Musical Storm

Photoshop CS3 speedpaint attempt, using Dave Phillips' brush recipe.
Not sure about the composition on this one, especially the clouds, but I think the evening lighting scheme worked OK.

If you're wondering, yes that's Lemonee Wee back when she was young. The background figure is one of her peers, a fellow student.
I'm relatively new to painting in Photoshop so I'm looking for crits from our gurus in that area.

That looks awesome.

Lemony Wee and... Citrusy Wizz?


I'm not much for crits, as I'm not very good with Photoshop myself.

[wanabe animator]

Glowing poof balls but I taught wee had a star on her hat...
Loving what you have, but im loving those clouds. Just wondering if you know there are some different typs.
Altocumulus are pretty cool and my fav of clouds, I hardly see them in the wild.

Oh I think the bottom could use a lil more ya know, its missing something

It looks really really good, like all of your stuff haha.

Glowing poof balls but I taught wee had a star on her hat...

she does! (look closer)

Just wondering if you know there are some different typs.

thanks but if you saw my cloud photo library you'd shit yourself I think (and I know all their names)

looks awsome, it kinda looks a little squashed down to me but it still looks really great. its almost like theyre about to do the fusion dance

I love the flow! And the clouds sort of emphasize the strength of the musical storm, so I guess it's not off at all.

Hey Adam!

Now lets start with saying that this is an extraordinary event for me! my favorite animator steps into the world of digital painting!... so i'll teach you everything i know!

Now, Design and compostion is pretty much your area here, ill say that, and probably wont make as many critiques on that as i would on the rendering and colors bit.


now lets start with the robe and the cape, i like the swosh and the swish alot! but the colors and the rendering is a bit cartoony. my art teacher said that every pixel counts in digital painting, now she was a bit weird, but its been burnt into my mind ever since. so if you're going to finish the piece, have atleast 2 - 5 pictures of robes in the wind at the other monitor. ( i guess youve got a library full of refrence? ) also the little witch was pretty much consumed by the dark trees in the back. id bring here forth with some pink fog behind here.


Colors. they are really desaturated. except the stars though, which are nice! but id brighten up the witch's clothing alittle.

composition, as i see it the composition isnt at harmony, by placeing the biggest part of the cloud on the right side along with lemonee wee, the other side feels lighter, and my feel over the picture tilts little to the right.  anyways i placed a moon there, to sort of get the balance back!

after writing all this i made a paintover!



hope you like it, and hope you wont ban me!( and oh, btw, if you're really serious about becoming a great CG painter, go over to Conceptart.org, make an account, and hang out there for a while, post in the critique center section and get alot of proffesional help. )

[My Brackenwood SketchbookMy ConceptArt.org Sketchbook]

Ooo wee!! Adma's got a sketchbook going?

Dave = Pleased

Edit:
I'll drop some thoughts later, but overall, I dig. I do indeed.

Edit2:
Hey Adma, care to expound on some things you were trying to get at with this piece? Or the effect/mood you were going for? (dark, ominous? or other?)

after writing all this i made a paintover!



hope you like it, and hope you wont ban me!( and oh, btw, if you're really serious about becoming a great CG painter, go over to Conceptart.org, make an account, and hang out there for a while, post in the critique center section and get alot of proffesional help. )

Holy shit man! That paintover is stunning and the composition is so much better - I knew it needed work. Thanks heaps for this, that's the kind of crit I love you guys for
 I love what you've done with the moon, the distant rain streaks, the fog and especially the foreground detail (cloak and the terrain with tufts of stubble).

@ Dave: basically the image was an experiment so the only thing I was really trying to do is paint stuff. The only preconceived ideas I had of the image was a strong idea of Lemonee Wee's casting pose with cloak billowing, and all the sideways trees in the background. I guess as I went along I wanted it to be dark but with the impression that the sun had already set and a nasty storm was brewing.
I had watched speed painting videos all day and used your brush settings so all I was really trying to do was loosen up and avoid getting stuck on refining any particular detail. As Espen suggested, I would like to finish the piece or just use this is a study and start over.

my art teacher said that every pixel counts in digital painting, now she was a bit weird, but its been burnt into my mind ever since.

ps. here's a 'loosening up' exercise I did yesterday in skin tones (complete with a particularly loose bit of anatomy), inspired by some of the speed painting I've been watching on YouTube. I've spent so many years working straight to clean that I have to readjust my working mindset by force.

glad i could help!

lemonee wee is my favorite character! shes oozing with creativity!!!!

HOW PRETTY! 

I really like Ms. Wee in black.

That's really good, Adam. And for some reason, the wizard reminds me of some of Ralph Bakshi's work. Was he an influence at all on this piece?

Espen, the paint-over is amazing and actually looks like a finished piece! Awesome!

[My Brackenwood SketchbookMy ConceptArt.org Sketchbook]

I messed around with it, but I lost something in the mix. Doesn't quite cut it:

*pop*


*Espen's brains lays all over the place*