Artifacting... an artist is only as good as his ingredients. I'm getting these images off the web, all of which are jpegs. Even with bmps, I'm sure for bandwidth issues mandrake wants the final product in jpeg. edit:
Is so, Mandrake? If you prefer .png I will deliver.As to the crowd, I'm honestly content with it, because it acts as a single image rather than calling the eye around to look at all the scatter.
While I'm no artist, I was a letterer for comics. Really. Electronic, mind! I'm not Todd Klein. Anyhoo, I do understand the idea of guiding the eye around the page. We have three critical elements to express: City Hall, Obi Wan Statesman, and the crowd. They're in an off-center triangle, with the (unimportant and monochromatic) statue to the left providing balance. Y'all see?
Oh, what am I doing? Show, don't tell! Hollywood's most important rule (besides asking for gross.)
Hmm... now that I look at it, the brightness of the dome does draw the eye right there, doesn't it? Okay, I toned it down a little.
And while I don't wanna interfere with Vy's process, it seems to me she had a straight pyramid with earlier drafts, but as the fireballs and the Boobettes came in, the pyramid was lost.
OH! Also Vy and Mandrake, if I may bother you, earlier drafts were pretty much "before/after," the doors of City Hall remained in the same place for both images. Keeping that center seems to me vital to our before/after effect. ...Did that make sense?