103 replies to this topic

[Ilmatar]

In this post I will first be 1) lazy, and then I will be 2) a spoilsport!

1) I think I should even TRY and draw someone who already isn't a drow.



2) I wanted to say a few things about the "drow are black dammit" -matter. First of all, there is no such thing as black color. Black is when the surface in question does not reflect light, so practically the only thing that can be really black is a black hole. What we think as color black is simply very dark surfaces, but they still act the very same way a pink or a blue surface would. It reflects light, it looks different in different lighting and beside different colors. For example these phones are black. We *know* they are black only by looking at them.




No but wait, let's check that to be sure.



Oh noes! My life has been a lie! The phone is NOT BLACK! ....so you see, to make things look natural, real and in touch with it's surroundings, you need reflections, you need to think of possible colored light and so on. Using pure black is often a bad call in art.

So I think Galsic's drow Aerie looks very good. I could explain the light, brown tinted skin with bright lighting and warm colored surroundings. And if I must pick one of K'aeloree's and vilkacis' drow edits of my portrait, I would pick K'aeloree's, because the lighting is more balanced and the skin looks more natural than in vilkacis's extremely dark version. The dark skin could look perfectly natural if the other parts of the picture were equally dark, too, or it would be obvious that light would hit her hair, but her face would be in the shadows, which unfortunately isn't the case this time.

But yes. The drow have *black* skin (even though some artists just don't seem to get it.) But black is always relative.

Edited by Ilmatar, 07 June 2007 - 11:00 AM.

[vilkacis]

...the phone on the left looks more like the base colour is grey than black, or at least some kind of "dusty" matte-black that's not even supposed to "look" truly black. (The one on the right is "supposed to look black".)

The point is that drow skin is supposed to look black. If they are grey, they look like someone is shining a spotlight in their face. And brown elves belong to a completely different sub-race. Lighting can explain part of it, but the problem is not that some images look like that, it's that many of them do.

[IronOx]

Drow skin vary from Viconia's blue to purple with shades of grey as it really depends on the lighting in the Underdark.

[Galsic]

While I certainly wanted a touch of brown on my ladies, what happened with my Aerie was in large part the result of a rather bad scan. I think I've corrected the problem to some degree (other issues will likely abound, though ).

[vilkacis]

Drow skin vary from Viconia's blue to purple with shades of grey as it really depends on the lighting in the Underdark.

I could just say "What lighting?" and tack on the sticking-tongue-out smiley, but:

Yes, as previously stated, light obviously plays in. Again, the problem is not that some drow are depicted as standing next to light sources that give them a "non-black" appearance, it's the fact that so many are depicted as light blue, purple, green, grey, brown and generally anything but black, even when there is no such light source in the picture, and the fact that this light that supposedly turns "coal black" skin into "light bluish-grey" apparently doesn't have any effect on their clothes, hair and surroundings.

Viconia's skin tone in BG2 does not resemble any description of a dark elf I have ever read.

These colours are generally accepted in art, but it remains a fact that it does not match the written descriptions.

[Ilmatar]

I have a theory on why some artists color drow so light.

They're LAZY! It's easier to get facial features to actually show (and to look not-mutilated) with lighter coloring, of course.

[IronOx]

Technically, Drow see in the dark to a certain degree...and in colors if I remember DnD rules well enough. I think only dwarves see in black and white. If dwarves wrote adventures in the underdark, that would explain the drow descriptions

[vilkacis]

I have a theory on why some artists color drow so light.

They're LAZY! It's easier to get facial features to actually show (and to look not-mutilated) with lighter coloring, of course.

I'll second that.

Technically, Drow see in the dark to a certain degree...and in colors if I remember DnD rules well enough. I think only dwarves see in black and white. If dwarves wrote adventures in the underdark, that would explain the drow descriptions

I have heard that drow see in false-colours when they use infravision, basically dark blue for cold items and red, orange or even white for hot ones.

...in other words, they see things in ways humans only do while on crack

"Real" infravision would be shades of grey, but hey. Wizards did it.

[Jarno Mikkola]

"Real" infravision would be shades of grey, but hey. Wizards did it.

No, it's just an interface adjustion thing and all that. You can pick what ever colors you like. Of course it might make more sence to make warm colors be warmer surfaces.
Just like going to a darkening one of your eyes(for few minutes) with barelly light at all keeping the eye open, and over lighting the other, and then looking to very colorful object while swiching the eye, the colors are both warm and cold depending with eye you use, but soon you'll see the normal colors. It's the brains that do this, not the eyes.

[Black Mage]

Less skin tone debate, more sexy female drow pics, please.

[vilkacis]

Less skin tone debate, more sexy female drow pics, please.

*ahem*

Eh, I dunno. There's such a thing as too big.

...decide for yourself which parts I'm talking about.

Edited by vilkacis, 13 June 2007 - 12:15 PM.

[Kulyok]

Eyebrows.

But - if it is your own art, which it must be, since it's a challenge thread - how come you haven't done anything similar before? This is very good.

[Galsic]

Here's my submission for the challenge. I'm neither sure why the last two turned out lighter than the rest nor do I have the patience to tweak them any further, so y'all will just have to take what you can get .

Edit: Red eyes FTW!

Attached Images

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Edited by Galsic, 14 June 2007 - 08:46 AM.

[Black Mage]

Less skin tone debate, more sexy female drow pics, please.

*ahem*


Eh, I dunno. There's such a thing as too big.

...decide for yourself which parts I'm talking about.

Ears. You could set up camp under one of those.

Eyebrows.

But - if it is your own art, which it must be, since it's a challenge thread - how come you haven't done anything similar before? This is very good.

Whoops, busted.

[Kulyok]

Here's my submission for the challenge.

Mazzy and Jae are very funny and endearing. But I know what confuses me, a little: eyes. They still have their own eyes, not drow-like red ones.

[vilkacis]

...



I had thought it would be obvious, but I have gone back and edited my post.

Sigh.

[edit] Also: good stuff, Galsic. Everybody really looks like themselves.

Edited by vilkacis, 13 June 2007 - 12:21 PM.

[Ilmatar]

Less skin tone debate, more sexy female drow pics, please.

One drow!Imoen in a scaty dress! Gosh this was a quick one. Again.

[Kulyok]

That's... a living image of Jaheira.

[Ilmatar]

That's... a living image of Jaheira.

Imoen with elven features = Jaheira?