Willing to teach environmental design-basics

[giby]

Wow streetz those are some great lookin thumbnails is it k for me to post studies from digital experts like Feng etc ..... i wanted to try out thier composition , colour , etc .. heres 2 works from feng and 1 from the landscape ii tried feng is hard work lol

[DAMJAN]

nice colors on that last environment. Problem with copying from images is that you don't see the real color and that's why they always recommend to paint from real life. Don't use blacks for dark, it flattens the images and shows that you are an amateur. When painting trees, use dark greens, blues, a bit of reds and purples. Go out and paint from real life, try squinting your eyes and focus on seeing dark blues, greens, etc in trees, rocks and everything else. Same goes for whites, don't use much of pure whites either, it's always off white. Black and whites should be used as a last resort and very little.

[DAMJAN]

ethmoro: please label your images so it's easier to point out to a correct one. I like your 6th image however, you still don't understand atmospheric perspective. You are using too much blacks. Check out streez's images so you can see how things get lighter the further they get.

ashess: I think you have a lot going on, you can't successfully tell everything in one shot. I really like the one that's from an ant view looking at the guy and a guy on horse with volcano behind him. Make the foreground person darker. Closer objects higher contrast, further they are, the less contrast they have and they blend with color of sky.

streetz: You got some amazing stuff, you certainly understand depth. I really like all of your thumbs. On the last one with that person looking onto distant town, I would add light near the horizon in the sky. By that I mean a storm in a distance so it's lighten up by thunder, show a bit of clouds, etc.

[rem92]

AHH!! why i dont get the email letting me know there's been postings lately? seems like there is new people on the group! welcome peps, giby nice feng studies, u got the colors down pretty well, and those thumbnails are pretty damn nice streetz, anyways, here is a enviro sketch, its been so long since i did one of this.. feels like i lost the grasp of it a little bit. Hopefully i can crank out 1 of this daily.

EDIT: reference uploaded, i thought it would be rather easy, but it turned out to be rather tricky, i guess i just need more practice

[DAMJAN]

same happens to me, I don't get notifications. I think the colors are too saturated. You have atmospheric perspective present which is cool, it tells me that this place is large. I would suggest you use hard brush with opacity at 100 when painting mountains, rocks, etc. Now the hard part is, you have to start breaking down those large shapes and make them smaller, detailed. Did you use reference? If so, can you post your sketch and ref next to each other? Thanks.

[DAMJAN]

Ok cool image, even original has a lot of saturation, try adding that image over it to add texture.

[DAMJAN]

For those of you that don't know how check out my quick video on how to blend colors in Photoshop in CS5 and older versions.
http://youtu.be/HO8ymn6WzO8

[rem92]

Actually, i find it really hard to give it form to surfaces full of grass... its like the value doesnt change but the color hue does.. i found it really tough to defines planes on that las sketch

[DAMJAN]

Understand, keep practicing. When things like that look all the same value, try creating thing in the order of dark, light, dark light or other way around that way, you'll be able to define where one thing stops and other one begins. Also, try making that image black and white and check out values then.

[rem92]

Tried something with a sort of opposite palette.. had to quit on it, it had gone very wrong, but no prob.. i learned a bunch from it. this kind of rocks with a lot of different color hues are tough.

[DAMJAN]

Good stuff, you are showing depth in this so it's nice, the only thing that's messed up is that ground is blending with mountains in the back so it's making it look weird. The next phase should be to make things sharper and add smaller details and texture Also, make less contrast between highlights and shadows on that middle mountain. when painting rocks and other sharp objects, try using lasso tool and go around the edges again, create outlines and color in, it will make things sharper. You also have that unsharp mask. Here is a new link to how bo lend colors in cs5 and older versions:http://youtu.be/6A12XYWENNA?hd=1

[rem92]

I see, thanks, i will definitely use that lasso tool trick next time, nice tutorial, Im sure some people here will find it very useful, also, i wanna restrict myself from using textures, i wanna be able to paint convincing enviros by pure brush stroke, i'd use textures maybe for a illustration that i wanna take to a very refined lvl, but as of now, it'd be nice to achieve some sort of style as that one of Noah Bradley, no texture, pure painting power.

