The Peer Project- OPEN Foundational Exercises for All, A great place to start.

[EtaCarinae]

Dear Idiot Apathy and All,
Thanks guys with the clarity on edges. I can't stop thinking about edges and planes at the moment... They're everywhere!
Lieblos that picture of the cushions really helped me a lot. I didn't know what you were talking about the first time I looked at it, but the second it dawned on me. The edge running from corner to corner is changing. Duh!
I think there's a couple of things stated by Elwell thats really helped to galvanize (or at least improve) my understanding of edges.

1. "...it has to do with how 'fast' the form turns."
and
2. "...(an edge is) any place where two 'pieces of paint' meet."

Is this not ALL you need to know about edges?!
I think my big problem with 'edges' was that it does not have an exact translation between it's lay meaning and painting. In painting it's means something slightly different, bigger, deeper! (Can you tell this has really opened up my mind?)

I also want to thank ChrisMayernik for the PS2 setup. I had just been using all the keyboard shortcuts before and thought, 'bah! seems a bit unnecessary'. But then curiosity got the better of my ego and I gave it a try. I'm using a much simpler set up all round now allowing me to concentrate more on painting and less on the tools.
Regards,
EtaCarinae

[EtaCarinae]

Addendum
Dear Idiot Apathy and all,
To answer my own question... "No, that is not all you need to know."
I was just rewritting my notes and realised that you can't leave out it’s composition, lighting conditions and it’s position in space.
Here's what I've got on edges now based upon other peoples words and my own thinking.

The 2 things you need to know first about edges in painting are,
1. An edge is where 2 'pieces' of paint meet.
2. The strength of an edge is dictated by how ‘fast’ the edge is turning, how near it is to the viewer, what it’s made of and how much light is on it. These factors are additive.
So what this means is, an edge is a transition from one surface to another surface. The tonal gradation rendered on an edge indicates how quickly the form is transitioning from one surface or plane to another.
We tend to think about edges in the physical world as an objects concrete ‘stop’ and ‘start’ point, but in painting we are talking about how the transition from one piece of paint too another looks, and what that says about the form, it’s composition, lighting conditions and it’s position in space.
There are a range of edges as there are a range of values between black and white, but for starters all you need to remember is; hard, firm and soft (with the possible addition of the extremities; sharp and lost). Once you start looking for them you will see planes and transitions everywhere and will begin to be able to categorise these transitions as one of the above types of edges. Just as reality uses a variety of edges to indicate form, so too should you.

Regards,
EtaCarinae

[Jtho]

I went back and did exercise five from the first peer project thread.



I used H:200 Blue and H:30 orange as my starting colors. Every other color on the canvas was made by either taking those base colors and manually moving the value or intensity sliders (the sky, and the dark blue interior), or the two base colors mixing with low opacity (basically everything else)

[Nicko]

Awesome thread. I have so little patience and much procrastination with this learning process but hopefully this thread will keep me on my toes.

[Primordial Flame]

Hey All, been floating around here for a while but finlly decided it was time to start kicking myself back in to shape. Great thread BTW

Anyway here we go!

[Idiot Apathy]

@Runecaster:
Hehe, sweet; glad you could join us for v2! No more lurking
---ExOne:
Don't worry about values too much for this exercise - understand that your object can be many value ranges in many different lighting situations, what it looks like means a lot. Now, do me a favor and read the 'precise' directions - that's what they are there for ok? Your sphere, I think you've overblended - you really only need to define two shapes at first, full light and shadow and blend between those. Keep in mind it's a little more complicated in color as you have to figure out the light halflight and dark halflight as well. Highlight - you need to think of highlights as reflections; they aren't going to be smack dab in the middle of where the lightsource contacts the object. Walk around an object with a glossy highlight, it moves because it is linked from your eye to the lightsource. Read some of the other posts or do a thread search for more. Cheers, thanks for joining us.
---ExTwo:
Oh hey, didn't see this post. Great, this is exactly what I designed the exercise for - seems you are seeing color in terms of value and saturation and what that does to the color. Sweet. I would check your construction again, same as ex1 - you're making it too hard on yourself. Glad you 'got' it, cheers.
-in reference to a later post; Try and find a sphere or something nice and round from life and take a peak, you'll learn a lot mate. An orange even. Don't worry too much about monitor differences, it shouldn't matter that much.

