m1kclark's art Reviews on Newgrounds

[robotday2011]

Good geometry, but...

First off, your models are good. Each character and object are well-designed and look very distinct even in this group of characters. You also put a lot of modeling work in the background, which gives the image far more scope than if you had put a wall or an image. And the content of the image (a ragtag group made of robots, humans, and that rock-thing) is also an excellent choice.

However, this is what I like to call "good to first order", meaning it's excellent beginner work. To make it really look like something, ALL of your materials need to be deeper than they are. The jeans need very fine noise to reflect how actual denim has a lot of color variations; the blue texture on the ground isn't high enough resolution for the object you put it on, and I can see the bicubic interpolation; the texture on Rockman is excellent, but it also needs a normal map or "bump" map so that it looks like its made of separate rocks instead of a single rock with lines drawn on it; every material needs work in the specularity (how the light shines off of it, not how it reflects off of it); and many of your materials need additional layers of noise or color-mixing, and the steel especially could use some mirror-reflectivity.

Finally, there aren't enough polygons. You have a lot of smooth surfaces that are pretty clearly (to me) made of only a few polygons, so the smoothing is uneven across the surface (e.g. look at Silver Robot's body, with all of the uneven lighting and reflections as if it were made of clay instead of steel).

This looks to me like an excellent project for an animation course (i.e. given that you are still learning how to do it), but my comment is meant to tell you that even one more hour's work would substantially improve the model and image.

Veinom responds:

thank you for the long and fair review. you sure know a lot about 3d! and yes you are right, some textures and some models could have a lot more detail. But if you consider the number of elements this image contains, im sure you will understand that for one guy's work this already has a lot of detail. Also I wanted the robots to look like they are made by something else. other than metal. Like they evolved in a way.
I wasnt going for realism and there is a lot of bump mapping, it just doesnt show much. Also, all these characters are animated and rigged, they are not just statues. There is a whole world behind them which took me 6 months to model and animate :)

[Alien face]

Clay model

I'm going to try to be thorough. I think the antennae set the bar: they are well modeled and they look smooth and organic, as if a real creature would have this exact structure. The overall head shape as well is good.

The real problem is the extrusions and intrusions. It looks (to me) like you made the head, and then "sculpted" the ear features, the mouth, the eyes and the nose. This method is very messy, as you can see the ear-channel is not straight or smooth, but "noisy" if you will. The mouth has that problem, too, and the nose has a lot of discontinuities. Honestly, most of these problem can easily be solved by "smoothing" all the features that you sculpted.

I'll compare this to making a model with clay. The head and antennae look like you spent time and effort on their shape, but the other features look like you sort of mashed pieces of clay onto the head to make it look recognizable. If this is the style you were going for, I'm okay with that, but then you should make the antennae and the chin also look "noisy".

And that line down the middle? That's a "normals" problem: the faces are "pointing" in opposite directions, so the smoother doesn't really know what to do in the middle.

Asandir responds:

Well, the whole program that I used for it, works indeed like building something with clay, I guess I will use the smooth function more in the future.
Thank you for your constructive review :)

[Trains of War]

Wow!

Every image has good parts and bad parts. In this image, your good parts are AWESOME and your bad parts are still fairly good, just not as good as the rest.

The bottom half of the image is flawless. There's really intricate details on the trains and in the textures that make it feel real. The choice of lighting and reflections is also quite realistic, and you paid a lot of attention to details.

The top half has some problems, though. The two human models are only okay-looking, and unfortunately that gives away the fact that the image is 3D. The top's background, too, is lacking in details and seems there just to fill space.

The real center of the story is the trains, and I would altered the camera's angle to make the trains fill the space. However, despite all that, this is still a wonderful render!

BHVampire responds:

Men, thank you very much for your review, raly helpful... And you are Right, I did not know what was missing from the picture, and you gave me the answer completely, I will improve the scene and make a new render with your recommendations, again, thank you very much men... Was an awesome review...

[I-N-S-L-T]

Simple but elegant

It is certainly a convincingly realistic room, even if it is lacking any non-background features. There is a lot of creativity here, too, and I like how you lit the model. I particularly noticed the lights up on the ceiling: cool! The background image looks a bit stretched, but that's really the only give-away that this is computer-generated instead of a set for a movie or something.

