The white of the water is air pocket erupting at the surface and breaking the surface tension. In area where the bed of the river is lower it tend to create turbulance and on the edge of the river if the edge as alot of rock instead of sand. If the bed of the river is relatively smooth like sand for example you get less of that white and where there is bigger rock diverting the flow it tend to make the water splash.The reason why it white is because the surface isn't smooth like the surface of a mirror.The faster the current is the more turbulance and air get trap inside the water therefor breaking the mirror quality of a calm body of water.
The tricky part about drawing water is think about it volume and implying it speed with your color&value choose.
Darktiste: In that painting, I was trying to depict simple capillary waves like those in your second picture. I hope they don't read as breaking waves, haha.
Rotohail: I haven't tried studying gems or diamonds yet. They make my eyes bleed at a mere glance.
I don't think I can make significant improvements on this painting at this point, so I'm declaring it finished. I feel bad for leaving in some perfectly sharp line tool edges, but they looked silly when I tried to break them up or soften them. I may just avoid using the line tool so much in the future.
There are a lot of rough spots, but the main thing I'm wondering about is if it reads successfully as a panoramic view. I didn't want to go curvilinear, so I drew the nearer building in 1-point and the farther one in 2-point perspective. I'm also wondering if the composition makes sense. If I were to re-do it I'd most likely make the figures more prominent.
Also, I know the girl is badly proportioned. In the future, I'll make sure my figure's head is not smaller than their knees before I start refining anything.
Hey man, pretty good renderings and details overall.
To create more depth and maintain the focal point, you could choose to "blur"/add some lost edges/remove some details and desaturate some of the background, for example, the tree.
Basically, create more variety.
Also, as you mentioned already, the head is too small and the feet are probably too big.
Other thing that bugs me a bit is the position of the dogs feet and weight distribution, specially the front feet.
I really like your attention to detail, good perspective too!
Finally!! ha ha ha. Okay the stuff that I liked the most, the colors, light, atmoshpere very vivid, sunshine brightly shining. The purple details on the canine, so funky! Get a retro/back to the 80s vibe.
The stuff that left me puzzle, you did mention the proportions but I first thought you were doing them on purpose, like they feel do consistent and deliberate. You make the head and torsos smaller and enlarge the legs and arms as they go towards hands and feet. So not on purpose then?
Panoramic I'm not sure, like it reads to me like 1/4th of a panoramic view? As a quadrant, like the top-right corner is the center of view of a panorama, but I'm not sure what kind of panorama you had in mind.
Sometimes to me when I feel silly doing something it might just mean I need to get used to it, may be too new a concept, unless I can voice over what is it that feels off to me about it. To me tho the line tool isn't that noticeable! ha ha, like maybe the cyan/cerulean blue house could use some less mechanical touch or texture but maybe it's a plastic house made on a mold! Ha ha, like a toy house? That's a fun idea actually. I dunno, what was your thinking for this piece? Goals?
The interaction between the character and dog is the most interesting point, You could use more palms trees for depth and clouds for depth, like there's a lot of pairing in the design of things, two houses, two doors, the windows seem to form pairs, the dog and character are a pair, but the palm tree and the cloud unless you consider them a pair, they break out a tad, I guess I do notice now some more clouds fading towards the horizon, but maybe adding those things in larger amounts or peeking out at places might give you noise? So they don't stand out.
(06-03-2020, 11:21 AM)Pubic Enemy Wrote: Also, I know the girl is badly proportioned. In the future, I'll make sure my figure's head is not smaller than their knees before I start refining anything.
This really bothered me, too, but you already recognized it.
It is really a shame when a picture is well done with all the coloring and polishing, but the underlying anatomy is a bit flawed.
But at the same time the dog and the girl both have really long limbs and I couldn't tell, if how they look is maybe completely your intention, so maybe her face also is exagerated on purpose. The viewer can't tell.
I also got a feeling the long legs were deliberate, it's a common feature of the wolves and dogs here. It's true though that when seeing one picture in isolation it can be hard to tell if it is. You may actually be trying to express something with that, see where you instinct leads you to if it's an urge. However, you know what they say: Before you change reality, try to paint reality. This will give you more tools to change it.
There is some intense storytelling in that piece: https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/4961...ebb5_c.jpg
Do you care to share some of it?
Pubic Enemy! I love how tidy your rendering is dude, this last piece has a real summery feel to it.
You were saying about reading it as a panorama? To me it would need to be a lot wider if you want it to read as a panorama.
