Lord of Atlantis as Aquaman is something I've always wanted to do, and I had time last week to complete a playset. Normally on stuff like this I will paint the border, but somehow on this particular set I felt that it looked good left as white. Maybe it's just the way it frames the heavy amounts of blue, I dunno. I'd love to hear opinions on this, because I am unsure of my decision.
Even when I'm not a fan of cartoon/comic alters, I like the way those look with white frames. Anyway, you can try to scan them and change their border's colors to see how they feel that way to your eyes.
Ya gotta start somewhere, right?
@ Kalaber: I'm obviously also a beginner, but if I may critique your work: the color and style matching look good, but the borders are still visible through the paint. You may have to change your paint's consistency or add another layer. Also, your signature is big and a bit messy - maybe go for something a bit less obtrusive?
Thanks Fredo, I appreciate the feedback. Those were the first time I tried adding a sig. I'm not really a fan. I think I'll just go sig-less for now.
@Sandre: Those are simply stunning! The line work is flawless, specially in the Seas and Joker. I haven't seen any comic work I can remember from you and it is great when an artist surprises the comunity painting outside his/her style. Both thumbs up for you!
Thanks for the feedback on my first alter & for answering some of my questions.
Here's the other project I've been working on:
These are collectively my second alter. Much easier than the first one, but still tricky. I actually tried 3 different methods of transferring the shape directly onto the card.
In case anyone missed it, this was my very first attempt at an alter:
I don't really have any artistic background or any experience with painting, so this has been a bit of an ordeal for me, but it's pretty rewarding too.
I'm wondering, does anyone have any tips for avoiding obvious brush strokes / texture? You can see in the blacked-out lands above that in some lighting, the strokes are visible (and not super great looking really).
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
Forestninja... those lands are... amazing. I love them, holy cow. If you don't mind, what method did you wind up using to transfer the image to the card?
Forestninja... those lands are... amazing. I love them, holy cow. If you don't mind, what method did you wind up using to transfer the image to the card?
Thanks, Scotty!
Method 1: Carving the image into the card. Very precise, but damages the card and is slightly visible in some lighting. I used this for the swamp. I had tried doing the soft pencil on the back of the image and transferring it like carbon paper, but that didn't work at all, nothing transferred because the card was glossy. That's when I noticed I was denting the card a little anyway, and just went with it.
Method 2: Carbon paper. Doesn't transfer well to the glossy surface of the card. Leaves a messy edge to the lines and doesn't come off the card - the best you can do is smudge it into a faded gray or else paint over the lines entirely (making your image look skinnier than you wanted). I used this on the plains and mountain.
Method 3: Stencil. Requires a lot of cleanup with the toothpick, but yields a great end product and automatically gets a base coat down around the hardest parts to paint. This is what I'm going with if I ever do these again. I used it on the island and forest.
I'll probably make more of these someday, maybe with white or with the colors of the lands instead of black, although black is pretty awesome.
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
@ forestninja: very cool concept, those lands! Looks incredible.
Probably hard to do for the red and white mana symbol, but for the others I could see a template work out well - cut the shape you want out of a piece of cardboard, stick it to the card in such a way that you can remove it without damaging the card and just spray paint the card black. Should result in a nice even black without any visible brush strokes (obviously), and it would be very easy to do lots of cards conveyor belt style.
@ BlackBull: nice design, can't wait to see how it'll turn out!
@ Sandreline: awesome stuff! You make some beautiful landscapes, I'm a fan!
@ forestninja: very cool concept, those lands! Looks incredible.
Probably hard to do for the red and white mana symbol, but for the others I could see a template work out well - cut the shape you want out of a piece of cardboard, stick it to the card in such a way that you can remove it without damaging the card and just spray paint the card black. Should result in a nice even black without any visible brush strokes (obviously), and it would be very easy to do lots of cards conveyor belt style.
Thanks Fredo! I thought the same thing about red/white. That is why I tried the carbon paper on those two. But once I saw how terrible that method was in terms of messy edges, I decided it would be easier to cut out a stencil with a thin connecting piece to keep the whole thing together, and then just free-hand the edge that was blocked out by the connector.
I used regular printer paper for the stencils. It worked fine for the island, but I laid down a thicker layer of paint on my first coat around the forest symbol. When I peeled off the forest stencil, the paper had fused to the card and left some paper stuck on that had to be toothpick'd off. I might try using plastic, you know, printing onto one of those old overhead projector transparency sheets? I duno.
Spray paint could work. Or an airbrush, though I don't have one of those. But even in non-solid-color alters, I think some people have figured out ways to leave less brush strokes showing. Then again, maybe the texture looks "right" on serious paintings like that and only looks "wrong" on cards like this that are solid color. The plains border extension I did looks fine even with the brush strokes because they're all small and going with the grain of the art.
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
Method 1: Carving the image into the card. Very precise, but damages the card and is slightly visible in some lighting. I used this for the swamp. I had tried doing the soft pencil on the back of the image and transferring it like carbon paper, but that didn't work at all, nothing transferred because the card was glossy. That's when I noticed I was denting the card a little anyway, and just went with it.
