Hey all, just got done remaking an old digital painting, just wanted opinions on it.

http://www.deviantart.com/view/3771350/ (Broken Wings)

Also, was curious what you all thought about this one

http://www.deviantart.com/view/3580133/ (Transcendent)

-Large- image though, takes a little while to load.... I consider it some of my best work, but I haven't had anyone give me any useful comments on it yet. I realize that Photoshop + Time does not necessarily equal ART, so I'd like some open, honest opinions on these, along with any suggestions you may have for improvements.

Thanks ahead of time!

Howdoo Rhalin:

Nice work, I love fallen angels

in the Broken Wings piece, I would either change the font on the lettering to something that's a bit more eclectic or just get rid of it all together. To get away from that hallmark moment.

I would also like to see some dark color in the background to give the shadows some charachter.

Last I would like some subtle details such as a hint of facial detail, the light mingling with the robe in the back could be fun to play with. The way the cloth is hanging off the front off the head seems to defy gravity a bit.

I dig the subject matter and the painterly color choices...

As for Transcendent, I think that this is good piece, maybe a little work but not to much. Once again I would like some subtle details to finish the piece off however your imagination decides. Good work.. You could easily work a figure into the clouds or simpy finihs it off as an abstraction.

Sonicgoo wrote:Howdoo Rhalin:

Nice work, I love fallen angels

in the Broken Wings piece, I would either change the font on the lettering to something that's a bit more eclectic or just get rid of it all together. To get away from that hallmark moment.

Yeah, I originally had the lettering in cursive, but I had to make it way too big to be readable. In all actuallity, I was planning on making the image print-size for 20x30, and the text would be -much- smaller. But I -had- been thinking of removing it entirely. It really doesn't add anything to the piece, and was really just put in there for myself.

I would also like to see some dark color in the background to give the shadows some charachter.

Last I would like some subtle details such as a hint of facial detail, the light mingling with the robe in the back could be fun to play with. The way the cloth is hanging off the front off the head seems to defy gravity a bit.

*nods* noted on the darker color, I'll give it a look.

I actually had quite a bit more facial detail at one point, but it just didn't seem to fit, so I blurred it back out. I may try it again, but I don't know if it's going to come out any different.

And yeah, I had the same feeling on the hood seeming to defy gravity, I just hadn't found a good solution to fix it with my painting style

Sonicgoo wrote:I dig the subject matter and the painterly color choices...

As for Transcendent, I think that this is good piece, maybe a little work but not to much. Once again I would like some subtle details to finish the piece off however your imagination decides. Good work.. You could easily work a figure into the clouds or simpy finihs it off as an abstraction.

I've actually got pretty good ideas to finish this one off, the hard part for me is doing them at the resolution the image is currently at. I was going to work some neat abstract/scenery into the background, but at 4500x3000, my computer is having a hard time keeping up with me =( I'm thinking I may have to wait untill I can afford an upgrade to finish it the way I want to.

Thanks for the info though, definately confirmed some things I wasn't sure about if people would notice or not and brought some other things to my attention.

I like the 2nd one very much. You'll have to tell me how you do all that.

Both have a nice ethereal quality & I rather enjoyed them... I would agree, tho, that they could uze slightly more detail 2 really make 'em "pop"

Ok, I've spent the day pawing over Broken Wings, trying a few things here and there to improve her based on the comments people have made...

Here's the result so far...

http://www.deviantart.com/view/3783549/

I'm inclined to stay away from adding -too- much detail to her, because again, part of the feeling is the vagueness. However, I did spend quite a bit of time touching up various areas... for instance he got a major face lift and I played with the fog a little more. The problem is that it's hard to see most of that on an image that size (it's only 1/4th the full size so people could view it easily)

Just to give you an idea though, I took pic of her face at full size:
http://www.deviantart.com/view/3783587/

much more detailed, but I'm still trying to maintain the subtle style that this piece feels like it needs to me.

Her hood still seems to defy gravity a bit, but its better than it was... Also, I'll only be including the text on the 20x24 print. Anything smaller and it just gets in the way. I'm still playing with some ideas for the background, but I may end up deciding to leave it how it is.

vicious_blood wrote:I like the 2nd one very much. You'll have to tell me how you do all that.

umm.... mostly hours upon hours of work, and a heck of a lot of luck =P While thats not entirely untrue, I may be posting an anatomy(brief walkthrough) of the Trancsendent pic to let people in on it's evolution.

Thanks for the comments folks, they've been a great help so far =)