A request for skilled people. A really great pic I've found: Please put him into a armor (ranger or rogue class). Lighten skin color (human color). Normal eyes (maybe blue or green?).
Like this two i've made, but they are not cool. I'm not skilled :-(((
This one is great too. Made in original Mike Sass's style. There is a lack of black guys portraits. Same as the first one. I have tried to put him into an armor , but no luck. His neck is too long :-(
well, do alot of my work as requests and such. So if somebody wants a recolored or re-done Enkida pic, then ill re-color an Enkida pic. I assume that these people put thier work freely on the internet for others to use... freely... (like I and others here do)
Enkida is not making a profit and niether am I. A google search for BG portraits will bring up Enkida art. If Enkida intended these to be used for profit and gain then he/she should have put thier signature on it and or copyrighted it.
Now, with that all being said. I'm not a bad guy. I really do try to respect the artists wishes whenever I can and I would certainly not wan't to piss anybody off. Its times like these though that take a good thing and make me walk away from it. I like doing "manipulations" and "re-works" but if people are gonna be like that then I guess I have to pack it up and move on.
Nice to see all the creativity in this thread. :-)
When it comes to making a photograph less realistic and more BG painted, which are your best Photoshop tips? For example, do you hand paint over, or use surface blur?
Also, what are your references? BG1 or BG2? Personally, I use the Jaheira portrait of BG2 as a reference as for size of head, colors, blurriness and such.
I am still perfecting my Baldurizing techniques/ I never really use the same exact methods twice. I use alot of the smudging tool in PS to "paint over" photos. but thats just a small part of it. Really, blending and maching colors/shadows/light sources take the most time. I use BG2 as my references on style and colors.
@Isandir - Awesome! I've been looking for pics for my PC for some time. I've loved your work on the dropbox collection and so it's an honour to have you do these. The background is great. Would it be possible to change the hilt to a more traditional longsword?
@RyanPK: Here they are. I also touched up the cloak a bit, as I noticed a few small things I didn't like in the first one I posted. Hope you like them, and I'm happy you find them appropriate for your PC.
@Astafas: I tend to prefer a more realistic look (obviously), and TiaxRulesAll and some of the others are far more experienced than me in making images appear painted.
However, I have played with a few, trying to make them fit the BG1 style in particular. The picture you start with tends to be important; generally, one with stark, contrasting colors will be easier to work with. Increasing the contrast further while desaturating a bit can bring out the vivid oil-painted look. Blur does come in handy in reducing the number of colors, but it can lead to a loss in clarity if overused. I think one of the most useful tools in replicating the smooth brush strokes of the original BG style is the mixer brush tool in Photoshop. It blends just as smoothly as blur, reduces colors better and adds thicker strokes.
As for reference points, I don't use any single picture. What I've noticed about all the BG portraits is that the heads are always 1/2 to 2/3 the height of the image. I just stick with that most of the time and play the rest by ear (/eye).
I like this one in particular, @DarkDogg. Was the model someone you know, or a picture you found?
Oh no! I'm not a painter. Have no talant. All what I can do - use google + crop and color :-)
Not a bad place to start, really. The more you do it, the easier it gets. The plus side is you get to have fun while also picking up skills that often give you an edge in work as well.
@Astafas: The latest one I did should give a good idea of what makes the mixer brush tool so useful. I used it a lot when working on her hair, and as you can see, it tends to result in wide strokes that look like they were made with oil paint. With patience, you could probably make even thicker strokes to maximize the effect.
The downside to this one was that her face didn't have much contrast to begin with, so it retained more of the realistic look.
I've been experimenting a bit and toying with the idea of a portrait set based on the often-discussed, hypothetical Baldur's Gate movie. The downside is that my holiday is just about finished, which means real life will intrude. Eventually I may get them all done, though...
These pictures are awesome, well done and "baldurized". Congratulations to all of you, guys. I noticed that most of them are good for humans and elves. Can you try to draw a male halfling with this picture?
@Isandir - Awesome! I've been looking for pics for my PC for some time. I've loved your work on the dropbox collection and so it's an honour to have you do these. The background is great. Would it be possible to change the hilt to a more traditional longsword?
