[Merekat]

He obviously is. ;} lol! Hi guys, long time no post, eh? Holidays are a bear. ;{ But I have been busy with work, honest!

Well, Flikk the Egg Thief took me quite a bit of doing to get him done right. Still have things I would change about him, but after a month of probably 50-60 hours of work, I'm done. Flikkin' finished. Flikked out and Flikked off.

But that doesn't mean you fine people can't enjoy him. ;}

Actually, I wanted to illustrate a vast scene as I had yet to ever dabble in greenery. I'm pretty pleased with the results of this, my first background (I don't really consider Savanah a true big landscape). I also wanted to convey a sense of depth with levels of blur (note the leaves in the foreground). And as for Flikk, well... he's gotten himself into a bit of a pickle, hasn't he? I think he of all people should know that if one early bird is getting the worm, the other one is close nearby... ;}



What do you think? And is he worth the cost of making prints? ;} lol. Either way, enjoy.

[ January 06, 2002: Message edited by: Merekat ]

[Cicinimo]

I was just at your site, and was thrilled to find a new cg (better than christmas morning ) Its my favorite you've done, and thats saying ALOT. Wow. Just can't get over it. Could we get closeups of the face?

I WOULD buy prints if I actually had a credit card .

[wisperman]

Hey, Merekat is here too. Loved seeing your work over at the MT boards.
I suppose Sijun seems to be every artists haven.
Well I am impressed. Just wanted to say I admire your style. Very nice.
The depth of field effect (on the leaves) is long overdue I think. Good idea.
The background is a bit confusing though in my opinion.
Is it supposed to have a big bird shadow back there? If it is,... I think its a bit unclear. And if its not, um, I guess the background is also unclear.
(By unclear I don't mean out of focus or lack of detail, just... confused)

Thats my $0.02,
Wisper

[Man With No Name]

Wow...

Completely unexpected. I thought you were working on another freelance cop piece? Very nice. I love how he appears to be off balance. It really adds alot of movement to the pic.

[Merekat]

Cici: thank you, dear. :} That means a lot.

Whisper: thanks! and see, there is no shadow on the extreme background with the falls. just on Flikk. but I've been having troubles with the way background for a bit. thing is, WHAT's the confusing part? and how do I fix it?

No Name: thank you! you'd be surprise how many people have critted me with the fact he's off balance. he's SUPPOSED to be off balance. He's startled from a big nasty coming home and half-covering him in shadow! lol. I don't get the trouble. ;} Thanks for noticing.

[Awetopsy]

merekat: Glad to see you posting again.. this is a wonderful peice of work.. Im very impressed.

one thing tho.. where his feet meet the nest seems a little hard to see... but great work.. very nice.

[burn0ut]

mmmm impressive!
i love the creature, and love his clothes/gear!!!!

[Benjamin]

Breathtaking. Inspiring. It has the coveted spot on my desktop for the month of January, no question.

-Ben

[lookitsfrank]

*salivating.* This is fantastic. OOoo. I would buy a print of this. definately. organic parts are wonderful. hooray for the women artists in this world!
frank

[FireFry]

Simply awesome. I love the work you put in with the background and foreground. I also like that monsters expression. Definitly worth making into prints. Good work for the new year!

[Ian Jones]

Cool pic. Really awesome idea.

Maybe desaturate the background a bit to get some more depth / aerial perspective...

The tail loks a bit weird imo, looks like a lasso comoing out of his but. sorry, just seems strange to me.

The details are great! bg is good for your first (I know what you meant by that).

[Cicinimo]

Ahh, I keep coming back to look at it. I think this is my favorite piece of digital art, from anyone, ever. Just so original, with so much personality. Hee hee - sorry to post again.


Cicinimo

[LOco]

well.. this is my first post at this board.. but some post must be the first

Really cool! i love the leaves in the foreground.. and the background is cool too even though it's kinda blurry (but i guess that was how u wanted it and i like it). And the middleground is fantasticly cool. The colors of flikk are great.. i can't say anything negative about it (but on the other hand, who am i to criticise on my first post? )

[gLitterbug]

I really love this one, it�s one of the best drawings I know. Flikk looks awesome! He�s so well done, from his hands over his face to his clothes. Great work.

I�d definitely buy a print too if I�d own a credit card.

[Highfive]

I say Flikk is dead meat! And he looked so cute, too.

That's utterly amazing, Merekat! It's definitely a month well spent. It's my desktop of January, too. Flikk's costume is very groovy, like he's from Final Fantasy X or something.

If anyone told me this was done in 3D, I'd believe them.

[jome]

Impressive. Flikk reminds me of the style of Don Lawrence (Storm), the leaves are perfectly detailed. This is an image I like to look at; there's a complete story behind it, something that lacks in so many other drawings (no matter how good they are).

I think to really create the depth, you could try to make the background more blueish, because of the refraction of light in the air. The trees will look unworldly big then.

Respect.

[Jezebel]

Very nice merekat! I really love all the leaves... my favorite part

[bigfoot]

Wonderful!!!!!!
This is not only fun to look at it....it is an illustrated beauty.
Some one posted that they just visted your site, But I don't see it posted.
Would you let us know, so we can all visit.

[S4Sb]

Give us some closeups, please

[Akolyte]

Wow, this is pretty impressive ;p So crisp, and everything foliage-wise is rendered with perfection. The hand is the coolest part of the pic. Sweet.

