m1kclark's art Reviews on Newgrounds

[Macbook Pro]

Gimme a 'B'! Gimme an 'E'!

And a "V" and an "E" and an "L" !!
Also, turn up the antialiasing. Looks like it's at 5 right now, I think it needs 11.
Otherwise, it's a simple design, but well done nonetheless.

gr33bl3r responds:

i dunno, i looked at some macbook pros and they looked pretty sharp... maybe not that sharp.

also the antiailiasing with the new render engine in blender is a little screwy... oh well, it is worth it for realtime previews and cuda support. have you tried it? if not you really should, its awesome.

thanks for the feedback.

[Concept: SMW-1]

'Goliath online!'

The drawing is good quality and shows a lot of imagination for the structure of the mech. It unfortunately suffers, in my mind, for looking a *lot* like the Goliath from Starcraft with the guns. I doubt that's worth a redesign, and since this is part of a larger world, it's perfectly acceptable to have similar elements. Nice work, looking forward to more.

Rhunyc responds:

Thanks, actually I had no clue it was anywhere near the resemblance of a Goliath. I believe the Goliath is much larger - with an enclosed pilot. I've played Starcraft 2 to see the Goliath in action once (I played zerg), so I didn't get a good glimpse of them, basically right now I'm relying mainly on my memory of them from the original Starcraft.

I've seen many many mechanized walker designs.. So there's probably a lot of minor influences I've used from different games and series.

But thanks for the kind review, and I appreciate you taking the time to let me know what you think.

[Beauty]

Truly skilled

The ears look a little odd in the details, but otherwise ... this is one of THE best portraits I've seen on this website. I really feel as if I've met the subject, because you portray her character and her humanity so clearly. It doesn't hurt that she *is* beautiful. Did you use a reference, or is this from memory/imagination?

einharjar responds:

I used reference for this one.. She was our model during sketching session. Then i decided to take her picture for future portrait studies.

Thanks for the comment. I really appreciate it.

I gotta admit, i still need alot of practice when it comes to portraits especially the ears. hahah

[Bamboo Forest]

GREAT, needs 3 finishing touches

This is a really nice render, particularly since it's almost entirely procedural! At the moment, it actually looks like something out of Pixar's 'A Bug's Life', but I believe it needs just a little work to look photorealistic.

Here are my primary critiques:
(a) The bamboo needs one more texture; there should be a sort of general, homogeneous graininess as the base color instead of pure green.
(b) That light is too bright and white, I think. Make it a softer, perhaps a touch of yellow in the color, or use an area light? The bamboo sort of looks like there's a search-light on it.
(c) I know I've said this to you before. Sorry for beating the dead horse, but please BEVEL. The joint between segments is too sharp, it should be rounded a little.

Now, I LOVE what textures you do have on the bamboo, making it look weather-beaten and so forth! And the leaves on the ground are an excellent touch: they don't need to be absolutely perfect because they are the background, but they're high enough quality that lend ambiance. And many other details are exactly right (the random tilt of the bamboo shoots, the random segment lengths, random widths, ...) :-D

Overall, I'd call this experiment a success!

gr33bl3r responds:

sweet!

thanks for the great review!

Hmmm, another texture on the bamboo for the base, you are right! that would look great! heh you caught me again... i always forget to bevel. And the light too its actually pure white with no soft size. I really like the groundcover too. it took way too long though. I love procedurals ;) my goal is to make a library of procedural environments.

Thanks so much for your excellent critique!

[Gift for Vana: Proud New Mommy]

Cute baby

I really like that baby. He is REALLY cute, and I'm willing to completely overlook the fact that 2-month-olds don't smile quite that wide. ;-) I actually want to pinch his cheeks.

The only reason it didn't get a 10 is the mother. I don't know what's hitting me wrong about her. I think it's that I expect her either to be looking at the baby, or to have her eyes closed because she is cuddling the baby with her head on his head. Or maybe I've just spent too much time around babies, iunno. It's wonderful regardless, and I think it's a really nice thing to honor their new family with this image.