Not sure what your intention was for this piece? Maybe you just wanted to set a scene? What I got from it is that we're in a nice, moderately wealthy neighbourhood, it is summer, either mid morning or mid afternoon and a young woman is out walking her dog who is just that little bit out of the ordinary - I've never seen a dog with a tail like that so I'm thinking maybe we're on another world or an alternate reality or something?
Maybe I'm trying to read too much into it but thought I'd share my impressions in case it helps you in anyway.
Keep it going dude!
“Today, give a stranger one of your smiles. It might be the only sunshine he sees all day.” -- H. Jackson Brown Jr.
I really like the way that you render, and I think your lines look very sharp and clean. Are there any tutorials, books, or articles that you would recommend for rendering? Or, could you please show or explain your process?
Whoa, that was a lot of replies for one post. You guys are too nice.
tiago nunes: Yeah, it was a bit of an experiment to see if I could get away with making everything in a picture 100% sharp. It may have been better with more defined focal points.
You're probably right about the dog. I'm still not sure if the feet position is 100% unrealistic, but it could be done better
Rotohail: The goal for the picture was just to make a fun picture of a slightly surreal fantasy suburbia, sort of like if a PS1 game was brought to life. The proportions were only partially intentional, but I'm glad it reads as being deliberate. Nothing kills a painting/drawing faster than an obvious lack of confidence, LOL!
Regarding that panorama thing, I was going for about 1/4 of a panorama with that blue house at the center. Good points about adding more noise so that individual elements don't stick out.
graphicnovelist: The proportions were semi-intentional but I did not want them quite that unreal. Strangely, I didn't notice it until I started painting. I tried to fix it but could only get so far, LOL. I like art with exaggerated proportions, just not so much that all the viewer can think is "WHOA, THAT'S A SMALL HEAD!"
Leo Ki: I actually didn't have a story in mind for that painting. I just wanted to paint a pleasant vista with a figure where everything is extremely orange, so I slapped a bunch of elements together that vaguely made sense. I'm happy to hear that you got the impression of it having more depth, though.
Artloader: That's exactly the sort of scene I wanted to set. The idea for it was "Fantasy Suburbia". So that's good to hear. And yeah, it's like a cropped quarter of a panorama.
Nirenia: I'll link you the books and resources I've used. Getting better at rendering for me has mainly been a matter of trying to understand the subject itself as best I can (e.g human beings), trying to develop a basic understanding of how light works, and simply trying to replicate photos. I've had, and still have difficulty with seeing subtle value differences, so I often open photos in photoshop and turn up the contrast massively (and sometimes play with brightness) to see the light and dark areas in more simplified shapes. I'm trying to do this less though. I'm still not sure if I actually understand anything or if I've just gotten good enough at acting like I know what I'm doing that people usually don't notice my screw-ups.
As for process, I try to do things a little differently each time, but I usually use the bog-standard strategy of filling in shapes with a flat midtone, then add shadows, and then light. I mostly practiced rendering with traditional paper and pencil until recently though. The skills carry over to digital just fine.
Books:
Color and Light by James Gurney (really good if you're like me and you need to have the absolute basics explained repeatedly)
Successful Drawing by Loomis
Got two new pictures. If you notice anything bothersome, feel free to comment.
I tried to pull off the small-head look in a more balanced way. I think I can say for sure that I prefer more realistic proportions now. I took a very simplified approach to the reflective clothing and made the reflections of the light source very large. I hope it still reads as being shiny.
[attachment=117043]
I probably should have put more thought into the figure and drapery here, but this was mainly a background practice picture, so I was somewhat apathetic about it. I failed to figure out a suggestive way of painting the grass that didn't look crummy, so I did it in a more laborious fashion. I'm not proud of it, LOL.
A nice control and variety of texture on the last two piece .Grass,stone,cloth,hair,skin,cloth,latex and a lil bit of suggested vegetation.One thing i feel is strange is how everything in your background as this color yet it doesn't seem to be affecting what in the foreground.Have you perhaps heard of the concept of mother color?
Those boots and gloves be looking shiny to me. The dress, not so much to be honest, but I think that is largely just due to the fact lighter colours are harder to make look as reflective as darker or saturated tones. I really dig the colour combo you did for it, and the setting of the yellow background. There's a few anatomy issues; like everything is very long, her pinky finger is a tad broken, and her shoulder (closest to us) seems a lot lower than it should be (or maybe the curve in it is just too intense so it reads as two different forms, not one). Otherwise, it's a really fun illustration! Her face and hair is quite charming. I dig it a lot. Keep it up!
Just to pop in and say those last two images feel like you've reached a different level in terms of the work feeling coherent — really great work and can't wait to see what you put out in future.
