February 2016 Challenge: Azanulbizar

[snodsy]

Beautiful sketch, thought about doing the line work all hand drawn, then just color in photoshop instead of a mouse? Your sketch is really nice.

[Deadshade]

Beautiful sketch, thought about doing the line work all hand drawn, then just color in photoshop instead of a mouse? Your sketch is really nice.

Well that's broadly the idea (only with GIMP, I have no PS). I use sketches to be only sure of scales, proportions, color guides and light/shadow - it's not really elaborated. Then I override everything with colors so that there will be no lines when/if I finish.
I could also leave everything B&W handdrawn what would be fast (and actually fun) but I set myself as the biggest challenge within challenge to try to find the right reddish colors for Barazinbar. If it doesn't look like "stained with blood" then it will be a failure.
The next WIP will be my first attempt at that.

[DanielHasenbos]

I'm not the first to say it, but the sketches look really great! Can't wait to see this develop!

-Dan

[Deadshade]

So here is the attempt.
I did a few tries, every time using a fundamental color and varied around it. Because it is necessary to have the variations, I developped the details enough so that one can see the whole color idea in context.
This one was what I liked best.
Please tell me if it looks like "stained with blood" or if I have to change !
The other mountains will be a cake because then I can go back to usual blacks, greys and browns for the rocks.

Blood attempt.png

[Chick]

The colors seem right. In fact I really like them, good variations within the colors and a nice match of two difficult colors.

Not sure how the mountain got bloodstained, but generally blood pools or puddles rather than streaks, so I might make the edges of the red less feathery, at least at the bottom.

[Deadshade]

The colors seem right. In fact I really like them, good variations within the colors and a nice match of two difficult colors.

Not sure how the mountain got bloodstained, but generally blood pools or puddles rather than streaks, so I might make the edges of the red less feathery, at least at the bottom.

Thanks for the comment Chick. The mountain has not been literally "bloodstained". Tolkien has used a poetic metaphor (because much evil happened on this mountain) to describe a reddish color of the rocks.
That reddish color was also at origin of the name "Redhorn pass" and the name of the mountain "Barazinbar" is derived from Baraz which means "red" in Dwarven language .
Because of all these informations it is clear that I must attempt a reddish color of the rocks which is so to speak the signature of the mountain.
Now you are right, red is a difficult color to manage and master so that's why I asked whether the color(s) I used are both red enough AND natural enough to believably represent rocks.

Btw the bottom looks like that (e.g streaky) only because I stopped for this color test there. Of course if the colors are OK, I'll continue to complete the whole mountain as well as the other mountains but these won't be red.

[Chick]

Ah, sorry, I had forgotten this was a ME map. In that case, I suggest you darken the reds a bit. Natural red rocks are red because of iron oxidation when they were deposited, and tend to be darker than blood red. Only the most freshly weathered rock, or recently broken rock would show a brighter red than this: http://www.kgs.ku.edu/Extension/redh..._redhills.jpeg

[Deadshade]

This helped Chick, thanks.
Actually the colors in your picture were lighter than mine, not darker. But I took inspiration from them and redid the whole thing. Here is how it looks with your suggestion.
A particular challenge was to find a good transition from red to grey (e.g from one mountain to the neighbour) . I found a way by moving towards purple from the red and the grey side untill they met.
The transition on this test sketch is still crude but it works.
Of course I'll redo it better at the end.

Any comments, criticism, suggestion welcome.

Red-test.png

[Chick]

I may have been wrong when I said "darker". I just put yours and that web picture up side by side and yours still looks too red to me. Not a lot of difference, but especially in your deeper in-betweens. I wonder if it could be the saturation, or maybe just the nearby white making it look different. Anyway, what you have now is good.

Another comment though ... red rocks get red by oxidizing the iron from the water as it evaporates. That only happens on land, not in the sea. So all such red rocks are sedimentary, mostly sandstones. Yours look too solid and uniform, not layered. That may not matter to you for this purpose, but I thought I'd throw it out

[jshoer]

Oh gosh, this is going to be terrific! I already love that snowcapped peak.

As for the metaphor "bloodstained," have you considered that the entire bedrock might not be red? Maybe it is brown/gray/tan/whatever, but there are layers or veneers that are blood-red. Maybe this ties into what Chick pointed out. I'm thinking of the colors and patterns of Canyon de Chelly, for instance. (The specific geology of Canyon de Chelly doesn't at all fit with mountains, but maybe there's something interesting to look at in terms of the colors.)

Or just do bloodred rocks for the base layer of the mountains. It's Tolkien.