[Art] Tapewolf's Colouring - Sethir redone [2011/03/16]

[Tapewolf]

Index

Shades of Project Grey Future (2009/06/17)

Dorcan and Daryil (2009/07/14)

Joshua a'la Deus Ex (2009/07/26)

Something Wicked This Way Comes (2009/09/11)

Project Future 83, detail & outtakes (2009/10/17)

Project Future New Year (2010/1/3)

Seth, Angels and Dorcan's youth (2010/3/23)

Ride in the Woods (test version) (2010/05/30)

Ride in the Woods (finished) (2010/05/31)

Flightsuit Josh (2010/07/25)
Torris (2010/08/06)

Dorcan, Road Warrior (2010/08/08)

Basilisk (2010/09/16)

Nigel's Nightmare (2010/11/04)

Niall plays shirtless bass (2010/12/10)

Sethir redone (2011/03/16)




Kipiru suggested I post this elsewhere than just the birthday thread.  Traditionally I've resisted creating a thread for my art so far because I don't do a huge amount of non-PF colouring and my figures suck.  But I figured I may as well after the huge amount of effort that has gone into this piece from all parties.  So here we go.



Shades of Project Grey Future (for Ren's 22nd birthday)


(Excerpt from the larger image)

http://www.project-future.org/stuff/things/Ren2009.png  (2MB!)

Notes

This was a joint venture by myself, Kipiru and Keaton the Black Jackal.  It took me a while to come up with a plan, not knowing much about Ren's characters and what they want out of life.  I tried to figure out how to get information from him in a somewhat elliptical manner and may possibly have tipped him off in doing so.  Suddenly I came up with this idea and presented it to Kipiru and Keaton for their comments.  It took longer still to execute.  Original planning began in early May if memory serves, shortly after Keaton's birthday.  I missed Ren's birthday last year and didn't want to mess up like that again.

Kipiru did the line-art.  There was an earlier version which was done on a single A4 page, and I might present that here too if Kip doesn't mind.  It had a couple of flaws and at the end of the day the characters were packed a bit too closely together.  Kipiru decided to redraw it all, but using an A4 page for each panel and leaving the compositing up to me.  As a result, the effective resolution of the strip is something on the order of 5000x10500.

Each panel was done individually and the whole was assembled in ComicLife, exported at a paltry 150dpi.  I dread to think how big the 600dpi version might be.

The colouring and backdrop was my work.  The bricks were taken from an actual photograph by my brother and made into a repeating texture with GIMP.  I was originally intending to use the graffiti from that photograph on the wall as well, but there was too much fisheye distortion for it to work.  I also did the highlight shading on the sword and Daryil's pants.

Keaton did the shading except for in panel 3, we ran out of time there.  I could do a better job of emulating her style, but with luck I'll have a revised version of the page with the proper panel this evening.  I also adjusted the contrast on Daryil's pants, making them possibly too shiny.  Stuff it - he's an incubus and he likes shiny things.

Critiques are of course welcome, though given that this is the work of three people it may be tough to figure out who the critique is directed at

[Ren Gaulen]

The words! They fail me! I cannot describe how awesome this picture is. Tape, Kip, Keats - you guys did a magnificent work. Thanks, guys.

Also, the writings on the wall cracked me up. Though some of them seem inconsistent (and they are aware of it themselves).

..If I eat that cake, nothing weird would happen to me, right?

[Tapewolf]

The words! They fail me! I cannot describe how awesome this picture is. Tape, Kip, Keats - you guys did a magnificent work. Thanks, guys.

Glad you like it.  It was fun to do, though definitely a labour of love.  If you're interested, I can send you the pieces as well - but there's a lot of data involved for the multilayers.

..If I eat that cake, nothing weird would happen to me, right?

Probably not, though with Daryil it's sometimes hard to be sure.


EDIT:  Aargh, I've put the speech bubble in the wrong place on panel 4...

[Lysander]

The comic is full of hilarity and awesome. I really can't define anything that I could say could be changed for the better. Line art, color, shading, I like it all.   

[Kipiru]

The words! They fail me! I cannot describe how awesome this picture is. Tape, Kip, Keats - you guys did a magnificent work. Thanks, guys.

Also, the writings on the wall cracked me up. Though some of them seem inconsistent (and they are aware of it themselves).

..If I eat that cake, nothing weird would happen to me, right?

Glad you like it Ren!

[Cogidubnus]

Wow. I can't believe it's not delicious cake Soviet Russia yaoi heresy! butter!