Sabtastic responds:

Thanks!

I agree. There are a lot less awkward ways to cuddle a baby. lol
I'm one of those people who has little to no experience around toddlers, so when I have one in front of me to take care of, I freeze and just stare at it. Had to actually google images "Mother holding Baby" to get an idea of what the hell to draw. XD

[Traction Engine]

What gr33bl3r said

I would write my own review, except it would literally be a repeat of gr33bl3r's review. So I'll just second his recommendations and leave it at that!

[Birds On a Wire]

Critical comments

I hate to be the only detractor. All my criticism is honestly intended to be constructive.
Your tag says "Blender", which I use. Four simple things that would help immensely: (1) add a second texture to the poles and transformers to make them look "dirty", like a Clouds texture using the Colorbar to adjust how big the dirty patches are; (2) do a "Fractal Subdivide" on each telephone pole (no more than 5%-10%) to make them look less like perfect cylinders; (3) since you have a sunset in the background, your lighting should be only from the sun and orange-tinted, with less ambient white lighting; (4) and finally (and I say this to almost every 3D post on NG), please BEVEL. No object in real life has infinitely-sharp edges, so make all your hard edges softer (for example, the transformers and cross-bars on the poles).
Really, though, the biggest flaw in the image is the birds. (Sorry.) First, the bird model is underdeveloped. The wings are clearly single flat polygons; they should have some depth, made in 3D instead of 2D, and maybe give them layers (either in the model or in the texture) to represent the different layers of feathers in a real bird's wing. Also, just about everything about the bird needs more polygons, as it looks like a 3D model at the moment. You might want to play with "Add Modifier" -> "Subsurf" to make a more detailed, less angular bird model.
The second problem with the birds is actually the hardest problem to tackle: they all look exactly the same. It's an excellent use of "DupliVerts", I must say, but there needs to be *some* kind of variation between the birds. I know this is bloody hard to accomplish with "DupliVerts" in Blender with just one model. BUT, you can make 3 or 4 resting-bird models, and try to mix and match them so the birds don't look quite so uniform. Or, after using "DupliVerts", use Ctrl-Shift-A to "Make Dupli Objects Real", after which you can modify each bird individually. An easy thing to do is to mess with scales in X, Y, and Z independently and do some slight (1-5 degree) rotations on each bird in all directions. These tricks will help mask the fact that all the birds are from an identical model.

THAT SAID: Your use of textures is excellent, and the geometry of the landscape is perfect. The overall vision for the image is high quality; in fact, if you don't Full View it, the picture looks wonderful as it stands. Most of the critiques above were because I stared at the thing in Full View for a while. You, like many 3D artists on NG, don't have the technical knowledge that I have, but are a FAR better artist than me because you have the *vision* and imagination to generate a captivating image.
Don't let the details get you down, and I hope I've offered helpful advice.

gr33bl3r responds:

thank you!

Thank you for all of the honest criticism! it is actually surprisingly hard to come by at this point.

you're pretty much spot on on the poles, looking at them now they do look a little fake. ill have to play with the textures, possibly a displacement modifier. good point on the lighting as well, my fill light is way too strong.
you really are also quite right about the birds, i really didnt put as much effort into the bird model as i probably should have. and as for the subdivision surfaces, you are probably right, i just have to be careful not to overdo it. im already pushing half a million polygons ;P

thanks again for the great review! and by the way I think that you are a very good artist.

[Blackness]

Very nice!

Post the others, I'd like to see.
I tried the two-tone thing (in my profile, if you're even mildly interested), but somehow missed the essence of the image. You captured the essence here, so well done indeed!

jewdozer responds:

Couldn't find your 2tone stuff but your 3d stuff looked very nice. The other panels to this might get me banned, they have sexual violence in them of the most degrading kind. Thanks for your comment.