@Heartbeat: Thanks for helping out mate! The darkest part of the shadow, located near the edge of the light that you are refering to is probably best known as the terminator. Something else for you to check out is 'trapped-light' look at where an object rests on any surface and usually you'll find it's really dark at that point. Cheers!

@Romance: Thanks man, I really appreciate it - something I've been thinking about a bit lately too. Cheers Rob.

@Jtho:
---ExTwo:
Heheh, don't sweat it mate - that's why the exercise is there, to catch people from making that sort of mistake. Start seeing color as having the properties of color and you're on your way. Try some monochrome paintings for a bit perhaps? I like the scratchy design you added btw, kind of neat. Cheers man.


Ok, more later when I get a chance - cheers!

[Idiot Apathy]

Exercise Three: Compound Response

Ok, first up is the generic key I wrote up when I wrote the exercise; after that is a specific response - you might just want to switch back and forth. Cheers and any questions let me know!

Using Photoshop terms for this so you can visualize it on the color picker better perhaps,
S = Saturation B = Brightness

General:
3: Pure red, since our lightsource has the 'maximum' amount of red and our object reflects the 'maximum' I think 100s and 100b (PS) is appropriate. Shadows, if you chose to include them, would be less B but same S. Highlights if there were any would technically be 100s 100b so perhaps you would leave some room in the full light for them.
4: Same as above, only replace the hue with 'blue'. Trying to get the idea across here.
5: Technically speaking I suppose this should be a mirror :|. But a white sphere is good too! Shadows still be grayscale, highlights even whiter if possible (probably not in this situation).
6: Ok, this I suppose would be akin to a blackhole - technically we wouldn't actually 'see' it - we'd see nothing. Remember, if you can see it it is either emitting light or reflecting light, don't forget that even shadows are visibile.
7: Should be orange right? And the shadows? Less B same sat. Not too different from steps 3 or 4.
8: This one is a bit tricky, it should of course be a shade/tint of gray - I would think 50% percent gray, but I need to think about that.
9/Optional: Oh noes, so? What is the sphere doing with sky blue? Well, that's a little bit of a vague name for a color - open for interpretation however generally I see a mix of blue and a little cyan as the hue - the saturation is fairly low and the tone very high. Very close to white, so if we are close to white that should mean we have a mixture of all colors, however we should also have more of this sky blue (blue with a lil' cyan in my case). How much more? How saturated is the sky blue you envisioned?

Notes: If it isn't at 100 s I think it is safe to say you have other hues mixed into your light. So, more hues less saturation, more of the same hue more saturation.

If it isn't at 100b I think it is safe to say you either have a weak lightsource or your object is absorbing the remainder. More tone more light, b for brightness isn't exactly the same.

Jtho:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...1&postcount=88
3: Yay!
4: Also Yay only blue! Something to consider on both, the shadows should technically be 100s as well. Highlights would be white depending on gloss/matte properties of the sphere.
5: Yup! Good, no highlight or rather not visible like you'd think. Keep in mind, this probably won't be the case very often.
6: Technically speaking, no highlight at all - it's a black hole. However say, look at a bowling ball. I think this could happen with say a glossy coat over an object like this - it can't absorb what it can't reach.
7: Yay!
8: Mmm yup, I think so.
9: Hey, ... you should do this one...

MisterStrum:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...4&postcount=78
3: (sphere1) Yeah good. Highlights, I'm still struggling to find the exact words I need as well as to understand the whole phenomenon but for now I think it's best to think of highlights almost as a seperate entity. Don't worry you haven't exactly missed anything, I think there is probably some good info on highlights in prom's tutorial though. Anyways, keep thinking about highlights, even if it's abstractly - it will eventually lead you to the answers. Let me know if you have any specific questions about them, I don't want to just babble on and confuse people about thoughts and ideas out of context.
4: Ha took the words right out of my mouth.
5: Yup, good thinking - see the 'key' for more thoughts on shadows.
6: Yeah, pure black - black as black black. Careful now, reflected light is really the 'same' as a 'lightsource' as far as reacting to the surface material (sphere).
7: Yar, orange. "Mixed" orange... err more on that later.
8: Yeah I think that works, your reasoning that is.. only light isn't in grayscale.
9: Yes! Great reasoning going on there, woot!

