Skins and Accents

@Novasiri

I like the update! He has eyes! :) I hope you win. If they pick eight like last time, then you should have a decent shot. I can't enter myself. I don't have the programs necessary, nor the talent with computer art to pull that off. I'm a traditionalist. Wouldn't mind branching into the digital world though. :)

@Azmetra

I'd love to win, or at least get a mention. But there's a ton of stellar entries that my simple one may get lost in the flood of pink. x.x

Well if you wanna try digital, it's relatively simple. I use a program called SAI and a basic bamboo style tablet. I've been drawing for years though, but it's all about practice.

I'm expecting a lot of stars and purple in the skins this holiday...

[quote name="Loddie" date="2013-09-10 16:07:30"][s]I'm not sure what to name this one....I'll edit this later if I think of a name[/s] My name is Earl! (but more formally this guy is named: [b]ShadowFall[/b]) [center][img]http://i1056.photobucket.com/albums/t371/citrusloddie/fae_mStarFallContest.png[/img][/center][/quote] I [i]love[/i] the callback to the lore on this one! And I don't think there's currently many good male fae skins, how delightful. I hope this one goes through.

[quote name="Azmetra" date="2013-09-10 20:01:54"]My only suggestion @Novasiri - would be to maybe make the eyes a lighter color? They kind of disappear into his head.[/quote] There's no point in changing the eye color; as the eyes of the skin never show when they are applied to a sking; as they are overwritten by the dragon's natural eye color

I swear some of my favorite skins in every contest are breeds I don't plan to ever own! There are 15 pages of sparkly right now and it's amazing. It's going to be hard to choose the winners, I'm sure, because space themes are already so awesome!

But -- I'd like to see more original skins. I'm noticing several that just take premade images off of Google Images and integrate it into a dragon skin. Also a lot that use brushes from DA that they didn't make. Not that it is bad to use brushes if you have permission, but a lot of brush artists don't allow their work to be used for commercial purposes. The contest theme makes it difficult to discern for a fact which ones are taken and which ones are not.

[quote name="EisenDragoon" date="2013-09-11 01:59:53"]I swear some of my favorite skins in every contest are breeds I don't plan to ever own! There are 15 pages of sparkly right now and it's amazing. It's going to be hard to choose the winners, I'm sure, because space themes are already so awesome! But -- I'd like to see more original skins. I'm noticing several that just take premade images off of Google Images and integrate it into a dragon skin. Also a lot that use brushes from DA that they didn't make. Not that it is bad to use brushes if you have permission, but a lot of brush artists don't allow their work to be used for commercial purposes. The contest theme makes it difficult to discern for a fact which ones are taken and which ones are not.[/quote] A lot of the winners in the last few contests used textures/custom brushes so I'm beginning to wonder whether I should too.

@Darketernity
I believe taking a pic off of Google Images and using it on the the dragon is against contest rules.

I don't have brushes... well, I have a few texture brushes but pretty much everything I do is by hand. Never could figure out how to make them work right on something.

[quote name="JetBlackSteel" date="2013-09-11 03:06:17"]@Darketernity I believe taking a pic off of Google Images and using it on the the dragon is against contest rules.[/quote] @JetBlackSteel It's obviously against the rules, but it doesn't take a genius to see that it's being done on an overlay layer/as a texture/semi transparent. The greatest issue is that 99% you won't be able to tell what individuals have taken it from because the reverse image search won't pick it up. I think there's a lot of validity in one person saying on my deviantart that the great majority of skins here look more like wallpapers than skins. A copy and paste of a star texture here, a star texture there. A semi transparent layer of opacity. @EisenDragoon is absolutely correct. The vast majority of skins look more like a photomanip/gif edit. In any case, it has to be said that RE the texture brushes: the majority are made from photos/stock photos or fractals. Pretty simple to do.