Looks pretty awesome guys. It made me giggle.

[Tapewolf]

Thanks.  If anyone's interested, this is the first draft:

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/projectfuture/renbday_originaldraft.jpg

[Cogidubnus]

That certainly came a long way. Dariyl's expression is golden, however.

[Tapewolf]

In case anyone is interested, I've been redoing some of the cast pages on the PF comic, specifically Daryil and Dorcan.  Ren provided the bare pencil sketches which I've inked and coloured, and they results can be seen here:

http://tapewolf.deviantart.com/art/Lord-Ikaarion-Daryil-127348712
http://tapewolf.deviantart.com/art/Dorcan-Ja-Fell-129397186

...at some point if anyone's curious, I can post the original pencils, but right now I need to go to bed.

[WhiteFox]

I'd love to see the pencils.

[GabrielsThoughts]

Dorcan's right knee (facing) seems disjointed and fatter than Dorcan's left leg. Otherwise, good work on the musculature.  

[Kipiru]

"also available for parties"- that killed me 

[Tapewolf]

I'd love to see the pencils.

Here you are:

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/projectfuture/DaryilSketch.png
http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/projectfuture/DorcanSketch.png

Dorcan's right knee (facing) seems disjointed and fatter than Dorcan's left leg. Otherwise, good work on the musculature. 

Well, for the most part that's Ren's doing.  The kneecaps themselves were my fault as the line-art was a bit rough and I didn't have Ren to fall back on to ask questions.

[GabrielsThoughts]

when you colored/inked you moved the knee back to where the frames linked, instead of where the knee actually was in the sketch... unless you've fixed the knee in the sketch after my suggestion. If that is the case, nice fix.   

[Tapewolf]

when you colored/inked you moved the knee back to where the frames linked, instead of where the knee actually was in the sketch... unless you've fixed the knee in the sketch after my suggestion. If that is the case, nice fix.  

I'm still not clear on what you're referring to - are you talking about the kneecap or the totality of his leg around knee height?  Because the problem with the kneecap is that I couldn't figure out exactly which of the lines to follow and tried to average them.

[GabrielsThoughts]

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d12/GabrielsThoughts/Dorcan_Ja__Fell_by_tapewolf.png



http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d12/GabrielsThoughts/DorcanSketch.png

It's a minor detail, the kneecap appears to be facing the wrong direction for the shin bone. one could do it, but not without twisting the knee uncomfortably.

it's hard to illustrate 3dimensional skeletons in two dimensions.

[WhiteFox]

It's a minor detail, the kneecap appears to be facing the wrong direction for the shin bone. one could do it, but not without twisting the knee uncomfortably.

Actually, your knee and ankle can't twist at all, at least not more then a few degrees. The ankle can pitch and roll, but not yaw. The best you can do is to pitch and yaw, and stand on the edge of your foot. The calf can't twist the same way your forearm can, either.

BTW: the inks really preserve the fluidity and energy of the pencils. Very nice.

[Tapewolf]

It's a minor detail, the kneecap appears to be facing the wrong direction for the shin bone. one could do it, but not without twisting the knee uncomfortably.

I'm still not seeing it as a major problem.  Something I'll try to improve on in future, but I'm not seeing it as bad enough for a recall, and I'm still not quite sure how it should look.

As of PF page 60, Ren decided he was going to go for the biker look for Dorcan, hence the gloves.  I guess I took it to heart here, and so I'm rather tempted to try and wriggle out of it by saying that the knees are padded (I was strongly considering colouring them differently).

However, the embarrassing truth of the matter is that as soon as I'd posted the first version to Photobucket, I realised that I'd completely forgotten to shade his right knee at all and added it quickly.  This is actually the second try, the first go was even worse.  

BTW: the inks really preserve the fluidity and energy of the pencils. Very nice.

Thanks.  There is a bit of a trick to that.  What I usually do is take the original pencilwork, double the size of it, increase the contrast until most of it is sufficiently dark, and then use a threshold filter to convert it into a 1-bit monochrome image like this:

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/projectfuture/DorcanSketch-mono.png

From there I will clean it up, fix the breaks in the lines and by this means gradually convert the pencilwork itself into the digitally-inked version.  While this sounds like cheating, it does actually take a long time and a lot of effort to do properly.  Sometimes one figure takes as long as an entire pre-inked comic - but it's more faithful to the original image than if I had traced over it.  Keaton's 18th birthday present was done this way and it took about three days until I was happy with it.