Lieblos:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...4&postcount=44
3. (Ball one, red) Great! Really great, you went 100s100v for your full-light and stayed with the same saturation for your shadows; good thinking. I am curious as you your reasoning for keeping the saturation, that's a tricky thing to understand. Highlights - you don't need to go straight to white, but it works in this hypothetical situation I suppose. Do note that this makes the sphere feel very shiny as you are reflecting the lightsource (that's what specular highlights are really) almost as a mirror. In this case it 'feels' like the sphere is glossy, like there is another coat around it - shiny plastic perhaps.
4. Great, same as #3 only blue, so same thoughts apply as above. Well done man.
5. Yup! Great, pure white - without being a mirror. Shadows are just less white, yet still very high in tone.
6. Hmm, I'm saying great too much. Really good on this one! Not sure about the glow - technically it wouldn't have a glow since it isn't reflecting any light.
7. Ah man, I love orange - got to be my favorite color. Kudos for going so saturated, most of the others have gone really dull. I think perhaps they manually mixed red and yellow? I'm no so sure that the highlight area would become more yellow than the rest of the sphere - what's your thinking on this? Serioiusly I'd like to hear it. To me it either implies a change in surface material or an additional lightsource.
8. Good, nice and gray.
9. Glass eh? That's a hard thing to do, technically it's transparent except for some flaws I suppose. I think this does look like colored glass though. Hehe, everyone seems to have some crazy ideas on this one - how would you have done it as a sphere like the others and what would your reasoning be?

HunterKiller_:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...5&postcount=38
3. (first sphere). Good, technically speaking your full light would probably be 100s100v. Your highlight on this one is both very diffuse yet really bright - I can't think of what material is like that if any,not sure. Usually if it's bright white like that it's shiny - which means it will be concentrated instead of diffuse. Also watch your placement, on a sphere the highlight is perhaps on the area that is closest to your eye.
4. Good, same as above but blue so same advice as above
5. Great, pure white - shadows just got gray is all. Probably pretty light gray.
6. Nice, pure black! just what I wanted.
7. Orange, could stand for some intensity (intensity is saturation and value). I think it would probably be 100s100v in this hypothetical situation.
8. Good, good thinking!
9. Hehe, I like your thinking. Nice and shiny. Althought I don't think I'd call this sphere sky blue - I'd just call it really shiny. Try and think what is happening with a matte sky blue as well.

Cup of Joe:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...4&postcount=27
3: Is that 100s100b red? Shadows should be 100s just less value. Technically speaking the highlight shouldn't be any more than 100s100b - unless I guess the object is glossy or metallic or something @_@. Then it would be more like a mirror. See how important highlights are?
4: Is that 100s100b blue in the full light? Also see above
5: Good!
6: Hehe, even blacker! blacker than black!
7: Good, I think it's safe to have the orange at 100s100b, just about the same as 3 and 4 I thinks.
8: Good, it's not so much completementary hues canceling each other out - it's every hue. Just like white light, only weaker I suppose.
9/Optional: Great! Good reasoning too. Glad you did the optional one mate!

[Idiot Apathy]

Jtho:
haha, you're all gung ho - sorry it's taken me as long as it has to get through all of these . Great thoughts on matte, glossy and wet. Cheers.

---Project One:
Yeah looks great to me! No real crits on this, you seem to know what you are doing. I think the plastic one is a bit shinier than middle but that's cool. On the glossy bugger you might have sharper reflected light as well. As far as rendering I think you might enjoy drawing in a middletone instead of black - gives you more breathing room and looks better in the end I think.
---ExSix:
Can't really crit this one, sort of does it itself huh? How was it? I found this one to be kind of fun actually haha. You get them all pretty quickly?
---PPv1,EX5:
Let's see, If I can remember when I set this up - the idea was to try and re-inforce using saturation for depth as well as temperature use. Not my favorite exercise as it ... well didn't work so great. Your results are a good exception though, kudos!

EtaCarinae:
Yup yup, notes look good to me. Another thing to think about is sharpness and lost qualities of edges are often linked to contrast. Keep on thinking and posting mate.

