HOME | DD
pineappletree β A Photographer on the Citadel - Liara Profile
Published: 2012-07-16 01:13:41 +0000 UTC; Views: 97268; Favourites: 2520; Downloads: 0
Redirect to original
Description
A Photographer on the Citadel
In a quiet part of the Citadel Wards, in a small alley known only to the locals, lies a studio.
Here lives and works a photographer who boldly defies all contemporary holographic technologies, relying instead on ancient human devices
based on crude mechanics and chemistry to capture his motifs.
Now - be it by chance or by purpose - some of the greatest heroes of our time found their way into that studio to stand before the camera...
You can find the whole series > here <
The "Bla bla bla" part
Wanted to do an 'en profil' 'photo' of Liara for quite some time now. With a head silhouette like that, you just have to!
When I decided to give it a go I thought this would be a 'quickie'. Turns out it had to go through more iterations (read: complete changes of concept) than all my previous Liara renderings before it stopped looking boring or 'too technical' and became something I liked. It was even a 'Sad Liara' at some point, modeled (!) tears and everything ...
And speaking of modeling, there was quite a bit of it this time. Apart from smaller details, I had to remake almost the complete mesh of the folds on Liara's neck. The original one is far from optimized for their form and looked horrible in a close up like this.
Anyway, it was fun to change tone and work with a bit more light this time, though it probably won't become the new 'standard' for the series.
But who knows ... 
The technical stuff
All pictures of this series are based on models and textures directly extracted from Mass Effect's game files and modified by me where I deemed it necessary.
Posing, lighting, rendering were done in 3dsMAX + V-Ray.
Background, composing, postprocessing in PS.
Updates
17/07/2012 - Small update with slightly altered eye reflections. Should look a bit more believable now.
Mass Effect, Character Β© Bioware
Related content
Comments: 345
It really does actually , it looks rough but i bet it's really sensitive and soft.
π: 0 β©: 1
Possible, certainly along the lines I was thinking...
π: 0 β©: 0
I'm flattered you think so!
Thanks!
π: 0 β©: 0
Well, I'm not sure who's responsible for this recent extreme influx of views on my DA page and this picture in particular, but let me just say:
Thanks for that!
And thank you all for coming by!
Off now, more individual replies later.
Keep your love blue and true!
π: 0 β©: 2
It just appeared on the "Hot" page. ^^
π: 0 β©: 1
Yeah, it's actually been there for quite a few hours now.
Which is a slightly bizarre, though admitedly not unpleasent experience, I have to say...
π: 0 β©: 1
Ah, come on ! You deserved it !
π: 0 β©: 0
A link got posted to this one on the ME subreddit today. I didn't do that, but once the thread was up I did point the crowd to one of your more recent ones, the "So Deep the Blue" piece, so that one probably got some extra views too.
Well deserved, at any rate. Β
π: 0 β©: 1
Good to know. I figured something like that must have happened. Still seems an awful lot, though...
Anyway, thanks for the notice!
And thanks for the extra link, too!
π: 0 β©: 0
I'm not a fan of Mass Effect, but this is awesome
π: 0 β©: 1
It's okay. Being a fan of Liara is all that counts...
Thank you!
π: 0 β©: 1
This is fantastic.Β This is the exact look I'm seeking for they Hyffa race in XIAIX.Β Wish I would have found and contracted you long ago.Β
π: 0 β©: 1
That's very flattering.
You do realize I didn't actually design her, but am working with (and improving on) a model extracted from Bioware's Mass Effect video game series though, don't you?
I can't even sell prints of these for that reason...
My thanks, Zyrexiax!
π: 0 β©: 0
Really nice texture, detail, and shading!Β It practically looks photorealistic.
π: 0 β©: 1
Well I can't really take credit for the textures' details, but I do try to bring them into a favourable light...
Thanks!
π: 0 β©: 1
I love this and the other pics in theΒ Photographer on the Citadel collection, these are awesome. I have to ask though where are some of the 'greatest heroes of our time'? Don't get meΒ wrongΒ I love Liara, she'sΒ probablyΒ my favoriteΒ character in the all three games but it'd be nice to see some of herΒ comrades. Β Β
π: 0 β©: 1
Yeah, the idea to bring other ME characters into this virtual studio was there from the very beginning. And I still want to do it at some point.
But, for the near future at least, I decided to focus just on Liara. Not only because she's my favourite (too), but mainly because I'd rather use the limited time I have for this to keep on pushing for detail and quality with one character (e.g. I'm in the middle of an extensive re-mesh of Liara's rather low poly game model), than spreading myself thin over multiple.
Doesn't mean I won't ever get to the others (as I said, I do want to), but I simply can't make any promises or estimates as to when that might be (or even definitely guarantee it will happen)...
In any case, I'm glad you like the series!
Thanks!
π: 0 β©: 1
you're welcome, keep up the good work this stuff is brilliant.Β
π: 0 β©: 0
spectacular... just jaw-dropping
π: 0 β©: 1
Thank you, Supernova!
π: 0 β©: 0
Glad you like it.
Thanks!
π: 0 β©: 0
Would drawing clothes kill you?
π: 0 β©: 3
I don't know. I've never tried it before...
Also, this isn't drawn but rendered from a 3D model.
So the correct question would be: "Would modeling, UV unwrapping, texturing, wheighting, cloth-simulating and rendering clothes kill you?"
Thanks for your feedback.
