10-26-2014, 06:02 AM
Hi Mike and welcome! Already seeing some great studies and artwork in here. It's good to see you do those figures with ref and then from mind; that kind of study will help a lot to actually learn and memorize instead of just copying. Your 'no ref' ones are damn close to the referenced ones those, respect!
When studying environments from photographs, be aware that photos often are post processed, and that photos almost never show reality as it is, as they tend to eat away a lot of subtle color variations and show black and high-contrast in areas that really aren't that dark to the eyes. It's fine to study from photographs, just be aware of these things :) And maybe look at some (old master) paintings as well.
As for the example in post #8 - I like how it turned out :) Though I also like the cooler mood in the third one. One thing you can do to avoid jumping around with ideas so much, is just trying out some things first, before you start rendering it. Build your composition first, then just copy the lines a few times, and play with different light situations and colors, just by roughly blocking them in. Like that you can just try out which mood you like best, solve light/shadow/composition problems early on, and then go and paint the best one :)
Great start in this sketchbook, keep working hard, you're definitely on the right track! :)
When studying environments from photographs, be aware that photos often are post processed, and that photos almost never show reality as it is, as they tend to eat away a lot of subtle color variations and show black and high-contrast in areas that really aren't that dark to the eyes. It's fine to study from photographs, just be aware of these things :) And maybe look at some (old master) paintings as well.
As for the example in post #8 - I like how it turned out :) Though I also like the cooler mood in the third one. One thing you can do to avoid jumping around with ideas so much, is just trying out some things first, before you start rendering it. Build your composition first, then just copy the lines a few times, and play with different light situations and colors, just by roughly blocking them in. Like that you can just try out which mood you like best, solve light/shadow/composition problems early on, and then go and paint the best one :)
Great start in this sketchbook, keep working hard, you're definitely on the right track! :)