Nicko:
Thanks for Joining us mate.
---Sphere One:
Good, a good starting point. Now I think you are overblending - check out the example I did and is now posted at the bottom of the exercise. You only need to define two shapes and blend between those on the sphere really. Not only should this save you time but it will look better too. I also recommend you familarize yourself with using a combination of hard and soft brushes and how to quickly change them in PS.
---Sphere Two:
Also pretty good, got a nice feel to it. This is one of the exceptions to the rule that the highlight shouldn't really be in the middle of the full-light as well I think we are looking smack dab in the middle. Though, maybe we would be blocking the light? Hehe. Looks like your process was a bit more efficent this time around, good. Keep working for economy!

Primordial Flame:
Great man, glad to have you here.
---ExOne:
I think you are overblending - think of blending as between two shapes and not the shape itself. Check out the example I posted at the bottom of the exercise header. You should really only need to create two shapes on a sphere and blend between those. It is of course more complicated with color as you will most likely have to determine the proper color for the blend as well. You highlight is also too high - remember that highlights for the most part are actually reflections - they are dependant on the angle of the lightsource and the angle from the surface to your eye. Same angle actuallly, just 'reflected'. Now your reflected light - you are right in thinking that the light coming from the table (in this case the transparent sepia toned of CA's background) would be tinted that color - but the way you have it depicted on the sphere right now would imply that the sphere is a shade of white, meaning it's reflecting just about everything it receives. Treat reflected light the same as all other light.



Yay, I'm caught up. Expect a new exercise or two soon.

[Christian223]

I hope not to offend anyone with my bad painting, i spent too much time on it, maybe an hour, i tried to make it with few strokes but i could make it look smooth with very little hardness because whenever i use a brush with lowq hardness i paint stripes all over the place, i dont know how u guys do it but i obviously need some help, i ended doing it with a 100% hardness brush, varying the opacity with pen pressure only.

Well, i first did the grey background, then the brown table and then i didi a ball with a big sized brush, i want to apply shadow to the ball, i did, but when i tried to make the cast shadow i realized i needed some perspective guides to make it (this after 30 minutes of many tryies of wrong placed shadows), so i started over again and i did a very simple and obvious light position so i didnt have to worry about perspective, and i started doing the blending, alt paint, alt paint and so on. I first did the full light color, then the shadow one, and the the half light, wich is the shadow color applied with low opacity.
Then i thought that since there is light reflected from the table, i though that it should light the shadow side of the ball, just a little, so i did that but a little inclined... also, i thought that the ball should reflect some green light to the table, so thats that green vomit you see standing there. The shadow has a thin edge near the ball, and goes getting soft to the right, i applied a very light green light to the cast shadow since i though that the light reflected from the table to the ball and back to the shadow should go there... I end with saying that all this was very frustrating... oh and many thaniks for making this thread, its very good to us who want to get better

[Idiot Apathy]

Hey Dude, 'bout time you showed up

It would help to see your 'failed' attempt at using a softer edged brush perhaps?
See the example at the bottom of the Exercise one header for 'proper' sphere construction.

Try thinking of highlights as reflections, they are dependant on not only the lightsource but the angle of the lightsource to the object and then to your eye. It's the same angle, just like pool.

Had some time so I did a little PO to show you where I thought the lightsource was judging from your cast shadow; even thought I thought perhaps it was parallel judging from the sphere. Think of your sphere as having two hemi-spheres, one is lit and one is dark. Use this to determine your lightsource and from there all else is easier.


Also, I think your reflected light on the table - the green is probably too strong a green, the table would seem to be white in that area; reflecting just about everything it recieves. The shape as well, light is reflecting off the sphere in many more areas.

Blending, lil uhm demo... try thinking of blending like this:

1: First shape (lit shape perhaps?)
2: Second Shape (shadow maybe?)
3: Using a soft soft brush now, color picking the first shape and painting right in between the two shapes. You need to be careful however not to mess with proper construction, the terminator shouldn't move. Here the shape isn't as rounded as a sphere; maybe a uhm soft flying saucer.
4: Rounder form, just more blending. On a sphere you need to make sure that the terminator (the edge between light and shadow) doesn't move around. You don't even need to use as many strokes as I did here as long as you have a large enough soft brush. I recommend starting with harder brushes to keep solid form and using soft brushes to achieve the 'proper' edges.

Cheers mate, hope that helps.

[Christian223]

Thanks a lot for your response, it helps me a lot.

I noticed that you made the lines of the light parallel, that means that the light is extremelly far away, what if the light is close to the ball?, it would be more complex right?, thats what i was trying to do at first, but it was too much for me.

