The_PMD

Generally speaking, I don't "get" fan videos. People pick a song and then put a bunch of footage from the game with it. I shrug and go on my way, wondering why they bothered. I've stopped watching them. So, I read a couple of people raving about this video, so I figured, if people are still raving about it a year after it was made, WTH, I'll give it a watch.

To say I was pleasantly surprised would be an understatement. What an amazing video. Mr. Abyss did something I never see with these, which is use demorecord to tell an actual story! And the song choice was absolutely perfect. Kudos, and thanks for making me laugh out loud AND feel all warm n fuzzy inside.

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I'm not sure what ambient occulsion means but that 2nd attempt look FANTABULOUS!!!

Great job Sartori! !! ! ! !

Now... got a fur texture? *snickers* KIDDING!

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"Ambient Light" is the light that bounces around in a room and give a general illumination without a direct source. Light is always reflecting off things and hitting areas indirectly, so everything in a room has a little light on it.

"Ambient Occlusion" is when this indirect light is blocked out. A good example is when you put a cup or pencil down on your desk; there might not be any direct light source (and therefore no direct shadow), but there's still a darkness nder it. The mere existance of the object still causes darkness. It's "Occluding" the ambient light.

Got it? Good =)

Class dismissed.

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Is there a way in Poser to completely turn off Ambient Light? Cause when I teach in Maya, "Turn off all Ambient Light and start from scratch" is one of my first directions. Ambient Light in 3d packages is hideous.

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/e stares

/e starts to cry

I want your talent!

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Forget that. I want his PATIENCE.

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What!? Not actually drawing? And it's just as easy with a tablet? Um, heh. No.

I dont use tutorials, never have.

I use my lasso by drawing a shape with it then filling it in with my brush. It's a lot of work, but it's something I found that gives me clean lines.

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Heh. I didn't mean that you used the tutorial, just that it was the same method. But it looks like I was wrong, and you're actually far more insane than I was giving you credit for. And I, of course, mean that in the best possible way.
I stand corrected!

The method that Farlow uses might actually make your life easier and give you similar results. He draws a path and then strokes the path with the brush. The brush has Size Dynamics set to Fade, so that way each line thins out. He controls that by where he draws his path. The result is a pretty clean line with what sounds like less work than the way you do it. And it also is just as easy with a mouse than a pen, since you're more plotting your lines than drawing them. ::shrug:: You might want to consider it.

It's way too nitpicky for me. I realized long ago that "clean lines" isn't really where my style is, so I use my brush with Size Dynamics set for Pen Pressure and then I just freehand it. The lines can be really messy depending on how steady my hand is, but I prefer that style anyway.

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You do this with a mouse?


/* looke at own mouse . ...shakes it angrily ....sigh

I was impressed before . Now I am just flabergasted.

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My sentiments exactly.

I have always been impressed with those that can "draw" with a mouse.

Amazing.

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Wellll....it looks like he's using a method of inking similar to the method in the Farlow Studios tutorial, where you're not actually drawing, you're setting paths and letting the brush settings vary your line. (Correct me if I'm wrong, Tim.)That method is more "selecting the path" than it is "drawing" in the traditional sense. It's just as easy to do by mouse as by tablet.

This method is way to painstaking for me, personally, but it looks like Tim, unlike me, has patience to go along with his talent and skill.

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I hope it's to your liking, was just a wild hair to draw my friend's and my characters.

Large detail image: here

And their individual wallpapers:
Glacia
Fusiono



Enjoy
~Kash

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The picture is really good. I'd like to see more, but I also don't want you to be miserable, so I won't push

Grammar nitpick alert!!
In the DeviantArt comment, you used "respectfully" when you meant "respectively."

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Yup. I ink the basic outlines and shapes first. Then go in with the details. A step I should have also added but...oh well.

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Okay, so there IS an intermediate step of tighter pencils? Or not? Cause if there isn't, you're one crazy inking master. Well, I mean, you are anyway. Just, you know, moreso.

