Chrispy
Active member
Okay, I\'ve been thinking of making this as an article, but It seems so small (relatively) to other articles and I really don\'t need too many pictures. This is more how to critique art in general, but I\'ll steer it towards minis for the most part. I just hope this might clear up some words people may have thought were synonamous and also allow people to express their feelings on pieces more eloquently.
First thing you ask yourself: what is the subject? This is pretty obvious for most, as the title will give it to you (ie: you\'re looking at a Mira the Reckless mini) but if there are other things going on, it gets a little deep. For example, if you\'re looking at a diorama, does it tell a narrative or story? It should at some basic level, even if it\'s \"This guy is going to hit that guy\", that\'s what makes it interesting.
A part of Subject is Iconography, which deals with both the subjectiveness of the work (what it is) and what it symbolizes ( what it stands for). This is not really found too much in mini work, but an example would be if you see a diorama of Space Marines destroying Tyranids also might stand for Human triumph or victory over darkness.
Now we move on to the definitions of words critics love to use when trying to convey their feelings on art..
Form: Form in art refers to shape or structure of the artwork. So basically, in mini terms this is the \"sculpt\" of the mini.
Compostition: Not the same as form, this is form being used. It\'s all how you put form into to use it. This could be the placement on the base and how it relates to the base, or in the case of plastic figures, what you did to pose it, which also ties into converted works.
Materials: Paint, tools, Greenstuff, pewter, brushes are all our materials in the mini world. We all begin with these no matter who or where we are. The more specific we get with these, the more we get into...
Technique: Any way the artist handles the materials to make their work. We talk about techniques all the time on the forums, just remember everyone\'s technique is thier own. No two people will employ brushstrokes or apply paint the same, even if they\'re both trying to use the NMM \"technique\".
Color: I go to extreme detail on this in my Mystic Color Theroy Article. Some things to remember to talk about are: Hue (the color\'s name) Saturation (richness of color) and Value (the brighntess or darkess of the color).
Texture: This is like it sounds, it is the quality of the surface. It could either be on the miniature (like hair, wood, stone,etc, ) or painted on to represent that. Either way, they must be an accurate representation for us to believe it is an actual texture. When you see a mini with good texture, you just want to touch it to see if it is really silky or soft or shiny, this is where most of us curse when people break them...
Mass: Mass in art terms is almost the same as in scientific terms. It refers to the \"weight\" of a mini due to the colors or shading used. You feel the \"weight\" of a GW mini as apposed to the openess of a Rackham figure, even though they are pretty much the same size.
Volume: This is the size of something. Note that also like in scientific terms, this is not the weight but the size. Things that have great mass do not have to have great volume. For example, a stone piller looks to have more mas than a plume of smoke.
These two terms of Mass and Volume are vital to any discussion on miniatures. When we say something looks \"flat\" we mean it does not look like it has volume to it. We know it does, because it\'s a 3D figure, but shading and highlighting are integral parts to fooling the eye..
Speaking of fooling the eye, that\'s a good term to remember: trompe l\'oeil. It\'s French for \"fools the eye\" which is what we\'re all about here, fooling the eye into thinking it\'s a miniature version of life. NMM is definatly a trompe l\'oeil technique, now it\'s obvious why the French master it!
Well, I hope I\'ve enlightened some of you in the way of terms and what to hit in descriptions. I\'m not saying it must encompass all of these but hopefully more comments will be better thought out than:
\"Do0d tHiS RAWKS!!\"
Go make some constructive criticisms, you monkies!
First thing you ask yourself: what is the subject? This is pretty obvious for most, as the title will give it to you (ie: you\'re looking at a Mira the Reckless mini) but if there are other things going on, it gets a little deep. For example, if you\'re looking at a diorama, does it tell a narrative or story? It should at some basic level, even if it\'s \"This guy is going to hit that guy\", that\'s what makes it interesting.
A part of Subject is Iconography, which deals with both the subjectiveness of the work (what it is) and what it symbolizes ( what it stands for). This is not really found too much in mini work, but an example would be if you see a diorama of Space Marines destroying Tyranids also might stand for Human triumph or victory over darkness.
Now we move on to the definitions of words critics love to use when trying to convey their feelings on art..
Form: Form in art refers to shape or structure of the artwork. So basically, in mini terms this is the \"sculpt\" of the mini.
Compostition: Not the same as form, this is form being used. It\'s all how you put form into to use it. This could be the placement on the base and how it relates to the base, or in the case of plastic figures, what you did to pose it, which also ties into converted works.
Materials: Paint, tools, Greenstuff, pewter, brushes are all our materials in the mini world. We all begin with these no matter who or where we are. The more specific we get with these, the more we get into...
Technique: Any way the artist handles the materials to make their work. We talk about techniques all the time on the forums, just remember everyone\'s technique is thier own. No two people will employ brushstrokes or apply paint the same, even if they\'re both trying to use the NMM \"technique\".
Color: I go to extreme detail on this in my Mystic Color Theroy Article. Some things to remember to talk about are: Hue (the color\'s name) Saturation (richness of color) and Value (the brighntess or darkess of the color).
Texture: This is like it sounds, it is the quality of the surface. It could either be on the miniature (like hair, wood, stone,etc, ) or painted on to represent that. Either way, they must be an accurate representation for us to believe it is an actual texture. When you see a mini with good texture, you just want to touch it to see if it is really silky or soft or shiny, this is where most of us curse when people break them...
Mass: Mass in art terms is almost the same as in scientific terms. It refers to the \"weight\" of a mini due to the colors or shading used. You feel the \"weight\" of a GW mini as apposed to the openess of a Rackham figure, even though they are pretty much the same size.
Volume: This is the size of something. Note that also like in scientific terms, this is not the weight but the size. Things that have great mass do not have to have great volume. For example, a stone piller looks to have more mas than a plume of smoke.
These two terms of Mass and Volume are vital to any discussion on miniatures. When we say something looks \"flat\" we mean it does not look like it has volume to it. We know it does, because it\'s a 3D figure, but shading and highlighting are integral parts to fooling the eye..
Speaking of fooling the eye, that\'s a good term to remember: trompe l\'oeil. It\'s French for \"fools the eye\" which is what we\'re all about here, fooling the eye into thinking it\'s a miniature version of life. NMM is definatly a trompe l\'oeil technique, now it\'s obvious why the French master it!
Well, I hope I\'ve enlightened some of you in the way of terms and what to hit in descriptions. I\'m not saying it must encompass all of these but hopefully more comments will be better thought out than:
\"Do0d tHiS RAWKS!!\"
Go make some constructive criticisms, you monkies!
