That owl is a thing on it’s own; would love to have him sit on my shoulder!
Wow this scene is look lovely. I think the lttle girls expression is spot on and the detail in the Skeleton, yoiu could probably use that in a medical book or something 
Pete B
A test with most items in place. Had to do a lot of reposing and shuffling things around.
I think I ended up reinforcing the second interpretation I had intended. (I wanted the viewer to think the witch was either a) afraid of her creation, or b) afraid her creation was falling apart.) I thought it was funnier to have Horsey looking at the Owl instead of the Witch, so I think it’s easier to tell he isn’t a threat to the witch now.
piz: Hehe, thanks! 
skinnybonez: Haha, thank you!
Blaine91555: Thank you!
-WOODY-: Thanks! Painting with cavity masks makes me feel like I’m painting miniatures again… applying washes and drybrushing.
voodoomonkey: Thanks, voodoomonkey!
Plakkie: Haha, thank you!
fizzy: Thank you!
LOL, that’s funny. The owl looks like he’s thinking, “what thu… I think I’d rather be somewhere else right now”.
I like the render and lighting and the colors look great.
Very good Buddy!
This is an effective dress rehearsal, yeah! 
Great work!
I tend to find the eye very distracting as well.
Really like the composition so far. The way the skelehorse is lifting itself from the chauldron is brilliant!
As the owl (my favorite ) has a role to play now I feel his expression could be pushed some more; like Woody said, he must be thinking: “What thu…”. Don’t know what would work; maybe bent him a bit away from the horse, or change the open/close scale of the eyes, or change the pupil size for one eye, or make the eyes bulge just a little…
Looking at the picture again I’ve get the impression that the chauldron, taking up a reasonable part of the image, is less detailed (/textured) then the rest of the objects.
The loose eye is such a great detail. Right now it seems to be looking at the book, trying to understand how it came into being, or: how he should look if everything had gone well… Maybe you could make this point really strong by rotating the eye just so that it really looked at the picture?
I’m much in awe with your modeling and visual storytelling skills; these observations are just from humble me trying to contribute two small cents. 
Looking really good, but I thought I’d add my comments about the eye. My first impression was negative - the rest of the horse is all holding together very well and the eye dangling so far down looked out of place. On the other hand, after reading Plakkie’s message, I also like the way it’s looking at the pony in the book as though he’s thinking “so that’s what I’m supposed to be?”. On balance though I think I would either put it back in it’s socket or somehow find a way to make it look less distracting. In your final image people won’t have the benefit of Plakkie’s comments and it’s first impressions that count. Just my thoughts, you’re the boss.
Jason
Marsyas,
Kudos my friend very well done indeed. Love the sculpt and elements you put into this work. With the new editions of the dangling eye and what not I took a bit more time to actually look at the scene respectively and have some food for thought.
The dangling eye is somewhat interesting and a bit as has been said distracting in a manner of speaking but also what came to me initially upon seeing it is that the eyes are the only organic piece of flesh like substance on the creature which to me seems a tad out of place, but hey its magic so yeah I suppose that compensates for it. However, it could be also that my personal preference is when I thought it had no eyes at all, just open skull sockets would be more fitting.
Also, the owl seems a bit obscure at this point with the current lighting. Maybe either bringing him closer to the horse head on the branch to be at a better compositional position or maybe add a “glow” coming from the cauldron that helps to bring him out a bit more.
Lastly, at first I thought the alignment of the pelvis was bugging me but I think its the left femur being shown that is doing it to me. When I place pen or object to block out most of the left femur it seems the skeletal critter is more appealing to me and helps the position of him using the aid of that left leg to help him rise out of the cauldron.
As I said take it with a grain of salt for this is truly a wonderful piece. I just try to give feedback when I can especially since I know I enjoy getting it myself. Keep up the great work!!
Though understanding the comments in favour of the eye, I have to say it is grisly and gruesome and does not fit the rest of the picture’s tone. It’s like if something from Resident Evil had gatecrashed Monsters Inc.
That aside, lovely!
R
Thanks for all the crits, everyone. I tried out a bunch of the suggestions and ended up making a lot of changes.
