Aaron Litz's (maybe not so cruddy after all!) art for his new character

[Aaron L]

Well, this is more pencil and photoshop, but I didn't really think it fit into the computer art category.


My newest character is a Grey Elven Duskblade. He's a bright, shining elven knight, decked out in mithral full plate, with a razored mithral heavy shield of bashing (I took the shield specialization, improved shield bash, and agile shield fighter feats, as well as somatic weaponry allowing me to cast while fully armed and bearing my shield, and I plan on getting the shield the speed enchantment and maxing out it's weapon enhancements as well as defensive enhancements, making into a truly powerful piece of magic.)


Anyway, I spent several hours doing the initial development of how the shield looks. It's supposed to be mithral with gold inlay. I was going for the feel of the shield that the elf in the 1st Edition Monster Manual was holding, and will probably do the same with his helm. Here it is:

I did my best to show the razored edges and give it a metallic sparkle using some photoshopping.


The symbol on the shield is his sigil (which I always make for any arcane magic-using character, seeing it as an important detail.) Here is the original of it:

Here is his sword, which I'm still not done working on. It's pure photoshop work. I have a much higher resolution version, in which you can read the Espruar runes (which I intend to change to Sindarin) and see that the anthropomorphic head on the pommel has pointy ears.

Here is the lower res version:

Here is the character, Valarion Greymoon, sans armor, which is just a direct scan of what I drew in pencil:

Tonight I'm going to start working on his Mithral Full Plate, which should take a while for me to finish. When I'm done I'll post it here if anyone's interested.


Any comments and/or criticisms are welcome. I started my college career in art but decided I didn't have the dedication or aptitude to crank out commercial art, but I still like to consider myself something of an artist and draw all the time. I wish I could paint and color things better, but I have no talent in that area, and can only really do line art.

 

[Aaron L]

Tonight I did up Valarion's coat of arms, in the Tolkien elvish style.

 

[Acquana]

A Piece of Advice ...

First off, never say your art is cruddy if you're bothering to put it up for display. Have some faith in whatever you're doing.

Second off, I'm actually impressed with that character sketch. There may not be rendering or detail, but the style has a great deal of character. One minor thing, try adding pupils to the eyes and it will fill out the expression nicely. Keep it up, dude! Let's see some more.

 

[jgbrowning]

With no arms, how does he wield his sword and shield?

joe b.

 

[Berandor]

With no arms, how does he wield his sword and shield?

joe b.

Didn't you read the second post? He's got a Coat of Arms (it's in DMG II, most likely).

 

[Aaron L]

First off, never say your art is cruddy if you're bothering to put it up for display. Have some faith in whatever you're doing.

Second off, I'm actually impressed with that character sketch. There may not be rendering or detail, but the style has a great deal of character. One minor thing, try adding pupils to the eyes and it will fill out the expression nicely. Keep it up, dude! Let's see some more.

Thanks!

I try to do ,ore detail with the eyes, but I always end up making them look like pinprick, beady little eyes that look totally unnatural and unnerving. But I will give it a try.

 

[Aaron L]

One minor thing, try adding pupils to the eyes and it will fill out the expression nicely. Keep it up, dude! Let's see some more.

Actually, here's an older drawing of mine, Malachi, the greatest (and ugliest!) Ranger in all of the world of Camathria. I'm rather proud of this one, it came out just the way I'd wanted and captures him perfectly.

He's human, he's just got a honker on'im that'd make a gnome jealous

How do the eyes look on him? With Valarion I was going for the mystic looking, "Storm" type look, but Malachi is a more down to Earth kind of character.

I really do appreciate the constructive criticism!

 

[jgbrowning]

Didn't you read the second post? He's got a Coat of Arms (it's in DMG II, most likely).

Where's the monkey in the corner for the drum splash....?

joe b.

 

[Acquana]

Actually, here's an older drawing of mine, Malachi, the greatest (and ugliest!) Ranger in all of the world of Camathria. I'm rather proud of this one, it came out just the way I'd wanted and captures him perfectly.

How do the eyes look on him? With Valarion I was going for the mystic looking, "Storm" type look, but Malachi is a more down to Earth kind of character.

I really do appreciate the constructive criticism!