I tried to make this one with soft edges, the problem was that i used big brushes, but jut not big enough, so now i used brushes sized like 1/3 of the ball, and 1% hardness. I also tried doing the blending in 3 strokes only, it was imposbile for me, no matter how i tried the edges moved too much and i had to spend many minutes to get the terminator where it was originally. I also had to set the "full size brush tip" cursor to help me see where i was going to paint exactly, it was a little slow though, my computer is not that powerfull... no big deal.

I also notice now that i did a bad choice on colors, i should have more value difference between light and dark, lets pretend its a translucent material
The higlight, i did what i could, i think i have some problems with imagining the shape, how to cure this? practice?.
I left the reflection on the table as it is, its just too much for me.
Thanks again apathy, you are a real help!



Edit:

I made this in like almost 10 minutes, i practiced doing many balls, i think im getting the hang of it, il try doing the other excersizes now i think.

What i did this time regarding values is that like the tutorial here http://www.anticz.com/drawing1.htm i choose for the light something near the whitest, and for the dark something very near the darkest, allways without touching the middle of the bar of greys.



Edit 2:

Ok, i have done excersize 2 a couple of times, this is the final "best" one i did.

Notice how much the color version changes regarding value, it doesnt seem to be so dark in the colored one does it?, thats because hues have a natural value to them (this is how i understand it at least), for example, in the HSB slider palette of photoshop, hue 240 has a very low value, almost black, but yellow is very light compared to it, so this makes everything a little harder, only trust your eyes.

Also notice how the background changed in the grescale verision, it gets darker by 9 exactly.

So, when the white light hits the surface at right angles, the ball gets whiter at that part because light get multiplied... wrong, i did this and it was wrong, i think it depends on the material, normally, the purple ball will absorb the all the hues contained on the white light except purple, wich makes the ball "throw" even more purple, making that part of the ball more saturated. The ball would seem wihte on that part if it was of a diffused material, like human skin, that way it would have many tiny reflections of the light making it have a whiter zone... am i right?

[Cup of Joe]

I'm back! Had some time today so I redid excersizes 1B (twice) and Excersize 4. 4 was just brutal by the way.

Attempts at replies- once again, I may be wrong.

Nicko- I think one of your main problems as far as rendering go is your brush size. It's hard to get used to, but always use as big a brush as you possibly can. Start out with a brush the size of the sphere you want, then move to on about 1/3 that size. For round forms, softer (press shift+{}) brushes can really speed things up. If you have trouble keeping the shpae, use the magic wand tool (or any select tool) to select your sphere area so you don't go outside. As far as I'm concerned, if PS has the tools, no shame in using them. Hope this helps!

Primordial flame- Very good! Perhaps a little more blending, but you definately get the general idea, which is more important.

Christian223- Better shape, but the value range is, as you said, too flat. Try darkening the shadows. As for undersatnding shapes, some life drawing might help, but it probably all come down to practice. Good job on the second and third ones!

Anyway-
Project 1B-
try1



try2



Project 4-
Notes-
1. Okay, white and blue. 100% sat with value changes, I think. That would mean no white highlight, I think, since that would require all colors and we only have blue.

2.Well, it would reflect nothing, which would make it black, right? I thought it might be invisible, but unless it’s floating in nothing, it would block out a little circle of the light coming fom surrounding objects towards our eyes.

3.Black again? Wait, that doesn’t sound right….

4.Okay, this one’s a toughie. Hmmmm, low(ish) value, low(ish) saturation red, with both changing? (Sort of a guess)

5.“Oh noes, what will happen to red?”….. Nothing? Well, if it reflects only yellow, wouldn’t red just not matter? Or am I missing something important. So I’m gonna go with just a yellow sphere, 100% saturation.
- WOW. I think I did something wrong because that is one ugly sphere.

6.That’s just mean.

7.Well, all colors is white, and all hues at 30%, so… Grey?

8.Bonus- 30% capacity red, 80% capacity blue, ~25 % everything else? Okay, red and blue are opposites, so the red acts to grey out the blue a little, so now we’re at 50%blue, 25% others. High value, low sat blue? I really have no clue, this exercise was BRUTAL.



Hopefully I'll be back soon, and sorry for the teeny image-to-text ratio.

