I finished the rendering of the druidic staff, adding some vines wrapped around it and holding the sphere in the centre in place.
I was happy with the final model sheet but asked a tutor for critique, who suggested that there wasn't enough contrast between the darker sections of wood, and that adding some shadows below the vines would make them feel more believable. Below is the updated finished version.
I asked the same tutor for critique on my other designs, and made some revisions to my ring painting. Below is the old version followed by the new version, which has much more contrast and has photo textures worked into it to give the texture a better feel, as well as some minor edge work and some small scratches. A general problem with my pieces seems to be a lack of contrast, which is something I'm going to keep in mind going forward with the other pieces I have left.
Another tutor offered me some advice on how to better paint the gem - the updated final version, which I also adjusted the values on, is below.
Arrow
I realised that I was running short on time and decided to make the last two items a pair; an (almost) indestructible arrow and a glove that recalls it, allowing it to be reused. I feel that I've found a good process at this point, working through silhouettes, then iterating, doing material studies if needed and then producing my final model sheet or painting.
For this design I pulled inspiration from bird wingspan shapes, particularly birds of prey. The final design reflects elements of both these and barbed arrowhead designs, allowing the arrow to cause damage both on the way in and the way out. I looked at a lot of different real-life styles of arrowheads here to make the design feel realistic even if something like this wouldn't exist in the real world.
From there I moved onto designs for the shaft and fletching of the arrow. I wanted these to be relatively understated so as not to detract from the design of the tip and settled on a simple coil winding around the arrow shaft and some lightly shaped fletching.
For the colouring I found I liked the idea of a sacred, almost religious theme; maybe to be used by a cleric. Given that the arrow is enchanted I didn't have to worry about using weaker materials, so the head and coil around the arrow are made of a mix of white and rose gold. The white and red of the dyed fletching add some contrast to the colour as well as keeping the religious theme.
Below is the finished design, which I think is really effective.
Glove
The pair to the arrow is an archer's glove to be used along with it. During the design process I realised a single glove would have to be worn on the dominant hand (the one pulling the string) to catch the returning arrow, but for it to be effective it would have to be able to be used both by both left- or right-handed people. Because of this, the design contains elements of gloves for both the drawing arm and the one holding the bow, and comes as a mirrored pair of gloves, either of which can recall the arrow.
The basic shape of the glove had to be on a hand, so I focused on the silhouette in terms of how it framed the hand shape, how it would reflect the form of the hand, and how it had been made to aid in its intended use, for example the reinforcement on the drawing fingers and the lack of material on the fingertips to make drawing arrows or stringing the bow easier. I tried to consider how the material would fold, how it might get in the way or movement, etc.
The glove ended up being comprised of two layers; a soft leather outer layer which provides reinforcement where needed and is the bulk of the glove, and a thinner fabric layer which prevents chafing and which the leather is stitched into, providing a foundation for the shape as well as a second light layer of protection.
Below is the final model sheet for the glove, in two different lighting settings. I tried to convey a sense of how the stitching holds the leather and the kinds of materials used, and also used the arrowhead design as a decorative embossed section to convey the nature of the two as a pair. I'm learning a lot of useful shortcuts in these paintings to create realistic effects quickly, for example using soft colours on multiply layers to provide consistent general shadows and using soft light layers for lighting, and for this piece I used a bevel/emboss layer on the stitching and arrow design to quickly give a realistic effect without having to hand-paint it.
Potion flask
I finished off the final painting for the potion flask using some of the tips I received on my other paintings, like keeping an eye on the contrast, using more hard highlights and bearing in mind the fact that refracted light will give translucent objects an inner glow. Below is a brief process following along the same lines of my material studies.
The first image is the basic setup of a base layer, a layer for liquid and a hard light layer on top.
The second image adds texture to the liquid.
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