[Archived Class 1] Week Four - Principles of Design

[Earendil]

Nice picture daldbaatar! Is this from Lord of the Rings? Sure looks like one of those "passing of the elves" sequences.

Just wondering...is anybody else is bugged by the very sharp shadows being cast by the structure?

[Gundersen]

The shadows look very sharp indeed, and i also wonder why the painter have decided to have the light source shine up the ground mainly and not the main objects... I cant seem to find a good focus point in the image, its a bit messy i think hehe

[Earendil]

Seems like the majority of lighter values reach down and encircle the figures standing in darkness. I think it works, but that sharpedged shadow area is competing with the figures. Hmm... think...think...

[chaosrocks]

oddly looking at that image of Dal's and emmediatly make it in to a stage set, foreground, wings and backdrop. Its just a damn big stage. But when you think of it in terms of leko's and fresnels the lighting makes perfect sense. When you realize that you can focus or diffuse your light source, and put different color gels on them.....its not natural, but it is logical.

[robmorfin]

I chose "The Mill" by Rembrandt, this I consider a masterpiece with the Unity principle of design, but I will try to in depth only with the Proportion design principle of design, and will just add some illustrations of the other design principles in it.

Rembrandt created the sense of proportion by locating Human Figures on the painting at different depths, creating an illusion of height, allowing the viewer to guess the dimension of the mill, the use of the human figure is the easiest way to create this effect, because anybody can relate to its dimensions & feels very comfortable totell if the surroundings are big or small, the same way, by looking at the proportions of the mill and the bluff, at first the mind thinks the bluff is really big, but then by comparing the human figures at front, you can tell the bluff is only 5 figures high because it is right next to them, therefore, the Mill is sent deeper into the perpective, making it feel even bigger than before; The trees in the background, being deeper in the perspective gives the feeling of very tall trees in proportion to everything else.

[robmorfin]

Gund, good job with the emphasis, it's looking better, one thing that looks kind of confusing is the color of your crystals being the same as the color of the mountains few steps before deeper into the atmospheric perspective and it kind of kills the effect, anyway, looking better.

Earandil, looking much better, you should add more detail to the branch in the foreground at least in the snowed area, make it stand more, just like the branches in Dal's image.

[robmorfin]

Will post again on Monday, I'm heading out to camping, have a good weekend everyone.

[robmorfin]

Ear, somehow, I miss some kind of rock or stone (or snow simmulating to be on top of it at the edge of your lake, I think that would give a better hint of it being the shore of a lake.

[Earendil]

More specifically? Where? I'll poke it with my paintbrush!

[robmorfin]

Here.

[Earendil]

I meant the rock, but thanks for the paintover! I see the huge difference in well...drawing/rendering ability. Offhand, does anybody know what kinds of trees those are?

[robmorfin]

Ear, I think the reason why they are usually present it's because the lakes tend to be eroding the shore and wherever there is a rock, it starts to erode around it, creating a peninsula and leaving the rock more visible, so I would say place it by the peninsulas, just be careful in #3 placement not to make too much emphasis, it's too centered, anyway, that's what I think but I may be wrong.

[Earendil]

Thanks! I'll get on it!

[Agustin Poratti]

this piece uses rhythm, and more specifically, repetition. the repeating horns or bones generate dynamism, and set the pace for the picture. something that wouldnt happen if the mountain was by itself. the way this is portrayed (foreground to background) further expands the illusion of distance, and helps generate interest. we can see some ships on the right mid to indicate scale.

i decided to rework the first part of my dyptic and see if i could use repetition to generate a more interesting rhythm.

here's my results so far.

[robmorfin]

Agustin, what an awesome piece, who is the author?

[Earendil]

Form was my first guess, but I don't have time to verify that. It is awesome tho!

Agustin, it's a step in the right direction, but for those foreground repeating patterns to have more presence, maybe get some darker blue tones in there? Something closer to to the value of the trunk and figures so they just go BAM. er...maybe you didn't want them to go bam... Just my thoughts.