@RyanPK: Here they are. I also touched up the cloak a bit, as I noticed a few small things I didn't like in the first one I posted. Hope you like them, and I'm happy you find them appropriate for your PC.
@Isandir: Perfect. The cloak picture is the one I'm going with. Thanks so much.
There is a strange pic in the core files called TESTPORT in a small resolution. No idea where it is used. But I think it was painted in the original BG style by the same painter. Here is this guy
resized:
I wonder if someone could remake this portrait with a bigger resolution, like some people did with Illasera, Sendai, Gronmir, balthazar, Mellisan portraits...
@Astafas: The latest one I did should give a good idea of what makes the mixer brush tool so useful. I used it a lot when working on her hair, and as you can see, it tends to result in wide strokes that look like they were made with oil paint. With patience, you could probably make even thicker strokes to maximize the effect.
The downside to this one was that her face didn't have much contrast to begin with, so it retained more of the realistic look.
Who is the original model for this?
BTW, I think this would make a spot-on Safana - a sultry conniver ready to backstab her comrades (literally and figuratively). ;-)
When it is that small, people would essentially have to redraw it. There simply isn't enough detail in the smaller picture to scale it up.
Is there nothing that can be done? Maybe focusing or sharpen a little bit or something?
Not really, no. The problem is that a pixel is, when you get down to it, a single dot of color. Scaling up a flat picture will always result in loss of resolution. In some cases, you can compensate, but when it is this small, there is really not much that can be done--at least, to my limited layman's knowledge.
There are ways around that problem, but they come into play when the image is created (for instance, you could make it in a vector-based drawing application--vectors are based on mathematical equations, essentially telling the computer how to draw it, which means the computer can scale it to any resolution you want).
The small picture looks like this when you zoom in:
While that's OK when each dot of color is the size of a pixel (so you can't see them), when a drawing application is asked to scale it up, it just doesn't have much to work with. It blurs the image while retaining as much of the details as it can, but it just can't extrapolate details that were lost when the image was scaled down.
but CSI Miami can upscale a blurry photo and read tiny licence plates all the time!!!
/sarcasm
no for real. there is only so much upsizing you can do. That pic is far to small to be workable.
I always find that absolutely infuriating when I see it happen on tv shows and movies. Every video camera used by any government organization must take footage at an absurdly high resolution...
@Astafas: The latest one I did should give a good idea of what makes the mixer brush tool so useful. I used it a lot when working on her hair, and as you can see, it tends to result in wide strokes that look like they were made with oil paint. With patience, you could probably make even thicker strokes to maximize the effect.
The downside to this one was that her face didn't have much contrast to begin with, so it retained more of the realistic look.
Who is the original model for this?
BTW, I think this would make a spot-on Safana - a sultry conniver ready to backstab her comrades (literally and figuratively). ;-)
@SharGuidesMyHand: Do a Google search for Maya Suarez, a Mexican fashion model. Her pictures tend to work well since she often models lingerie, making it easy to adjust the image to fit any type of dress/armor. I'll put together a different version in leather when I get the time to have one that's more appropriate for Safana or any rogue type.
These pictures are awesome, well done and "baldurized". Congratulations to all of you, guys. I noticed that most of them are good for humans and elves. Can you try to draw a male halfling with this picture?
@Aedan: Here you go. I can switch it over to leather armor given some time. The weapon and/or background could be changed much faster (or taken out entirely in the case of the hand and weapon).
Additionally, for everyone else here, I see that there are a lot of different requests and ideas. I'll try to do some if I'm able, but please remember that I and the others here do this for fun. I'll typically pick out the ones that appeal to me first, and do others later. I'll also start work again tomorrow, which will severely limit the amount of time I can dedicate to this.
Comments
A really great pic I've found:
Please put him into a armor (ranger or rogue class).
Lighten skin color (human color).
Normal eyes (maybe blue or green?).
Like this two i've made, but they are not cool.
I'm not skilled :-(((
There is a lack of black guys portraits.
