sketch - female head

[frog from itchy]

A quicky, I spent about three hours in Painter - no direct reference. The hair isn't rendered but I quite like that, I wanted to only render the face.

[Kuruni]

Looking great so far! i only see that the nose is pointing at us instead of the direction she is looking out. noses are kind of difficult.

[frog from itchy]

Thanks for the reply, I've repainted the nose after your suggestion, hopefully it's looking better.



It's only meant as a sketch so I won't be polishing it too much, I want to keep it pretty rough - it's very rough when you zoom in.

Interestingly, the thumbnail as viewed from the forum looks quite ugly, which implies that there is something wrong, maybe the proportions? The full size looks OK to my eyes, but the thumbnail doesn't.

[Kuruni]

don't worry much about the Thumbnail, it happens and it's normal.

It does look better! Keep up the good work!

Now i have another suggestion, look at her eyes, the iris on each eye, if you throw a line crossing both eyes, you will see her left iris is a tiny bit too low compared to the other iris making her stare a bit strange, is just a little bit, take a look at it. I telly you this because i actually like the piece very much, i hope it helps.

[Hexokinase]

I'm not quite sure where you're light source is. For the most part, it appears to be two sources pointing towards both of her cheeks (though her right cheek appears to be under more intense light).

This however, does not explain the shading on her forehead. Based off the rendering, its implied that her forehead is concave inwards like a bowl (which would be the only scenario where this lighting would happen).

This bring me to my point: You need to localize your light source. From what you have so far, it appears that both the forehead and the ridge of her nose need to be higher in value. However, it could use some hue variation. Her face seems to have too much red and too much white all over.

The rendering of the right side of her face is pretty good.

[frog from itchy]

Thanks for the replies.

In terms of light source, I've based it on two diffuse light sources being either side of the face, two windows in fact, with the one of to the right being slightly closer. I've also hinted at this with the background shading. I don't think the forehead is inconsistent with this, basically with the head as a simplified cylinder the middle bit would be darkest in this lighting set up, so the forehead and the bridge of the nose are dark and the sides of the head are light. There is one inconsistency which is the cheek on the left which I've darkened to make her face look thin, it was initially much lighter but it made her face look fatter.

As for hue variation, on a lighter skinned person I would totally agree, especially around the cheeks and nose, but I think that someone with darker more olive skin tends to have less hue variation on their face. In fact I think it would look quite strange on skin of this colouring.

[Ferrilonver]

nice shading, I like how you painted her skin

[Hexokinase]

An example of dark skin hue variation: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...2&postcount=19
Notice besides the blues (from the skylight), there are also purples, maroons, and oranges. I agree with you completely that hue variations are much more noticeable in Caucasians, but nevertheless it is still present in all skin tones.


As for the lighting, I'm clearly not proficient in any 3d programs, so bare with me and the following attachment:

The implied light sources are shown by the arrows, one shall be simplified as red light and the other as blue. I edited the face so that it is a curved grey metal plate of sorts for simplicity. The light cast by the red light is shown in red, and the blue light in blue. On the forehead, there are elements of both the red light and the blue light (shown as purple).

If there were one light source, the forehead would not be as dark as you have it depicted (assuming the light sources match the arrows drawn). But when you have two light sources that layer on top of eachother, the layered middle ground would be brighter than if you had any one light source on its own.


The lighting that you have on the chin seems to appropriately accommodate both light sources. The forehead's value should fairly match the chin's value, though your depicted forehead is much lower in value than the chin's.

[frog from itchy]

Thanks for the reply again.

I think I'm coming round to agreeing that the forehead is too dark, here's a simplified version of my lighting setup as I imagined it:



The two lights to either side create a small form shadow in the centre, I wasn't entirely consistent with this though, and so the forehead should come up some in value.

Skylight wouldn't be appropriate here as it is set indoors in my mind, so still not sure about the hue. The shadows are redder and more saturated than the highlights so I don't think the skin is too dead, in terms of hue variation I think it compares OK with the Promotheus image you linked to as long as you discount the blue skylight reflection. I'll see if a bit more painting will improve it.

I just want to add that I appreciate you taking the time to comment, and I am thinking quite carefully about what you've said. There's a lot of subtle things that go towards good painting, and the more subtle they become, the trickier they are to master.

[Hexokinase]

Glad I could assist somewhat. Any updates yet?