[Frost]

It looks great Micke, quite "comic-y", with nice shading. Some portions look a bit flat in the shading, but I assume that's the comic style. Nice characters and line art. Perhaps it would have been nice to have the edge characters a bit less uniformely lit, pulling the light focus in the center?

Nice work Mikael!

[Snake Grunger]

Very nice Mikael-kun!

I particularly like the old man and his suit, as well as the robot and finally the rabbit. I love the rabbit's expression hehe. Like Frost said, it really has a comic look to it, it seems as though there is a black outline, but at the same time there isn't really a black outline.. I guess my only concern is the color of the skin of the woman and the guy wearing a fish-hat. I guess it's a bit too pink, when you used black to darken the pink. (or maybe it was a multiply layer over the B&W version).

Very nice work on the other Star Wars illustration. However, like you mentionned, the big guy in the background doesn't really fit too well.. I think the light source position and intensity really makes it ackward to the eye, it's as though you cut out people in two different magazines and stuck them with glue on a piece of paper. But that sort of painting is a pretty tall order I guess. I'm also quite positive you didn't have much time to polish everything like you would have wished for.

Keep up the good work!

[ April 22, 2001: Message edited by: Snake Grunger ]

[Rinaldo]

heh, the words starwars and Micke next to each other....can't get much better than that...oh wait there's two threads, I guess it can.....drool.

I love the graphic quality.
Am I right in assuming the B+W linework was created digitaly in PS?

[nickmarksdotcom]

I remember that comic!! Awesome story! If I remember right it was reminicent of " Seven Samuri" . I was like 5 but i thought the chic was sooo hot. The rabbit was cool too.

Thanks for bringing back some old memories

Nick

[Francis]

Really cool - I remember those characters from the comics. I was wondering if the old bald guy is supposed to be sort of the center of attention, based on the way you rendered the lighting on him?

[Cos]

wow the drawing is class micke, you can really see a huge brian bolland influence here.

IMO I prefer the b/w version, something about the colour looks maybe too flat, most of the characters have this red lighting on them xcept 3 on the left back row which are spotlighted which seems a little odd, maybe they should have some of that red on them too? Just to tie the whole piece in some more.

[ April 22, 2001: Message edited by: Cos ]

[Rage-lion]

Great stuff...I have those comics, with the off the wall characters..I will have to dig them out and look at them. Thats cool.

[TheMilkMan]

amazing stuff.....your to good micke!

[Jenn]

dayyyyyyyyymmmmmmmmm those rock

[Vortx]

You are making me cry Micke. Your drawings alllllllways look perfect...

i love this one...my new wallpaper..

damn, you are so good at defining form....

thanx for posting this inspiring picture (i was gonna play some games tonight...but now i'm gonna go sketch....)

-feng

[micke]

Thank you so much for great comments
It's really good for me to hear from you what works and what don't work. Many good and valid points. I really appreciate it.

Frost: I tried to reach for a relatively simple shading mostly since i spendt most of the time trying to get the shapes and forms
look right. yeah, the lighting could have been more uniform in the coloured version. I think it works well on the B&w version though. Thanks, man

snakeY-G:
I used 3 different layers for the colouring.
1 with the actual colours(set to multply), another one with shadows(dark grey-multiply) and a last one with an overlay gradient(yellow to red) Maybe the skin is too pink on some of them, not sure. I wanted them all to have different skintones. It's true i did'nt have too much time to think how to blend the different elements together, i was mainly concerned about just getting the different things to look right(anatomy, proportions values and light& shadows)I should maybe have balanced it more. Would probably have done it different now. Thanks!
Rinaldo: Thanks alot. I made the original sketch on paper as i almost always do, but i did a lot of changes while working on it in PS. In many ways i painted(with 2 colours) it rather than drew it.
Francis:My mistake. The light really confuses. They wanted the Black and white too so they could take mugs from the different characters.
Cos: Bolland has been one of my favorite comic artists since i first saw his work.
Somehow i prefer the b&w version too. It's more solid in a way. The red overlay texture should affect all the characters equally. Maybe the reason for the characters on the right looking more red than the others is because that their outfits actually have a lot of red in them. I could have moved them around and spread them more, did'nt think about that before you pointed it out. Thanks, Cos.
Vortx: Thank alot, man
I'm really glad you liked them and that my stuff inspires you. Really encouraging to hear!

Thanks people!
You have no idea how useful feedback is to me.

Mikael

Edit: typo, need to take courses in english

[ April 22, 2001: Message edited by: micke ]

[micke]

What the hell happened?!?!

