Mattchew's fanart thread 5.0... *****e, refined!

[imaperson2]

One of my favorites in mythology! Glad you made her a good looking Gorgon-many people confuse that.

 

[Mattchew]

Thanks, imaperson2!

Here's yet another update. Snake Hair: Complete!

More to come.

 

[Mattchew]

More Medusa Progress...

More to come.

 

[Mattchew]

Here's an update on my Medusa piece. It's gonna feature 3 or four guys that have been turned to stone.

The first guy is about 95% done, needing work on his hands and sword.

The second guy is just a rough sketch so far.

As for Medusa, she still needs a lot of work on her body.

Anyway, more to come.

 

[imaperson2]

So is she crying because she can't ever have a man in her life? Something like that?

 

[Mattchew]

yeah... the idea is she's standing amongst and admiring a bunch of guys who have tried to kill her.

 

[KAD]

Here's an update on my Medusa piece. It's gonna feature 3 or four guys that have been turned to stone.

The first guy is about 95% done, needing work on his hands and sword.

The second guy is just a rough sketch so far.

As for Medusa, she still needs a lot of work on her body.

Anyway, more to come.

It all looks Greek to me.


Great job so far.

 

[Mattchew]

Thanks, Kad...

Another update on my Medusa piece...

I finished up the first statue. Also, I pretty much wrapped up Medusa's body, adding arms and doing some paint work. Cleaned up and finalized the second guy's look.

Up next is to paint the second guy as a statue.

More to come.

 

[Mattchew]

More work on Medusa and her men...

In this update, I made a few alterations to the first guy, finalized line work on the second 2 guys, and threw down a base color for each of them...

I think I'm gonna add the the last guy, before I paint any more of the guys.

I'd love to hear thoughts.

 

[Mattchew]

Finished the line work on the last guy statue on my Medusa piece...

Let th painting begin!

 

[The Navigator]

Goddamn it man, you've got to tell me when you make yet another art thread!

Great work. Medusa's one of my favorites.

 

[Mattchew]

Rabbit: sorry for the billionth thread, but it was a preemptive strike because they said they were closing threads above a certain post count. anyway, thanks for the kind words about my Medusa pic...

Speaking of which, here's yet another update, the last of the weekend i think (read: i need to shower, and interact with other people).

In this update,the left 2 guys are more or less done, while the right two guys are in various states of being complete. Also did a little more work on Medusa to tie her in to the right two guys and make her dress pop a bit more.

I'd love to hear thoughts.

 

[The Navigator]

The one that's really blue is a little distracting, and I think it oculd use a background...

The shading on Medusa is excellent, particularly in the folds of her dress/wrap.

 

[imaperson2]

Seeing the guys made me wonder- did their whole clothing/weaponry turn to stone as well or was it just their body? Just curious because I don't really remember reading about that. Still, it looks cool. The only thing I think would look cool is a guy transforming while she looks at him or her snakes going crazy- but that's a whole other piece What kind of background are you planning?

Oh and if you are going to keep with the mythology, I wouldn't mind a piece involving The Fates haha

 

[Mattchew]

The one that's really blue is a little distracting, and I think it oculd use a background...

The shading on Medusa is excellent, particularly in the folds of her dress/wrap.

Thanks for the kind words about Medusa. As for the blue guy... actually both guys on the right are not done. The blue guy is the farthest from done. He'll be refined and made less blue in the end. And yeah... I also was thinking a background might be a good idea.

Seeing the guys made me wonder- did their whole clothing/weaponry turn to stone as well or was it just their body? Just curious because I don't really remember reading about that. Still, it looks cool. The only thing I think would look cool is a guy transforming while she looks at him or her snakes going crazy- but that's a whole other piece What kind of background are you planning?

Oh and if you are going to keep with the mythology, I wouldn't mind a piece involving The Fates haha

All things I thought about. My thoughts:

I definitely think only the bodies would turn to stone, given the fact that Perseus could look at Medusa through his shield's reflection. Having said that, in the final piece I want the guys to be very secondary and I really want her to stand out, so I decided to ignore the logic and make them solid stone.

Also I had considered making one of them in the process of transforming because it would be cool, but 1) again I want the guys to be more set dressing and 2) my concept is more that these guys weren't all attacking her moments before, but rather this is her collection of men that tried to kill her over many years, and she's arranged them all and is posing with them.

Finally, the fates are an interesting subject for sure. I may not jump right back in, but I think I'll do more mythology in time.

 

[Mattchew]

Another update... This time I wrapped up the guy in the foreground on the right.

That leaves the guy in the back right to work on, and then I'll start work on the environment.

 

[Mrh7448]

Hey Matt,

Fantastic work as always. Amazing rendering, soft subtle feel to it. I know you aren't finished yet and I can't wait to see what you do with the background.