Basically, with the eye gone, something felt missing, so I punched up the expressions.
-WOODY-: Thanks! Definitely want it to be funny.
piz: Thank you!
John Strieder: Thanks for your opinion! You weren’t the only one.
LittleDedder: Thank you!
Plakkie: Thanks for all the comments, Plakkie! I tried to push the Owl some more but I probably could have gone further. I might wait to dirty up the cauldron more in Photoshop. Glad you liked the eye. Sadly, I decided to snip it (for now). 
Dondemaker: Thanks for your opinion, Dondemaker. I tried a long time to make the eye work but eventually gave up.
AngelJ: Thanks for all the crits, AngelJ. I originally planned to put more meat on Horsey but that turned out to be too ambitious. I kept the eyes because I wanted him to be more expressive. I’ll be bringing the owl out more in post, along with enhancing everything in general. Thanks for the femur suggestion. Not sure I did what you were suggesting, but fooling around with him more helped make things more dynamic, I think.
Rory_L: Thanks, Rory_L! I probably should have integrated the eye sooner (I planned it in the sketches but I guess it’s too grisly for the style I ended up with).
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Marsyas,
You have the heart and talent of a true artist. Love the changes and I firmly believe they help convey what you want for this type of piece. However, as much as I am enjoying your piece, give yourself big kudos for examining the suggestions made by your zbc friends and putting the suggestions to the test to see if it helps your goal. Regardless if you choose to go with the suggestions or not doesn’t matter what matters is you gave it good food for thought and tried em out yourself. Means you have heart and mind of a someone always willing to do more to get more, that type of open mindedness is a valuable trait to have my friend!!
Love the scene and what your doing adding some light mist, expression on horse is great! So many great entries but as I’ve said on others this one is right up with the best of them!!
Hi Marsyas!
I think that the addition of fog effects is cool and give realism to the scene… only one thing (but I know this isn’t the definitive version yet… ;))… I don’t know if is right that the fog/smoke affects the luminosity of the flames… I think that the flames behind should generate some kind of addictive effect.
Anyway I really like this project!
This is fantastic! I really like this image and i think it could definately be a prize winner.
The green fog on this makes a massive difference, it makes the whole scene look less ‘sterile’.
I think the only thing that this seems to need is maybe some small amounts of rotting flesh on the bones. nothing too much, maybe just some staining on the bones instead. It’s just that he looks a little too clean and making him a bit more decomposed might make him seem a little more scary. just my opinion.
Anyhow, top image, I am very impressed!
It’s all nice and cohesive now. All the elements belong in this world.
Love the owl’s expression.
R
I absolutely love the book’s detail as well as the skeleton!. As far as needing Photoshop, to do the fog, and fire, after you get your models dropped onto the canvas, trying baking the layer you want the effect on, select the highlighterII brush and set the modifier to main. Then pick a red color and overlap a few strokes. This also translates to fog as well. Just remember to start dark and go light.
Hi, folks.
This is probably my final, though I haven’t submitted yet. I might tweak it more but I think some blanks should always be left for the viewer to fill.
I was gonna try to make the fire look more realistic but I kinda like the cartooniness of it (maybe they’re just light bulbs…)
Thanks to everyone who dropped by; it really helped me slog through. I’m especially indebted to those who took the time to critique my work as it often caused me to reexamine everything.
AngelJ: Thank you for the kind words and helpful advice!
piz: Thanks, piz! You were right about the smoke.
dustbin1_uk: Thank you! I originally planned more ‘flesh’ but that proved a bit too ambitious. Rotting flesh might have proved too ‘gruesome’ too considering some were turned off by the dangling eye.
Rory_L: Thank you!
sirquadalot: Thank you! It would have been cool to play with ZBrush’s 2D elements but since I rendered as large as I could, it was easier to manage in Photoshop.
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I tell you what, it’s so hard to choose a winner with so many great entires. you have worked so hard on this and it’s paid off. I take my hat off to you and say with frank admiration, I hope to be as good as you one day.
Well done. 
congrats! great job.
nice work