Method 2: Carbon paper. Doesn't transfer well to the glossy surface of the card. Leaves a messy edge to the lines and doesn't come off the card - the best you can do is smudge it into a faded gray or else paint over the lines entirely (making your image look skinnier than you wanted). I used this on the plains and mountain.
Method 3: Stencil. Requires a lot of cleanup with the toothpick, but yields a great end product and automatically gets a base coat down around the hardest parts to paint. This is what I'm going with if I ever do these again. I used it on the island and forest.
I'll probably make more of these someday, maybe with white or with the colors of the lands instead of black, although black is pretty awesome.
I hope you don' t mind me giving this style a shot...I LOVE how bold they are. Great work!!
Finally sat down and made my first alter! Overall I'm happy with it. It's not good looking, but a lot of the mistakes are simple and I can fix them moving forward. I normally don't paint this small or use these types of paints, so I just wanted to get paint to cardboard and start learning!
*Based on map from Super Mario World.
**Image fixed.
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
I guess OP wants it to be 'keyworded' like "dies" was. What word would you replace ETB with though?
When Aegis Angel is born?
When Huntmaster of the Fells arrives?
When Kitchen Sphinx lands?
When Faerie Imposter busts in?
When Dread Cacodemon pops in?
When Malfegor shows up?
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Thanks Fredo, I appreciate the feedback. Those were the first time I tried adding a sig. I'm not really a fan. I think I'll just go sig-less for now.
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Thanks for the feedback on my first alter & for answering some of my questions.
Here's the other project I've been working on:
In case anyone missed it, this was my very first attempt at an alter:
I don't really have any artistic background or any experience with painting, so this has been a bit of an ordeal for me, but it's pretty rewarding too.
I'm wondering, does anyone have any tips for avoiding obvious brush strokes / texture? You can see in the blacked-out lands above that in some lighting, the strokes are visible (and not super great looking really).
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
Sheva (commissioned for a friend)
Bribery:
Sensei's Divining Top:
http://s1082.photobucket.com/albums/j375/Vexitor/ (photo bucket)
Thanks, Scotty!
Method 1: Carving the image into the card. Very precise, but damages the card and is slightly visible in some lighting. I used this for the swamp. I had tried doing the soft pencil on the back of the image and transferring it like carbon paper, but that didn't work at all, nothing transferred because the card was glossy. That's when I noticed I was denting the card a little anyway, and just went with it.
Method 2: Carbon paper. Doesn't transfer well to the glossy surface of the card. Leaves a messy edge to the lines and doesn't come off the card - the best you can do is smudge it into a faded gray or else paint over the lines entirely (making your image look skinnier than you wanted). I used this on the plains and mountain.
Method 3: Stencil. Requires a lot of cleanup with the toothpick, but yields a great end product and automatically gets a base coat down around the hardest parts to paint. This is what I'm going with if I ever do these again. I used it on the island and forest.
I'll probably make more of these someday, maybe with white or with the colors of the lands instead of black, although black is pretty awesome.
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
Probably hard to do for the red and white mana symbol, but for the others I could see a template work out well - cut the shape you want out of a piece of cardboard, stick it to the card in such a way that you can remove it without damaging the card and just spray paint the card black. Should result in a nice even black without any visible brush strokes (obviously), and it would be very easy to do lots of cards conveyor belt style.
@ BlackBull: nice design, can't wait to see how it'll turn out!
@ Sandreline: awesome stuff! You make some beautiful landscapes, I'm a fan!
Thanks Fredo! I thought the same thing about red/white. That is why I tried the carbon paper on those two. But once I saw how terrible that method was in terms of messy edges, I decided it would be easier to cut out a stencil with a thin connecting piece to keep the whole thing together, and then just free-hand the edge that was blocked out by the connector.
I used regular printer paper for the stencils. It worked fine for the island, but I laid down a thicker layer of paint on my first coat around the forest symbol. When I peeled off the forest stencil, the paper had fused to the card and left some paper stuck on that had to be toothpick'd off. I might try using plastic, you know, printing onto one of those old overhead projector transparency sheets? I duno.
Spray paint could work. Or an airbrush, though I don't have one of those. But even in non-solid-color alters, I think some people have figured out ways to leave less brush strokes showing. Then again, maybe the texture looks "right" on serious paintings like that and only looks "wrong" on cards like this that are solid color. The plains border extension I did looks fine even with the brush strokes because they're all small and going with the grain of the art.
"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
I hope you don' t mind me giving this style a shot...I LOVE how bold they are. Great work!!
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**Image fixed.
Standard
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"There is no glory in a death of age, as even the leotau know. As winter steals into their coats, they seek the deadliest lands, that they may die as they lived." ~Aarsil the Blessed
You realize she is holding the dress
Damn! those lands look really nice, specially the plain and the forest.
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