Baron Samedi

Wow. Perfect stock image, and excellent cropping on it. The picture is high quality, and excellemnt for a desktop. Hair is normally a ***** to crop, lol, and you have done a really great job on cropping this hair. I love the background effect you used... I wish I had Adobe. Or PSP. Heh. The only suggestion I could find to improve, is to move the Kanji down lower onto the black edging. That'd be good. Or move it to the middle, and change it to a black font. Overall, good work.

Here is another version of it. I will tweak it a bit, and show you some of my different tweaks. Eventually, I may come up with something I am [Completely] happy with. [img]http://www.otakuboards.com/attachment.php?postid=539949[/img]

I think it looked better when Sasuke was grey. However, tone down the background a bit on it. Dull it somewhat. Also, I don't particularly like the font. Go for one or two sizes larger- it is too hard to read. Also, the top black line is thinner than the other two. If this is intended then make it thinner even. As it is it just looks like an accident. If it is an accident- fix it. Overall, not too bad here. Grey-Sasuke Aesthetics: 8/10 [6.5 for Orange-Sasuke] Technical: 7/10

*eyes boggle* You can do that with mO? Wow. I wish I knew how to do work like that. Both of those are really really impressive. I love them both. I find myself leaning towards the more relaxes, easy-pace of Layout 01. It seems so much more simple. And wonderful. I love the eye, and the shadowed tones. So much nicer. I am... flabbergasted. lol. Great work here. I don't know what to say really. This work is just so great it deserves a comment for all the effort, plus how impressed I am. [If you ever get bored... you can make something like this for my site...] Heh.

Heh. I suggested this before... I think the whole point is that information may not be reliable, people may lie, you should do your own work, and that we shouldn't be coming on here when we're supposed to be doing homework. I thought it was a great idea... but the problems with it make enough sense, I suppose.

[OOC: Hope nobody is left on the [i]Event Horizon[/i] >.> If so, you may be well and truly screwed over] Ruben pulled himself to a sitting poistion, grappling with the table leg, slippery as it was with his blood. Gazing in horror at the airlock door, Ruben listened to the dull pounding. It became hypnotic. The pounding must have rattled the table. Maybe Ruben shifted position slightly. Whatever it was, it caused a pair of medical scissors to fall off the table. They bounced, point first, mere inches from Ruben's hand. With a jump, Ruben got to his feet. Holding his mangled arm in his shirt, he staggered up the corridor towards the medical bay. His head felt light, swirling dots spun in front of his eyes. Falling to his knees, a mere twenty metres from the entrance to the Med Bay, Ruben slumped to the ground. Tryign to call out, all that came out of his dry throat was a croak. Half hefting himself to his feet, Ruben crashed into the floor with all the force he could muster. Surely they would hear that.

Yeah. With the hue/saturation, how do you set what colour it will change too? Is it the current colour pallette?

lol. That is, as everyone here has noted, a cute banner. I like the font. lol. I agree with Shizoku that the 'd' shouldn't be so close to the edge. Also, put the periods [.'s] on separately, and move them further apart. The blue border is effective... and overall, quite good. Did you just crop a picture? Or are the girls on there as layers? Because, if so, I recommend moving the top girl more to the left. Just to balance it a bit more. Aesthetics: 8/10 Technical: 6/10

Heh. I am not entirely sure how to change the whites and greys. I was mucking around with different layer effects and airbrushing to get this. lol. So, I don't really know how to alter that. lol. With my old set, I cropped/used the demon heads from another picture, and I got a background logo thingie from another site. I added the rest as abstract tools and the little donut shaped things. Heh. Took me quite a while. lol. But, yeah, Flying High was a good set. I like the avatar for this one more than the banner. Maybe it is just the text on the banner which I don't like. Anyhow... I might get rid of the text. We'll see. It may grow on me as Flying High did.

