Tuesday, July 15, 2008

The Thing revisited

I originally posted my Thing illo a couple of years back, but recently decided to give old Ben Grimm a bit of a makeover. Below is the new version.


Back when I created the original in 2004, I was very wary of making major changes to my 3D work in Photoshop as I thought it would lose some of it's realism and start looking...well, Photoshopped. Four years on I've become a bit less precious about older art, and have also used many different programs together, both 2d and 3d for other jobs, and know that they can be used well together. In the end it's all about the final result, making a job as good as possible no matter how many programs were used in the process.


So from the side-by side comparison above, the most major change you'll notice is his mouth. I was never completely sold on the way the left side seemed to smile. It didn't feel right for the overall expression. To make this change I used what for me is one of the most useful and timesaving tools in Photoshop, the Liquify filter. It lets you push and pull areas of the image with any brush size and degree of subtlety. It's great for making changes to one's artwork which would normally take many hours to redo. Also his brow and nose were adjusted with the Liquify tool as well.

Additional changes were made in the eye area, a new rock texture was overlayed, and a more convincing cigar smoke was created. Also the colour and shadows were adjusted as well.

Overall I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. Let me know your thoughts.

Edit 9th August 2008- Thought I'd try my hand at a little bit of simple gif animation for my new forum avatar. Bit of a learning curve but it was fun.

14 Comments:

Blogger SRH said...

subtle yet effective alterations. Well done.

2:45 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I like the new one - the colors are deffo more vivid - and he looks less plasicy - but i kinda prefer his slight grin on the original - he looks satisfied - and now he looks more menacing - still a brilliant peice of work either which way :)

11:52 PM  
Blogger gemini82 said...

Yeah the revision feels more like the Thing.

2:21 AM  
Blogger tim wertz said...

I am blown away with the old illo and the new one. Thanks for posting your techniques like you did with the liquify filter. I try to do the stuff you big boys do and all the little tips help. Thanks!

10:42 PM  
Blogger SEILER said...

Man, that is crazy awesome!!!

2:13 AM  
Blogger Faboun'e said...

Awesome..!

As a great picture after and now.. you make me crazy to make some good stuff like these , and quikly I think...

8:09 PM  
Blogger Beatriz Iglesias said...

The revision have "something". Congrats. Love it! ^__^

6:02 PM  
Blogger Jav said...

amazing!
talk about subtle...
I think you really "feel" the difference more than "see" it.
This is an awesome piece...
your stuff rocks as always!

3:03 PM  
Blogger Mike Nassar said...

awesome. thanks for posting the revision pass. the value range and textures seem more pushed, i like it.

also, thanks for posting the time saving tip about the liquify tool. It's not something I ever put to use and was familiar with. I'm sure it'll save my ass some late night.

3:24 PM  
Blogger Josh (musarter) said...

The texture really pops in the new version; he really looks crusty. For this reason, I like it better than the previous one.

4:24 AM  
Blogger xenos said...

i would have been thrilled to have either version in my portfolio. awesome stuff chris. down to the gif animation. i can already imagine all the fanboys trying to lift it and add is as part of their signatures whenever they comment on the boards. cheers.

-xenos

p.s. thanks for the bday greeting too...

4:36 AM  
Blogger Hugo Freutel said...

Great work. The change of the mouth works very well.

12:49 AM  
Blogger Andrew Glazebrook said...

Ha ha ! Great animation on this !!

10:15 AM  
Blogger therealtony said...

what an awesome image!!!

I love the intensity of his expression...

12:50 PM  

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All artwork © Chris Wahl 2019 unless otherwise stated. All characters are copyright to their respective owners