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Amarynceus — Tree of Life .:WIP:.
Published: 2006-07-07 00:09:53 +0000 UTC; Views: 14665; Favourites: 202; Downloads: 926
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Description
A fairly recent commission that turned out reasonably well. I was asked to do a "tree of life" image with the condition every artist likes to have from time to time -- "do it however you want to." The only thing specified was that it be fairly large, which this is (at least for me).It's labeled a WIP because (a) I intend to colour it digitally and (b) this isn't the actual finished drawing - those crap-ass foothills and mediocre intersection of trunk into landscape were corrected just prior to delivery with some nice crosshatching to even out the tonal distribution and more hatching on the trunk to give it more weight and shape. I'll probably end up making similar corrections with the computer before it gets coloured.
16x13", Rapidograph on Crescent Illustration Board (cold press x100, heavy weight)
Hot press probably would have been better as there were spots where the ink started to bleed into the cold press surface. :S
Oh, and details, for those who care >> [link]
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Comments: 51
Well Done. The image is twice as interesting when viewed up close.
That sky is great. A nice concept.
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I love this composition. I love all the detail and the fact that you obviously spent a lot of time on this... Why are you planning on coloring it digitally? Why not color it traditionally? I mean, you already did the hard part. I feel like it would be so much more beautiful if painted by hand. It would be nice to see the color so delicately and deliberately painted as this amazing line work.
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Why is this in your Scraps????
I love how you did the Celtic knot pattern in the background.
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Oh My GOD!!!! this is fantastic!!!!!!! I love this, Its gorgeous!!!
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You may not think the work's impressive, Dearest, but it is to me and I think She's perfect. she is truly a World Tree. thank you.
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This is incredible. Oh, wow. I could stare at this forever.
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I absolutely 
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What a gorgeous tree - i want to go there and climb it!
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The sky and the varying patterns really agree with me. This is one of those that just makes my jaw hit the floor...
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Glad you like it. 
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I Love this! It might just be me, but this "tree of life" looks so much like the after math of a nuclear explosion. ^^
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Yeah, I suppose so. o_O Hadn't noticed that before.
Nice sig, by the way.
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YES! YES! YES! Awsome! Instant favorite! Yggdrasil has never looked so good
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Yup, that's the case for sure. This tree must be several miles high...
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WOW... I Imagined the life-tree to be pretty close to something like that O.o;;
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I don't know WHY I crit, based on two thoughts:
One, It's bloody phenomenal, and I could quite literally spend the rest of my life trying to reach this level of excellence and die a deeply disappointed man, and
Two, an artist of your caliber has most likely noticed anything I've got to say.
So sorry if I offend with my naive and misguided thoughts, but they're all I've got, so I spit 'em out.
...Nothin' to lose and all that...
ANYHOW. My criticism is based mostly on the fact that the tree looks terribly realistic until you get into the most voluminous part of it: The leaves. It was neat to see how someone could so closely form clouds and trees and still clearly show the difference. The leaves are bouyant and poofy, and that combined with the fact that they've little for realistic texture (Though the given texture isn't unappealing) makes for an unnatural feeling of... feathery... poofyness. Sorry, poofyness is too good a word to pass up.
ANYHOW. The othernother part of my criticism... involves the same exact thing...
I got distracted, so shoot me. I know from my sad, small amounts of experience that it's blasted hard to
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(Continued)
...it's blasted hard to still show the actual wood of the tree AND place bunches of leaves on all sides of the tree, BUT that's me, not you. You've got the powahs, you've got the skills, and you've gone and imbalanced your tree by putting plenty of leaves above and behind, and few in front. I realise that this COULD be because you're looking up at the tree from under, in which case it makes sense save for the rope curving down, which makes my brain think we're looking either level with the leaves or even further above the tree and down at it. The ground, too, helps the second of those theories.
Some of the branches that are backshadowed (Heck YES, I'm making terms up.) by leaves have odd glows on both top and bottom, which make it seem as if they're more paper-cut-outs, less tree branches. Probably that's a technique to add definition, but hey, I'm aware that I'm a fool. At least I try hard.
Last, but not least, we've got the crazy, wide wind swirls that look rather out of place. Their translucency makes the parts behind them seem darker than the rest, which is how I noticed them in the first place, which I don't believe was the intention. There's also one forking between the main vertical branch and the right (ours, not its) that vanishes into the leaves.
There you are. I still don't know what inspired me to criticize. The last words of the day I've got to say is that adding you to my watch list was probably one of the smartest moves I've pulled on DeviantArt. I almost feel guilty that it was so easy to do; Rewards like this should come at a price.
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I don't mind the crits at all. :>
Lessee... the leaves... yeah, they're not at all realistic. This piece was all about texture fills and a more evocational rather than representational approact. I suffer a bit from the tendency to try to define every object and shape and I'm trying to move away from that.
As for there being more mass of foliage to the side and behind of the tree, I think that's an impression fostered by the large expanse of exposed main trunk. I know that while I was drawing it one of my concernes was actually getting more mass on the side and behind. For what it's worth, the viewer's eye level is probably about at the top of the blank white clouds behind the mountains.
Backlit branches -- unfortunately what you're seeing there is a result of it being scanned before it was finished -- when it was done I had gone through and added a light hatch over that to make the effect more subtle.
As for "wind swirls" I really have no idea what you mean unless you're referring to my "AZ" watermark which I have on most of my pieces here.... the only other swirliness is the sky texture, which is nothing more than that... texture.
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Ah, watermark indeed it is. I was wondering if that were the case.
Coolcool, I look forward to your next piece!
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NO! Son of a GUN! It's incomplete, please hold. Stupid submit button.
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I live in Orlando and when I first saw this thumbnail I thought it was a sketch of the Tree of Life at Animal Kingdom. You know you've been in Orlando too long when everything starts looking like something Disney. 
Very cool sketch though, I always appreciate your attention for detail in every inch.
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Heh. Thanks -- can't say I've seen that Tree of Life thingy you speak of though. This one's basically an oak that got rather obese XD
...just found some pics of it... I must say, that thing's pretty cool, especially for something in a Disney park -- particularly all the carving work, very nice.
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one of the best picyures i have ever seen! its a fav.- on my list keep up the awesome work!!
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Hey, it's good to see you around again.
I believe I shall die of envy -- your textures are always a highlight in every piece you do. The variety and risks you sometimes take are exciting.
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Thanks!
Yeah, it's always nice when a risky move pays off well. I tend to avoid them, but I seem to have at least tolerable luck when it comes to them working out.
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That is simply delicious. I love the trunk and branches.
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Thanks. It was a happy solution to a problem -- at one point the sky was completely blank but I needed a midtone to make the light areas "pop" a bit better. I started doing hatch clusters in the upper left and the pattern of "snakes" spontaneously emerged.
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Spontanaety is fun! I like that little burst of illumination that comes when the pieces suddenly fall into place.
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Wow! The shading is unbelievable!! I love the Idea of the art too. It flows very nicely. Nice work.
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Your Welcome! You are very Talented!
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wow ! everything's very impressive about this drawing !
I truly appreciate the amazing and subtle details !
definitely an instant fav
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