SolidSpidr mecha design, Working on the wrong things...

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SolidSpidr
Posts: 118
Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:42 pm
Location: Relaxing in Britannia

Yay! I finally bothered to update!

Tieren Tao mk VII
The Tieren Tao mkVII is an idea I got based off of what the HRL's machine would look like without the GN-X being suddenly dropped into the picture. Basic armament is a compat beam rifle, shield, and a pair of beam sabers.
“The school of the undefeated East!”
“The winds of the king!”
“Zenshin!”
“Keiretsu!”
“Tempa Kyoran!”
“Look! The East is burning red!”
-Master Asia

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SolidSpidr
Posts: 118
Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:42 pm
Location: Relaxing in Britannia

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

Sooooooo, its been a while, a long while but that doesn't mean I've stopped drawing mecha. Mostly it was a combination of drawers block, hard drive failure, and general lazyness but I'm back with redesigns for the first four mecha I posted. I really liked how they came out, granted there are things here and their but meh, I'll fix them when I decide to draw them again.

RS-109 GR-Enforcer

HFS-009 Shaman,Command Antenna,Rifle,Shield,Heat Sword

YXE-027 Deus

TA-08 Interceptor

So what do you think?
“The school of the undefeated East!”
“The winds of the king!”
“Zenshin!”
“Keiretsu!”
“Tempa Kyoran!”
“Look! The East is burning red!”
-Master Asia

Click me!, Click me!
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Seraphic
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Joined: Fri Jun 22, 2007 1:56 am
Location: Inside the barrel of Wing Zero's left Buster Rifle.

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

Finally delivering the goods, eh? :wink:

I'll have to say that the quality of your work is still quite shocking. I think at this point you should start focusing on more of the background qualities in making lineart, such as posture and proportion. If you work on making your lineart tighter and neater, I'm sure you'll be getting a lot of attention real fast.

It's good to see that you're drawing larger. It definitely gives you more space to work, huh? You gotta start trying to draw the hands though, haha! You should also be extremely wary of how those legs, ankles, and feet connect together. It's quite difficult to get right. You might want to look into methods for removing those notebook lines. I can discuss a few (difficult) methods if you ask. Either that, or you can upgrade to copy paper. =) Instead of having a bunch of separate links, it might be simpler if you just throw all of those parts together on a single design sheet/page using a program. Consider scanning your files in a larger size/higher resolution, and also posting them in a larger size in the future. It helps when you do editing in programs, and of course it lets us have a better look at things.

It's a Gaplant! I really like Gaplants. =) While I think all of your frames are drawn skillfully and with a high degree of accuracy, I will have to be honest and say that the modifications you've made aren't quite enough for me to distinguish them from their base inspirations. I'm not sure how much you actually intended to differentiate them, so this might not even be a valid point. Just making aesthetic mods? That's cool. Want to make some original units in the future? That'd be great, too.

Anyway, I think all that's left to say is that you're going in the right direction, and the only thing that can help you improve is a crap load of practice. And that's the slow and crappy part of any past time. =p Keep it up, Solid. I'm confident that you'll be one of the best among us. Don't hesitate to ask for specific help if you ever want it.

EDIT: You should post up some of your characters, by the way. As you know, a lot of us are interested in character design, but no one knows what the hell they're doing, including myself. We just need more people to put up material to encourage everyone else.
"Red particles are bad, they mutate you into... dead? But green/blue particles are good, apparently, for reasons and for purposes yet to be determined. Isn't science sometimes nicely color-coded?"
-Antares

GW: The Sword . Sera's Art . Gameplay . The Lost Citadel
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SolidSpidr
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Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:42 pm
Location: Relaxing in Britannia

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

Thanks for the review Sera. What you said really pointed a few things out to me. Proportions have always hounded my artwork and caused me grief, as well as their posture.

Yeah, more workspace is always nice. The hands, no anything but the hands! Haha, well for most of these I just took the easy way out and made some bubble like ends. Actually the day I read your post I ended up drawing a whole notebook page of various mecha hands, so I am practicing. I was noticing the connections as well and I've been trying to fix those in my drawings but sometimes I just miss it.

