Startin' new project (MiG-3)

[Mangas]

Hello to all...
After being cheered up by James and Gaëtan a little, I decided to start a new project...
As far as I'm concerned, this guy is quite rarely profiled... So I intend to fill this gap...
Perhaps this one particularly will be with underwing gun pods -- a monster with 5 fire
power sources -- hide your bombers! )...



Sincere regards,
Mangas.

P.S.: Since it's my 2nd profile ever, I strongly need some advices, especially on making proper 3D stuff... Besides, I'm not sure my cockpit is 100% OK (I made it pure intuitively)...

[inkworm]

At first glance I'd say it's got the basics, watch the leading edges though, especially on the tail fin where you have a highlight, then a dark line then the softer highlight, it looks odd, the shape of the fin is a slight curve so it should be lighter near the front.

Also there is a shadow on the radiator scoop, where is this coming from, looks odd and out of place. Hope this helps and good luck with it, nice to see something different.

[gamary]

Very nice starts, Mangas! You're a fast learner!

Inky is right in all his comments. i'd also suggest adding some shading on the lower part of the nose. You've done the rear fuselage correctly, but the nose needs more.

Perhaps you haven't finished that part, however?

Keep it up. And be aware that if John takes an interest to your profiles, he will soon start throwing rocks at you about shapes, angles, dimensions and colours. It's a bit surprising at first (a shock and awe kind of experience) but really quite helpful on his part.

Edit: try working from a pure white background. I think the light grey gradient might be distracting.

[JMSmith]

i take an interest in EVERBODYS work,
some i help, some i don't, this guy is using the best drawings there is out there, most people get the nose wrong, but this looks fine, now where did i put my calipers

i second GM on the background.

[Mangas]

Thanks for your comments, guys.
I think I managed to fix/rework everything you mentioned... I also added some minor 3D elements + reworked cockpit...
A small update:



P.S.: Gaëtan, chasing after cool looking 3D shades on grey pattern, something tells me I will have some SERIOUS problems when addin' colors to this...

[JMSmith]

hi mangas,

check out this site, research done by an old friend of mine from AWF

[pkassak]

what site John ? we all wanna check...

[gamary]

Gaëtan, chasing after cool looking 3D shades on grey pattern, something tells me I will have some SERIOUS problems when addin' colors to this

You shouldn't normally. The risk with creating shades on a colour pattern is that if you change that pattern, you realize you have to restart the shading completely because it doesn't fit with the new pattern. That's happened to me several times and it's the reason why I started shading in neutral grey and only after adding the actual colours.

Of course, you'll need to adjust a few things here and there according to the colour pattern, but it will be much less work than recreating all of the shading.

Recently, I created a template for the Lancaster. As it has black camouflage on its lower part, I created the shading on the camouflage instead of the neutral grey. As a result, if I want to do a Lancaster that is not painted black on the lower part, I will have to rework the entire shading.

[JMSmith]

ok, just seeing if you were all awake

a senior moment, i forgot.

MiG-3 family

[Mangas]

Thanks, JMSmith. This site is great. I've been using it since 2007...

P.S.: Gaëtan, chasing after cool looking 3D shades on grey pattern, something tells me I will have some SERIOUS problems when addin' colors to this...

This is what I've been afraid of: I have a lot of shading/highlight layers, some are opaque, some are not (), but they all are made to perfectly fit the GREY pattern... Here's what happens when I try to apply color to this:



Or do you mean just merge everythin'->copy into another PSD.file->get it back->add green/yellow color (Ctrl+B) until it fits the AMT-4 sample? Right?
But in this case I'll loose some dark shading on small 3D stuff...
Gaëtan, any suggestions how to apply color to this painlessly? Without loosing any hard work on shading?