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Category: Visual Art

A Test Image

A Test Image

Just a quick experiment with DAZ Studio and Photoshop, to put together a test image along the way to producing a cover for “In the House of War.” Here’s Aminata Ndoye in a spaceship’s corridor, in front of a large viewport.

The last time we saw Aminata was on the cover of “Pilgrimage,” when she was sixteen years old and still Earth-bound. At this point she’s in her early twenties and is serving as one of the first human officers in the Hegemony’s interstellar service. “In the House of War” is the story of her first deep-space assignment.

Of course, almost nothing in this image (aside the character herself) is as I imagine it in the story, so the final cover for the e-book isn’t going to look anything like this. The problem with building images in DAZ Studio is that you’re stuck with the assets people have gotten around to releasing for you to use. If they don’t look like what you had in mind, too bad.

Still, I wanted to get back into practice with DAZ Studio by generating a simple bit of character art, and this answers the mail. I should have the actual cover image ready to go by the weekend – I have a design in mind already.

Book Cover Finished!

Book Cover Finished!

Whew. After over a week of work, a pile of tinkering and experimentation, at least a dozen new digital-art techniques mastered, and a lot of frustrated beard-tugging . . . I’ve finally put together cover art for The Curse of Steel.

My self-imposed deadline was the end of the month, and it’s now about two hours away from local midnight on 31 July, so I’m barely under the wire. Even so, I’m very happy with the results.

Now to finish revising the draft and get the book ready for release. It’s starting to look like a mid-September release is going to work.

Angry Krava

Angry Krava

Further progress toward an image I can build into a book cover for The Curse of Steel. Lots of small posing and rendering techniques acquired for this one: creating a floor with a plane primitive and a materials shader, mixing upper-body and lower-body poses, and so on.

I think I may be getting within striking distance of an image I can use.

Drothan the Silent

Drothan the Silent

Here’s a first image (well, aside from sketches and scraps) of a second character from The Curse of Steel. This is Drothan the Silent, younger son of a clan chieftain of the Tremara people, and eventually Krava’s primary love interest. Not that the two of them are going to have an easy time of it, getting their relationship started.

As with the images I’ve been producing of Krava, this one started with me selecting a Daz Studio character model and tweaking its parameters – in this case, scaling the character model up by about 8% and ratcheting up the “bodybuilder” settings to get a guy who’s big and muscular. The selection of hair and clothing went a lot faster this time since I already had some of the assets I wanted in my personal catalog. I seem to be climbing the learning curve with respect to using Daz Studio effectively.

At this point, I think I’m just about ready to start setting up the render that’s going to provide the cover image for the novel. A few more days of work and this part of the project will be finished.

Krava in Cloth Tunic II

Krava in Cloth Tunic II

First experiment with altering the color and textures of an existing Daz Studio model, using Photoshop. I’d say it was entirely successful and surprisingly easy to boot. Turning Krava’s tunic forest green took maybe fifteen minutes of work, once I reminded myself how to apply the appropriate editing tools.

Also added a few accessories – bracers and a bit of jewelry. I have to say, this portrayal of Krava is starting to grow on me.

A little more work to produce a sword that matches the one in the novel, and then I’m going to start working on a model for another character, Krava’s long-term love interest. Hopefully, that process will go smoothly, and then it will be on to a combined render that can form the basis for the book cover.

Krava in Cloth Tunic

Krava in Cloth Tunic

Okay, now I think I’m making progress. After several days of experimentation, I’ve found a set of clothing models that work for Krava. Something within striking distance of clothes that an Iron Age “barbarian” warrior might actually wear. Leather trousers and boots, and a cloth tunic with very short sleeves or no sleeves, that’s more or less what I had in mind. This ensemble very nearly qualifies.

I think the next step is going to involve tinkering with the textures for the tunic – I’m going to see if I can produce materials maps that more closely match something I describe in the draft novel. Meanwhile, I may also try to add a few small accessories, such as a torc and maybe an arm-band for jewelry.

Krava in Elven Jacket

Krava in Elven Jacket

Okay, this is kind of promising even if I still don’t think it quite fits.

The boots and trousers are still working, and the jacket at least seems plausible and looks good on Krava. The ensemble doesn’t exactly suggest “Iron Age barbarian,” though. More like “high fantasy elf.” It might be the kind of outfit Krava wears much later in her story, after she comes into contact with some more civilized folk.

Still, as an experiment, it’s not bad. Still looking for a top that more closely matches what I have in my head – something a bit looser, with much shorter sleeves, and not looking quite so machine-stitched.

Krava in Leather

Krava in Leather

Okay, now that Krava has some clothes on, I can start posting my experiments here.

For the record, it is a royal pain in the nether regions finding clothing models for pre-modern characters that are at all realistic. Look for “female warrior” outfits and you’re likely to get something that’s all keyholes where it isn’t shiny black leather. With stiletto heels. The above isn’t terrible in comparison to some, but it’s still not very close to what I have in my head. I might end up keeping the trousers, boots, and belt here, but that’s about it.

Honestly, if I’m serious about the Celtic inspiration for Krava’s people, their warriors are more likely to look like this:

Image by Angus McBride

Light woolen tunics and trousers, not a lot of leather, maybe a metal helmet, and lots of bright colors and patterns.

Getting there is probably going to mean a lot more digging through the catalogs, and probably some kit-bashing with texture files and whatnot. More experiments to come.

New Map for Kráva’s World

New Map for Kráva’s World

Stayed home today with some kind of ick, which let me catch up on sleep . . . and also gave me a chance to play with Wonderdraft a bit more. Lo and behold, with a little work, I’ve been able to finish the top-level reference map for The Curse of Steel. Here it is:

If you’re interested in more of the technical details, or a more high-resolution image to look at or download, here’s a link to the pertinent page on DeviantArt.

This will be my primary reference map from now on, while I work on the story. I plan to produce some regional maps too, so I can keep locations and distances straight in my head. With Wonderdraft that should be a snap. The only trick will be converting from the plate carrée projection here, to a more conformal projection for the little local maps. I think I’ll be able to do the requisite transformation, or at least approximate it, in Photoshop.

In the meantime, I’m very pleased with the results. This map took a lot less time to produce than similar efforts using only Photoshop, and the result looks better. Wonderdraft is an excellent tool for this kind of work!

Introducing Kráva the Swift

Introducing Kráva the Swift

Here’s my first attempt to generate imagery for The Curse of Steel:

This young woman is my protagonist, Kráva the Swift, close to the beginning of her story.

I’m pleased with how her face, body, hairstyle, and coloring all came out; I was able to make her look almost exactly like the image I had in my head. Clothing and gear, not so much. It’s very difficult to find precisely the look I want for those, among the digital assets that are available for DAZ Studio. Her gear is supposed to suggest a pseudo-Celtic culture, but at the moment she looks kind of generic. This isn’t a bad first approximation, though. Later I’ll try to get her hauberk to look more authentic, improve the sword a bit, add a cloak, a scabbard, and the bow and arrows she also carries, and so on.

Here’s a link to the DeviantArt page where this image was also posted. You should be able to get higher resolution there, and some technical notes that I left out here.