Hah. Thanks for the lesson .h4ck. Here are a few choice quotes. [quote][i]Originally posted by MetalSonic700[/i] Yeah, I did a pretty half *** job, and the lyrics were wrong[/quote] [quote]really? I thought they sucked. Heres a different style, little. PS: Im just stalling with the dumb ones.[/quote] I feel I was fully justified. Now look at this. [quote]Yeesh, thats harsh. Well, um, heres a way better one. I made these like a month ago.[/quote] Despite the harsh bit, doesn't this introduction sound much better? More positive? I didn't see the point of this thread. He was posting banners he didn't like, and didn't care about. Now he is posting up banners which deserve criteria. A banner has little value unless the maker has put some effort into it, and feels that it is decent. Ok. Now to the banner. This one isn't too bad. I think the font could be a bit sharper, and it needs a border. The picture isn't too good quality, but paint will do that to you. All the time. lol. I like the background behind the picture, but I don't like the lines you put on it behind the text. Leave it plain, or do subtle tone difference with the lines, rather than so bold. Aside from that, not too bad. Each piece seems to be gradually getting better.

lol. What OS are you running on? There are a few programs with XP I think that would be a bit better. Such as 'Picture It' or whatever. I know what you mean though... Get warez off your friends, or borrow CD's from school. Like I did >.> This isn't too bad. I think the text should have been lined up evenly though. Also, the 'Otaku[b]Boards[/b]' should be a different colour to stand out more. The green box lines could be changed as well. The colour doesn't complement the banner very well. Not too bad a piece though.

Hey all. I am really happy with how this piece turned out. Just one little note though- the yellow part came from a pink image of the American Flag being pounded by missiles. In case you were wondering ~_^ I thought the banner turned out quite good. I have another banner with smaller text, which I will attatch later. So... how do you all feel about my new set?

As with everything... people will reply when they feel like it. Someone once said that people wouldn't reply if your work was too bad, or too good. I don't think this is true. I too know what it is like to get one reply to a piece of work that you thought was excellent. But you can't make people reply. Mayhap they feel that they have nothing to say? Maybe it just doesn't 'do it' for them. Yet they have no reason. I like your work, thought it is commonly very similar. I'll reply if I feel like it, if I feel I can help, or if I feel very impressed. I often like your work... but there isn't always something to say. I disagree on a fundamental basis with just saying 'Awesome banner. Great work'. I need to be able to comment more specifically, or to be able to suggest improvements. Thats how I feel on the matter. If there isn't something to say about the work... no matter how good it is, they won't say anything.

OK. This banner itself isn't very good. I think you should have tried to crop the pictures, because they are just squares currently and don't really blend with each oither well. You should have a border on it... just a plain black one would do. The text... did you design this is Paint? Because the text is a classic Paint work. Try making text using a half-decent program that doesn't leave the white box around it. Even draw the text yourself. Anything to get away from the white boxes. The presentation of this is much better- you didn't go right out and say that you thought it was crap and stalling, so this is much more endearing to you. Anyhow... if these really are stalling, I shall look forward to seeing your newer ones.

Well, what is the point of this thread if you're 'stalling' with these banners which you plainly admit are crap? The font sucks, the pictures aren't that much better, they could all do with borders. You know these are crap? What is the purpose of this? The lyrics or whatever they are, are crap, some plainly offensive even. Basically they're all rubbish. One is tempted to wonder... can you make better banners than this?

