TITLE: Withered
MOOD: Angst, Dark, Hope
REVIEWER: sorarius
REVIEWED FOR: Ascending

FIRST IMPRESSION & OVER ALL QUALITY (8.5/10)
When I first saw this graphic, I’m kinda “Wow!”, though I’m a bit frowning because of the main character’s face expressions (I’ll elaborate about this below).
 
RELEVANCE & THEME (9/10)
“Withered” is commonly related to flower, damsel, darkening color, and I found all of this aspect on your graphics thus I’ll say that this graphics is relevance with the theme you bring out. And I personally love the way you put the flowery picture in dissolve effect as the background. It makes the feeling protruding more. The overall dark color gives angst mood whilst the bright contrast coloring on the main character points out the meaning of ‘hope’ so well.
 
CHARACTER DELIVERY (8/10)
Now, I’m gonna elaborate the reason of why I’m frowning about the character’s face expression. I think it is because the character’s expression, she looks too ‘enjoying’ and ‘bright’ rather than ‘withering’ and ‘dark’, she looks too ignorant in my opinion thus it’s kinda a bit swaying from the ‘withered’ mood. Maybe if she furrowed her eyebrows and looks more vulnerable (yet strong) a bit it will look perfect. But well, I know it’s kinda hard to find a very perfect match character render for our graphics. Hence, after all it’s still acceptable.
 
HIERARCHY (5/5)
The dark color against the bright color look so contrast but match well and it gives strong vibe thus the graphic appearance stands out more compared to other poster. There’s no problem about this.
 
TECHNIQUES (8.5/10)
Honestly I’m not a GIMP user and never use it, but my friend is and I somehow know whether the user of this program is good or not, and I have to say that you are good. Your masking and blending technique is smooth and neat thus it keeps the good quality of the picture’s element. Yet, I didn’t give you perfect score because I found just some very little lacks on its detail. They’re on the left hand of the girl (right, from our point of view; the hand with tattoo).

In her inner elbow, it looks unconsciously erased when you do masking, thus I think it look a bit awkward. I have a tip for this problem, I don’t know what the tool’s name in GIMP, but you can use some brush type that can darken the picture/burn the color which can reach that very small corner part with 5%-10% opacity and brush it on the picture bit by bit until you get it covered the erased part. The second is near her left armpit (sorry if I sound rude and too detailed), there’s a white spot in the touching point of her arm and the black cloud texture and I found it also awkward. I suggest you to nudge the black cloud to the left more and close the gap and cover that white spot. My simple tip is, don't doubt your sense, you have to be bolder when placing elements in graphic. ^^

ELEMENTS (5/5)
To be honest, I’m personally kinda bored when I see most of graphic designer always put clock element on their artwork whether it is relevance with the theme or not. But for your theme, I think it suit very well since ‘withered’, ‘withering’ tells us about progress, and it’s relevant to the term of ‘time’. The way you put the layer of the girl between the clock base and the clock hands gives different meaning that the girl is the clock itself, that the girl is that time itself, and it tells us that there is a somewhat progress about the girl. Thus, it is, again, protruding more the story theme so well. And I love your signature in the left below, it’s kinda unique and gives a strong authority of the graphic’s designer yet it doesn’t look awkward for the graphic.

TYPOGRAPHY (4.5/5)
It’s good, the font type delivers the feelings well, and the size is fit well. Though in my personal preference (it’s up to you whether you agree with me or not), I suggest you to be bolder on placing that ‘Withered’ text. It can be nudged a bit to the left and stacked in front of the girl’s layer or behind the girl’s layer, or you can place it side to side but give more gaps to them. But you might have your own taste about this kind of text placement. ^^

COLORS (9.5/10)
Honestly I really want to give you a perfect score because I really love your coloring, but the grayish daubed color in the right above side of the flowery background seems awkward for me since I don’t find other item in similar grayish color scheme in the other part of the graphic. It must be perfect if you keep it in similar brownish color with the overall part of the graphic.
 
PLACEMENT & BALANCE (8/10)
I think I have said enough for most of placement of detail things in the rubics above. So, I’ll talk about the overall placement and balance here. It’s good and neat! I really love it. Yet, the overall balance seems too heavy on the right side because of the black solid cloud. There‘re two tips from me to outwit this ‘a very little lack’, first is just simply to nudge the items (girl, clock, texts and that black cloud) a bit to the left. Or you can lessen the cloud’s opacity a bit. And again, the grayish color on the right part of the background make the balance looks awkward. You can either change it to be brownish or change the other part to be grayish so that it will balance more.

DOMINANCE & EMPHASIS (10/10)
Because of the size and contrast, the character seems standing out more significantly. And I have to compliment your smartness because you placed that black cloud covering one side of the clock thus the clock wouldn’t stand too much and beat the dominance of the character.

HARMONY & RYTHM (9/10)
I love the flow in your graphic, you play the flow from bright to dark and the flow from the side part to the contrast bright in center very well. Yet I have to say it again that the grayish color on the right make it awkward.

UNITY (4.5/5)
Over all, your graphic’s elements blend so well as a whole piece of artwork, except for the grayish color.

TOTAL SCORE: 89.5
REVIEWER NOTE: I personally love this graphic and envy your skill. Good job, dear!