This thing is full of Bugs.

edit:
Nevermind...It works now.

[ April 22, 2001: Message edited by: micke ]

[A.Buttle]

Rock on micke. You rock my world.

[::Dino::]

I'm glad I'm not the only one crying... Holy crap, as soon as I saw the pic I had some kind of involuntary spasm and before I even realized I had set the pic as my wallpaper. The only noticable problem is that the old armored guy seems to be spotlighted. The light is centered above him and then radiates(?) to the rest of the characters...[edit: insert] Unless of course the spotlight is intentional, if so it's great. phuck I need to get off my ass...you make me drool.

[Poo-head types without thinking]

[ April 23, 2001: Message edited by: ::Dino:: ]

[::Dino::]

Sorry...double post (It even happens to the best of us )

[ April 23, 2001: Message edited by: ::Dino:: ]

[spooge demon]

That spot lighted guy is really great. The shapes are too good. Glad he is front and center, so to speak.

geez, that's what i need to do, just BW comic inking. it will make you think.

[micke]

I did this shortly after the Jaina Illustration.

I started first in Black and white, since they wanted a B&W-version too:

It's for the same issue of Starwars gamer.
The characters are designed by Marvel sometime in the late seventies. You can see a pic of the original cartoon:

I could'nt touch the designs too much even if i wanted to. I did some changes though. The 2 characters on the left were added in the last minute after a request from the magazine. I know it don't look much as Starwars, but this is what they wanted. I enjoyed doing this one, though.
Crits comments, welcome as usual.
Thanks!

[Grendel Khan]

Wow! Man, your inking (if it's actually ink and not photoshop) is fantastic! I too, prefer the black and white version. Actually, I'd love to see a version without any shadows, just black and white.

Sorry, no much critique from me.

Inspiring stuff!

[Collosimo]

I really love you style Micke, you have a great website and all your stuff is very inspirational, so good work.

I can't work out what that dark blue strip of colour is on the B&W version, it is next to the bunny's ears, and imbetween the young soldier and girl. Can anyone else see it? I think it may be a problem considering that your B&W should be pretty well monochrome, even though here you have used a subtle amount of blue in your values which looks good btw. Is it a mistake? It is also in the colour version, but not so obvious, it is reddish.

[n8]

umm...i havent been around for a while, mainly because of work etc.
but i come back here and find all this starwars stuff....amazing...the colours make it look like an old comic too
anywho, keep the good stuff coming
cheers

[CaptainCool]

Wow, Like the comic style, No Crits, seem good , Like the B&W too,

What's up with the Bunny, New thing in Star Wars ?
Darth Bunny !!!

[micke]

Dino:I just thought it looked cool. I figured it did'nt matter much since they're were gonna use the B&W pic too for more information about the different characters.
Spooge demon: Would love to see some comic work from you sometime and i'm really glad you liked the shapes in the pic If you're
interrested, check out Brian Bollands work.
He has a very good balance between B&W and is really good at describing materials like stone, metal, glass and clothing. Some of it is pretty stiff, but it's still great. You would have no problem doing this.
Grendel khan:Thanks It's mostly photoshop.
the rough pencil-lines is gone. I think i prefer the one without colours too. wanna see it without shadows? Save it and just turn up the brightnes and contrasts, that should do the trick.
Collosimo:Thank you for the compliment
Blue strips? He he, check your monitor man or go see a doctor. No blue stuff. atleast i can't see it. The B&w is in greyscales no blue used.
Captain cool: The Bunny is from a Marvel comic from the 70's. That's about all i know.

Mikael

[ April 23, 2001: Message edited by: micke ]

[J Bradford]

It does have that Starwars "feel" to it. Err, a bit hard for me to explain why, but it does. Perhaps because the look of the characters is something I would have seen during the 70's science fiction.

[Collosimo]

Woah weird then... it has some subtle blue in it. And when I copy it into PS it has grey but with very subtle hues of blue and ble green! I checked with the colour picker.. hmmm.. wierd..

[Leo]

always been impressed how you work with shapes with only a few brush strokes/colors.

-leo

[catnip]

WOW! I'm so glad I look for your work
everytime I log-in. Your work is fantastic!

[Sedone]

(sigh) What can I say? You're good.

[LordArioch]

heheh... I remember that issue.

[-Tepox-]

Yep. I really like this!!! like the way you shade your characters. That armored old guy is certainly my favourite!

[Bizarde]

great sense of light&shadow in this one.
cool stuff Micke.

~bizarde