What is Khayal? / Final Pieces

What is Khayal?

Hello guys,

Today I am going to talk about what I will be naming my major project and why I chose this name for it.  Moreover, I will be showcasing my final pieces of work with description. 

So what is Khayal?

Khayal is an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) that talks about a world where peace is not found since there are a lot of dangerous creatures in it that keep on attacking the city of Khayal (kayala).  They usually come from the dark and normal forest next to that surrounds the city.  Khayal in Arabic means ''Fantasy'' and that is why I chose it as a name for my Project.  

Final Pieces

The Bat Mage is a wizard that changes into a bat in the night.  He uses magic in the light while he uses his claws in the dark.  The bat is usually found in the dark forest of the caves of Khayal.

The Clumsy Mushroom is a poisonous creature inspired by toadstools and mushrooms.  It is usually harmless and clumsy but if the players bother i, it will attack them.  These mushrooms are usually found roaming and climbing the trees of the forest. 

The Cat Panda is a crature mixed between a Red panda and a Caracal cat.  It is usually found in the dark forest and it takes a large amount of people to defeat it since it is extremely huge in size as seen the scale on the piece.  It uses its claws and arrow tail as a weapon.

The Tree Monster does not have any eyes or a nose and it is hollow from the inside, instead it senses its predators by using its ears.  It uses the poison ivy plant as a weapon since it is a poisonous plant that affects living things such as: humans.  They are usually found in the forest as well.

I have always wanted to create this project although I did not have the experience to draw it when I started drawing in 2014.  The mushroom was my first painted piece out of all the others while the bat was the last.  I am really happy with the results of the pieces since it was my first time painting on Photoshop.  I saw improvement from the mushroom to the bat since I learned new techniques in Photoshop on the way of creating these pieces from my friends.  

In the end, I think this is the best major project I have done so far since I have not faced difficulties in proportions and anatomy as my other projects which shows improvement although I could not imitate the style of my favourite artist's painting style (Kekai Kotaki) since I lack the experience in using Photoshop. 

Errors in the portfolio and how to fix them in the future 

I have made many spelling mistakes in my portfolio and it was too late to print the whole portfolio again since the shop closed down after I saw the mistakes while I was reading it.  I feel frustrated and sad about it.

I have made many spelling mistakes in the description for every piece in the portfolio since I forgot to proof read my the text that I wrote. one example is: writing forest as ''forrest'' and I have made many other mistakes where you can actually find them while reading the pictures above.  Unfortunately, I will not be able to edit them for this assignment but I will definitely edit them after it.

  My only problem here is proof reading and this taught me to never forget to proof read before I submit anything else since there will be always errors in the text.  

Initial Sketches

Initial Sketches and practice 

Hello guys,

Today I am going to show you the initial sketches and practice for my creature art major project.  The initial sketches will consist of studies including: Red pandas, Bat wings, fire effects, plants, branches and mushrooms.  

Mushroom Study

Here I studied different kinds of mushrooms from my moodboard I did before filled with mushrooms.  I did this study to have a grasp of how a mushroom should look like in different kinds and shapes.  Moreover, another reason I did this study was to put what I have learned into the design of my mushroom.

I did some initial sketches for the Clumsy mushroom since I was not sure how it will look like as a design.  I showed my friends the 2 first designs without a face and they told me it looks boring and it lacks a lot of elements of design.  So I added the toadstool patterns on the head and added a clumsy sad face since the angry face does not show a clumsy personality.

Red panda and Tail Study 

This is a study for the red panda that I made in order to get inspiration for my red panda + caracal cat creature that I am doing.  This study was really helpful for my piece since it helped me in proportions by studying the body of the panda and learned new knowledge about the red pandas.  Red pandas use their tail to protect themselves from cold weather and to balance themselves on trees which is really interesting.  Although red pandas are tiny in size, my creature is going to be huge since I am aiming to make it a large creature.

To add to that, I have made more than one idea on how the tail of my creature would look like if it had different medieval weapons connected to its tail so it can protect it self from any danger.  I ended up choosing the last design which is inspired by an arrow since it looked simple and worked out the most with the creature's tail.

Plants and Branches study 

Although, I have not used any single plant from this research and study I made, it was really useful since I learned about new plants that I can create creatures and characters out of in future designs.  Here I studied flowers including: Orchids and Cala lilys which were a couple of pictures of these flowers put in a moodboard layout for inspiration.  Instead of these flowers, I chose to use poison Ivy for my Tree Monster since I could not draw and paint the other flowers properly on Photoshop which made the design look unacceptable.

Since most of my Tree creature is made out of branches, I made initial sketches of random branches to add to my design including: branched from trees and dead branches on the ground.  I also sketched broken routes in order to make the neck and legs of my creature similar to it.

Bat wings and fire study

I have made a couple of sketches of Bat wings and fire spells in order to know how the bat and fire looks like.  I made these sketches to apply them on my Bat Mage.