Frankly, I havn't read the last one and a half pages. It seems to descend into a morass of conflicting views, over little importance. So, I shall just state my views on this. I studied Fascism, Communism and Marx this past year. I am in year 9, but taking... 'top' classes. I would wager that a lot of kids I know wouldn't have any idea who Marx was. I found it really interesting though. Thats just me. I think that you're terribly stuck up for saying that anybody who doesn't know about Marx isn't intelligent enough. What would you know? That was a horrendous line. Communism and Fascism are at opposite ends of the Left/Right scale. But the truth is, they have many qualities in common. Which is why a Pournelles axis is the best way to view political groups. Here I quote from the site "Some years ago I set out to replace the old model with one that made more sense. I studied a number of political philosophies and tried to see what underlying concepts separated them from their political enemies. Eventually I came up with two variables. I didn't then and don't now suggest these two are all there is to political theory. I'm certain there are other important ones. But my two have this property: they map every major political philosophy and movement onto one unique place. The two I chose are "Attitude toward the State," and "Attitude toward planned social progress". The first is easy to understand: what think you of government? Is it an object of idolatry, a positive good, necessary evil, or unmitigated evil? Obviously that forms a spectrum, with various anarchists at the left end and reactionary monarchists at the right. The American political parties tend to fall toward the middle. Note also that both Communists and Fascists are out at the right-hand end of the line; while American Conservatism and US Welfare Liberalism are in about the same place, somewhere to the right of center, definitely "statists." (One should not let modern anti-bureaucratic rhetoric fool you into thinking the US Conservative has really become anti-statist; he may want to dismantle a good part of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, but he would strengthen the police and army.) The ideological libertarian is of course left of center, some all the way over to the left with the anarchists. That variable works; but it doesn't pull all the political theories each into a unique place. They overlap. Which means we need another variable. "Attitude toward planned social progress" can be translated "rationalism"; it is the belief that society has "problems," and these can be "solved"; we can take arms against a sea of troubles. Once again we can order the major political philosophies. Fascism is irrationalist; it says so in its theoretical treatises. It appeals to "the greatness of the nation" or to the volk, and also to the fuhrer-prinzip, i.e., hero worship. Call that end (irrationalism) the "bottom" of the spectrum and place the continuum at right angles to the previous "statism" variable. Call the "top" the attitude that all social problems have findable solutions. Obviously Communism belongs there. Not far below it you find a number of American Welfare Liberals: the sort of people who say that crime is caused by poverty, and thus when we end poverty we'll end crime. Now note that the top end of the scale, extreme rationalism, may not mark a very rational position: "knowing" that all human problems can be "solved" by rational actions is an act of faith akin to the anarchist's belief that if we can just chop away the government, man truly free will no longer have problems. Obviously I think both top and bottom positions are whacky; but then one mark of Conservatism has always been distrust of highly rationalist schemes. Burke advocated that we draw "from the general bank of the ages, because he suspected that any particular person or generation has a rather small stock of reason; thus where the radical argues "we don't understand the purpose of this social custom; let's dismantle it," the conservative says "since we don't understand it, we'd better leave it alone." Anyway, those are my two axes; and using them does tend to explain some political anomalies. For example: why are there two kinds of "liberal" who hate each other? But the answer is simple enough. Both are pretty thorough-going rationalists, but whereas the XIXth Century Liberal had a profound distrust of the State, the modern variety wants to use the State to Do Good for all mankind. Carry both rationalism and statism out a bit further (go northeast on our diagram) and you get to socialism, which, carried to its extreme, becomes communism. Similarly, the Conservative position leads through various shades of reaction to irrational statism, i.e., one of the varieties of fascism. On the anti-statist end of the scale we can see the same tendency: extreme anti-rationalism ends with the Bakunin type of anarchist, who blows things up and destroys for the sake of destruction; the utterly rationalist anti-statist, on the other hand, persuades himself that somehow there are natural rights which everyone ought to recognize, and if only the state would get out of the way we'd all live in harmony; the sort of person who thinks the police no better than a band of brigands, but doesn't think that in the absence of the police, brigands would be smart enough to band together. " Here is a picture of the Axis itself. It is a very apt model. Fascism and Communism have similar faculties, but also different ones. Now down to Marx. What do you want to know about him? What is there to say? His [i]Communisto Manifesto[/i] has a lot of good points. His theories are very good. But the crossover from Paper to reality was harsh. It wasn't the same. The Bourgeoisise still ended up in control. The proletariat and the petite bourgeoisie were set against each other. Industrial world condemned it. it didn't work, because of humans. And their urge to succeed. What is there to say? The leaders of Communism destroyed what could have been a great movement, and was a great ideal.

