Silkroad Online Forums

Hmph, been dorking about with GIMP and figuring out certain ways I like doing things and equally liking the outcomes. They are far from great, but I like them.

Also been working on rendering images. Did Rangiku in my signature below, used a picture I've had for ages so I couldn't possibly tell you where I got it but I'd be happy to share the render and stock image.



Thoughts, suggestions? Hmph, and I'm just noticing the pixelated parts, guess my background wasn't as solid as I had thought. I'll get to fixing that in a bit.

I dont like your green one, primarily because you have us trying to decide whether your image or your text is your focal point, and neither have a sense of unity with eachother.

I like your current alot though, text is gorgeous, needs major depth work, but render blend/effects/text are v. nice.

I don't like the texture of the background, or the white things. I also don't think that cutout is suited to its location, with the edge sticking into the sig being rather flat, it pulls the centre of attention way to the side.

At the risk of sounding like a serious idiot, what sort of depth are you referring to? And any tips/tricks that could be easily converted to GIMP that would help?


I do agree, but I ended up trying to work around the cutout. Unfortunately what you see is what you get, that's all there was to the cutout and I wasn't really sure how to blend it in well anywhere else. *shrug* Maybe I'll work on that too when I'm fixing and fiddling with the background.

grab the nearest object to you and set it out in front of you, focus on it exclusively, but pay attention to everything around it. Things behind it or in front of it blur, it has a shadow and a hotspot from light hitting it, it is contrasted differently than the things surrounding it because you are focusing on it. That is depth in the easiest way I can think to explain it.

Decided to tear apart the other and start from scratch, and this is what I've come up with...

Seems a bit busy to me. :\ Got kinda frustrated in the end and ended up just doing whatever was easiest. Hmph.

Assuming you were attempting a "dark-light" feel, the right side doesn't look dark: it looks faded.

I'm not a fan of the leaves on the left side, they just look stamped on with a brush, and the centre leaves are very distracting and take alot away from the character cutouts.

Is that a little better?

What I was going for was dark/light but sort of mirrored image on the cutout, and was trying to get rid of "plain" space on the left, and get rid of a line I couldn't seem to fix between the cutouts.

It's better but the right side's white-green-thing is still unrecognizable and faded looking.

If you want to make the cutout look dark, don't lower the opacity. You want to open the layer up as a new document, tweak the levels, cut it out, paste it back on.

Hahah, okay last try here. Even though I am liking what you're suggesting when I try it out, I'm about to yank my hair out. But not due to you. Been trying to get on Xian for the past half an hour and between errors and server traffic...I...argh!

Last one for the night.

Tis a waterfall I snatched from a picture I got from a friend awhile ago. I had duplicated the layer and set it to the mode "subtract" to darken it up because I felt it was a little too bright and would steal focus. Not sure now though, now that I've been staring at it for awhile. Hah.

Elikapeka, Just because some random person doesn't like something you've done doesn't mean you should change it so drastically to fit their taste.

No, it doesn't but I'm here to learn and if somebody suggests something that might help and I end up liking it, I'm gonna run with it.

Thanks for your concern though.