Criticism-wise, I like the amount of character he's got. I'm actually really impressed with this one, because it shows you actually have a good handle on how the skull is shaped. Even though it's a charicature, the head is properly shaped and most of the features are well-spaced. The shapes for the hair are nice ... From a profile I can't see what you were saying about your eyes being wonky. From what I can see it's pretty solid. *thumbs up* Pretty good! I saw people at art school do a lot worse, really. I'm anxious to see more. ^_^

 

[Aaron L]

Criticism-wise, I like the amount of character he's got. I'm actually really impressed with this one, because it shows you actually have a good handle on how the skull is shaped. Even though it's a charicature, the head is properly shaped and most of the features are well-spaced. The shapes for the hair are nice ... From a profile I can't see what you were saying about your eyes being wonky. From what I can see it's pretty solid. *thumbs up* Pretty good! I saw people at art school do a lot worse, really. I'm anxious to see more. ^_^

Thank you! That really mens a lot to me, and is the nicest thing(s) anyone has said to me all year. Here are a few more unrelated drawings, most of the rest of the stuff I have scanned. Any more comments and criticisms are welcome, I'm taking them to heart and trying to use them to improve my skill.

Here is Rheathiir Iliphar Vytheryl N'Vyn, my 19th level Gold Elven Fighter4/Wizard2/Bladesinger10/Eldritch Knight3, who is currrently teaching swordsmanship, spellcraft, history, and Arcana at the Evereska College of Magic and Arms (until our DM gets the wherewithal to create another game for us, what with our near-Epic levels and all. He's promised to have one for us soon!) This is him without his amor on, and the way he looked for most of his early career:

If you can see the tatoo on his arm, that is his Bladesinger sigil, and if you can make out the symbol on the upper edge of his glove, that's his Wizard sigil (remember I said I like to make sigils for all my arcane casters! Especially in the Realms, where I think a Wizard's sigil is important, what with Mystra's Three-Fold Curse and all.) I figured two separate arcane casting classes warranted two different sigils, and it gave me the opportunity to be more creative. (I really like devising magical symbols ) His Bladesinger sigil is actually an altered form of the Kanj for Strength.

Here is the profile of Rhaethiir's head:

I kind of got the idea for his hairdo from Nester from Nintendo Power magazine way back in the late 80's/early 90's, and went from there. He keeps it held up with magic, a Hairclasp of Prestidigitation, a Wondrous Item that he had commissioned in Silverymoon.

You know, I think I figured out the eye thing: I like to leave elven eyes blank and featureless to give them that "mysterious" look, kind of like sunglasses, if that makes any sense.

And finally, here is Rhaethiir's elven chainmail:

The figure wearing it has no features because I figured it's just a mannequin, and all I was worried about was the armor. I based it heavily on the exquisite elven chainmail Todd Lockwood drew for Storm Silverhand in the FRCS (and later embellished upon even more beautifully in the 3.5 DMG.) I altered it quite a bit, making the skirt shorter so it would be less cumbersome in the leg area; I consider it to be the special cut of elven chain made specially for Bladesingers, and call it Bladesinger's Mail (with my DM's kind cooperation.) Mechanically, it's actually Everbright Elven Chainmail of Nimbleness +3, and it shines like polished liquid moonlight (I just wish I was more adept a coloring things, I've never been good a that with pen and ink, and I;m still learning with Photoshop.)

Not, to get to work on Valarion's Mithral Fullplate of Nimbleness, and revamp his Razored Heavy Mithral Shield of Bashing! (that's going to take a while! I've gotten better at Photoshop by leaps and bounds over the past week ) I seriously enhanced Valarion's sword, too; here's a peek:

You may have noticed almost all of my drawings are unfinished and/or very rough drafts; thee is a reason for this. I have Attention Deficit Disorder, and it makes it hard (near impossible) for me to continue concentrating on anything beyond a certain point. Even things that I truly and dearly love to do, like drawing, I am unable to ever fully complete, and just eventually get to a point where I am so frazzled and unable to concentrate on it any longer that I have to abandon it. Sometimes, when I am very lucky, I am able to return to a piece that I really like and continue working on it, but it's unfortunately pretty rare that I can do that. That's why I decided to change majors away from Art in college: I just wasn't ever going to be able to create finished, marketable products.

Now I can just focus on drawing solely for my love of drawing, not have any pressure on me about it, and truly enjoy it again.


And again, thank's so much for the kind words and constructive criticism, it really does mean a lot