[Binke]

That looks really great! although the soldier in the background to the right looks misplaced. And the soldiers heh, they look painted, you sure they are photos?
my crit would be, that it doesnt really look like matte-shot, more like some concept art.

so let me get this straight, you used a photo of the model, and painted ontop of it?

[Gecko]

yes, it's a total paintover on one of the scans.

I tried to have the soldier on top to go with the perspective of the legs of the robomachine, but i realized now the macro lens twists the perspective so badly he has to be dropped down a lot.
the soldiers are from the same photo, i had to paint them a little to fit in the perspective.
I guess matte painting is a wrong term for this.

[Gimbal8]

lol, that's pretty creative Gecko.

"The first AT-AT prototype was armed with a 500 gallon bladder which could be emptied onto the sides of tall buildings deep whithin enemy territory."

[Gecko]

The Finnish Defense Forces are about to reveal their new all-terrain-troublemaker, the so-called Chaosmachine! Yet again capt. flushgarden and his swedish mech force bows to their superior, eastern military power.




Spooge mentioned how they used to build real models for matte painters before 3d came around, (and i guess they still do).

Conveniently enough, I built this robotic horse with my friend a while back, of spare parts of old tanks, airplanes, cars, helicopters, spare parts of old models. The parts were burned together with a candle in the parking lot :).

So when I put 2+2 together, I just had to scan some photos of the thing and have a quick matte try on top of it. The soldiers in the picture is yours truly, back when I was doing my mil service :]. Ah hell, does the scale look at all like it was right? It wasn't planned to be used this way so I had to paint away some of the more obvious and recognizable parts.
Not the hindleg tire though, it rocks too much.

eh, start building your models boys and girls, isn't this how the mech thing got started in the first place :D

oh there are some closeups of the model itself, measuring about 10" from head to tail.






g'day

[Max]

Very cool.
Reminds me on Star Wars Episode 5

[AndyT]

Hehe, what kind of perspective is it? Looks isometric to me.

It's very creative!!!

[ September 25, 2002: Message edited by: AndyT ]

[Arc][Pello]

very nice although i think it would look even more real if it the dog bot was made smaller. the lighting doesnt quite make sence, the soldier in the background has a shadow going in the reverse direction to the light source which appears to illuminate him brightly.

but its just an excersize, still got a lifetime to learn

[Bg]

Good work! There's some problems with the perspective of the other guy, he should be a lot smaller (or you can move him down a few centimeters). Here's an easy way to see if characters are in correct perspective:



Another thing that is bothering me is the white background, in bad photos the highlights can "burn" to white, but I think you wanted to make it look as good as possible. The best solution I can think of right now: Darken the snow overall, add some details and dirt to parts that are close the camera, add some shading to the robot's highlights, keep the white only in the brightest parts.. explaining is just too slow.. takes thousand words to explain minor changes and major changes are impossible to explain :/ wait a minute, I'll make an overpaint. done, this has everything I was going to say:



A couple of things that I've learned by looking at matte paintings: Almays try to make the lighting look as real as possible, shadows should be very accurate. Other less important thing when doing fantasy or other stuff that people have never seen before is to "bind" real objects to the artificial objects, make them interact. That way their brains say "it must be real, because that guy is holding it" or something.. you get the point.

Always a pleasure to see new art from you, keep it up!

[Binke]

wow! very nice paintover there BG

[Novacaptain]

I am very impressed Gecko, and BG - right on the money as usual. I really like the design for the warhorse (dog?)...it reminds me a little of the myth of the battle of Troy. It seems the Mechs have all been called into action once again...maybe some tropical bots shall come into play supporting the western end further on

[ZakatH]

You expect us to bow to suomi because of some tech dog? :P

[THE LAST GOONIE]

ZakatH, Luis Royo is the king! rock on

the paintings good