I can not hope to compete with Dagger's marvellous work in opening up and reviewing this poem, but I may add my little thoughts on the poem. I particularly love the title. Arraign. Accuse. What exactly happened with your breakup? Who dumped whom? What for? Because the title of it alone points the finger at someone. I didn't like the 'sincerest' part of it though. Perhaps "A contemplation of most sincere selfloathing" or "selfloathing most sincere" would better fit it. I loved the last stanza/verse. It sings to me of precious memories and good times, the rare beauty that can be found in a loved one, the inner beauty. It then moves to 'rebounds' with the "Substitution is fleeting." line. Rebounds are never serious, and often leave one longing for the original embrace. I loved it. Great work. You can see that you put your heart and soul into this poem. It literally flows with grief. A very touching piece.

Wow. I loved the descriptiveness in this story. You did excellently, the imagery of the scene, and allusions to a past life were excellently done. It was... quite strange. Something about the way it was written seemed really strange to me. It was a good piece however. You described it all really well, and I am very impressed by it. [quote]pressing your hip against the door's metal bar,[/quote] I didn't really like that part. The door's metal bar? What is this? I just didn't like that particular sentence. Aside from that, good work.

Petir raced from the low brush cover as soon as he heard the explosion. Glancing at the fire cloud as he worked at the fence, Petir was amazed at the sheer amount of sound being generated. Then a fizzing sound he knew very well reached his ears. Bullets. Jedgar had obviously sent the car right into the ammunitions dump. Damn, that was loud. Foricng his way through the hole he had cut in the fence, Petir and Julia headed oevr to the cover of the Vehicle compund. Finding the keys board for their half of the compund, Petir threw Julia two sets of keys. "Start them up, and have the backs open. I'm going to go look for some fuel containers" Petir headed into the nearby cellar. Surely they would have to keep fuel supplies nearby. Stashed in a corner with a tarp thrown over them, he found twelve or so eighteen litre fuel barrels. Hoisting one over his shoulder, Petir staggered up the stairs. As he reached the top of the stairs he saw a terrible sight. Julia was on her knees, and an MP guard was standing behind her, with a pistol pointed directly at her head. Petir heard the whisper of cloth as he felt the cold barrel of a gun jammed into the nape of his neck. Glancing at Julia, she dipped her eyes down to the right. Attack it was. Petir dropped low, and tipped the fuel drum onto his captors feet. Spinning around, he straightened, using all of his momentum to deliver a sweeping right hook onto the very point of the guards jaw. His head snapped back, and the guard fell down the stairs, landing in an awkward heap at the bottom. Petir turned to see Julia deliver a probably lethal blow to the other guard's sternum. Grinning lightly, she turned to Petir and bowed. "Yeah yeah" Petir saud, blushing. "Try to be more careful next time, won't you?" "You try to be more careful too." "Whatever" Petir called back as he strode down the stairs. After hefting the rest of the drums up the stairs, Petir and Julia hopped into their respective vehicles, and drove straight through the eastern fence of the compound, in their recently liberated military vehicles, and waited at the 'drop-zone' for the others to arrive. [i]15 minutes passes[/i] Where the hell were they?

Ooh. Excellent piece here. I think the white outer glow on the text could be reduced a bit- it seems a little bit too much. Reduce intensity and blur on it somewhat. I think the screenshot or picture used on the left could be slightly better. It seems a bit blurred. The background image, and effect used on the background is... astounding. Amazing. Mind-blowing. I love it. It just looks so damn good. I am blown away. This is probably one of the best banners that I have ever seen you produce. Congratulations on this masterpiece. Aesthetics: 9/10 Technical: 8.5/10

Where is the Dumb Little Kagome banner? I found the Quite Good Actually Kagome Banner. But not the dumb one. I'll just rate this one I suppose. OK. The screenshots aren't too bad really. In fact they're quite decent quality. I think those lines you put around could be different. Just... they look rather like an afterthought there. The font is excellent, though could perhaps be bolded. Only other thing- this banner deserves a border. Borders are pretty well much a given for banners. You have to have them. They define the banner and give it... body. Aesthetics: 7/10 Technical: 6/10

