/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

>>1993616
I liked some of the earlier versions to be honest. Right now it feels boring and the black smoke cloud behind her seems too conveniently placed and artificial. The huge dead space behind her is also boring and feels unnecessary.

I wanted to add more interest to the image and make the space behind her lead into her. So I made the smoke be a couple big billows that cut across the composition diagonally. This leads into her and also contrasts the angle of her body and the flagpole. I also added more flags in the distance to echo the rhythms in the image and help force the eye to the main figure while filling the image out more so it doesn't feel as empty. I still felt hte image was lacking, and thought that a bit of interesting lighting might help. So I threw in a strong warm light at a low angle--maybe a sunrise (which seems to fit the theme of the image)--and it lets us add in some strong colour on the focal point and break the shape up a bit, as well as get the interesting effect of light passing through fabric and lighting it up with some nice SSS. The ground was too uniform too, so I made it slant slightly and added a bit more variety in the texture and the grasses sticking up.

Now keep in mind that I made a ton of changes and may have strayed form what you are going for. I just feel your image is a bit lackign and needs some changes to really make it powerful, so you need to decide yourself what changes best suit what you want. Look at the reasoning behind my changes as much as the chnages themselves Isuppose. Hope this helps a bit.