Art: Transformation (G, Delenn)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

With thanks to icepixie for the idea - I've been working on this ever since we talked about the Art Nouveau influences of the visual style on B5.

Thumbnail:






Click to enlarge. :)

Comments

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Wow! That's so amazingly beautiful! I am seriously, seriously impressed. I love the whole thing, but I think I love the Minbari cruisers the most; they are just gorgeous.

You know, I don't remember seeing that strong of an Art Nouveau influence on the show (not that I'm great at just being able to ID that kind of thing); I will definitely have to keep an eye out for it when I start my rewatch. With all the Tolkien influences on the show, the Minbari especially, this makes for a very kind of elf-like aesthetic; or at least that's what I'm seeing. Which is to say, I love it.

Oh, the little triluminary. It's so pretty.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Wheee! I'm so glad you like it! And I'm glad the ships came out - I was a little worried about them at a few points in the process. :P

I mostly see it in the ship designs (the Minbari, the Vorlons, the Drakh) and then in the designs of the Minbari and all their stuff - the shapes in their cities, their headcrests and so on. icepixie has an awesome icon remarking on some of the furniture and interior decor on the station, which I'd never noticed until I saw the icon, but now keep noticing everywhere.

The triluminary saved my butt on this - my first few sketches I didn't have the slightest clue what she was going to be holding, I was just trying to get the general shapes down. As soon as I thought of the triluminary, everything else fell together. ♥

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Okay, now that you explain, I can see it. I think I'm bad at catching that kind of thing because I just tend to take stuff at face value, heh.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Eh, the only reason I noticed is that I totally love art nouveau, and it still took me a long time to actually twig to it. It's just a thing. *Shrugs*

[icepixie]

icepixie has an awesome icon remarking on some of the furniture and interior decor on the station, which I'd never noticed until I saw the icon, but now keep noticing everywhere.

Heh. I only noticed it because of the chairs in the council chambers--they're exact reproductions of one of the classic Charles Rennie Mackintosh chairs, which I've thought were cool for some years now. (Amusingly, my friends and I found two in a Starbucks when we were in Glasgow. Of course, I think pretty much every building in that town had something either by or inspired by Mackintosh in it...) A lot of the station has that Nouveau look to it, especially the light sources and walls. I hadn't really thought about it as a Minbari design element until you mentioned it a few weeks ago, but now I totally see the influence on their crests and ships. Though Minbar itself seems a bit more Deco than Nouveau to me--things are a bit more streamlined there, especially in the stained glass and building exteriors. (This may well be a function of CGI being in its infancy rather than a particular design choice...and Nouveau and Deco are so close together that it's hard to tell lots of pieces apart anyway.)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

I just think it's so fascinating that, even on an extremely low-budget show, either some designer sat there and thought "okay, what can I actually do that will look both unusual and futuristic, but can be done on almost no money?" and came up with Art Nouveau, or JMS sat the set guys down one day with their plyboard and paint and a couple of bucks to go to garage sales or something and said "I think we need an Art Nouveau look, here." Whereupon they nearly died. Either version just delights me, and I admit that I sort of wish I knew which was the one that happened.

This may well be a function of CGI being in its infancy rather than a particular design choice...and Nouveau and Deco are so close together that it's hard to tell lots of pieces apart anyway.

I've wondered about that, too - they do seem more Deco, but... it's so painful in some of the shots on Minbar to wonder what it was that they were actually trying to get across, as opposed to what the computers actually managed to spit out. On the other hand, that's true of other, non-computer moments as well... I have a little bit of an angry determination that the glowy pastel erector set Delenn plays with through the first season was meant to be crystals... they're just so hideous, I couldn't help but ret-con them here.

(And yes, I admit that I tend to sort the two styles more or less into buckets based on "organic shapes = Nouveau, straight lines = Deco, which I know is not necessarily correct. But art history was a very long time ago, and I've yet to come up with another system that doesn't land me in the wrong buckets about the same amount as my false dichotomy, so...) Someday I'll figure it out for sure. Someday.)

[icepixie]

Either version just delights me, and I admit that I sort of wish I knew which was the one that happened.

They are both pretty delightful. I think a lot of the design actually does come from plywood and paint--like, practically every light source on the station is pretty much a florescent tube stood on its end behind a rectangle of frosted plastic, with some painted wooden strips over the top of part of it in the same checkered pattern as on the council chairs. If they'd gone for Star Trek-esque futuristic, they'd have been shelling out for lots of molded, rounded, plasticky stuff.