[rem92]

HEre is another one, an island, this time i used some pretty cool new brush that came with PS CS6 to give some texture to the ground, i think i prefer it more than just laying a photo texture on top of the whole thing.

[DAMJAN]

check out his approach to mountains with trees and foliage:http://www.noahbradley.com/blog/medi...eamsketch3.jpg

http://www.awesomehorsestudios.com/w..._the-giant.jpg

http://digital-art-gallery.com/oid/5...igital_art.jpg

http://www.noahbradley.com/blog/medi...the-harbor.jpg

If you notice, all of his stuff is with scribble like strokes and they are sharp. You can definitely achieve this with lasso tool or a brush that has no opacity set and it's flat for the shapes and then you introduce opacity to add color variation on top of the set design.

[rem92]

If you notice, all of his stuff is with scribble like strokes and they are sharp. You can definitely achieve this with lasso tool or a brush that has no opacity set and it's flat for the shapes and then you introduce opacity to add color variation on top of the set design.

Mmm that makes sense, actually i tried to to that kind of strokes with no opacity, but i find it hard for it not to pup out like crazy, because of the color difference contrast, i think i will do some study on his work, Thanks Damjan

[DAMJAN]

No problem. Your problem seems to be with not knowing how to choose colors that are same value. Take his photo, then choose eye dropper tool and then click on the color box to choose color picker and pick his colors and then look where the colors are moving. You'll notice how close they are in value.

[ashess]

damjal, thank you for looking at my work!
I took one thumb and continued it. im still not happy with the amount of debth I have, nor the lighting. but, well. there it is:

[rem92]

Ashess-

I like your work, nice concept, and the composition is pretty good, as for the depth goes, u have a problem with contrast, the contrast in the background is almost the same lvl as in the foreground, thats why it doesnt look like there is much distance between planes, i did a quick paint over for you, kind of went with the airbrush over the different planes to lower the contrast of the background, hope it helps.

And down below is a study i did of a Noah bradley's piece, i learned a bunch, i think i will study his pieces thoroughly, seems to work out well.

[Streetz]

I took one thumb and continued it. im still not happy with the amount of debth I have, nor the lighting. but, well. there it is:

Hey man,

Try not to use pure black or white in your painting. Try staying between 10-90 % and then use the pures for additional emphasis or a focal point.

[DAMJAN]

great comments guys, Your noah bradley stuff looks nice. You still have problems with things being out of focus, not sharp. Ashess:post your perspective work, things seem incorrect.

[Streetz]

Damjan do you have Gchat or a messenger ?

[DAMJAN]

No, I only have Skype. I used to use Yahoo msng but not anymore.

[Streetz]

No, I only have Skype. I used to use Yahoo msng but not anymore.

Ah ok. I was going to try to chat with you. I have yahoo also but no skype. I did send you a message on her though.

[DAMJAN]

did you send me today? I didn't receive any.

[Streetz]

No maybe like a week ago.

[DAMJAN]

I replied, didn't you get it?

[Streetz]

no sir lol

[DAMJAN]

I said, I don't mind.

[ashess]

@Damjal-
I'd just gona and thrown away the extra space for the vanishing points, so I had to put them back manually. the 3rd point is still off the paper; it was so far off I didnt draw it in, but guessed it. its supposed to line up with the lower left vanishing point to build a horizon. somewhere right under the canvas.



@rem- hey, thanks for going thourgh the trouble of a paint-over! I reall appreciate it. I tried using darker values to convey closeness, but I guess I should limit the contrast for far away too. ill go and do what you did. maybe even a bit more extreme!

[DAMJAN]

Those blue lines above Pegasus' wing, where did they come from? They don't seem to connect with the same vanishing point on horizon. Also light doesn't match, light on pillars don't match your light source. The guy's right shoulder doesn't align with vanishing point that's touching his left. Another thing, what are those red lines on the face? They also don't match vanishing points.