DJ's Den

[BentonGrey]

Wow.  Just...wow.  That is fantastic, DJ.  The work on the wings is particularly impressive.  I can't believe how good that whole skin looks in action.

[deanjo2000]

Simply beautiful 

[Podmark]

I love it!

[Cyber Burn]

This is stellar and gorgeous already. I'm so very impressed by your work, DJ. The cape-wings are insane. I love it.

Part of the credit on the cape-wings goes to AA and his Classic Banshee skin.  I spent some time studying what he'd done on that skin's cape-wings and combined what I learned from said studying with what I know about painting drapery to get what you see.


And now, Siryn finished:

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Ortho

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Screaming


I'm still tinkering with different styles for my female faces and while this one isn't that bad, something about the eyes still bothers me....they fit the wireframes perfectly but they just seem "off" to me still.  Going to have to go back and do some more studying, I guess. (Forgot to include a close up pic of the face....eh....might post it Tuesday...we'll see how folks respond to this...)

Definitely a fantastic piece of Art DJ, but I get what you're saying about the eyes. I think the eyes, in and of themselves, are actually pretty spot on, I think what seems "off" (At least to me), are the eyebrows. Look at the pic below, the center pic, and those seem more accurate. The thicker, more defined look, definitely the way to go.

[detourne_me]

Gorgeous skin DJ. And as always that skope is picture-perfect, too, WB.

[Deaths Jester]

Here's the close-up of the face on Siryn:



Now on to other stuff.....

[Deaths Jester]

I'm beginning to think that the problem I'm having with the eyes - both on Siryn and on Dani Moonstar - revolves around the fact that they seem...lifeless.  They just seem dead to me - Vamp had that problem too - not vibrant and full of life like some of the other eyes I've done in the past - while not perfect, Boom Boom's worked better even if they were hidden behind a pair of glasses.  It's this style I'm tinkering with, I think..but I'm not quite sure...going to have to continue to tinker with female skins to see if I can get it right.

[daglob]

Looking at a blow up of these two you might make the eyes lighter and add a white highlight. I use the line tool and try to do just one pixel. At times this may make them cartoony, but you can adjust between the shades and see if you can make it work.

[SickAlice]

A trick, and I'm not sure why I forget to use it anymore myself, is put a little speckle on the reflection texture where the eyes would be. Human eyeballs are naturally moist and that will give your works a "living" effect.

[Deaths Jester]

I went back to my books and tutorials and dug around for answers on the eye problems. While this setup looks okay on a male mesh, the female meshes show off the fact that the underlying shape and build of the eye are just a tad off. Add to that the fact that the eyelashes are a bit too...cartoony (?)/solid draws even more attention to it.

I'm going to have to pay attention to that and spend some time with my books on the next female skin I do (will be a bit as WB was having comp probs last I talked to him so I'm looking at a few other skins at the moment) to make sure I get things right.

[Deaths Jester]

Some of my older pics will start showing up as not there anymore as I'm moving my future images over to Imugr instead of Photobucket (even if I seem to be the only one that hasn't been affected by their new plans).

[Deaths Jester]

I had previously asked Unko permission to skin a few of his Weird World characters and having just received Painter 2015 (updated my old Painter 11 finally), I decided to tinker around and see what I could do.  So here's Unko's Dorian Grave (original idea here):

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Ortho

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Face Up close


I see some problems with it but that's mainly my thing and the fact I'm not 100% comfortable using 2015 yet (they changed the GUI a bit since 11..so having to relearn a little)..still not bad for a tinker piece.

[BentonGrey]

Ohh, very nice DJ!  I love the work on the stitches.

[Cyber Burn]

Agreed, the stitch work is very nice. As is the cloth texture on the Mask, as well.

[Podmark]

Very nice, and creepy.

[UnkoMan]

I've already seen this but still humbled you would skin one of my characters.
You do top notch work!