Same as the first one. I have tried to put him into an armor , but no luck. His neck is too long :-(
I hardly recognize Tyler Perry out of costume anymore.
Enkida is not making a profit and niether am I. A google search for BG portraits will bring up Enkida art. If Enkida intended these to be used for profit and gain then he/she should have put thier signature on it and or copyrighted it.
Now, with that all being said. I'm not a bad guy.
I really do try to respect the artists wishes whenever I can and I would certainly not wan't to piss anybody off. Its times like these though that take a good thing and make me walk away from it. I like doing "manipulations" and "re-works" but if people are gonna be like that then I guess I have to pack it up and move on.
When it comes to making a photograph less realistic and more BG painted, which are your best Photoshop tips? For example, do you hand paint over, or use surface blur?
Also, what are your references? BG1 or BG2? Personally, I use the Jaheira portrait of BG2 as a reference as for size of head, colors, blurriness and such.
However, I have played with a few, trying to make them fit the BG1 style in particular. The picture you start with tends to be important; generally, one with stark, contrasting colors will be easier to work with. Increasing the contrast further while desaturating a bit can bring out the vivid oil-painted look. Blur does come in handy in reducing the number of colors, but it can lead to a loss in clarity if overused. I think one of the most useful tools in replicating the smooth brush strokes of the original BG style is the mixer brush tool in Photoshop. It blends just as smoothly as blur, reduces colors better and adds thicker strokes.
As for reference points, I don't use any single picture. What I've noticed about all the BG portraits is that the heads are always 1/2 to 2/3 the height of the image. I just stick with that most of the time and play the rest by ear (/eye).
All what I can do - use google + crop and color :-)
I'm in love:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZyxzeEL6D_Y/T4tcQ61OC3I/AAAAAAAALNw/RouQBCU2ZFE/s1600/Ashley-Greene-DKNY-campaign2.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-muMwTZwGKLI/Tp-UHK40UsI/AAAAAAAAGmQ/c2gJCT8PfnA/s1600/Ashley+Greene+DKNY.jpg
and another version with some "mystic" glow
The downside to this one was that her face didn't have much contrast to begin with, so it retained more of the realistic look.
I noticed that most of them are good for humans and elves. Can you try to draw a male halfling with this picture?
No idea where it is used. But I think it was painted in the original BG style by the same painter.
Here is this guy
resized:
I wonder if someone could remake this portrait with a bigger resolution, like some people did with Illasera, Sendai, Gronmir, balthazar, Mellisan portraits...
BTW, I think this would make a spot-on Safana - a sultry conniver ready to backstab her comrades (literally and figuratively). ;-)
Maybe focusing or sharpen a little bit or something?
There are ways around that problem, but they come into play when the image is created (for instance, you could make it in a vector-based drawing application--vectors are based on mathematical equations, essentially telling the computer how to draw it, which means the computer can scale it to any resolution you want).
The small picture looks like this when you zoom in:
While that's OK when each dot of color is the size of a pixel (so you can't see them), when a drawing application is asked to scale it up, it just doesn't have much to work with. It blurs the image while retaining as much of the details as it can, but it just can't extrapolate details that were lost when the image was scaled down.
/sarcasm
no for real. there is only so much upsizing you can do. That pic is far to small to be workable.
@SharGuidesMyHand: Do a Google search for Maya Suarez, a Mexican fashion model. Her pictures tend to work well since she often models lingerie, making it easy to adjust the image to fit any type of dress/armor. I'll put together a different version in leather when I get the time to have one that's more appropriate for Safana or any rogue type.
Additionally, for everyone else here, I see that there are a lot of different requests and ideas. I'll try to do some if I'm able, but please remember that I and the others here do this for fun. I'll typically pick out the ones that appeal to me first, and do others later. I'll also start work again tomorrow, which will severely limit the amount of time I can dedicate to this.
Oh my! It is brilliant! I really like the way you coloured the face. Also, the hair are lovely ruffled.
Sir, you are very talented indeed
EDIT: Why can't I "Like" posts multiple times? Your portrait deserves thousands "Like"