[jodali]

chaos - i like your thumbs so far, i would like to see a little bit more of the environment though

Gundersen - I agree I think that it is looking a little better

Earendil - that image looks great, I really like the lighting on the trees and the reflections on the water, you got some skills.

Agustin - I would also like to know who the artist is...

For my piece I un-tilted it a little bit trying to get the composition to look a little better, I also tried to add some rhythm,
using repetition with the added sky snake things, I also set them back into the cloud formation to attempt to get the viewer
to associate the clouds and snakes as one force or entity. there was a little confusion about the saturated orange streak
on the ground underneath the largest sky snake, that is a dead youngling which was killed by the guy hiding behind the rock.
I would have liked to work on the balance a little bit but i don't think that can be done without complete redraw, maybe it can what do you guys think?




I also did some real quick sketches, I know these dont look good at all, but I only spent 10-15 min on each. they are just to get an idea of overall placement and a feel for the different angles, The architecture of the castles will not look like this, I only used very primitive boxes for time purposes.

[Earendil]

Why not have the monsters lead the eye smoothly from the clouds to the confrontation with the human? Right now the monsters are perpendicular to the verticals you set up from the clouds, and it might be more effective to have more of a transitory er...path? You have one in the distance just dropping down from the clouds, another further ahead, but swooOOShing away, which is picked up by another closer to us that swooshes around towards the man...Make a path. Just an idea.

Incidentally, I really like how you and Agustin build up your forms. It seems more correct in terms of colors to use etc.

EDIT: Maybe have the foremost one swooping around in a more confrontational posture, at the same time, using his body to help frame the dead monster lying on the ground?

[daldbaatar]

well well well...this here is the fixed version the stuff i did last week. I comletely erased the cracks and redid it. i thought what needed the most was a rythm and repetition.

[daldbaatar]

and btw...could anybody tell me the about the "flow" thing on ps. i know it makes this kind of random stuff when u make a stroke. but i dont see much diffence when u put the flow icon on and off.

[Gundersen]

sorry for my lack of activity this week so far guys, I will catch up with you from tomorow on. Have had one hell of a week here, including bussy uni, water breakdown(we had to go to a school to shower and use toilets) ..

daldbaatar: What if you also try to work on emphasis? To create a stronger focal point for the viewer.
flow this referes to an ink pen kind of... it depends on the flow of inc or pain comming out of your brush, if flow is on 100% the same amount comes out all the time, is it on 10% there is a biger difference in the amount of "paint" that comes out of your brush..

Jodali I have to agree with Earendil, the monster is leading you away from your "Hidden character" on the ground ... I could not see him for a long long time. Maybe if make the monster attack him instead.. Your thumbs look good, I prefere the first one even if its very inspired by lord of the rings and even if Form said it had to be on EARTH, i still think you should create a more fantasy feel to your castle... they look a bit to simple atm..

Augustin I like the update on your piece, it gave it more dept! nice work And no its not Form that have painted that image, its part of the series of Guild Wars... and Form lives WAY to far away to be in that team hehe

[rvdtor]

This painting i feel has a lot of the elements that we were asked to identify, i like the proportion used, the tree trunk towers in comparison to the gleaming city lights give them an air of enormity. the repetitive tree trunks and their change in saturation as they recede into to the background give the entire piece the impression of a large area. they are also evenly spread throughout. another clever way the artist used proportions was using the flying mantis creatures. they become smaller as they go further away and this in turn creates nice rhythm in guiding the eyes toward the back. both rock faces on either side of the painting balance the picture well even tho the left rock has more detail and more space alloted to it. the right sky although empty [not as many clouds] still balances the right full of clouds with the main tower in focus. so i think most people's attention is drawn to the illuminated tower first because of the contrast on the sky your view is still drawn smoothly to the foreground....IF it goes to the foreground first esp. at the cross on the ledge, your eyes can still be smoothly guided to the rest of the area by the path made by the mantas...so i think the entire piece fits well together and and is joined with each other by form not just color. i like it.