[Deaths Jester]

So, I decided to tinker with my style a bit and see how realistic I could make a face with Painter 2015, FF's graphic engine, and a mouse (because that's all I use is a mouse).  What follows is still extremely early, I've still got another 3 or more hours to work on the face (already spent 2 and a half to get here plus an hour or so staring at a tutorial, trying to decide how to recreate what I saw with nothing but a mouse).  Anyways, still more work to do...thus the slightly blurry look also on some areas...

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Face - Early WIP

[daglob]

Ooooo... nice.

[Cyber Burn]

Not on my best day, could I ever do something that awesome.

[Deaths Jester]

An hour and a half or two hours further in and it looks like the eyes nose and mouth are pretty well set..though there might be some minor tweaks to do and some very light highlights/warmth passes on certain sections.  Still quite a bit to go...am avoiding putting eyebrows and hair on this right now because I know that realistic blonde hair is going to kick my arse and take forever (even masters of art agree with me on that).  Also avoiding texturizing the finished parts just yet...want to make sure everything fits together perfectly before the final few passes.

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Probably another couple of hours of refinement followed by an hour or so of tightening it all up (not counting the extra hours I'll probably spend staring at it and books/tutorials trying to figure out stuff - the horrors of being self taught and mouse-only-centric) and the face section will be pretty much done...hopefully...

[Cyber Burn]

Ok, now I have to ask. What size TGA/DDS are you working with that allows you to get that kind of detail?

[Deaths Jester]

I work at 512 by 512 almost exclusively. Been using that size ever since I started skinning for FF almost 15 years ago.

It's really less about the size - I could do this in 256 by 256 and get similar results - and more about time and stroke opacity. I've spent a lot of time zoomed in on the face laying strokes set to 5 or 10% opacity, layer after layer (current count for the file is somewhere around 150 layers or more but only 100 are the face).

[Deaths Jester]

Started in on the hair Saturday and after two and a half hours this is what came about:

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Came back on Saturday and finished it up with another three hours of work:

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360

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From the top down

I've still got to go in and put in the shading from the hair on the face, some texture work on the face, and a minor hue/saturation pass on the flesh before I'm done with the head.  Once I finish that up, I'm going to take a few days off from this and get some other stuff done (start up to the tablet piece, redesign the outfit for this character, write some other stuff, sleep...stuff) before coming back to this...

Post-edit: Hair shows where FF's graphic engine fails for realism.  Being unable to create strands and such kills some of the realism, unhappily.  Oh well...probably the closest I can come to.

[Deaths Jester]

<channels Rorshasch> Lots of views, no comments. Hrmmm....realism unwanted? Just another regular DJ thing? Trip thru the scummy side of city to get answers. Hope enough ambulances available...

[Podmark]

Well I think it looks great. The hair has a nice grainy element to it, and having worked with that mesh piece before I know how difficult it is to skin.
I've mostly been wondering who it is...

[BentonGrey]

Looking great, DJ! 

[Deaths Jester]

You won't know who he is, Pod, because he's going to be a revamped version of one of Prem's Evengers - much like that group pic I showed earlier.

[Cyber Burn]

I'm still just blown away by the level of detail that you have using a mouse.

[Deaths Jester]

Remember, CB, I've been painting with a mouse for a LONG time (self taught on it, in fact) so I've had time to experiment and find means to create what I'm looking for. For something that might take an artist with a styllus one motion might take me longer and are more complex/against the grain (my most often used brush for all my work is the airbrush - a brush most folks advise against using or use only for a few minor things) but they work for me. I actually don't think I could transition to a styllus now because I'd have to trash years of experience and start off brand new.

Edit: I've also got a whole collection of books and tutorials that I can drag up and study. Most are for Photoshop CS and onwards and wacoms but I've learned over time how to adapt what's presented to Painter, Photoshop 7, and a mouse.

[deanjo2000]

I'm the same, mouse and self taught too. I wouldn't have a clue with any other method now