Thanks for your input in my sketchbook... Fantastic one you got there, I love your renderings! At my skill level I can't give you any tips or any kind of observation, just try to learn from you!
I love the character "buySUPERHARDhairgel.png" :D She looks awesome. The proportions still seems a bit off to me.But I really enjoy colors you choose in you art.
In the painting with a pink sky, that woman for some reason feel gigantic to me, maybe add something to show her size more accurately, that might help.
Your colors are still striking and forms read super well! I dunno to me the grass works, simple works when you don't want to detract from the main focus and it reads nicely, subdued. You can paint some extra blades by hand to break up or add subtle reflections on the tips or so but otherwise nice and damn with magenta atmosphere ha ha. Retro vibes!
Proportion wise you still make them tall but that's not a bad thing for superhero stuff or god-like characters it does makes sense if you want to awestruck someone. Simple reflections but they sort of are like that at times, you could bring secondary of less intensity on the edges/form turn. I personally like the silhouette/gesture of the pose is so fluid but still keeps some sharp brakes (elbow) really nice rhythm.
Great paintings your have here. I like your rendering but I believe you'll benefit from using less highlights on the face and more color variation. The skin looks a bit monochromatic and shiny.
You can check Marco Bucci's 10min to better painting on Youtube, he has great content on value and color.
You got some interesting style for characters. I'm guessing the proportions are intentional.
You mentioned in the first post searching for feedback. First thing I notice is you sometimes got tendency to crop the full characters very tight. Like the feet and the top of the head are very close to the edge of the painting which makes it feel a bit claustrofobic. Also sometimes you make and illustration where the main object is placed somewhere on the side but there is no shape to balance it out on the other side (or it's very faint). Doing more thumbnails would help with those type of compositional problems.
Other thing I sometimes see is you got core shadows very flat because they don't have any reflected light in them. Adding even very subtle one would make the even stronger form.
darktiste: I know of mother color, but whenever I've tried to apply it, the result always looks too monochromatic to me. I tried to suggest the color of the atmosphere in other ways (mainly by making the shadows trend toward a pink-ish tone)
Nirenia: Thanks. Michael Whelan is great.
chubby_cat: Thanks very much. I hear you about the longness and weirdness in that one.
scrap: Thanks Bob, I hope you show up again one day.
bonesworth: Thanks a lot, and I hope I have given you good advice, LOL.
Shuty: Yeah, I think I ought to have made the nearer tower bigger or figured out some visual cues to indicate its distance.
Rotohail: Thanks very much, I hope you and several other people to re-appear one day.
: Thank you for the feedback. Regarding everything in the images having the same importance, I was doing that for a long time despite the advice of many patient people because I genuinely thought that if one arranged everything nicely and made everything equally sharp and detailed, the composition would just work itself out. I'm not so sure about that now, LOL.
Kassatay: Thanks. I was neglecting color variations, for sure. I'm more mindful of it now, but I still like the monochromatic look in some pictures.
Farvus: Thanks for the feedback. I never thought of the tight cropping issue.
This was the first painting where I made an effort to have distinct areas of focus (probably not successfully because looking it seems to cause me eye strain). I've also started using texture brushes, which I almost completely avoided before because I thought I could get the same effect with small round brush noodling (it can work, but it takes too much time for something that will still look worse and have less texture than a lazy pencil drawing on copy paper, and you usually have to resize the image until it looks like it's a picture for ants)
This was a sketch commission for a guy on reddit of his D&D goblin, which remains my only commission after multiple postings on several commission subreddits. I hope to improve those metrics, LOL.
Some D&D fan art. I never played it, but I did spend a lot of time admiring the old wizards.com gallery back in the day.
I did several Warcraft fan art paintings out of nostalgia, for I played WoW every day before Cataclysm came out and single-handedly cured my video game addiction. A few of these got 1-2k updoots when I posted them on the WoW subreddit, which makes those my only successful social media posts. Interestingly, they got the usual near-complete lack of response on all other platforms.
In this and several other images I got hung up on small sections and over-worked them to the point that they looked incongruous with the rest of the picture, which required even more work to correct. Total waste of time. I'm trying to pay more attention to the big picture when painting now, which seems to be a skill that needs to be built in and of itself.
Some charcoal drawings in a newsprint sketchbook, contrast and brightness adjusted. One day I'll learn to take decent photos of pages that are too big to scan.
I wanted an excuse to draw the barcode scanner that came with the Jurassic Park: Scan Command game. Not a "good" game, but a fun game. Sorry about the Bride of Chucky look.
As usual, I am open to comments on all of these if anyone notices anything bothersome.