I love it there are just a couple of compositional elements you may want to think about. You are creating to very strong lines in this comp. The first is across the top with the sword leading right across to the right rear statues cloak. The other is the left of the statue on the right rear leading down to the one in the foreground. There is also a slight one across the bottom from her body into the statues legs. For me it seems to be drawing my eye out of the image, even though she's pretty nicely framed.

There is some very interesting negative space on the left side while on the left it's a little less so.

Anyway, I threw some lines on it to try and show you what I'm talking about cause I'm not sure I'm to clear.

Just something to think about at any rate.

 

[Mattchew]

Hey Matt,

Fantastic work as always. Amazing rendering, soft subtle feel to it. I know you aren't finished yet and I can't wait to see what you do with the background.

I love it there are just a couple of compositional elements you may want to think about. You are creating to very strong lines in this comp. The first is across the top with the sword leading right across to the right rear statues cloak. The other is the left of the statue on the right rear leading down to the one in the foreground. There is also a slight one across the bottom from her body into the statues legs. For me it seems to be drawing my eye out of the image, even though she's pretty nicely framed.

There is some very interesting negative space on the left side while on the left it's a little less so.

Anyway, I threw some lines on it to try and show you what I'm talking about cause I'm not sure I'm to clear.

Just something to think about at any rate.

WOW! Thank you so much for the critique. Having no art training beyond my freshman year of high school art class, I am hardly aware of any of this stuff. I try to tweak things to make them more pleasing to my eye, but its more a process of following my gut.

So i am assuming your point is (And forgive me for any lack of understanding) that once the eye is in the lower right corner, there should be a line to loop the eye back into the center of the picture, making a loop or sorts? In other words, what is the goal?

 

[Mrh7448]

Yes that's it once it reaches that spot I find the eye is just drawn outward, you need a way to move it back in. I think if you move the foreground figure in (the bottom left) his gaze moves upward into the folds of her clothes which would bring the eye back up to her face. Also you would break the line I've indicated from the top to bottom. On second look the sword and cloak while it does create a line and you could break it a little the way the folds are done, do draw the eye towards your focus which is Medusa.

You composition is almost there it just needs a few tweaks.

If you're interested you should like at some Rennaisance work. Especially Da Vinci, he was certainly a master of moving the eye around and keeping focus. A typical way is with the three and creating a sort of triangle.

Contemporary wise I think Mike Mignola is a master of composition. Whether you like his style or not, he knows how to create a focal point.

Anyway definitely good work and as always I've loved what your work has progressed too.

 

[Mattchew]

Yes that's it once it reaches that spot I find the eye is just drawn outward, you need a way to move it back in. I think if you move the foreground figure in (the bottom left) his gaze moves upward into the folds of her clothes which would bring the eye back up to her face. Also you would break the line I've indicated from the top to bottom. On second look the sword and cloak while it does create a line and you could break it a little the way the folds are done, do draw the eye towards your focus which is Medusa.

You composition is almost there it just needs a few tweaks.

If you're interested you should like at some Rennaisance work. Especially Da Vinci, he was certainly a master of moving the eye around and keeping focus. A typical way is with the three and creating a sort of triangle.

Contemporary wise I think Mike Mignola is a master of composition. Whether you like his style or not, he knows how to create a focal point.

Anyway definitely good work and as always I've loved what your work has progressed too.

thanks for taking the time to give me your thoughts. I really appreciate it. I now see what you mean. i'll definitely take it into consideration with this, and future pieces.

 

[Mattchew]

FINALLY, major alteration to the character's is DONE!

In this Update, there have been a BILLION tweaks to all the characters, plus major work on the back right guy. Medusa finally got her other arm and hand. The front right guy was shifted, as per the great advice of Mrh. The back guy also got a lot tweaks, effecting his arms, cape, and face. Colors on all the statues have been desaturated, so now they're all almost gray, with just a hint of their respective colors. A bunch of other crap was done too...

The next step is to sketch out and complete the background, and then I just need to a little work to tie the two together, and I'll be done!

I'd love to hear thoughts.

 

[spideyboy_1111]

so this is were you've been! lol.

you better keep giving me my large format pics! i love medusa!

 

[Mattchew]

Completed: 1/29/2010

This is a final on my Medusa picture, my first piece of 2010!

I was inspired to do a piece based on mythology as the remake of "Clash of the Titans" trailers started to be released in fall of 2009, but it took a few months for me to get around to it.

I always loved Medusa and wanted to do a piece that cast her as a tragic figure, beautiful but doomed to be attacked by an endless number of men until one finally succeeds in collecting her head.

This is the first paper-free piece I've ever done. I generally sketch, scan, and then clean up my sketches in Photoshop as a first step, but I recently bought a Wacom Cintiq so I sketched on my Cintiq. A new process for me, but I am happy with the results.

As always, I would love to hear thoughts, if you have a second.

Super-Gigantor-Version below:

Spoiler

 

[The Navigator]

Very nice.

 

[KAD]

Totally Greekin out on this one. (Bad pun intended.)