bothered too much with the eyes or nose or with everything in general, but that wasn't really the point of it. Anyway, the mouth is a bit more detailed, and it could be helpful to examine it. There are quite a bunch of different types of that around, but with sketches like this, you could easily learn tha basic characteristics of these let's say smaller parts, details of the face.

Some guidelines, the eye's on the side view for example are a bit off, but I corrected that one with gimp.



Anyway, don't take this pic as some kind of template or something. Of course you wouldn't even find two exactly lookalike face, so there can be no good template, but this can be helpfull to start to get the basic way of thinking for drawing a portrait. Think as if it's a short guide to those things you should be aware of, examine, when you're looking at your subject, or thinking about a character.

Also another important advice: Be carefull with art learning books or even with tutorials. They can't really replace a teacher, since they don't give you feedback. Also most of them concentrates on a selection of methods ant techniques, but drawing is more like a way of thinking and also a continous experimenting, than technique. And sometimes they dont really point to the fact that there are more than one way to reach a destination.
Of course, technique and self confidence are important, but you have to analyze the subject you are drawing, and to understand its structure and the way it's working to draw it correctly.
And it's not definitely about photorealism or such. Examine some cartoon figure. Almost everyone's artist knows it's subjects. They build up them with their own style, and they might ignore a lot of things (even and most likely proportions), but they've got a certain artistic reason to do that and they exactly know why those changes should be made. A good example is one of my favourites, Bill Waterson's Calvin and Hobes.
You can't learn these from a book, since it won't give you advices based on your current work or point out some aspects you've missed. They can only give general hints, but no more.

[MGoods]

I've done some more editing on the face, mostly following what you suggested (with some extra edits of my own), and I'm going to leave it as it is for now, I still welcome comments on it, but I've been working on it for too long, I need to leave it for a bit (to do the other parts) and come back to it with fresh eyes.

I haven't touched the gun yet, but I will make it thicker, the only reason it's so thin is because getting the perspective right was very hard with a wider butt, but I'll have a go at it soon.

@books not replacing teachers; this is why I welcome comments so much, I don't actually have any teachers so I rely on my own interpretation and advice from other artists to improve.

[MGoods]

Hmm, I haven't updated this in a while, then again I've been busy (exams and all that jazz) and doing the website.

Anyway, here's the (hopefully) finished version of his top half.