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 Jaxler wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
.

I just don't see how poxwalkers are so seriously obviously look like splicers; the difference is damn stark.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jaxler wrote:
Blanche style work

I'm just gonna shake my head sadly and hold my tongue here; suffice it to say, not everyone likes his "art".

His art may be messy and red but it's still got more soul than 90% of anything made for AOS. Nothing about the new 40k art direction or anything new for AOS screams interest, novelty or style. It's got no stylization, we've seen it before and it's boring.

At least when you see a Blanche painting it's 'interesting'.

Actually the Stormcast Eternals where designed by Blanche:



And the ships of the Kharadron Overlords

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Jaxler wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
.

I just don't see how poxwalkers are so seriously obviously look like splicers; the difference is damn stark.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jaxler wrote:
Blanche style work

I'm just gonna shake my head sadly and hold my tongue here; suffice it to say, not everyone likes his "art".

His art may be messy and red but it's still got more soul than 90% of anything made for AOS. Nothing about the new 40k art direction or anything new for AOS screams interest, novelty or style. It's got no stylization, we've seen it before and it's boring.

At least when you see a Blanche painting it's 'interesting'.

How are you measuring soul?

When what is shown in the picture is not a repurposed faithful representation of an existing model, it's a good start.

And why is that?

Originality

 Jaxler wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Jaxler wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
.

I just don't see how poxwalkers are so seriously obviously look like splicers; the difference is damn stark.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jaxler wrote:
Blanche style work

I'm just gonna shake my head sadly and hold my tongue here; suffice it to say, not everyone likes his "art".

His art may be messy and red but it's still got more soul than 90% of anything made for AOS. Nothing about the new 40k art direction or anything new for AOS screams interest, novelty or style. It's got no stylization, we've seen it before and it's boring.

At least when you see a Blanche painting it's 'interesting'.

How are you measuring soul?

When what is shown in the picture is not a repurposed faithful representation of an existing model, it's a good start.

And why is that?

Originality

Except originality doesn't equate to soul. So what really gives soul?

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

So what really gives soul?

Is a mix of good technique (you can "feel" the artist, and what depicted grants immersion) and what you see is somewhat comunicative (remember the chaos marine of Wayne England, in the 3rd edition codex? one look and you have a grasp of what that guy is, his story and mental state)

Look what Galas posted about the Stormcast. Look at what Blanche did with that concept, and what the Deviantart-tier artists of AoS do.

I don't know if I can explain myself correctly, I have a science background, perhaps a person with greater knowledge and vocabulary in humanities could help me.

The biggest change for me was when they started doing monopose multipart plastics. Cant remember which was the first miniatures that had it? was it dark vengeance? Alot of restrictions disappeared and the miniatures now became alot more 3d. They also became abit bigger with more details elements but softer in them.
It also feels like now that they are not limited as much in how they have to sculpt and with being able to sculpt in 3d software, it seems like every other miniature they make must out to the other, kinda like a aestethic power creep. More details, more swirly stuff etc.While a regular soldier now looks like a captain of old, the captains are the size of daemon princes. And that means we cant have daemon princes that small anymore, so they turned into massive primarch/greater daemon of tzeentch.
And now there is no place for the humble footsoldier no more.:( Its like we are overloading on sugar, i mean it taste good for a while, But when is too much too much?
I suspect they will keep pushing the limit for a while and we will see where we land.

Where a piece of art loses any "soul" to me is when it appears to be trying too hard to advertise. There is a large amount of quick-fire computer-generated "paintings" which adorn a lot of the modern 40K books.

This is probably necessary due to the amount of "filler" crap artwork they need to match the huge amount of books and material they pump out. You see this with a lot of games - I don't think I've ever stumbled upon a game from any manufacturer that matched the feel of say, Mordheim...which is renowned for its creepy/ink-spilt art. Most of its art is simple corner placards or headings, but that is "soul" for sure.

There have been a handful of truly skilled artists working for GW. They come and go, but by and large the majority of filler art is "meh". I think the quality of some artists can be judged by the older artwork which in turn...pushed the aesthetic of the game. There are lots of older art pieces which ended up generating miniatures because they were so damn cool. The opposite rarely works (a piece of art compiled to push a model line).

Sometimes even the very worst art still gets picked for the codex cover which is kinda mind-blowing. This...arguably one of the worst pieces of art ever to grace a GW product was a codex cover for Christ's sake!



