Leandro G. Pimentel

Although Leandro G. Pimentel asked for comments on his work called "Dorothy finding the scarecrow" he wasn't happy with our critique. He obviously only likes the ones that say: Great Work! We didn't and so he asked google to remove his art discussion from our blog.

This was our post. This time without the images that supported our comments.
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This is a work from Leandro G. Pimentel
You can find this beautiful work right here: http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=133&t=883892
This is what we think of this piece called: Dorothy finding the scarecrow.
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Functional use of color
I think that if you use your color, and this is no ordinary color -it's the yellow from the yellow brick road- you can still use it in a functional way without losing the communicating value of the color.
Use the yellow to spotlight Dorothy. It tells the story better (we don't have to follow the road until it's disappeared in the horizon) because it keeps the focus on our main character.

-M-
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story
One thing you can use when telling a visual story is emotion. In this piece you can not read the emotional response on Dorothy's face. This way the audience has a hard time connecting with her. Changing this into a situation where you can see her emotion, pushes the story into another level. Having done this, I also noticed that the scarecrow needed to be flipped around, so that they together tell an emotional story. Eyes are a very important aspect of conveying an emotion. Walt Disney was somenone that understood very well the power and importance of eyes, and used to remind his artists constantly to not forget about the eyes.


-D-
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Story2

The story of the scarecrow is a little bit confusing. He is hanging there, really sad and down. He is showing no energy. Because he is hanging there and the crows are bugging him. He gave up hope.
But he has cought a crow? That costs energy? If he doesn't care anymore why catch a crow. Or if he would mind, why doesn't he try to catch the other crow?
(Is this crow death? If yes, why is this crow then looking at me? If no, why isn't he struggeling to get loose?)

-J-

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His comment:
Leandro said...

Hi guys, It’s cool you analyze artwork for storytelling, but I think you should try to read more carefully the authors interpretation of each theme. In art, each person is different and has a variety of opinions and interpretations of the same subject, which may not always agree with yours.

I appreciate your interest in art and illustration but I think you should study more art history, composition and visual language before going into other people work. Your analyses are based on personal opinions on how you would do this or that and how you would tell a story. This is totally subjective and it’s not based on any art theory of any kind. If you are teaching this, please stop doing it, because you are cheating on people and has no educational validity.
I say this not only for my case, your other analysis of other pieces are very wrong two…

Let me try to show how I see things and why did this piece the way I did it.
I agree in the correction you’ve made of Dorothy’s feet, I forgot to turn the shadow layer before I published the work (sometimes happens). But never the less, the correction you’ve made of Dorothy’s feet does not correspond with the light source of the whole picture!!!! So it’s very wrong.
Anyway, if you remember, the Golden path she needs to follow is extremely long, and that causes the feeling of sadness and the sensation you are very, very far from home… So following the golden path until the end is a good thing and I wanted that to happen.

About the story telling: if I would have done Dorothy turned around as you say and the scarecrow looking at her, all the piece would just be another common one with a totally direct reading and nothing to think about. Besides, haven’t you see romantic paintings? The guys aren’t facing the viewer, and never the less, they work just fine!

First, the scarecrow is looking to the cornfield, in a hopeless and lonely way, nearly melancholic. That’s why his eyes are looking down with this expression. His left hand is hanging useless, showing his doesn’t care much about his work and he is tired, and the other one, holding the living crow shows he partially do his work, but in a “humorous” sense. (I mean, he is a scarecrow and he’s till hanging there) The fact that the crow is looking to us, nearly in a smiley way, with a superiority expression, tells us that he has a friendship relationship with the scarecrow, cause he is a good guy!!! More like a kindergarten teacher that plays along with the kind but has some kind of authority. Same reason with the crow in the hat, he is playing with him, he is smiley and don’t want to hurt him. He is just a naughty boy…

About Dorothy: she has just come by the scarecrow, and as long as I know, if he is in a cornfield, why would she be surprised? Is not normal thing...?

The composition, as you can see in this new picture I post, is set into two mayor triangles, and a circle in the center (which remains nearly empty). You see how important the eyes direction is to the composition? They make our eye take a cyclic visual interpretation of the story, as long and you go for each detail…

I hope you reconsider your opinion before “analyzing” other people work and please STUDY!!!!

Sincerely,

Leandro G. Pimentel.