3E art and age

[kenjib]

I'm over 35, and I'm neutral about 3E art. I think the tattooed and pierced look will look dated rapidly (and so will the real people who have done these things to themselves) but the 3E look is better than Elmore at al. I know he's popular, but I just can't stand his stuff. And why do all his women have to have a bad 80s long curly shag? Blech.

As regards real people, the tattooed and pierced look to which you are referring has been going strong for around 20 years now, which is much longer than most fashion trends last. It's staying power is kind of interesting, actually. You could be right that it might look dated in the future, but on the other hand it also might continue making inroads into the mainstream as it has consistently been doing over it's entire lifespan.

PS -- The Elmore-hair jokes are killing me. What's up with the hair? I've had more than enough of plastic boobs in fantasy art, too.

 

[kenjib]

... who are possibly the ones with the most stylised, comic-bookish artwork in the 1E books. I'm talking KODT and Dork Tower comics here.

Very good point Hong. Yes, it's true, I like Erol Otus because he invoked the old Wierd Tales era feel. I guess I was referring to his color paintings more than his line art, really. Those are the roots of the game that I like. The new artists invoke a different feel - there seems to be an injection of Shadowrun. This is a new influence on the game that I don't like. It's completely subjective, yeah. Very good point.

I guess, after all, that the "comic book" complaint is not really fair. Even so, many of the color pics in the MM (Reynolds, Wood, etc.) are still kinda cartoon-ish goofy looking to me. The wight, for example, is a great modern comic book style drawing - perhaps ala Todd McFarlane? However, that's not as creepy to me as a more realistic drawing of a deeply evil and cunning twisted walking corpse would be. Yeah, you're right though -- totally subjective. I'll just stick with the cyberpunk/goth complaint from now on. I'm totally fine with cyberpunk/goth stylings, just not in fantasy.

I'm a bit of a traditionalist for fantasy, I suppose. I do like the CoC art though, but different genre...

 

[mythago]

As Mister Six said, style never goes out of fashion.

And goodness knows, we gamer geeks wouldn't want to do ANYTHING that was considered silly or unfashionable...

 

[mmu1]

I'm not crazy about a lot of 3E art, although I think it's ok overall.

I think the guy who does the illustrations at the front of each chapter (Arne Swekel?) does amazing work, I'd have loved it if the core books just used his black and white art all the way through. I also like Wayne Reynolds' stuff quite a bit, although sometimes he makes his characters just a bit too blocky. I also like most of Lockwood's stuff.

I absolutely can't stand Fischer (sp?), I think his characters tend to be badly proportioned, low on meaningful detail, and just plain messy looking - his art looks "fuzzy" to me.

I also dislike things like Alhandra's bizzare triangular swath of scale armor, the human rogue's biker outfit, and Mialee's elven fishing vest...

The worts set of illustrations in all the core books by far, however, is the illustration of various types of armor. To begin with, most are suits, which is completely absurd, especially given the stats - no Armor Check penalty in a whole-body suit of hard leather, eh? Brilliant. Second, too many of them look the same. The scale, chain shirt, chain mail and breastplate are pretty much all an irregular, asymmetrical mess of what looks like a mix of chain, scale, and irregular metal plates. It all looks like it'd look much better on refugees from a Mad Max ripoff than fantasy characters. Not a single piece of armor, besides maybe the plate mail, looks truly functional.

 

[Desdichado]

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

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

 

[mmu1]

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

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

I believe so... Definitely a winner in the category of "Dumbest... Helmet... Ever!", if memory serves.

 

[Vuron]

Hrmm I must be unusual in wanting even more stylized perhaps even manga oriented artist conceptions. Of course I mean skilled manga artists like masamune shirow or such and not hacks. Alot of the art in 3e has no real movement expressed in the images. WAR however has excellent detail and movement in his images. It seems he has alot of comic book influences because his images are so dynamic.

Currently I would place 3e's art behind Exalted and most DP9 products on average (although without ghislain barbe DP9 art is suffering). WW can have some excellent art and really hit and miss art.

I would say however that besides the occasional Brom, WAR and DiT work that the old 2e ravenloft art as seen in the Van Richten's guides etc is my favorite as it is very appropriate for the genre and consistent in feel throughout a book.

 

[Olive]

As regards real people, the tattooed and pierced look to which you are referring has been going strong for around 20 years now, which is much longer than most fashion trends last. It's staying power is kind of interesting, actually. You could be right that it might look dated in the future, but on the other hand it also might continue making inroads into the mainstream as it has consistently been doing over it's entire lifespan.

PS -- The Elmore-hair jokes are killing me. What's up with the hair? I've had more than enough of plastic boobs in fantasy art, too.

i agree with the elmore stuff (actually i think he's amazing, just has terrible taste)...

i don't know what the penetration of tatoos into the mainstream is like in the US, but in new zealand its almost complete... the number of extended family dinners i've had where the tattooed out number the non tattooed is insane. admittedly i've got more tattoos than most of the rest of my extended family put together, but thats not the point...

 

[Vuron]

Maori don't count

 

[The Sigil]

Crud.

Now I'm going to look "dated".

WTH does that have to do with anything? I got this work done between 10 and 12 years ago. I'm already "dated" I guess, goes with the territory of being 31. Hell, we are all dated! Look around, bet you can tell that most of your friends were born quite a while ago, they have all these signs of not being fresh and new! Better get rid of that! We don't want anything "dated" around eh?

(whoa there Mr Hound... what on earth prompted THAT rant?)

Isn't the stereotypical gamer the kind that WANTS to look "dated" as opposed to "left alone on Saturday nights?" The best way to look "dated" is to wear a wedding ring LOL.

Not to hijack the thread too much but I remember reading an article by Orson Scott Card a while ago that said something to the effect of:

An artist, writer, etc. will unconsciously make assumptions about his subject matter that will date the work and usually place it in its proper place in culture... because it doesn't really occur to him that the world COULD work in any other way. The result is that ANY creative work of art will scream its datedness. His example was "I Love Lucy" - it just screams '50s - not because it's B&W or because it has status as a cultural item, but because of its attitudes toward and treatment of women (which is far from enlightened). His second example was Huck Finn - revolutionary in that it treated Jim as a round character and as human as the next person - but decidedly 19th-century when you look at the roles all the characters played.

IMO, assumptions about "what's in" in fantasy come and go - whether it be chainmail bikinis, big hair, and big boobs or piercings, tattoos, and spikes. The assumptions about "what's functional" don't change so much. In other words, "styles" may change, but the "substance" remains unchanged - stuff looks like it conforms to the laws of physics.

IMO, Elmore does fall victim to "what's in" from time to time (especially in his hairdos) but (with the exception of the aforementioned chainmail bikinis) his armor, weapons and equipment always looked more or less functional - IOW, they had substance. 3e art has (IMO) whole-heartedly embraced style to the point of marginalization of substance.

1e and 2e stuff tended to have less style, but there was style there - but it was based of off functionality and substance "underneath." I don't see that fuctionality and substance as an undergirding as much in 3e art.

As others have mentioned, the LotR movies are a terrific example of trying to marry style with substance. But you MUST start with the functionality and then add style, not the other way around. LotR started with, "well, here are the techniques for making swords - given this, how can we make swords appear different while maintaining functionality." 3e art ignores the question of functionality, IMO.

--The Sigil