As was this travesty:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Jaxler wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Jaxler wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
.

I just don't see how poxwalkers are so seriously obviously look like splicers; the difference is damn stark.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jaxler wrote:
Blanche style work

I'm just gonna shake my head sadly and hold my tongue here; suffice it to say, not everyone likes his "art".

His art may be messy and red but it's still got more soul than 90% of anything made for AOS. Nothing about the new 40k art direction or anything new for AOS screams interest, novelty or style. It's got no stylization, we've seen it before and it's boring.

At least when you see a Blanche painting it's 'interesting'.

How are you measuring soul?

When what is shown in the picture is not a repurposed faithful representation of an existing model, it's a good start.

And why is that?

Originality

Except originality doesn't equate to soul. So what really gives soul?

Originality isn't needed, but if it's a carbon copy of a model, don't Ye think there's a bit of a limit on the creative Liberty and such? Originality =\= soul 100% of the time, but novelty is something all the GW art is lacking. What makes new art stand out when every fantasy franchise is drowning in quality art? Saying originality isn't needed is rather pointless when the art is something we've seen before if you've seen the models.

Art looks fine to me.

 Galas wrote:
I respect Blanche but his style is not the one I miss more from new Codexes. Jess Godwinn, Paul Daiton (The autor of this beautifull piece of art https://i.pinimg.com/originals/2a/cf/0f/2acf0fb60e928d869f0a87908ccf5e61.jpg ) and Karl Kopinski in the other hand? I want more of them and less of random commisioner artists.

Just look at this work of Kopinski. Art before miniatures, not art based IN the miniatures.

Spoiler:

Two of those look exactly like models we already have, 1 of them is just a normal grim reaper with some chaos baubles on him, the 4th one is the most generic 'leatherface' type murder guy I've ever seen. You could of told me that was a drawing of any of the male killers in dead by daylight and I wouldn't of been able to tell the difference.

In summation, "Fart, not into it.".

I sometimes get out my collection of stripped-of-paint early edition warhammer stuff. Its nostalgia and a feeling of "everything used to be better" - old greater daemons, daemon princes, character models, old fantasy high elf and wood elf stuff, flimsy boobed daemonettes, chaos marines that were part metal and part plastic, etc. - but always quickly realise new stuff is a hundred times better.

I think the new death guard esthetic is absolutely amazing.

Love the new models miss the older style of art. I would love to see at least one or two commissions per book of the old style art. It gives a much more vivid picture of 40k than the cartoony art style does.

Those art styles are what got me interested in the games and rpg. If I seen the newer cartoony style art before the older style I'm not sure if I would have been interested in 40k. In a game like this striking visuals are the first way to get peoples attention.

ERJAK wrote:
You could of ... I wouldn't of been able".

You could have and I wouldn't have been able. I don't get why this is so widespread. Are teachers not correcting this?

Anyway, I do agree that the art isn't exactly inspiring, but as far as concept work goes, it does its job really well.

Let me just say that the extreme horror vacui found on GW models has put me off them completely.

They don't paint well and they don't look well on the tabletop. Once fully painted, from a couple of feet away they look like shapeless blobs of random colors.

They've also traded body horror for goofball kookiness, evidently going after the 10-year old demographic. It's just not something I'm interested in and so I've taken my business elsewhere.

 -DE- wrote:
evidently going after the 10-year old demographic.

Evidently not, as there are a lot of full fledged adults in this thread alone that quite like them, but do continue throwing insults against anyone that doesn't agree with your subjective opinions. That's real productive.

I must've hit a nerve.

 -DE- wrote:
I must've hit a nerve.

And?

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

So what really gives soul?

Is a mix of good technique (you can "feel" the artist, and what depicted grants immersion) and what you see is somewhat comunicative (remember the chaos marine of Wayne England, in the 3rd edition codex? one look and you have a grasp of what that guy is, his story and mental state)

Look what Galas posted about the Stormcast. Look at what Blanche did with that concept, and what the Deviantart-tier artists of AoS do.

I don't know if I can explain myself correctly, I have a science background, perhaps a person with greater knowledge and vocabulary in humanities could help me.

I think you got it. I agree. When you do something creative, especially something artistic like sculpting by hand. You add small details and touches that tell a story, communicate a character but at the same time you're limited by your medium so you need to convey the maximum amount of information with a very limited amount of detail.