I think the first time I used this technique in anger was for the 'Male Keaton' picture:
http://tapewolf.deviantart.com/art/Notaek-106884865

As an aside, I did once try to trace Ren's lineart, on the very first strip, I think, before I'd got the hang of colouring it.  This was the result:

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/projectfuture/josh_comparison.png

...while it looks a lot cleaner, it also looks like I drew it and not Ren.  I couldn't stand the look of it, in much the same way some people hate recordings of their own voice.

[WhiteFox]

It's a minor detail, the kneecap appears to be facing the wrong direction for the shin bone. one could do it, but not without twisting the knee uncomfortably.

I'm still not seeing it as a major problem.  Something I'll try to improve on in future, but I'm not seeing it as bad enough for a recall, and I'm still not quite sure how it should look.

Actually, now that Gabriel pointed it out, it does look really awkward. The kneecap should be facing the same direction as the toes.

What I usually do is take the original pencilwork, double the size of it, increase the contrast until most of it is sufficiently dark, and then use a threshold filter to convert it into a 1-bit monochrome image like this:

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/projectfuture/DorcanSketch-mono.png

Why not scan the image at a higher resolution?

[Tapewolf]

Actually, now that Gabriel pointed it out, it does look really awkward. The kneecap should be facing the same direction as the toes.

I'll see what I can do.  I think I now see what needs to be done.

Why not scan the image at a higher resolution?

You'll have to ask Ren that one.  Judging by the size of the pencil strokes, I suspect that a lot of the sketches are physically rather small, hence the scanner may well have maxed out anyway.
Either way, the actual piece of paper is about 1600 miles away, so I can only work with what I'm given.

[Tapewolf]

Is this better, knee-wise?

http://www.project-future.org/stuff/things/DorcanCast50.png

[GabrielsThoughts]

up thumb. tooth ping. excellent!

[Tapewolf]

up thumb. tooth ping. excellent!

Cool.  I'll update the FA and DA versions this evening, so there's still time if anyone sees another issue with it.

EDIT:
Okay, the changes have gone live.

[Tapewolf]

It's 2:45 am so this probably won't make sense, but basically it's a rendition of Joshua Oswald (from Project Future), as Agent JC Denton from the classic Warren Spector game, Deus Ex.

As usual, Ren did the pencils, I did the inking and colouring.  The background was mostly poached from Ren's birthday present last month.  Hope you enjoy it, it was certain fun to do.



http://tapewolf.deviantart.com/art/Joshua-C-Denton-130890458
http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2567006/

[Kipiru]

Brilliant as usual Tape, your coloring and Ren's drawing. But what's with the old men stuff

[Tapewolf]

Brilliant as usual Tape, your coloring and Ren's drawing. But what's with the old men stuff

This is the original intro, in case you've never played Deus Ex:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKp0DP1O4bs

This is the edited version (which will only make any sense if you've seen the original) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vxi7JRJrod4&fmt=22

[Zedd]

Brilliant as usual Tape, your coloring and Ren's drawing. But what's with the old men stuff

This is the original intro, in case you've never played Deus Ex:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKp0DP1O4bs

This is the edited version (which will only make any sense if you've seen the original) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vxi7JRJrod4&fmt=22

*tosses link at Tape* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j8jMn2Kcgs

[Gabi]

I like it. Especially the bricks and the shirt. Did you use some special tool to color the bricks?
I think the hair could use some shading considering that everthing else already has some.

[Tapewolf]

I like it. Especially the bricks and the shirt. Did you use some special tool to color the bricks?

The bricks were taken from a photograph of some graffiti.  I used GIMP to tessellate them, and a certain amount of colour-correction was applied.

I think the hair could use some shading considering that everthing else already has some.

One day I'll figure out how that works.  At the moment, it makes things worse, not better.

[Tapewolf]

By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes...



Large-size versions:

http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2698946
http://tapewolf.deviantart.com/art/Something-wicked-this-way-come-134616581

...strictly I did this a few weeks ago, but I didn't really want to publicise it until we finished chapter 9 of Project Future.  This has now happened, so here we are.

This is of course, Keaton the Black Jackal's character.  You wouldn't like her when she's happy.

EDIT:
The original lineart was done by Ren as a test sketch to experiment with a new costume for Keaton.  I decided to ink and colour the pencilwork to practice for her appearance in the comic, and it turned out rather nicely, if I do say so myself.  We were originally thinking of a purple dress as was done for the birthday present, but it just didn't have that 'You're dead and so is your soul' vibe that black lends it.