3E art and age

[Lurks-no-More]

I'm in the 22-25 demographic, and I'm mostly positive on 3E artwork.

What I really like about the artwork is the way it keeps reminding us that D&D world isn't real medieval world. It looks more alien and more alive to me than the art in the previous editions.

There are some botches, and sometimes the artwork has a bit too modern flavor (rarely, though), but on the whole I feel it is very much improved upon the 2nd edition. (Remember those blue, clumsy line drawings that populated most of the DMG? Ugh.)

 

[Mercule]

I really do. not. get. all the fuss about the iconic art. One--ONE--the Sorceror, might induce eye-rolling at the d00dish outfit. But the rest of them?

Actually, Hennet doesn't bother me much. He's a freak who's armored everywhere except his vitals, but sorcerers are supposed to be a bit different.

The one that annoys me most is Alhandra. The spikey hair looks so lame. I can't quite put my fingure on it, but she looks decidedly un-paladinish and vaguely goth.

 

[Mercule]

Wasn't it also Fischer who did that absolutely ridiculous blackguard ilo in the DMG?

And I agree -- the armor pics are Simply Stupid.

Whoever it was who did the Blackguard did quite a few of the illos that I'm talking about as being bad -- horrid even. After looking again at my DMG, I like most of WAR's pics.

I don't know who did the iconics, but they are a mixed bag. Mialee has _no_ good pictures in anything I've ever seen. Lidda is sometimes cool looking, sometimes not. Tordek is the same. Krusk usually looks pretty bad. The druid (whassername) looks really cool except for those wierd horns. Devis usually looks okay, too.

I think a lot of the problems I have are an indirect result of the medium used (bear with me, this thought _just_ occurred to me). It looks like all the color illos are done in watercolor. They have this wierd quality of being both bright and washed out at the same time. There are no real metalic colors. Nothing really has _texture_. It's all flat.

This is really where the old Elmore pics have an edge. Whatever medium he used (probably oil or acrylic with an airbrush), steel looked like metal, not washed out grey/blue/white. Clothes looked like cloth, not polyvinyl. Hair actually had strands.

It's not breast-size or how their armor is shaped or nipple-piercing sorcerers. It's how flat the new pics are. They look like cartoons. They should be out capturing Pokemon rather than fighting dragons or orcs.

I don't like it in D&D and I don't like it in d20 Modern. They would have been better off skipping the color and sticking in pencil or charcoal illos.

 

[Darrell]

Age: 36
Feeling about 3E art: mostly positive

While there are several individual artists I dislike (Scott Fischer being among them--his stuff just looks sloppy.), I _really_ like others (Todd Lockwood, Kevin Walker, Arnie Swekel, and Wayne Reynolds being among them);
but it's really been the same for every edition.

For all the acclaim he receives from a very vocal few here, Larry Elmore's stuff is rather bland, as far as I am concerned (with a few exceptions), and Tony DeTerlizzi pretty well stunk (again, with a few--a _very_ few--exceptions).

Spikes, belts, buckles, tattoos, and the like don't bother me a bit, and those who complain about the "brevity" of Mialee's outfit would probably faint at what she (and Soveliss--and any other elf, for that matter) would be wearing in my campaign.

Regards,
Darrell King