The best example I can think of off the top of my head is the old Archaon model compared to the new one. The old Archaon is simple, intimidating and has a very distinct feel to it. If you looked at it without knowing who or what it was you can discern a lot from it. The newer model is a mess of textures with a dude who is difficult to seperare from everything else around him and he looks secondary to his mount. Look at the older models mounted on dragons. Engrimm Van Horstman or Azhag The Slaughter. The mounts were sculpted with their heads down and backs arched, to emphasis the riders who are in general the highest point of the model and the focal point of the model as a whole.

I suppose my point is that the CAD process is weighed down in the fact that detail is much easier to sculpt and the temptation to grow more and more elaborate and complex isn't hampered by the medium. The artistic side of things is lost because stuff like focal points, silhouettes and showing-without-telling is less important because you can just jam a bunch of details on there with much less effort.

For reference I've done both 3D sculpting and I'm trained in darkroom photography as well as digital and I always felt more of a connection and pride in my film photography and pictures I developed myself than most of my digital work. I'm sure CAD sculpture vs hand sculpted would feel similarly.

There is a large amount of quick-fire computer-generated "paintings" which adorn a lot of the modern 40K books.

This is probably necessary due to the amount of "filler" crap artwork they need to match the huge amount of books and material they pump out. You see this with a lot of games - I don't think I've ever stumbled upon a game from any manufacturer that matched the feel of say, Mordheim...which is renowned for its creepy/ink-spilt art. Most of its art is simple corner placards or headings, but that is "soul" for sure.

There have been a handful of truly skilled artists working for GW. They come and go, but by and large the majority of filler art is "meh". I think the quality of some artists can be judged by the older artwork which in turn...pushed the aesthetic of the game. There are lots of older art pieces which ended up generating miniatures because they were so damn cool. The opposite rarely works (a piece of art compiled to push a model line).

There is no such thing as "quick-fire" "computer-generated" art. The fact that some even call it "computer generated" in this day and age is surprising. They aren't firing up Poser, hitting the "make cool marine" button and calling it a day. A lot of the art they generate is actual 2D paintings done in Photoshop and Painter (this has been the case since around 3.5 - I'm willing to bet there are some pieces you like that you don't even know were done on a computer). They are for sure also using 3D modeling and animation software (the 4th ed CSM codex cover was done in Max for example), but that doesn't tend to save any time. Since changes can often be made a little faster, art direction often becomes more involved and you end up taking the exact same amount of time as if it was a "traditional" piece. I totally get not liking the new art direction (especially if you grew up on Blanche and actually liked it), but that's down to the art direction. It has nothing to do with the method of creation. IMO that tends to be an elitist "art snob" point of view that probably needs to die.


As far as what gives a piece "soul", anecdotally, I've found that (at least in terms of GW gamers) it tends to be a combination of nostalgia, along with a model that was just slightly to the left or right of "center" at the time of it's creation. While there are exceptions, I'm willing to bet that if I put down an old second ed. model that I feel has this "soul" in front of a younger gamer who has just started the hobby, they're not going to agree with me. IMO things like the GOff Rockers, original Noise Marines and Squats riding Harleys all have "soul". I'm also willing to bet that if you're a newer gamer, you probably think they're kind of stupid. I can't necessarily blame you for that opinion either. lol

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

So what really gives soul?

Is a mix of good technique (you can "feel" the artist, and what depicted grants immersion) and what you see is somewhat comunicative (remember the chaos marine of Wayne England, in the 3rd edition codex? one look and you have a grasp of what that guy is, his story and mental state)

Look what Galas posted about the Stormcast. Look at what Blanche did with that concept, and what the Deviantart-tier artists of AoS do.

I don't know if I can explain myself correctly, I have a science background, perhaps a person with greater knowledge and vocabulary in humanities could help me.

"Soul" of an art piece is not unlike this text, a means of conveying meaning using commonly understood symbols composed to hold specific information.

It's fine to dismiss metaphysical terminology, I wouldn't resort to associating a picture's content with "soul" or "spirit" or what have you. Others do.

But the fact remains that a picture conveys meaning, like a text, and its composition matters. Brevity in text as in picture format (aka limitation in physical size) limits the amount of information that it can hold. It's hardly far-fetched to claim that an art piece whose main message it is to tell you how much alike your models it looks loses space that could be used for something else. Since many modern pieces do just that, it's easy to criticize them for not having as much "soul" as older artworks that were freer in their depictions.