I have a little bit of an angry determination that the glowy pastel erector set Delenn plays with through the first season was meant to be crystals... they're just so hideous, I couldn't help but ret-con them here.

Bwahaha. I think they probably were meant to be crystals as well. They do definitely look like a kid's toy, though.

Your method of separating Nouveau and Deco is pretty much the same as mine. I've heard that much of Deco, especially early Deco, is Nouveau streamlined for mass production, which seems as good a comparison as any.

[lizbee.livejournal.com]

That's gorgeous! I love the symmetry, and the meticulous detail, like Dukhat's staff on either side.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It was very fun to do. ♥

[lizbee.livejournal.com]

I wish I could do B5 art. D: But somehow all I can produce are chibis, and let me tell you, Michael Garibaldi does not want to be a chibi.

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Michael Garibaldi chibi! Ahh!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Just because he doesn't want to be doesn't mean he shouldn't...

[delenntoo.livejournal.com]

Michael Garibaldi does not want to be a chibi.

LOL! That is so funny!

[nhpw.livejournal.com]

So pretty! I have no artistic ability whatsoever, so I'm insanely jealous :P But this is just wonderful. There are so many little details that I must confess I had to go back and look at it again after I'd read everyone else's comments. But it's perfect in that, though, because that's part of what makes B5 special - all the little details that maybe you have to go back a few times to catch. So it fits. Great job.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Awww, thank you! I'm very glad you like it. I had a lot of fun doing it (although my back will be very happy to have a break from hovering over the laptop late at night, now that I'm done!). The details like the staff and the ship came out of the fact that I was basing the general look of the piece on art by Mucha, who tends to have borders filled with symmetrical or repeated images of stylized flowers and so on. Flowers don't really work for B5, so I had to come up with something else... and the cruisers and staff seemed like the most thematically-appropriate thing available. Plus, the ships were really fun to draw!

[flarn-chef.livejournal.com]

Absolutely lovely!
It has a Minbari feel, with an Art Nouveau flavour.....

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm very glad you like it, and that both sides of what I was going for come out. :D

[imhilien.livejournal.com]

Beautifully done. ^_^

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! :D

[ghanimasun]

Really amazing work!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[philomytha.livejournal.com]

That's gorgeous! I love the symmetry, and the way Delenn is positioned within it. It's very beautiful and very Minbari.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It was a very fun, challenging little piece to work on. I'm glad you enjoyed it!

[rebecca2525.livejournal.com]

This is pretty! I love the symmetry, and especially the the little Minbari ships! Great work!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! The ships were probably one of the most difficult bits to draw, so I'm very grateful that people seem to like them. :)

[aris-tgd.livejournal.com]

Very pretty! I love how it has so much depth, for a style which I have always associated with a two-dimensional stylization.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

It's interesting that you bring up the two-dimensional stylization of art nouveau - I had some difficulty with that late in the coloring process. I'd already done her face and crest, and a little fine shading on the rest of the drawing, but... the whole thing looked a little too flat. I think part of it is just that I'm not as fine and clean with my linework as Mucha - even at my best, I tend toward a sketchier style that demands shadows. Also, without a landscape or something in the background, I had way too much flat color. Adding the stars-scape in the background demanded more shading and levels in the rest of the image even as it evened out the problem with the flat areas, so... it's a blend of styles. I think I learned a lot from putting it together. ♥

[jenavira.livejournal.com]

This is beautiful! I love how it looks like a slightly more stylized version of the aesthetic that's already there in the show -- you're so right about the art deco influence. :D

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! That's exactly what I was going for - I'm so glad it seems to be working for people! I think the visual feel of B5 is one of the most interesting parts of the show that often goes unnoticed. It breaks my heart that there doesn't seem to be any kind of art book or compendium of the concept work that must have gone into it.

[thebunnybag.livejournal.com]

I think I just died a lot OF JOY.
(can you tell I'm very caffeinated right now?)
This is so flippin' gorgeous! You have much talent. The symmetry is fantastic, and this probably sounds really weird but I love the triluminary.
(probably in part because I'm considering getting it as a tattoo, but that's besides the point)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

LOL. I'm glad you like it! The triluminary made me very happy, too, because I didn't really know what I was doing with the original sketch until I realized "duh, she's holding the triluminary!" After that, the whole thing just fell together. And a tattoo of the triluminary sounds awesome! I hope you'll post pictures if you do decide to get it. I have to live vicariously through other peoples' tattoos, as I'm too much of a wibbly wimp to actually get one myself. ;)

[thebunnybag.livejournal.com]

Haha I already have two, and need to get one touched up (I have sensitive skin so it didn't heal well) and I definitely plan on getting more. I'm still trying to decide on what sort of B5 tattoo I should get. Any suggestions? The triluminary would be awesome but I'm trying to see if anything else might work too.