>.< Please don't ask me to say I like the drawing. There are some parts, like the socks which are great, but the rest has some serious problems. Now, as for the colouring... thats pretty damn good. In the rags wrapped around the walking stick/cane/sword/whatever is great, and the hair isn't too bad either. Compared to the rest of her, the line for her chin is too thin. The overall colouring is quite good, and you have used shading techniques etc. I think you could possibly have cut back on some of the shading, but I don't think this piece is too badly coloured. For the colouring work: 7.5/10

The Bladerunner! Thats where he needed to get to. [i]Ruben's face took on a look of renewed concentration as he sprinted down the corridor. Beneath the calm, focused veneer that had enshadowed his features, his mind was ablaze with images, thoughts, sounds and smells. Satell! Weir! Chubb! Everything blurred, as the primitive took over.[/i] Ruben found himself running along the corridor leading past the bridge. His gaze was drawn into the room as he dashed past, and, seeing movement within, he stopped a further three metres down the corridor. Drawing a pistol, he edged around the corner into the room. There was nobody there. Yes. There was. Dangling over the edge of the seat was a pair of short legs. Ruben could see them hanging on either side of the brushed aluminium swivel stand of the driving chair. Kicking the chair around with his foot, Ruben stared in horror as the chair swung around once, twice, three times, to come to a rest facing him. It was a little girl. The side of her face and neck had been torn off, as if by some colossal animal. Yet she had not a drop of blood on her. As Ruben reached down to check if she had a pulse, her eyes flew open, as her hand simultaneously came up and grasped his in a grip of steel. Her other hand came up, so she now had both of her hands on his arm. She was strong, and pulled him in towards her. Her mouth opened in a knowing grin. In a flash Ruben saw what was going to happen. Even as her teeth bit into his arm, his body was leaning backwards, hauling the small body from the chair. As the teeth broke through the skin, as blood welled up, his arm was moving along a trajectory towards the wall. As her little fingers, oh so much stronger than their appearance suggested, burrowed into the wound, her head was mere centimetres from the wall. The sickening crunch as her neck and skull shattered upon contact with the wall dislodged her grip from his arm. She fell limply to the ground as Ruben backed away, staring in horror at the gaping wound on his arm. His gaze shifted as the young girl, appearing to be no more than five years old rose from the floor. "You hurt me... now we are gonna play tickles" Her fingers seems to grow, and became hags hands, her nails growing sharper and longer. "Tickle, tickle" she chortled as she waved her fingers at him. With a scream of pure terror Ruben turned and fled out of the room, turning back down the corridor. From his peripheral vision he sense a massive hulking presence to his right, but he was already running up the left branch of the corridor. Though the sprint lasted for several minutes, not once did he look back. His arm was pumping blood all over the corridor, but in his numb state it did not even register. Dimly he was aware that the speaker system was blaring, but his mind was wrapped in fog. In a state verging on amusement he saw himself sprinting deperately down the final corridor, sliding under the closing airlock door, crashing into the steel leg of a table. He watched the 'Others' head for the door. He was pulled back into his body... pain engulfed his mind.

I pretty much concur with all that Dagger said. However, two little improvements/gripes I have in mind. I think the border is fine as is. However, on the left with the stock there, it looks so crisp, whereas on the right with the light glow in the background... it doesn't look so good. I think you should leave the glow on the cross, but remove any extraneous glow in the background. That way it has a solid colour base for the black border. It just doesn't look right when you have the black border and dark blue hair on one side, but have the border, and the creamy overlay on the darkblue. Or thats how I feel about it. Section two: The Text. I think a better font could have been found, for sure. Too plain. It doesn't do the banner justice. Overall, good work. Aesthetics: 8/10 Technical: 7.5/10

Man. What has poor Shinny ever done to you? He certainly got a crap deal in this. Glad to see that you're letting your artisitic frustrations flow into something else. Otherwise Mr T's adventures would be filled with pent up expectation and randomness. Which may be too much for our weak little selves :). So, good work. Very funny. Haha. Nice stuff. Love gollum. Loved James. Loved the movie.