BHVampire responds:

Hey Men... Your Reviews are very Interesting and I am Very Grateful with that... You are the only person who see all the details, I feel Great when a person looks for a miss detail... Rely, I have not enogh words to describe your reviews, Just Thanks :)

And... Other thing.... Rely the Background is streched??? XD.... Is a blow to the stomach, thanks for tell me about that........ :P

[Robot]

Robot Day 2011 entry?

You should re-tag with "robotday2011" to submit to NewGround's Robot Day contest, too.

The shading and reflections, particularly that glow, are wonderful and nice to look at. The perspective is also fantastic, highlighting the dragonfly and the robot with equal weight while delivering the robot as huge. The attention to detail on the robot's structure really convince me that he's made of metal, and a really polished and shiny metal at that! The logo on the forehead, the sharp angles for the eye-rims, and the reflections on the shoulders are all wonderfully explicit details. The level of detail is so good, in fact, that even in full-view it remains intricate. And THEN, there's the lack of color, the apathy of the robot's black and featureless eyes, the absence of background action. You manage to tell us, unequivocally and with such deliberation, that this humanoid robot is completely devoid of humanity.

It's a fantastic piece in technique, delivery, and content. And at worst, it deserved to be entered into robotday2011. In the meantime, it might be the next picture to hang on my office wall.

J-qb responds:

thanks for the indepth review, glad you like it

[Leaves nothing to B remembered]

Great idea, with flaws

I love the three-headed dragon idea, and the idea that the three heads are individualized even though they are part of the same creature. Some critical comments:

- Other than the robot's chest-light shining onto the hill, there's very little shading and many features, though detailed, seem really flat.

- Cyborg-head looks distinctly anime, Android-head looks more like a painting, and Robot-head looks somewhere in between. Meanwhile, the moon looks like a pencil sketch. This gives the piece an "unfinished" feel, even if it's done.

- From middle-right to lower-right looks really blurry and unfinished. What happened there? It's missing the detail of the rest of the piece.

- There's no uniform sense of scale. Those pine trees look 50 feet tall, except they're about the same size as 5 steps on the stone stairs in the lower-middle, and they're also about the same size as the stones in the path itself. I'm not sure if this dragon is 3 stories tall, 30 stories tall, or taller than the Sears tower.

I think you've got a great idea here, and you should keep playing with GIMP, as it is really powerful. (Although I think your computer has problems if you can't get Photoshop or GIMP to run correctly.)

Ramatsu responds:

yes, It is slightly unfinished , I should have referenced the moon but over all due to my schedule and this being for a tourney. I found it best just the way it is and turn it in as it is now. And plus the programs weren't really being cooperative, but be on the look out.. When I get my tablet I will re-edit this and post the updated version.

[Portrait of a Woman]

What 'negative space' means?

Although the ruled paper's lines interfere with the drawing, they also lend it a surreal sense. The shading is sufficiently realistic that I easily imagine this as a three-dimensional object, but then the transparency that is "white" instead of "shaded" sort of gives it away as a 2D image ... and that confuses my brain in a good way.

I mean, the drawing itself is really nice and I think you've captured how a face with humanity should look. But my favorite part is still the ruled lines peeking through the transparent negative space.

Bryony responds:

Not intentional, but thanks!

[Revolver]

Keeps getting better

You're right that the metal material is just ... off somehow. I can't pin down how at all, so you should try something different. Maybe a lighter gray, with similar reflectivity, and some kind of (not sure what) texture that gives the metal that "scratchy" look that you see in your silverware.

But otherwise this is a really nice image. The lighting, reflections, and maps all look pretty photo-realistic, and you've come a LONG way since the spas-12!

Dawn-Breaker responds:

Haha always good to hear from you :D, and I'm glad to see that you notice the improvements.

I agree on the material by the way.. I'm having a hard time adding that last touch to finish the whole look but I'm going to upload another one with a different metal and all.. so stay tuned!

[Giant Beach Pixel Banner]

Seriously

I just kept nerd-gasming, from Falcore to Phantasm to Sloth to the Crane Kick, it just kept getting better and better the more I looked.