[vjs2259.livejournal.com]

Really lovely and unique. I particularly like the use of color. The brown and green of her robes echo Delenn's 'battle dress' rather than the rich silk reds and blues and lavenders of her formal robes. Those ships are my favorite of the series (I had an angelfish once; they are beautiful and vicious animals, tending to dominate the tank. I chuckle whenever I think of it.)

Design, costume, and background props are one of my favorite elements of B5. I love the innovative use of normal materials to create the totally distinctive and particular backdrops of each culture. I recently listened to an interview with a first season props person. Each culture had colors and textures that were to be worked into the props and costumes. They were very inventive with their limited budget!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! The browns and greens are definitely a more martial look for Delenn than the other colors she wears - I had to run back to my S1 DVDs to check my memory, since I'm in the middle of rewatching S4 at the moment, and I was pleased to see that the dull reddish brown showed up fairly regularly in her wardrobe (not the green, alas - that's pure later-season anachronism, I just couldn't resist it!).

The Minbari cruisers really do look amazingly like fish, don't they? Angelfish are a great comparison - they're so lovely and so darned nasty.

I'll have to see if I can hunt down that interview - I love everything to do with the conceptual work for TV series and movies. The process of coming up with a theme for each group, color schemes and uniting concepts... it's just so fascinating. If I were quicker and better with drawing and less fond of steady work and not moving, I would say I could happily have gone into artistic direction for movies. As it is, I'll settle for piggybacking on what others have already done. ;)

[vjs2259.livejournal.com]

The interview with Leslie Erganian is #201 at http://www.babylonpodcast.com/.
She was a small fishie but her memories are clear and interesting and it was worth listening to. Just for the original Valen's staff being made of sculpy. (!)

I have a secret yen to be one of those people who arrange food and varnish turkeys for movies and commercials. Careers we should have pursued for $200, Alex. And steady work grows more appealing the older I get :)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Nifty! New podcast for me to listen to at work! ♥ And holy hell, that's a lot of sculpy! It's great stuff, but I'd never have thought of using it for something that big!

Totally! As a teenager I wanted to be an actress (ha) or a professional makeup artist - I still do fancy makeup for all my friends for Halloween and conventions and so on, and it's a blast, but I never learned to do the fancy stuff with molds and latex, so I'm stuck at 2D construction and wax (though you'd be amazed what you can do with that, with a little determination!). It still kind of tweaks me that I gave up all that, particularly since I have friends who act or do makeup professionallly, but... as you said, at some point reality starts making compelling arguments in favor of steady jobs, medical insurance, and so on, and I'm not quite confident, brave or talented enough to hold out against them. I settle for wishing I had more frequent excuses to play at all that stuff for fun.

[vjs2259.livejournal.com]

I think the sculpy as just the prongs. The handle was probably your standard pipe or broomstick spray-painted silver. That one was apparently stolen right away, and they had to get a new one later.

It's a reasonable podcast, and I've laughed myself silly and argued out loud at work listening to it.

[ingrid44.livejournal.com]

Very interesting and innovative!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[mac-beth13.livejournal.com]

I'm always drawn to pieces that have added small details that help support the whole. You've done that in a very lovely fashion here so I guess I'm sold. ;) The Minbari war cruisers in the background, the stars, the crystal formed temple, the triluminary, the staffs are all wonderful details. I love the colouring and the symmetry of this piece. The colours you chose really reflect the Minbari, with the earth tones of the clothes and the cool light colours of the crystals they are so fond of. The expression on her face is great, both full of wonder and apprehensive at the same time. The shading of her eyelids and the blue before the bone crest and the bone crest itself is great. Really wonderful job!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I had a really fun time drawing the cruisers in particular (they're such a lovely design in the show - they've always been one of my favorite visual elements), and I'm so glad the expression worked out for you. I hardly ever do full-color, completed drawings with background and all anymore, so this was a little bit of a stretch for me. I'm very relieved it seems to have succeeded. ♥

[alexcat.livejournal.com]

Just lovely. Delenn's face is so dear and as others have said, the symmetry is wonderful... your attention to detail like the ships and staffs is what really makes it stand out!

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm very pleased you like it. ♥