π: 0 β©: 0
Although I don't like nude pics, I must say you're being a bit "too close" about this kind of stuff. In this one, she isn't showing anything. And I would also say this is something that increases the art: even though she isn't wearing anything to cover, it doesn't show what we can place as "mature content" and also shows the details of the skin (something that increases the quality).
Overall, she isn't making a "sex related" pose, so... Yeah, this art is perfectly acceptable; I don't see why you're complaining, because at his gallery you can see other arts of the same character where she is wearing clothes. In fact, if the artist just made "nude pics" of her, you comment would make sense; but since its gallery isn't covered with it... There's no reason.
π: 0 β©: 1
It doesn't change the fact that she's naked for no reason. We can see the texture of the skin on her face, but obviously, people didn't like this picture because of her face. And it's one of those cases where breasts are barely covered so the guy who made this doesn't have to put the mature filter on. Besides, my question stands. Would it be so hard to add clothes? Were the upper parts of her breasts so important that they just had to be shown?
π: 0 β©: 3
Go and rip the model files/textures out of a UnrealEngine3-based game, import them into 3Ds max then you can tell the author how to do their pictures. I recently did the same sort of thing by extracting some models to import into a little "testproject" I am making in Unreal Engine 4 just to see what its capable of. (Surprisingly I did not need to do much work apart from converting the textures to ue4's .FBX files and then it accepted them with no errors... well apart from the skeleton mesh was not present so it did not like that but oh well...)
π: 0 β©: 0
Man, I liked this art not for this, but because it's well-made. And art like that can't be placed as the ones that Slawa post, as example (she has a good body, but doesn't use it to artistic photography, btw).
And also: he didn't cover it because it's part of a sequence of pics he's doing: "A Photographer on the Citadel". If you look, almost every pic of this sequence is just like this one (minimal clothing), and he placed them in the mature content. This one wasn't because you notice her face, and only after you notice her uncovered breasts. Just look closely at her face: it's expressive and well-detailed, right? So, why would you look at her breasts when the main thing is her face?
She isn't using clothes because of the sequence, btw. In others (mature tagged), her breasts are completely shown.
I must say that I sometimes have the same thing of "worrying because of such"... But only when the pic is something that has the intend of make the person see the sexuality of it. This one is more to an "artsy" form than this, so... I still don't get why you're worried; what if she was wearing a low-tube top and this couldn't be seen?
Oh, and if you felt offended in any point, I'm sorry; I don't want to offend you
π: 0 β©: 1
Sorry but i guess you alittle waste time in this talkΒ ...when artist made naked picture it is his right to do so and when somebody dislike picture simply because of nudity then it is just idiot whose watching something what dislike just to shit about it.... argue to someone like that about art value is like throw pilows on wall-it may seems to be fun to some point but its waste of time after a while
π: 0 β©: 1
I see.
Oh, and the Slawa point there: I actually worry for her because a lot of the people who comment at her pics actually are objetifying her... I wonder if she sees it. She would be an awesome nude-art model, but she uses it to catch attention. I don't have anything against her, but I just worry if she knows that many of her watchers are people who could leave their girlfriends (yeah, there was a comment saying it in her last pic that was in the "What's Hot") just to have her naked to themselves.
π: 0 β©: 1
im really sorry but mine eyes are literaly unable read so small letters
π: 0 β©: 1
Ah, don't worry :U Adjusted.
If you feel offended by what I said in the small letters, sorry again.
π: 0 β©: 1
i see nothing offensive...but also i see not much sence-mostly because I have no idea who is slawa?
π: 0 β©: 1
I will explain: she's what some users call "Attwhore" or something alike of dA. Her latest what's hot pic was this one: slawa.deviantart.com/art/Shapeβ¦
Ok.
But if you give a look at her gallery, almost every pic of hers is something like that: "look at my butt/boobs"
I must say she would be an awesome photography-artist, nude-model or nude-artist (I say it because she apparently likes this kind of cathegory), but she's wasting herself with pics like that.
Buuuut her "Horror" pics are awesome.
π: 0 β©: 1
well Im not sure but how much famouse are you or how much money you do with your art skills?...Because honestly one has to be relly succesfull to dare decide which way is wasting of talent and which way not....because doing atractive photos is actualy something like worldwide multybilion busyness and assume that everyone whose part of it is something less or wasting time seems to be really uhm shortsighted, sayd politely....partialy I really understands your point of view that tallented artist may be able achive fame and succes with some less , lets say, slutty tactics...but her way works and works damn good, when you once become famouse you can do whatever you want to do...until that is really no shame to do what people want, because until you are really really really genius artist doing something total epic, you will be unknown nobody, as long as you wil stubbornly do only what you want...as most real original artist was in past and became really popular often after decades or even after death...so even if we may disagree with her way to become famouse, is smart to get some lesson from it...because she is the succefull one and we obviously, not so much
π: 0 β©: 0
Actually, I would think most people who liked this picture are fans of the character since it's from a famous video game series...I didn't even notice she didn't have clothes on until you pointed it out because it's a bust and with busts, it's kinda moot to complain about drawing clothes since you don't actually...see anything.
π: 0 β©: 0
and there goes tolerance to artist freedom to do whatever he wants on free art site.....
π: 0 β©: 1
Pfff. Tolerance. We can't tolerance everything, because that's just being blind and indifferent.Β
π: 0 β©: 1
while blind hatred and beign art value ignoring redneck brings us succes and awesomnes instead....
π: 0 β©: 1
<= Prev | | Next =>