Here's my fixed piece i noticed the rock piece and the hill was taking up most of the picture like form said and i need to counter balance the image without taking away form the main point which was the object. so i think the biggest issue with my painting was balance. the proportions of the guy and the trees and the structure were okay, repetition in the trees helped with the depth a bit, i hope the unity and the overall rhythm and mood were upped. what do you guys think?




gundersen Whoa that crystal is really popping out now the bright lights on the right really offset the crystal so although its symmetrical the change is lighting gives it a bit more variation...good stuff.

Earendil good thing you cut off the unnecessary trees on the left and although your main focus is on the right with the shining fire ball thing, the even poles in the fences give a good contrast from the lit ground and serves as a guide for the eyes leading to your main point.

jodai i agree with earendil on some of the points. the snakes are a bit toooo repetitive and seem to be only placed there ,,they do help with depth tho, making the man a bit smaller and sharper would help more with the proportion comparing the man and the snake things,,,i dunno its probably just me wanting to see the snakes look HUGE!!! hehe. i think the tilting u had before worked more because the clouds on the left seem really heavy and tilting the image to the right like a see saw would give the illusion of balance i think. cause ur area are low rocky hills, THEIR repetitiveness adds to the feel of the landscape already. so counterbalancing the big clouds would be difficult placing a big mountain there wouldn't look natural for ur type of environment maybe the sharpened foreground character would do that ..oi i've rambled too long

daldbaatar well i think yours already had enough repetition with the object shapes not their color and the cracked surfaces on the right bottom side. that separated the two sides well and the colors made the uniform. i think there seems to be a bit more weight on the left side where the objects are.

[Gundersen]

rvdtor thanks for nice comments

When it comes to your image it is looking ALOT better now, the main structure dont seem so pressed bellow the edges of the image, you have given it more space to show itself of on. There is still possible to create even more depth in your image. I can see that on the left side there is starting to get some depth, but if you add some mountains behind the structure, you might create a longer depth into your image...

Good work so far!

[rvdtor]

yea man thats what i was trying to go for ,the mountain tips on the left i guess don't read too well wanted them covered by the cloud cover,maybe they're a bit too unsaturated their forms get lost. gotta start the final piece soon tho

[Gundersen]

yeah i can read the mountains on the left side, so its deffenatly an improvement

About the final piece, dont worry about that yet, we got all the time until thursday So plenty of time still!

[Earendil]

rvdtor that image rocks! I should visit CGSociety more often for inspiration and study.

FYI, I didn't know there were mountains on the left side until I read your posts.

Yeah Gundersen, I guess that first thumb does look like Minas Tirith doesn't it?

[Agustin Poratti]

ummm, i forgot who the author is, i found it on the guild wars eye of the north thread.... i'll check later.

[Form]

hey i just came back from a pretty cool live painting event called cut n paste... im a bit psyched up so im going to do some personal work tonight (his morning), but i was keen to check in - and glad at how smoothly progress is being made

For daldbaatar who asked about flow setting -
this has to do with the amount of time you hold the brush down. If you put the opacity setting to 25% then press down, you will get a 25% grey dot, and it wont change. However if the FLOW is at 25%, the brushstroke will slowly get darker as you hold the pen down. Like using an airbrush, or lightly spraying a can in the same spot from a distance. I much prefer to use flow than opacity as it adds in random variety and leans away from an overly vectory/plastic/strokey look. In fact my favourite is to have the flow of a fairly simple brush set to about 3-4%, it kind of feels like oil painting with a dry brush - you get those lovely sketchy rough lines... or like when a marker is running out of ink.

I also seem to see a similar effect in justin sweet's digitals, whether or not he achieves it using the same settings... it kind of has that look to it. Best to go over at the end with a harder brush to tighten up shapes/edges though.

Cheers guys, time to paint

ps. that painting Augustin posted is by CICINEMO, who works at arenanet

[chaosrocks]

been messin with it
gets better,, and more fucked up
I intend to keep messing with it

[Earendil]

Here's what I've come up with so far. I like the design of the 2nd one, but the composition of the 4th one. I might try and combine those, or just keep working things out.

1st


2nd


3rd


4th



I'm going to keep reading up on castles, because right now, my designs just blow chunks.