Notebook lines, yeah those are a pain to remove. I've tried several methods from erasing in MS paint to tracing lineart in a B5 pencil and then scanning it in on black and white text doc (I tried this on the Tieren Tao). So if you have any methods I'd be glad to hear about them.

For the original four I was just trying to draw something descent from memory and a Zaku, Dom, Gaplant and a GM were what I got out of it. So after a while I went back to these designs and decided that I had to make them less of a laughing stock, that and I had drawn up the Shaman II and it really had no resemblance to the Shaman; so the Shaman needed to look more of an ancestor to it. I then revamped the four into these designs (with the Dom/Deus having a mid version between these two that hasn't been posted). When I get a chance I'll post up some of my more original designs but I just wanted to get these up since there's an easy comparison in my first post.

On characters I've got a couple I think I can post up, granted they tend to have horrible hands like my mecha but there's a few that are okay. I've broke down in this area and went and got a couple manga books, specifically The Idiots Guide to Manga and the Big Book of Manga. The Idiots guide is actually helpful while the other one is more for people who want to draw and then beautify it in a editing program.

Now for a quick mecha update. This little guy(okay he's not little at all) is one I drew just last weekend. The MRS-119 Hercules
This one has an Ink job done to it and drawn on copy paper. I think this one would probably be a mechwarrior or something. Perhaps it would be a good Strider pod for VR7?
Well lets see, this babies armament,
x1 dual barrel grenade launcher, mounted on left forearm
x1 115mm smooth bore cannon, mounted on right arm
x1 medium range machine gun, mounted on the 115mm cannon
x1 two barrel slug gun, mounted over right shoulder
x1 16 tube short range missile pod, mounted over left shoulder
“The school of the undefeated East!”
“The winds of the king!”
“Zenshin!”
“Keiretsu!”
“Tempa Kyoran!”
“Look! The East is burning red!”
-Master Asia

Click me!, Click me!
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Seraphic
Posts: 1434
Joined: Fri Jun 22, 2007 1:56 am
Location: Inside the barrel of Wing Zero's left Buster Rifle.

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

I'll apologize ahead of time if you don't have Shop. :shock:

At first I used this method. (Remember to click NEXT for the second part of that tutorial.) I didn't like this too much because trying to fade the notebook lines out of existence also had some bad effects on the lines that I did want to keep.

Eventually, I used a modification of that method, where instead of using Levels to fade out the remnants of the lines, I just erased them manually with the erase tool. Crude, but it accomplished what I wanted. Prior to doing anything else at all, I manually erased all the lines I could in the big open spaces using that Selection tool.

Lastly, I've been using a completely different method. I've actually been taking the Pen tool and filling in ALL THE NEGATIVE SPACE with white, leaving only my pencil lines behind. You have to zoom in like crazy for that kind of precision. Some might call that obsessive compulsive....and it is...but here are the results. It even cleans up all the grays and blurs that are bound to happen with pencil! Given, this one was originally drawn on copy paper, but you get the drift. If you absolutely need to see the results for notebook paper, try these two. (This drawing has bad proportions.) Also, make use of the Burn tool to darken specific parts in your pencil strokes if you feel like it.

I think some of those How-To books can be a bit of a bad influence. Instead of just picking up techniques, I find that a lot of people that use them also pick up the style of the author. My friend used one of those books, and it had a really old school comic-y look to the characters. >.>; Remember, those texts/examples are for learning techniques. Don't copy the drawings exactly if you can!

Yeah, that'd make a fine strider pod! I'm sure VR would like it, though I think he requires that they are colored if possible. No one seemed to like my Marble aero pod, though. I'm sure Ryujin must have laughed his ass off when he saw it, whether it be from him getting it was a joke or from seeing the terrible quality of the image. =p

Lookin' forward to more, sir, and I'm still particularly interested in seeing your character work. =o

EDIT: *Oh yeah. You should post that practice sheet you did for MS hands!! I'm sure it'll help out a lot of people.
"Red particles are bad, they mutate you into... dead? But green/blue particles are good, apparently, for reasons and for purposes yet to be determined. Isn't science sometimes nicely color-coded?"
-Antares

GW: The Sword . Sera's Art . Gameplay . The Lost Citadel
TGping
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Joined: Tue May 05, 2009 4:23 pm

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

Honestly, you are the guy that made me want to post here :)

I looked through your whole thread here, and I see vast improvement over your first post. Eventually I want that to be me :D

We'll see. Keep up the drawing.
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SolidSpidr
Posts: 118
Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:42 pm
Location: Relaxing in Britannia

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

Fourth page this time, I think that's a new record for me! I blame this on three things. Xbox 360, summer break and college, simple as that. Well anyways now on to the update itself.

