Darktiste Sketchbook

[darktiste]

Plasma Rifle with with scope.

[darktiste]

A new bunch of thumbnail with the theme being modern ''melee'' weapon.First set is throwing daggers and the second set are knuckle

[Leo Ki]

Fifth throwing dagger (second on second row) for the look of it - might not be the most stable and effective though.

[darktiste]

Fifth throwing dagger (second on second row) for the look of it - might not be the most stable and effective though.

Sometime you push the design to get cool shape and it throw off the believably it a tricky balance.Thank for your opinion

[darktiste]

6 throwing axe.I am realizing now how much my image format is all over the place i am gonna try to come up with a format that is more fix and fit crimson daggers more without being oversize.

[Leo Ki]

The first ax without a doubt! Will be interesting to see it rendered with all the details.

[Rotohail]

Heya! Sorry for not having come earlier to comment on your SB. I saw you do a lot of design! And I struggle with that quite a bit myself, so I didn't think I could be much of help. I browsed over your SB and saw you have done earlier studies and sketching, but yeah your main focus seems to be design, lots of variety!
From the earlier sniper rifle? I would say the blue cell at the back, you could repeat that choice over the rifle, but that also makes me thing it might not be a good tactical idea to have on a weapon, meant not to draw attention? Ha. It looks cool! I guess on that position it can be covered by the body/arm of the one using it so maybe that is way. I guess what I'm trying to say is that when you design something, purpose and function has to be a part of it, not just cool stuff, which is why I personally struggle with it. Trying to make something both useful, sound and cool looking, feels like it requires lot of thought behind it.
From the axes I like all except the 1st row 2 and 3, mainly because the blades feel too small or close to the handle. They feel a bit wimpy. I think the one I like the most is 2nd row 2 col. Has a nice flow of curves, subtle on the handle. Fist I like 1st col, 1. Mainly due to the direction of the spikes being straight. I feel the ones with spikes pointing radially? They dissipate the energy visually, the straight ones really reinforces the direction, makes it look more threatening to me.
Knives I would take the 2nd row, 3. I'm a classical guy with my knives shapes, ha! I would say the one above, looks like an ice-pick! so that's interesting.
Anyhow, hope it helps!

[darktiste]

Heya! Sorry for not having come earlier to comment on your SB. I saw you do a lot of design! And I struggle with that quite a bit myself, so I didn't think I could be much of help. I browsed over your SB and saw you have done earlier studies and sketching, but yeah your main focus seems to be design, lots of variety!
From the earlier sniper rifle? I would say the blue cell at the back, you could repeat that choice over the rifle, but that also makes me thing it might not be a good tactical idea to have on a weapon, meant not to draw attention? Ha. It looks cool! I guess on that position it can be covered by the body/arm of the one using it so maybe that is way. I guess what I'm trying to say is that when you design something, purpose and function has to be a part of it, not just cool stuff, which is why I personally struggle with it. Trying to make something both useful, sound and cool looking, feels like it requires lot of thought behind it.
From the axes I like all except the 1st row 2 and 3, mainly because the blades feel too small or close to the handle. They feel a bit wimpy. I think the one I like the most is 2nd row 2 col. Has a nice flow of curves, subtle on the handle. Fist I like 1st col, 1. Mainly due to the direction of the spikes being straight. I feel the ones with spikes pointing radially? They dissipate the energy visually, the straight ones really reinforces the direction, makes it look more threatening to me.
Knives I would take the 2nd row, 3. I'm a classical guy with my knives shapes, ha! I would say the one above, looks like an ice-pick! so that's interesting.
Anyhow, hope it helps!

I agree that light from a sniper is not such a good design idea but i was still playing with the concept of ammunition that glow.Also thank you for the comment on the thumbnail i always take the opinion of the public in consideration when i develop them i make my process participative rather than go something with my own taste it just a preference for the moment maybe i will do more design for myself in the future but i want to start by pushing my boundary first.

[chubby_cat]

Instead of making random weapons, I think an interesting exercise to embark on would be trying to design weapons for a single character/theme. Could be a theme like what weapons would a viking warrior carry? Or even something from another universe, like a series of hand crafted weapons for some kind of survival game. Basically, an exercise like this forces you to make design choices that carry over to multiple assets, so see if you can carry the same shape language through all of these weapons.