[Christian223]

Thanks for your comments Cupofjoe, i remember you from the older thread, i see you are getting much better

Ill try to comment your work on p1b, as i see it, it has an extremelly little reflection from the left side, i think it would be better to add more to make it look like more realistic.

Matte: the lighting is wrong, see you painted the edge in the same tone of gray, it should get darker going to the left.
I see also that it tryies to be the half off an egg, but the shading is very rough, i prefer something more smooth like your second try.
Try to revewi the tutorial made by Prometheus http://itchstudios.com/psg/art_tut.htm
A matte material would be the equivalent of a dull surface i think, having a very high number of little specular reflections of the lightsource, your missing that. I think that there would be a more whitish zone that spreads widely across the surface.

I dont think that there exist a material without the hability to have specular reflections its just that they might be so weak that you dont see it as speculars, but like if it where a more "lighted" zone.
Only in a plane that doesnt reflect light you where not be able to see specular reflections.

Plastic: Gloss surface. Basically its like a mirror that reflects the lightsource only. See my second excersize, it looks like plastic right?, its because of the specular wich is a mirrored reflection of the light, without bumps and without beign spread across the surface, its concentrated, like on a real mirror.
Also is important to have in mind that plastics may have a coat of a transparent material to protect them, that would be like two materials in one, this second material would provide another specular reflection.

Metal: there are many kinds of metal, some look like matter, some other look like plastic and others looks like mirrors, but they all share something in common about how light rebounds on them, im not sure what it is exactly, but ill try to explain it as far as i understand it (oh and get yourself many pieces of different metals and try to comprehend how light rebounds on them compared to matte materials).
In metals, light doesnt spread across the surface, thats why it gets soo much concentrated light in some parts, and gets so dark in others, in metals, there is abundance of both light and dark. Think about it as a polished mirror too and that grey is their most common color (but there are yellow metals, green, orange, brown, etc).

Look at this:


Its like a grey mirror.



Kind of an orange mirror, very polished, thats why it like a mirror, if it was dull, with many small bumps, it would not be like a mirror, it would look more like plastic almost, thats why some plastics appear to look like metal.



See this one, it doesnt look like a mirror because its dull, light gets more spread, but as soon as the light reflections goes off, its gets very dark in comparison, i wonder why is that??.



Another nice example, see that there is high values and also very low ones, and the edges, all because its very polished.



This metal is very polished, but doesnt absorb much orange, or red and yellow.


This one is polished plastic, very metalish right?, all because its polished so that it reflects like a mirror, it reflecs all the hues.

So allways think on how much polished a material is. The more polished, the more mirrorish, the more hard edges it will have.
Oh and forgive me if i am wrong in something, correct me if possible

[Eyebrow Guy]

I actually laughed out loud when I saw just how much more dark the colored version was. I had such dreams.... Ah well, at least I like the blending. BTW, awesome thread idea, I think im gonna have a lot of fun with this for the next few days, maybe even weeks.

[Cup of Joe]

Christian223- Thanks for taking the time for that!

Thought I had today to explain near-black and white next to eachother on metals-
Light is reflected off of matte objects from lots of little bumps. This means that light hitting any part of the object is reflected in many directions, so a little light from each part of the object is reflected back to our eyes.
As you go into plastic and closer to metal, there are fewer bumps, so light is reflected in a more concentrated direction when it hits the object, so only the light from a small section of the object reaches our eyes, while the rest appears dark.

Also- Did you have anthing to do with THIS Tom?

[Idiot Apathy]

@Christian223:
Great dude, my pleasure - keep the questions coming. Yup, I made them parallel - thinking of the light source as the sun. Technically speaking the difference would be something like 1/2 a degree but yeah ... no one will notice including you. I'd say stick with this for awhile, tackle artifical lightsources after you get this down.

Brushes; ran across this quote the other day: "A pretty good brush rule of thumb is to find the largest brush for the job, and then put it aside and use an even larger brush." -William Whitaker. Looks like you are doing great learning some stroke economy - it's pretty hard to do it in 3 strokes haha - the terminator is going to move too. Just keep economy in mind and work towards efficency. Full size brush cursor? So it's like a circle right? Yeah that's pretty important I think, that's what I use. Work smaller if it's too painful. Sphere looks pretty good man - I think the terminator could curve a bit more to show off the roundness of the form perhaps. Highlight is ok, it's a hard thing to get right and to describe - like you said, keep practicing and just as important keep observing. Check out how mother nature does it . Don't worry about getting everything right, I like to tackle things one at a time too.