Okay, so stole the concept and tweaked it to fit my liking. On Virtue I made Two Year Old. I made the head as big as it would go, and used a t-shirt with the bare legs option (same color) to give him a onesie (with a heart on it.) He actually looks frighteningly like my son. I made him a Brute, so he will rush from group to group trying to keep his rage bar up, resembling the way my son tears from room to room. I went with SS/Invul so there are no fancy looking powers, just the raw unadulterated power and fury of a small child who badly needs a nap. His battle cry is "MINE!!! MINE!!! MINE!!!"

Screenshot to come!

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I just took this. I dare anyone to top it:

http://i95.photobucket.com/albums/l1...he_toddler.jpg

He's the big guy on the left. The file name is his character name.

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The Toddler is a great concept, but he should've gone with a HUGE head to fit the proportions of a toddler.

I have a year and a half old son. I think I'm going to go steal this concept on another server, but tweak it. Mine is going to be a Brute, constantly running from mob to mob to keep the Rage up. I wish we had a "Ducky" chest logo!

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Thanks for the replies.

Heh, yeah I usually clean things up but this was done just for fun. Not really meant to be a masterpiece...that's coming soon.

Usually my colors are more clean, like say in the image I did with Gill for Celtic Bolt. http://www.mmoart.com/gallery/cb.php

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Ohhhhhhhhhhhh

Okay, sorry for talking to you like a noob. Didn't realize it was you.

Oh, well, hopefully someone else learned from my comments!

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While I agree that the first is clearly superior (sorry that you feel that your unique drawings was better), I think he was saying that because he DIDN'T trace he was able to come so far. The same point you have been making.

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Hmm..on second read I think you're right.

I thought the first bunch of posters had this straightened out. Tracing and Copying freehand are two entirely different things. The poster was saying that tracing isn't always bad, but then went on to describe a way of working that is NOT tracing. (I misread it after the first sentence.) I think even the anti-tracing people here see the value in copying something freehand. I sure do. But that's very different from actually putting paper on top of a drawing (or a new layer in Photoshop) and just tracing over the lines.

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it's the superior of the two drawings

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I completely and thoroughly disagree. The first one has a much better pose and composition. Now, that's because you were copying the pose, but that's not always a bad thing. As far as the tone and detail being superior, I'm not really seeing it. And, even if I agreed on that "more detail" doesn't mean "better drawing." To be honest, it looks to me like the tracing has made you focus more on the LESS important things in drawing, like detail, while providing you little of the more important things, like learning about the underlying structures and the composition and posing.

I think your drawings prove the exact opposite point of the one you were trying to make.

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I really like it! Like above, get some typing paper instead of college rule, and it'll really really shine!

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Or use Photoshop to get rid of the yucky blue lines. If you have the scan of the original sketch on a separate layer from the colors (and, really, why wouldn't you?) you can just hide the color layer and then eliminate the lines. Either select by color, select the blue, and fill with white, or you can use the Adjust Hue/Saturation to work on just blues (or cyans, whichever they read as) and desaturate and lighten them. If the whole thing is on one layer this won't work anymore, but it's something you can do the next time before you start coloring.

If you keep the highlights on a separate layer, you can run a Gaussian Blur on them to quickly take out some of the "Basic Photoshop brush" look on them and soften them up some. Unless you like that look, of course.

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When learning to draw, does tracing help?

Cosmic

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I don't see the point of tracing, frankly. Now, copying, where you're recreating a drawing free-hand, is a time-honored technique that I think yields great results if you do it correctly. But I'm not sure that tracing really helps you understand the logic behind the lines, how the underlying structures of objects work together. I don't see much harm in it, but I wouldn't use it as a primary method of learning.

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Thanks ....I will look those up

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In addition to these fine Eisner books (Comics and Sequential Art is the BIBLE for storytelling) you also might want to check out Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud. It's a little more general than Eisner's books, a little more philosophical, but I think it makes a great complement to Eisner.

I have to say, I'm pretty fond of the Death Spiral fishy...

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He was actually meaning brush opacity. If you are using airbrush, you can chage it's opacity and you won't have to worry that much about heavy overlap.


BTW, you using a mouse or pen?

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I was meaning both, actually. Brush Opacity first, when that wasn't the problem, layer opacity.