Wow, people calling contemporary GW lineup "cartoony" hasn't obviously been around in the 90's (or before). I'm not missing 90's models, like at all. Even when I take a near lethal dose of nostalgia-gas.

Current lineup is mostly fine and I argue that you cannot find better quality plastics anywhere. If you find them cartoony or whatever just paint them more grimdark.

Sim-Life and Geifer, thanks


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 Weazel wrote:
Wow, people calling contemporary GW lineup "cartoony" hasn't obviously been around in the 90's (or before). I'm not missing 90's models, like at all. Even when I take a near lethal dose of nostalgia-gas.

Current lineup is mostly fine and I argue that you cannot find better quality plastics anywhere. If you find them cartoony or whatever just paint them more grimdark.

The old goofy art had its charm and looked more genuine to me. Modern wow-esque proportions can be cool on some model but are often "off".

I believe John Blanche is one of the creators of the best of 40k art. My feelings for a piece of art generally get higher as the art gets further from soullessly depicting the models IN NEW MARKETING ART FORM.

In my opinion, this is art.


This is soulless marketing image pretending to be art. Find anything in this image that GW does not sell.


The new model aesthetic is mixed. I like Primaris. I find most Death Guard with the exception of beautiful bloat drone and blighthauler to be overly detailed and busy blobs of too much clashy color. The paint on the studio models does not help.

 Verviedi wrote:
Find anything in this image that GW does not sell.

So? Oh no, they're making pictures of things that actually have models... how horrible? I really like the first and last picture of those three. Think they look great. The first one of the "art" ones you linked just looks like a mess to me. It's like someone's first attempts at making something grimdark. Find anything in that image that GW DOES sell. Find anything that makes any sense at all.

We have to go back.... lol...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Purifier wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Find anything in this image that GW does not sell.

So? Oh no, they're making pictures of things that actually have models... how horrible? I really like the first and last picture of those three. Think they look great. The first one of the "art" ones you linked just looks like a mess to me. It's like someone's first attempts at making something grimdark. Find anything in that image that GW DOES sell. Find anything that makes any sense at all.

The first one looks like someone threw up on it and it happened to be somewhat orange.

 Purifier wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Find anything in this image that GW does not sell.

So? Oh no, they're making pictures of things that actually have models... how horrible? I really like the first and last picture of those three. Think they look great. The first one of the "art" ones you linked just looks like a mess to me. It's like someone's first attempts at making something grimdark. Find anything in that image that GW DOES sell. Find anything that makes any sense at all.

Ladies and gentlemen, the definition of "Blanchitsu"

Blanche's work might have been relevant at one point but now it just seems like a mess that tries to be 80s inspired and fails miserably at times.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Purifier wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Find anything in this image that GW does not sell.

So? Oh no, they're making pictures of things that actually have models... how horrible? I really like the first and last picture of those three. Think they look great. The first one of the "art" ones you linked just looks like a mess to me. It's like someone's first attempts at making something grimdark. Find anything in that image that GW DOES sell. Find anything that makes any sense at all.

Ladies and gentlemen, the definition of "Blanchitsu"

Blanche's work might have been relevant at one point but now it just seems like a mess that tries to be 80s inspired and fails miserably at times.

Yea...

Amazes me that people are complaining about busy models, that first damned pic is probably the most busiest thing I've seen in some time and that's what, from 80s?

Probably mid/late 90s or early 00s.

 Purifier wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Find anything in this image that GW does not sell.

So? Oh no, they're making pictures of things that actually have models... how horrible? I really like the first and last picture of those three. Think they look great. The first one of the "art" ones you linked just looks like a mess to me. It's like someone's first attempts at making something grimdark. Find anything in that image that GW DOES sell. Find anything that makes any sense at all.

I would like to minimize things that GW sells being in art. Art is an opportunity to expand the universe, not focus on the parts that have already been shown by the models. If you absolutely must, include Skitarii fighting Orks, but take artistic license with the art, instead of drawing the models fighting the models.
The new art is too technical for me. It, in many cases, looks like The Phantom Menace. I like my twisted nonsensical abominations, drawn with what looks like a pencil, full of gothic weirdness, skulls, and tentacles. I see Xenomorph Servo Skull, I am inspired to make Xenomorph servo skull. Or perhaps Spacesuit Chimera Man.

And people hate on Liefeld....

I also hate on Liefeld, don't compare him to Blanche. Liefeld is producer of uninteresting abominations who cannot draw feet and hands, or female anatomy.