krissalus's art Reviews on Newgrounds

[Flower!]

This is wonderfully vibrant with great color contrast between the background and the flower, and the textures on the petals are particularly nice. Good work!!

KNefarious responds:

Thank you so much! I'm still fairly new to texturing, so you saying that makes me happy. ^_^

[Toward a Shining Future]

I love how much you have going on here, but in a ridiculously subtle way. The footprints tell a story, and then they lead you into the background and let your imagination run off to wherever the hell it feels like. The way you've managed to do that is awesome, and your ability to tell a story with just a landscape illustration... well, it makes me insanely jealous but also really glad that artists like you exist.

As for that little creature... I can't wrap my head around its anatomy. I kind of wish that you'd drawn it so that we could see more of its body or left the wings off completely. I'm kind of nitpicking here, but those wings are a bit distracting for me. I keep wondering what the rest of the thing looks like, which is a bit of a shame, since I bet it looks really cool. On a more intelligent note, the wings turn the creature into a blob of color on an otherwise beautifully shaded piece. I love that you have the creature there, but I personally think the wings turn it into too much of a focal point. In spite of that, I'm still totally in love with this picture.

Amaruuk responds:

I love the way some people on here actually write out an actual critique and/or analysis of a piece. Thank you! I thought it'd be neat to paint something with a little more narrative in it and leave it up to the viewers to interpret their own ideas of story, while at the same time it's also a personal allegory like most of the rest of my work.

The creature is a baby of a dragon species of mine. It's kind of crouched on that rock but yeah, a more spread-out pose might have been more interesting. The wings are inspired by the gold dragons of DnD (they function the same way), and the animal's colors and markings were inspired by crested geckos. I didn't decide to add one until most of the way through painting this. I figured it'd be neat to have him as a witness along with the viewer. There are also dragons flying around the castle, but of course without description it's not possible to tell.

[To Part the Clouds]

Pretty Good

I think you need to practice clouds a bit, and the sun looks very unnatural, but I love the concept and you drew the water very well. The lighting on the dragon is nice and so are the shadows on the water, but the reflected sun is a bit too perfect. It's also out of alignment with the actual sun XD The picture itself is slanted, but the reflection should not be independent of that. The reflection needs to be pushed more towards the rocks, and probably should be mostly concealed by the rocks.

Amaruuk responds:

This painting is a couple of years old, and I've already learned a lot since then, but thank you for the critique! I've noticed a lot of those things myself.

[Jungle]

Great for a practice...

... although I think the light green in the water is a bit too vibrant for the lighting. Try using a paler color next time to keep with the mood. As for the misty lighting itself, the large washed out spots near the middle of the picture look a little funny. I like the washed out corner, but my suggestion for the spots is to quickly smudge 'em a bit next time, make them more horizontal and give them more irregular shapes. Also, I think the circles in the bottom left are a bit distracting and I'm not entirely sure what they're supposed to be. Water droplets, maybe? At any rate, consider dialing those back a bit. I like the effect they have in the trees, but they're a bit too concentrated in that one corner, at least in my opinion.

[Wingless]

Love it!

I'm not too sure what's going on with the sky and I think the perspective is a little off where the shoreline curves up, but other than that, this is really well done. Love the colors and the way you did the water. Very beautiful picture. One other thing, though: maybe go a little darker on the skin tone next time. The shading is very nice but I feel like his back is more in shadow and should be a bit darker.

InsolentMinx responds:

Cheers for the review :) I was thinking the same thing on the skin actually after posting :P

[Red Hood]

not bad

I like this a lot. Only thing is, though, that the outlines need some cleaning up. In most places, they're nice and smooth, but in a few areas... not so much. They look a little messy on the hood and the shoes. Also, when I looked at the full size, I noticed that there were a few areas where the color didn't quite reach the outlines, especially on the gloves. I'm not sure if this was a quick doodle (if it was, you can ignore my criticism XD) but it does need some cleaning up. But overall, great style and character design.

[girl in the darkness]

Good but...

her eyes are HUGE. Might want to shrink those down a bit along with her mouth. That also looks to be a bit large, at least to me. The hair is very nicely done, though, as are the eyelashes. Nice work on the crosshatching on her face as well.

Great-Rambo responds:

Actually i still need some training before getting better. I'm working on it

Thx for your review

[Timber Ancient]

Great Concept

This is pretty awesome, but I have to say, the green patch on the chest looks a little weird to me. I'm not exactly sure what that's supposed to be, let alone if it's supposed to be leaves or moss or whatever. I really like the rest of the design, though. The arms and legs are great. I'd love to see this guy with a background.

Dawn-Breaker responds:

Heh, well yeah originally it was supposed to be a mossy / leave-ish kind of beard xD buut yeah it seems kinda off now that mention it..

But I'm glad you like the design in general :D thanks allot, I might consider redrawing something like this with some more dynamics and possibly a background.. if I'm not lazy-- ok basicly there won't be a background

[Winding and Twisting]

Nice!

Definitely shouldn't worry about what one person wrote about this in a caption. This is really well done and deserves recognition. Aside from the fact that it's a very cool dragon, the pose is great and I really like the way you drew the head. The details are fantastic. Honestly, the only thing I could say about this is that I think you could have gone a little darker on the body shading. It definitely doesn't look flat, but the shadows could be a little darker, which would give it a bit more dimension. Other than that, though, this is fantastic. Great work!

FiraPhoenix responds:

Thanks. I agree with you there on the shading. I have it nicely shaded in very few spots then in the rest it could be darker.

Yeah, I know I shouldnâEUTMt read too much into what one person says. When that all happened it was when my art was transitioning from child like sketches to serious art like this, and so I was not very confident about my art then. Anyways thanks again it really gives me a confidence boost to hear that and keep drawing. <3

[Grimmy the Soul Collector]

Nice

Good character design and the shading on the bones is really good. The box came out great, too. There are a few couple you might want to work on in the future though:
--The black coat is very flat. I think there's some shading there but it's still hard to tell if there's any depth at all. I know the buttons are shiny and reflect a lot of light (good work on them, by the way), but black fabrics have shadowed areas and reflect light, too.
--The lighting in general is another thing you'll want to work on. Like I said, the shading is good, but not really consistent with either the ominous glow from the box or the light coming from behind. Check out some pictures with light sources from different angles in order to get a feel for that. Also, consider adding in some purples to areas that reflect light. That will show that the box is really glowing and throwing light on the character.

Overall, nice work here. The little hat is awesome XD