#39 - "Cinematic Spectacle"

[Commissar Molotov]

Well, the latest news from GW HQ is of a forthcoming 40k movie - you can find out more at www.ultramarinesthemovie.com. This week's topic is to try to depict something that's really cinematic. Something epic, something that would catch the eye of a cinema-goer. Whether it's a gigantic explosion, a dastardly villain, a roguish hero or a hideous monster is up to you!

[russ29]

Awesome topic there Commissar Mol! I'll try my best to enter as my ideas I can here. Hopefully it'll be up to standard!

[BiGFooT]

Is the movie poster possible?

[Commissar Molotov]

Definitely!

[Chris Jones]

On the subject of new GW releases, has anyone else heard about the Warhammer 40000 Space marine game that is being developed by relic at the, hear is a link to a trailer. moment?http://www.eurogamer.net/videos/space-marine-trailer-english?size=hd

[Forgefire]

I spent a bit a bit more time on this one than intended, trying to pin as much focus i could on the champion and trying to think a bit more on composition.
Will very likely continue working on this one a bit more.

[Stugmeister]

Great job Forgefire!

The composition works really well.

[Chris Jones]

Nice work forge fire, i agree with stug, the composition works well, and i can see this being a great piece with a little more work. The only thing i will say is that you seem to have ben doing a lot of work with dwarfs lately. I dont no if you are working with an on going concept, but maybe try something different. Anyway i really like this piece.

[Forgefire]

Thanks both of you! Im glad you think it worked out well, i was using my head a bit more than i ussualy do when drawing .

Hehe yeah you are totally correct Chris, my mind has gotten stuck on dwarfes both ordinary and chaos. I have a soft spot for stunties .
Hmm maybe some greenskins would be nice for a change ive always like those crazy gobbos too .

[russ29]

Nice one Forgefire! You should take part in the WSG more often.

Anyway I'm doing a piece, and its really horrible. Let me try to tone it down a little first before showing you guys, just in case your eyes bleed.

EDIT: Forgive the horrendous work. Had a pretty trying week.(Though some good things happened. )

Anyway, this is how Commander Brightsword came to be. Pictured from Origins, a fiction from doombringer from ATT. It was too big a scale for me to handle, and I messed this one up pretty badly. Sorry guys.

[schwager]

Oh no... another week gone! It just never ends

Anyway, a bit disappointed to see so few entries this week, after all this enthusiasm over the couple of weeks before. Hopefully there'll be a few more before the deadline.

Comments so far...

@ Forgefire:
It's always a pleasure to see you contribute to the WSG... and what a great entry!
I just love the way you take on the old tall-hats. On this one in particular, the pose of the main character, his armour and helmet design are just brilliant. The overall composition is also pretty awesome. What grabs me the most, though, is how the main characters eyes are peering out from under the facemask... great job!

@ russ29:
Well, you're not selling it very well, that's for sure
Seriously mate, never apologise for your work. It's contributing that matters for a community activity like this.
As for some (hopefully constructive) crits...
The idea is great, the composition isn't bad either. It's just some of the marines anatomy that needs tweaking. The torso is quite long compared to the legs and the right arm gets a bit too small, despite the perspective. The marines left arm is in a very odd position and should probably point in the direction of the viewer some more... fingers stretched out to indicate the shock of the weapon entering his chest.
The Tau's legs and arms are a bit short, compared to the rest of his body, but the pose is pretty good.
The colours aren't my cup of tea at all, but that's just me.
Since you're doing all this digitally, I think you should try to explore (sketch) shapes over lines, starting with rough silhouettes and then refining things from there. Defining your shadows and highlights a bit better should also help the final image.
And to finish off my rant... use references, real life is best! When you're drawing a hand for example (since there are quite a few in this one), look at your own hand from different angles... it makes a huge difference, believe me


Right then, I wanted to do something clever for this week... but then I couldn't think of anything clever. So I went with the simple movie poster design approach instead. Very rough due to the usual lack of time... more of a layout study, really. Look forward to hearing your thoughts

[Striogi]

Here is a perfectly awful scan of a perfectly quick sketch. I'll upload a better one later.

My idea was to do a storyboard from a movie of the comic that I'm making for this.



how's THAT for mind bending?
A storyboard for a holoplay adaptation of the fancomic I'm making of an assault on a nonexistent world in a fictional future.


Ahh the power of a real scanner...

[schwager]

Nice one Striogi!

I was thinking of doing a storyboard myself, but in the I decided it would be too much work for the time I have available. Good on you, though.

I quite like the style you've used for this, but I would have liked to see a whole scene, rather than just one shot. Any chance you'll be doing more on this one?

In any case, great work, as usual

[Chris Jones]

Russ: Good work man, definitely a cinematic moment. Good to see you doing some work in color. Dont apologize for 'messing up', as far as i am concerned you cant really mess up a piece, i find almost every drawing i do goes through a phase where i think hmmm im not sure about how this is looking, you just have to persevere and push on through, and keep going until it looks good.

Schwager: My favorite this week I love the way you have arranged this piece, it would make an excellent poster, good job!

Striogi: Ounce again nice work, are you going to post more images to go with this one?

Ok apologies for the poor effort i hate making excuses but college has really taken over my life this week so this is about fifteen minutes of sketching around before i go to bed. Basically i saw the box for alien versus predator and i thought 'hey il steal that idea', and im sure it has been done before, kind of felt a bit lost for ideas this week, not sure why, i think i find it hard to come up with ideas when my mind is on other things. Anyway i hope to commit to next weeks theme. Good work guys.

[Striogi]

Responses:

@Chris Jones: I really dig on the parody/homage. Fantastic idea. just needs some refinement of course.

@striogi: Dude your story board would rock if it actually had some freeking ARROWS or CAMERA direction or DIALOG. you know, like a REAL storyboard. loozer.

@Schwager: It's a lovely sketch, just generally devoid of the dynamic work you normally exhibit. perhaps it would show more in the bottom of the poster.

@russ: I've probably mentioned this before, but I once had a teacher who said one thing whenever you showed him some art work.
"It's a good start" even if the piece was as finished as you could make it. His theory was that your art could always be worked on more, improved. Oh, he'd say other things too, but "it's a good start" was usually where he started.
One thing I'm always harping on is layout. Layout layout layout, and I think that's the biggest issue here (aside from it not being finished)
you might want to think about how to make the tau look even more heroic: change the camera angle, really make the marine tower over the little tau.

@forgefire: always good to see your work, dude. The eyes are drawn to your high contrast point, Axe vs. Backlight, but the upper left seems lacking and distracting for it's lack of focus. the characters are either looking straight out or in the opposite direction, their hats seem to be about the same height (ok cool) but then there's the big void above their heads. perhaps that might be a good spot for some atmospheric perspective and large monolithic objects?

in response to the questions, no I don't plan on doing more storyboards for a movie for the comic that I'm making. people understand comics more readily than storyboards and they would end up being an interpretation of Colada... changing the story further... not something I want to do.