/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

>>2903713
my exact reaction to pic related

>>2457026
his chest material could be more reflective than his gauntlets or at the right angle to catch more reflection - so the chest catches more light from the fire, which then reflects on the opposite side onto the gauntlet and gives it a softer appearance.

the front gauntlet likely could have some more lighting from the fire but you're nitpicking. overall the values cohese really well to bring out the focal region of the piece.

Keeping the pauldrons a cool temperature helps to balance out the fire compositionally. Ruan also tends to lift his shadow values a bit, it's not "technically" correct because there isn't as much ambient occlusion between objects as you'd expect (which you pointed out) but he sacrifices some technical correctness for atmosphere because it implies an extra amount of haze.

>no exaggeration
>could have been pushed

I always hear this and often I don't believe it's a valid critique. Yeah, he could have pushed it more than he did. But he didn't. Where do you define how much a piece should have been pushed? When does it become too cartoony? I think he executed the piece with the amount of exaggeration that he desired, and it's not a flaw that it isn't as pushed as say, a LoL splash.

I don't know why you think having an upper key source is a lighting mess. It's a common technique and here allows for the face to be well lit. The sword is farther back in space and wouldn't logically allow for enough light. He could introduce another weak fill and then have the fire backlight the character, but does that make it a superior piece? No, that would just be different but equally valid lighting.