After that, I made initial sketches for the Bat mage since I was not sure of the design exactly because it has two forms ( normal form, bat form). I was not sure about the cloak that he is going to wear so I drew two designs and ended up choosing the second one since the first one did not work with the head.  I chose the fireball over the wand since it looked better and simpler as well.  For the bat form, I merged the normal form and added bat wings to it since the first design was too simple as stated on the paper.

In the end, these sketches and studies definitely helped me in the creation of my creatures since it gave me a grasp of how the final design of them will look like.  The hardest study I made was the red panda study since I faced difficulties in drawing the fur of it and the eyes.  I usually do not draw animals which is the reason why I faced difficulties studying the panda.  

Process

Process of one of my pieces

Hello guys,

Today I am going to show you my process of the Clumsy Mushroom where I use both traditional and digital media to create it which you will see below.

First of all, I started with sketching the mushroom in different poses and views with a pencil and paper which is considered traditional media.

After that, I moved the picture of the sketch to Photoshop in order to do the line-work for it by just dragging the file to Photoshop.

Then, I used the paint bucket tool to create a grey background instead of leaving the background white since in my opinion the grey will mix with my colour pallet better. You can see the paint bucket logo in the second picture.

Here, I did the line-work for all the mushrooms on one layer by drawing on the lines of the sketch to be more accurate and have cleaner line-work.

Then, I made the picture of the sketch unseen to start with the colouring and to make sure that the line-work looks clean and presentable.

In order to colour comfortably without taking care of colouring over the lines, I moved the line-work layer to the top layer.

I started adding colour to it (Solid colours) since these colours are the base colours of my creature.  I made the solid colours all on one layer which was a bad idea since it allowed more mistakes to happen. To paint the solid colours I used the normal brush in Photoshop.

Here, I did a new layer for smudging the colours together by using both the normal brush and the mixer brush shown in the second picture to make the mushroom pop out more and make it look more 3D by adding shadows. 

After that, I played with the Image Adjustments settings in order to make the tree lighter since it was too dark and the shadows were not seen which made the painting look bad.  

Here is an example of how I used the mixer brush which was by colouring to solid colours (one lighter colour and the other is darker for the shading).  First I used the normal brush to colour the solid colours, then I mixed them together and this was the result.

Then, I added more shading on the mushroom using a normal brush by just making the size of the brush slightly bigger.

I added highlights on some places such as: the head of the mushroom and the tree.  I chose for the tree a different highlight colour since I thought that white will not work with it.

I added a colour pallet to show the viewer the main colours of the mushroom and I finished the art piece.

Doing some things differently

On some pieces of my work like the Tree Monster, I have used a different shading technique and a softer brush as seen in the first picture to shade the example of the head and leg of the creature above.  

Then after I shaded it with a slightly larger and softer brush, I multiplied the layer which gave it a shading feeling to it.  I found this method to be easier than what I had to do with the mushroom since It took less time to make although I still prefer to make my pieces as how I made my mushroom.

What is an MMORPG

What is an MMORPG?

Hello guys,

Today I am going to talk about the development of MMORPGs adn where they came from.  MMO's where first inspired by a Role Playing Game called Dungeons and Dragons which was made in the 1970's.  Moreover, I am going to show you which MMOs inspired me to create my creatures for my own MMO game.

 

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This is the logo of the Dungeons and Dragons RPG game and a concept art for the game.  It was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rule and made by Gary Gygax.  The game was really popular in the past and it is still running strong in the present time since there are online and board games for it that are still popular among people. 

Info Link

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MMORPG's are refereed to as Massively Online Multiplayer Games and the first to be made was a game called Ultima Online in 1997 and it was the first successful game in its genre!  Ultima Online got inspiration from Dungeons and Dragons by taking elements from it and adding its own elements to make a game were players can play together in a massive world filled with fantasy.

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Here is a picture of the gameplay of Ultima online and as you can see it looks old because of its pixelised and out dated graphics.  

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Info link 2

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World of Warcraft is the most well known MMORPG in the world with a huge following with over 10 million players around the world including myself.  Although people have to pay monthly and buy every expansion of the game, they still play it and invest a huge amount of time in it.  World of Warcraft was developed and made by a company named Blizzard.  The second picture shows the gameplay of the game.  These graphics are considered outdated since it is an old game although Blizzard managed to develop it and make it look a lot better than now.  I chose this picture since it shows a huge number of players trying to kill a boss (Creature) together.

For more info about the game Click here

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Guild Wars 2 is an MMO I mentioned before since Kekai Kotaki, the concept artist behind the game inspired me in creating this creature art project.  Guild wars 2 is made by NCsoft and Arenanet and it is my favourite MMO of all time since it was my first MMO I played and its art inspires me to create my own work.  Guild Wars 2 is a newer game than World of Warcraft since WoW was made in 2004 while GW2 was made in 2012 as you can see the graphics difference.  

This was really useful information to me since I never knew what was the first MMO ever made and from where it was inspired which broadened my information about games in general.