[Merekat]

Wow! Thank you! Everyone is being so welcoming to my poor Egg Thief, this is marvelous! Thank yous to all for your kind comments and compliments. You warm a meerkat's heart. ;}


Oh, one thing: jome: Actually, the background used to be on the bluer side, but then I felt it didn't feel part of the environment and morning sunlight. It seemed to be a strictly overcast day. I will try it again, but the main crit I've been getting on the waterfall is that it looks like seawater and that it's two "photorealistic" and not "realistic". I understand the concept between the too, but with a sufficient lack of mega jungle waterfalls in northern Ohio, I can't say it's all that easy to take my computer out to the park for a good painting session...

Here's my photo ref for the middle background...


Would anyone be able to explain the concept a little more clearly to me? I can do just fine with improvising lighting on smaller objects I'm familiar with (why the nest was tedious, but not too much of a problem) but something vast like a waterfall is kinda difficult to pull out of a hat. Any conceptual and/or practical infomation would be nice. Thanks. :}

And, ask and ye shall receive:







Also, for those of you who want desktops, I am working on one just for you. ;} Gimme a couple hours. Hope 1024 is okay. ;}

Thanks again for such a warm response! You made a bad last couple days much more tolerable. You have my appreciation for that. ;}

[ January 07, 2002: Message edited by: Merekat ]

[piethuiz]

Great art i love it.
Your site is super. Super tutorials a great
help.
Check it out now !!!!.

[Jezebel]

OooooH! The details are especially tasty!!

[Quasar]

pretty damn good !

[wisperman]

Merekat,
Well, its cool to see where the background came from. The reference is actually gorgeous all by its lonesome.
The only suggestions I have to help fix the background are some basics.
The photoref is very nice but I might suggest in the general sense to do some intentional simplification of the background elements you use from it. Remove some detail (I know you love detail).
Also, I would suggest including more atmospheric perspective between your middle ground and the background.
I suggest atmospheric perspective because it is due to light refracting from particles in the air between the viewer and the object. It causes objects to lose detail and contrast as they are moved farther from the viewer. The color range also begins to lighten and shift generally towards the cool color ranges (blues/greens etc.
This would be especially appropriate to your subject, I think, as many jungles have quite dense atmospheres and might be ideal subjects for this study.
I think it could help increase the clarity of your middle ground as it seems to have an almost identical value range as the background (in terms of darks). The mid-ground will most often have darker darks than the back.
I think this Craig Mullins pic illustrates this perfectly. (Hope Craig don't mind)

(I'll note though that since you already have a lot of cools in the piece, the hue shift provided by the atmosphere is dependent upon the environmental conditions (location and time of year, etc) Some rarer conditions can add red or purple hues to the atmosphere) Although I think the cooler colors are easier to utilize since they naturally "recede" visually and warm colors naturally will jump "forward" in a painting]
Forgive me if I am being redundant. You are a VERY accomplished artist already and I don't mean to be insulting if you are familiar with these concepts already. I just thought it might help this piece.

As for the waterfall I think the only problem I can see with your's is maybe its not "choppy" enough (??) Maybe like this.
I, however, think it really looks beautiful.

Wisper

[Merekat]

Whisper, THANK you for such a thorough reply. Sometimes I get so caught up in the details that I have a terrible time trying to be objective about my own work.

The concepts you mentioned, indeed I did know, but I forgot to remember a couple. ;} Specifically the contrast. I couldn't understand why it looked right in the photo but not in my picture. Your mentioning about taking out the darks is marvelous. It was like a good swift punt to the forehead. :} THANK you.

As for the blue shift, I had done that before and as I said, it looked out of place for the time and foreground environment. But I will revisit it. I had also blurred it a tad bit more previously (http://www.merekatcreations.com/flikkfinalblur.jpg) but that also seemed a wee bit out of place. I think it wasn't so much my techniques as the solidity of my vision at that point. I've never had to put this much depth and precarious lighting before. Perhaps I did a few too many firsts, but I am still happy.

I will try all the solutions you suggested and post another version. If you or anyone else might have some quick visual tips, feel free to scribble the suggestions on my pic above. ;}

Thanks again for all of your help!

[Radiater]

Hi Merekat,

This is another excellent piece! I don't have any more to add to whats been said. I do have a question - you do alot of your work in Illustrator - was this Illustrator too?

[snarf]

Heya Merekat,

I've always admired your work. I've been hoping you'd resurface here at Sijun at some point. I think that it is great for the community to have artists as talented as you contributing.

I have one... question, really. I'm not qualified to give you crits.

Wouldn't the leaves in the foreground be MORE in focus than anything else instead of the opposite?

I could be entirely retarded, that happens sometimes.

Regardless, you are one talented woman.

Keep it up, I can't wait for more!
-Snarf

[Merekat]

;} Thank you again for the kind responses.

Radiator: Um, actually, I only have a few pieces in Illustrator. I'm darn proficient with it, but I prefer Photoshop to anything else. Thanks for thinking I could pull something like this off in a vector program tho! heheheh. Just that thought is a compliment.

Snarf: I used to LOVE that show. That and He-Man...

*ahem* Good question. ;} But no, not really. Okay. Try this as a real-world example. Look at your computer monitor. Now, out of the corner of your eye � as you are still looking at the monitor � you should be able to see your hands typing at the keyboard, right? Well, your monitor is in focus. But the hands, though they are closer to your eyes, are not in focus. Likewise, the back wall behind your monitor is not as sharp as your monitor if you are focusing just at your computer screen.

See? It's all depending on your focal attention. Then it's depending on what falls in that focal perception. Your eyes will have an easier time focusing what is slightly behind the focal point rather than what is immediately near your eyes. But either way, good question. :} Thanks!

[fellipe]

i must say, thats the your best work ever. congratulations!....its really, really impressive