WIP digital painting help

[Jinno321]

Hi! I'm back again after some studying and recreating the same idea I had posted before (WIP). Just wanted to know if the shading/values looks correct?

[JosephCow]

Hey, it looks like you really took the last round of advice into account! The whole landscape is giving more depth now with a groundplane and layers.

In regards to the values. I think the colors look pretty decent, but there's still room to go darker I think. I do like how the white part in shadow has a lot of blue influence to it, and you have the underside of the rock a lot darker which makes sense since the sky light won't be touching that. But a lot of people starting out go with pretty pale shadows, and while you can do that, it probably will have a better effect if the shadows are darker, and all the colors in shadow go toward the same color and value. It unifies it and makes it feel more like light shining on something. The orange in my version for example is more muted, since I'm trying to get the same blue light on everything. But I might have made it more desaturated than it needs to be.

Another tip is to make sure the form matches the shading. Anywhere the values get darker, or go into shadow, like on the bottom of the rock, the outline should match it. That goes for any cuts and dents in the rock as well. If there's shading to indicate the form goes in or out, that should be apparent in the outline of the object as well. It makes it feel way more 3D. Otherwise it can sometimes feel like a pic cut from a magazine.

[Jinno321]

Hi joseph! Yea I just realized perspectuve grids helps a lot than just eyeballing everything. Although I still struggle putting some more complicated constructions like angled surfaces or when an object is rotated, especially when it recedes in two vanishing points. About the underside part, i studied your rendition of my last post and wondering if the reflected light would still influence it, but judging from my piece it seems it's bright enough to be considered as such? Should I put more darks and emphasize the light bouncing on it? Or am i Just overthinking it?

[JosephCow]

Reflected light would still influence it, just a different take on it. There's no sunlit sand in yet so I just went pretty basic. I think the darkest planes would realistically be the 'column' of the rock in shadow since the ground would light the underside. I would maybe look at some reference to clarify what you want to do there, it's up to you.

if an object is rotated or tilted it requires either new vanishing points, or there are other tricks. But keep in mind you don't really need to use that type of perspective construction at all for something like rocks. You would need new vanishing points if lets say you had a chair rotated a bit, and you wanted another chair with the same rotation. or a slanted roof, and you need another roof with same tilt. Perspective with organic objects is more about helping to visualize the underlying geometry, and make a sense of space. so i wouldn't worry about that stuff too much.