Avior Base Frame
The Avior is based in that gundam, code geass, macross thingy I was thinking up eariler. Its a Mobile Suit but stylized like a knightmare frame. I've got a few of the customs thought up, about five right now.

Sigma 7
A continuation of Jovian ms, its pretty much the final boss of the Jovian Rebellion. I've also taken the whole Jovian rebellion thing and stuck it into the above universe, I need to come up with a name for it.....

Flag Type A
The Thunder Cat is the successor to the Fire Cat which is in an earlier post. I'm going to redraw the Thunder Cat so that's why its not up right now. The top half of this was going real good but then I got to the reverse legs and I crashed.

Flag Type B
The Flag Type A was actually unfinished until I finished this version. I then went back a finished it for completions sake. My second attempt, I felt it wouldn't be able to really transform so I just opted to have it removed. When I was inking I got a little over zealous and drew all sorts of 'detail' lines everywhere. :roll:

here ya go Sera
I had meant to post this up a while ago but I kept putting it off but hey better 4 months late than never right? (It seems that's slowly becoming my montra.....) I really like how this turned out, two hours of work pays off. also I left my little stick figure that I used for positioning up in the top right corner.
“The school of the undefeated East!”
“The winds of the king!”
“Zenshin!”
“Keiretsu!”
“Tempa Kyoran!”
“Look! The East is burning red!”
-Master Asia

Click me!, Click me!
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Josh
Posts: 219
Joined: Tue Mar 07, 2006 5:18 pm

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

Interesting look for the Flags there (sort of reminds me of the various *lions from SRW). I also really like how you drew the Avoir's legs, that head screams Ahead to me.
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SolidSpidr
Posts: 118
Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:42 pm
Location: Relaxing in Britannia

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, Back with an update

UPDATE!!!!
I really don't do this often enough.

@Josh: Thanks Josh, yeah after watching 00 I really liked the ahead/GNX's four eye design and used that as the basis of the Avoir's head instead of a gundamish head (although one of the customs I'm working on has a gundam like head). I had like eight leg designs I was looking at using and it turned out that the rather plain one worked the best.

SRMO-014 El Diablo, redeux
So I went back and redrew the El Diablo that I had spent two+ hours in PAINT.NET tracing over. Personally I think this version comes across as a heavy mobile suit much better than the previous version. I screwed up while tracing the gatling gun but oh well.

SREU-032 Knightmare, redeux
So I've completely overhauled the Knightmare, the only things still the same are roughly the shoulders and the chest. Once again I feel this version is levels above the old one, which was pretty much a sketch done instead of listening to my teacher in Computer Maintenance. Also instead of trying to carefully trace straight lines of its rifle I just did it in PAINT.NET, works worlds better than my shaky hand.

SRUS-027 Fire Cat, redeux
This one has probably had the least done to it. I mostly streamlined the legs to look like wings, drew up its weapons and made it look better.

SR-037 Sentinel
The SR's main mobile suit, or at least it was supposed to be. As I developed the WWIII scenario some more I found that the D (Desert) type would likely be used more and consequently be the main unit.

Something completely random and unrelated.
rick :roll: get it?
“The school of the undefeated East!”
“The winds of the king!”
“Zenshin!”
“Keiretsu!”
“Tempa Kyoran!”
“Look! The East is burning red!”
-Master Asia

Click me!, Click me!
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SolidSpidr
Posts: 118
Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2007 6:42 pm
Location: Relaxing in Britannia

Re: SolidSpidr mecha design, UPDATE!!!!!

Just something to pass the time, even though I should be working on my entry for Sera's contest >_>

Seraphim rough
“The school of the undefeated East!”
“The winds of the king!”
“Zenshin!”
“Keiretsu!”
“Tempa Kyoran!”
“Look! The East is burning red!”
-Master Asia

Click me!, Click me!
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