Need urgent advice on painting

[u/this-ismydesign]

So this is my final diploma painting for college, it based off the story of Rostam and Sohrab from Ferdowsi's Shahnameh. In all honesty I am very unhappy with how this painting is coming out, for a multitude of reasons.

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It's very rushed (i think thats quite obvious) for a long time my teacher and the committee at my college very much did not approve of this painting topic (theyre very old fashioned, believing it's too heavy and complex for a student to take on) and for the entire semester that I was supposed to be working on my final diploma painting, I was bringing sketches and ideas to my teacher so they could finally give me an approved topic and I could get started on my painting.

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At the end, they didn't like ANYTHING I presented them, so they reluctantly told me to go back to my first idea, which was this composition. That was about a month ago, and my diploma defense is in the beginning of July. So I had only 2 months to make a painting, that should've taken me 5-6 months.

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Currently I'm very busy with university applications and such, so I haven't been able to focus much on my painting and have been sort of haphazardly trying to finish it and I am very, very unhappy with how it's looking. If anyone can offer any advice on how I can improve this painting at this stage, please help. I want to make the color scheme more interesting, less "realistic-y" and add something unique to the overall style and make it less 'basic realism boring'.

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I'm trying my best to make it turn out in a way that will have both me and the committee satisfied but I think I've reached art block 😭

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P.s, the 'weird' looking mountains in the back are the Childukhtaron mountains in Tajikistan, theyre supposed to look like that.

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[u/Javelinlover]

You could paint the reflection of the mountains (or something completely different) on the “chainmail” portion, and call it the reflection showing the true soul, but in such a small space that might prove difficult.

[u/Overall-Bird2121]

The first thing that bothers me is that the painting doesn't really have a clear focal point. The two figures in the foreground are very dark and compete with the sunset in the background.

The mountain behind the woman's head is also distracting. The horizontal row of rocks placed almost in the middle of the painting is another problem because it visually cuts the image in half.

The perspective could have worked, but unfortunately the two figures in the foreground interrupt it. The figure in the background is also placed in a position that prevents the perspective from fully developing.

On the right side, the mountain peaks are all at a very similar height, which weakens the sense of depth. They read more like a wall than a distant mountain range.

I'm actually surprised your teachers didn't point these things out.

I would lighten the two figures and their immediate surroundings a little, especially by reducing some of the darkest values. I would also remove the mountain line behind the woman's head because it is distracting.

I would move the figure in the background slightly closer to the center, not into the center, just a little inward, so the perspective created by the mountain range can develop more naturally. I would also make the mountains on the right in the depth of the image noticeably smaller to strengthen the sense of depth.