It would be great to see some more story telling elements to these weapons too. Who owns them? How are they used? Have a look at concept art from the Injustice 2 game: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/xLXdY
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/BDPar
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/2a2Be
This is an excellent example of weapons with story telling

[darktiste]

Instead of making random weapons, I think an interesting exercise to embark on would be trying to design weapons for a single character/theme. Could be a theme like what weapons would a viking warrior carry? Or even something from another universe, like a series of hand crafted weapons for some kind of survival game. Basically, an exercise like this forces you to make design choices that carry over to multiple assets, so see if you can carry the same shape language through all of these weapons.

It would be great to see some more story telling elements to these weapons too. Who owns them? How are they used? Have a look at concept art from the Injustice 2 game: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/xLXdY
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/BDPar
https://www.artstation.com/artwork/2a2Be
This is an excellent example of weapons with story telling

It not random as it might seem if you pay attention and i am actually heading in the direction your talking about.For shape language i am not sure if we can count this as being deliberate but if you go back you can see i have design some weapon from the pre historic era and then i slowly move on to mediaval touch a bit of fantastic and progressed toward making modern weapon.The main problem i am coming in contact is how much more rich costume design is compare to weapon.Every career as it own costume and every region as there own twist on it.I could spend a whole years just developing costume design but i think i can feel it not the direction i wish to go toward.

I am slowly but surely heading toward character design were i will be able to apply what you call story telling were the character will have multiple asset that could end up being personalize completely for himself.

For shape language in my design so far i didn't see the need to gave them a sense of belonging in the same universe i was not trying to limit the design with shape language.

If i was do design multiple asset i would probably make them less rendered to let the character be the center of attention if they were to sit on the same page.

[darktiste]

Just Finished this throwing daggers next will be the knuckle.I tried to play more with reflected light and try to force myself to go a bit stronger than i use.

[darktiste]

To day i bring the brawler favorite the knuckle a gore version for Halloween and a clean version for those brawler who don't like to get there hand dirty.

[Leo Ki]

You sure know how to add the gory details. How about adding scratches, bumps, stains to the various weapons you designed recently?

[darktiste]

Here the throwing axe.I tried to play with more scratch.

[Leo Ki]

Yes! You did make a dent in the ax blade!
The texture on the black metal, though, doesn't quite read "metal" to me.

[darktiste]

Yes! You did make a dent in the ax blade!
The texture on the black metal, though, doesn't quite read "metal" to me.

It because it metal painted with a matte finish.This is why you only see the metallic part where there the cutting edge.I did not try to do highly reflective metallic surface yet because it require more time to analyse the color that will need to be part of the reflection.That why most of the thing i done so far are unrefined metal or metal that look matte i will need to do proper study to advance my understanding of highly reflective metal but right now i am trying to enlarge the catalogue of texture i can play with and leave the harder texture for later.You can see somewhat more successful attempt at making reflective metal in some earlier page in this case the axe here was not indeed to be reflective.

[Leo Ki]

So, is the texture due to overlapping layers of paint or shifts in the paint layer? At this low resolution I can't make my mind on this.

[Jephyr]

Hi,

Those brass knuckles look lethal! 

Thanks for your comments over in my SB.  I looked over the last 3 or four pages of yours and it looks like lately you've been specializing in weapons and armor etc.  I hardly do any of that unless I need something for an image I'm working on.

Have you tried Blender or another 3D program.  Some of your designs would transfer to Blender very easily and would allow you to visualize them from different views.

Thanks again and keep 'em coming

[darktiste]

Hi,

Those brass knuckles look lethal! 

Thanks for your comments over in my SB.  I looked over the last 3 or four pages of yours and it looks like lately you've been specializing in weapons and armor etc.  I hardly do any of that unless I need something for an image I'm working on.

Have you tried Blender or another 3D program.  Some of your designs would transfer to Blender very easily and would allow you to visualize them from different views.

Thanks again and keep 'em coming

I been ''holding back'' the 3d stuff since i see my work as primary 2d even if i understand the advantage of using 3d to visualize my work.I never felt the push toward modeling my design since i see this as the work of someone else as i see myself as primarily a designer.But i am slowly moving toward learning how to creating full turn around of a design so that it could be hypothetically model by someone else.I would not mind collaborating with someone else that know those program if they felt my design where interesting enough to be turn into a model aslong as we both share the credit of were work.

[chubby_cat]

It could just be my monitors, but some of your concept work is actually quite difficult to see. As in you have a lot of dark values on a dark value background. I would suggest making the backgrounds lighter if the weapons are dark, that way we can see the silhouette and details clearly.

This is what I mean. Left is yours, right is my edit