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<;.;> odd, my opacity is at 100%... and I'm just using the normal paintbrush for most of it (the vest was airbrushed though).

<~.~> I'm prolly missing something simple aren't I?

(Using 6.0 <~.~&gt

Thanks for the feedback!

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The layer opacity needs to be set for 100% also. And you should have the airbrush button checked off. (Photoshop SIX? Im not sure I even remember that one.)

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Its not that great - I'm having a seriously weird problem with photoshop in that - I can't seem to 'let up'; if I stop holding the paintbrush down for one second; when I come back over that area, it'll overlap the previous colors and make it darker, which would be fine when I go to add shading - but its terrible when I'm trying to put in the flat color. Its weird. Trying to figure it out though.

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Make sure your paintbrush settings have Opacity at 100% when you're doing flat colors. (It's up top)

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We're all thinking it.

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LOL...I love your comics, but I also LOVE the Luddites. They're one of my favorite enemy groups in both games.

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The Luddites are bad and you should feel bad.



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The Luddites are one of the most original villain group ideas in the whole game. They have a really well-thought-out background which meshes with the overall plotlines really well, they're deceptively difficult to fight, and they have hysterical dialogue. Of the enemy groups made for CoV, outside of Arachnos, they're my favorite.

How could anyone not love the Luddites?

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We're all thinking it.

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LOL...I love your comics, but I also LOVE the Luddites. They're one of my favorite enemy groups in both games.

The overall pose is very nice. I think you fixed the belt issue.

The part that's jumping out at me right now is the angle of the shoulder pads. They're perfectly in line with each other. It's not anatomically wrong, per se, but it might be a slightly more dynamic pose if you'd gone with having the closer shoulder dropped a little more.

On his left thigh, it looks like you're inventing muscles. The line that you have drawn down the middle of the thigh isn't descriptive of an actual muscle that I'm aware of. It needs to shift slightly(I think outwardly)...check out an anatomy book.

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LOL...Yep, that's Death Spiral in my avatar.
http://www.deviantart.com/view/31990360/

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ooOOOoooo he's got a groupie! I really like that... you should post more of yer stuff, PMD Can't talk too much about yer work in Stars thread after all.

So, does this mean we get ta see th' Death Spiral fishy?

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Yeah, that wasn't me trying to threadjack, I was just showing Star where the icon is from. I should've PMed. Actually, that painting had its own thread back when I finished it and it didn't last very long, for whatever reason.

Star, you have my blessing to do a Death Spiral fishie if you so desire.

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The PMD

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There aren't enough pieces of artwork out there of Death Spiral for me to expect him to start showing up in people's drawings. This is intentional on my part. I'm the anti-TA. I basically want to be the only person who ever draws Death Spiral. (Yes, I'm selfish. So sue me.)

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Ah HAH!!! I was looking for pics of your characters to put you in there but couldn't find any!!! THAT explains why!! Ah well, that just means you get to be a blue beardy fish in the next one


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*facepalms* Okay, I was studying your avatar for your impending fishyization when it suddenly dawned on me that it WAS your character XD I hadn't realized that was a face tattoo, or even a CoX character. To be honest I thought it was some kind of really arty self-portrait.

Soooo The PMD will not be in the next acquarium (unless you have something that represents you that you aren't so attached to I can use ) But it's the thought that counts, right?

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LOL...Yep, that's Death Spiral in my avatar.
http://www.deviantart.com/view/31990360/

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Here's a start. My first subject will be my hero Cosmic Sentinel. Here are a few screenies I will be working from.

Cosmic 1
Cosmic 2
Cosmic 3
Cosmic 4

And here is the prelimanary pose sketch:

Cosmic Pose Sketch

This is going to be an in-flight pose and I'm gunning for some perspective so that his head and upper torso seem to be coming off the page. I want the right leg (Cosmic's left) to go further back into the distance. I'm not pleased with the current rendition but am not sure which way to go.

Again thanks in advance for helping me with my not so mad skills.

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It's a good start, but I think you wanna round that torso shape up a little bit. More like a kidney bean than a box. The belt line should be rounded out slightly rather than straight across.