Swift_SCBWI September prompt and beyond

evilrobot

I think you should get rid of the goat (even though he's super cool) Then I think if you work on the shadow side and make it darker it will make that light pop so much better. I messed around with it in Photoshop and once I darkened the shadow side your rim light/ bounce light popped out way better. I darkened the cloud behind and under the plane in that corner and it seemed to work pretty well. Give it a shot on a layer above everything real quick and see what you think.

Rebecca Hirsch

I agree, as cool as the goat is he doesn't add anything to the story - he's just kind of "there". Once you take him out you have a great flow around the image. Let us know how this worked out for you! Working on a prompt for my SCBWI conference myself and disgruntled with it...

Kevin Longueil

@smceccarelli But i thought the goat was coming to the rescue? That's how i am reading it - he has a determined tilt to his head - he looks like he is going to solve the problem with the force of his brow to me - so my thought is possibly go a tiny bit larger with the goat if he seems ambiguous to folks - i could be way off of course really great painting!

Rebecca Hirsch

If the goat is coming to the rescue, then I think he should be larger so we can see the expression on his face more clearly. Also, maybe something to tie him to the donkey: maybe the goat could wear blue on his head as well - that would create a link between them for the viewer. I love the dynamic action in this piece.

smceccarelli

Thank you everyone! Yes, the goat is coming to the rescue, and this should be (for portfolio considerations) one of three pieces about these characters. After a night sleep I am a little less negative about the goat staying in. I have painted it out and it looks like something is missing....which is no surprise, as the composition was built with the goat in. So I will follow your advice @Kevin-Longueil and @Dulcie and try to make it bigger and with a clearer expression, as well as think of a way of relating the characters. I have also made the furthest wing lighter and it helps solve the "unicorn" issue (thank you for that!). @evilrobot I have tried messing around with the levels of clouds and plane, but I have the impression that the value structure does not work anymore (the silhouette of the plane should stay dark over light). But I think you are describing the main issue here - the clouds are competing for attention. So that will be the focus of the next studio "window" - calming them down value and contrast-wise. And a lot of other things that are bugging me....
Thank you again - I will post the final when I am done!

smceccarelli

@Rebecca-Hirsch Being "disgruntled" is a good description of how I feel about my work nearly all the time ;-). It seems I can only like a piece (if it is any good) three or four weeks after finishing it...That gap between how you see things in your head and how they turn out on paper and/or screen....

Lee Holland

Great piece Smceccarelli. I hope you don't mind but I did An adjustment layer on your work. I thought that you could add abit of mist and get rid of a little detail off the back of the plane. I may be wrong but just thought I could give some feedback. 0_1474288014210_Monkey drawing.jpg

Russ Van Dine

my issue is the deepness of the saturation of the sky and the same color as the plane. I love this and i would hang this on my wall. I am a little jealous and will keep working hard until I match this level and beyond. Great job. I too, would liek to see the ram larger, you probably show him in other frames, so maybe that is not as important here...I want to read this book!

Russ Van Dine

Here is mine... ...not even close to what you produced. I am rooting for you. Great job!

smceccarelli

@Russ-Van-Dine This is a cool concept! And great color scheme, very clean and harmonious.

I have decided to leave the goat in, but only visible as a second or third read. And made a bunch of other adjustments to atmosphere, levels, details, etc....
Now it's submitted. May revisit it before portfolio upload, but needs a pause of a couple of weeks.

Russ Van Dine

very nice, I am looking forward to seeing more of your illustrations.

Carrie

Absolutely incredible!!

Rebecca Hirsch

The facial expressions of all characters are awesome! Hope you win, good luck!

smceccarelli

Does anyone know when the SCBWI gallery is posted, and above all, where??? The SCBWI website, I am sorry to say, is one of the most confusing, complicated and difficult to navigate portals I have seen in a long time...

Rich Green

@smceccarelli - When you are on the main page of the SCBWI - the little banner of rotating images has one about Draw This!

When you click on it - it brings you to this page: http://www.scbwi.org/calling-all-illustrators-2/

From there they have a click here link to a gallery page - which currently shows you a blogspot page for Royal which perhaps was the previous months prompt? So I am guessing the Swift gallery is not posted yet.

Rich Green

@smceccarelli Oh and I agree - the SCBWI site does seem much more complicated than necessary and I think limits my own awareness of much of what they really have to offer.

smceccarelli

@Rich-Green Yes, I agree - it is very difficult to understand what all their activities are. In my search yesterday, I accidentally discovered that they also accept submissions for a bunch of other promotional activities as well as a few different contest. I understand is probably a loosely governed body, which survives out of volunteer work, but boy it does hurt to move through a website like that (mind you, I have seen lots of European publishers with such websites, including the German branch of Penguin-Random House...somehow strange for a visual and design-driven business).

QuietYell

@smceccarelli agree with you and @Rich-Green

The gallery typically does not go live until the 1st of the following month.

It has typically been at something like: drawthisswift.blogspot.com (for the next one). If you go there now, you will see that this link is only open to invited readers. It should be available on the 1st, but probably more like the 2nd for you, Simona, since it will be in accordance with their monthly enewsletter sending and I think at the EST time zone since the address is LA, California.