---Sphere#2: Hot damn, that's a nice sphere. Nitpicky crits - I think the curves at the very edges of the terminator could 'smile' a bit more. And the spheres edges themselves could be a little softer to show the turning of the form. Good thoughts on softening the further bits of the cast shadow.

---ExTwo:
Yup, colors do have an inherent value to them - pretty important, photoshops brightness measurement is not value. And yup, convert to grayscale isn't perfect , but I think it does keep the relative values ok. Squint and compare the two spheres on the colored pic - there is a subtle difference in value. Anyways you got the point of the exercise - your questions now;

Light hitting at right angles? @_@, not sure I follow. Your purple ball would reflect the light yup, all light we see that is not an actual lightsource is basically reflected light. Not sure I follow you on the next part, but diffuse surface etc is more in relation to the highlight - so yes, if you had a white lightsource and the highlight was really concentrated (glossy) it could look white. More than likely though it would be less than white. The more diffuse the highlight the less 'powerful' of an effect it has, more spread out than concentrated really.

Ok, more replies later - stuff to do!

[Idiot Apathy]

Cup of Joe:
Hehehe, sweet dude. Glad to see you back and kicking - ex4 made your head explode then? Hehe.
---Project One:
Try one, nice - pretty good man. Nice contrast between all three. I think perhaps you could have used some more defined shapes in all of them, in the metal one especially. Also, don't be afraid to 'exaggerate' the effects.
Try two: Yup, real nice. Could use a little definition again, but don't worry .
---ExFour:
Hrm, I think you are the first one to do this? Sweet, sending you a general key and a specific response via PM to keep things 'blindfolded' for the rest. cheers dude!


Okay doke, more later - these take awhile @_@ (short post but it was writting up ex4 keys and what not...)

[Christian223]

Finally got some time to do this excersize, but i must go to sleep fast, or else...



So, notes:

Red ball, reflects all red hues, basborbs all others and thats why we dont see them.
The shadow part just gets less red, because it recieves a little of reflected white light from the oposite direction, thats why we see a nice blacker line in the middle.

Blue ball, the same than the other.

White ball, reflects all hues mixed together, wich in results form white, the shadow recieves less light and thus reflects a lower quantity of light thats why its darker...

Black ball, its absorbs all light, and since we see light, it means we can see it... its like a black hole, it doesnt even has a highlight because such light gets absorbed too... reflected light gets absorbed too so we can see any values or tones, because the ball eats them and doesnt share....

Orange ball, its like that because the yellow and red hues mix together, since light its additive, they mix in that way...

Grey ball, since its absorbs all other hues in equal quantities, its reflects little light, getting closer to the black ball, and beeing less white. It relfects a little reflected light too, not too much.

Sky light, well, this one i added some speculars i think, it has a yellowish white reflection on the top (the sun), and reflects the blue light of the sky, some of it only, in fact, thi ball is white, thats why its very white on the top, wich is "closer" to the light and facing it, and while the the face of the ball faces away, the light it reflects gets mixed with the light of the sky. It doesnt have a reflection of light bellow the ball because there is no surface to bounce the light and reach that part.

Ok,. thanks for the excersize, now to sleep

[Idiot Apathy]

Christian223:
Good thoughts dude. On your pictures, 'a grey mirror' and an 'orange mirror' it is what they are reflecting that determines the color. The grey one most likely reflects quite a bit of each hue and obviously much more light and much more predictably in the highlights. The orange one, is really just reflecting something orange in the enviroment or perhaps indoor lighting. On the third, I think it's probably helpful to think of the highlights more as reflections and keep that a little more seperate from the general lighting. On the others, polished would mean that when light hits the object it stays relatively 'intact' and reflects cleanly so to speak. On the pipe example, I'd have to think a bit more to be sure - but I think the dark spots are either just reflections or perhaps without the sheen of the metal it would be a very dark object, I dunno. On the plastic, I don't think it's because it's polished - that is of course what we are seeing to effect, however I think the plastic is coated with something you know? I'll have to get your last post tomorrow mate, cheers.

Eyebrow Guy:
Hehehe, well this is why I designed the exercise after all . Glad you could join us. On sphere construction - do make sure and check the example link at the bottom of exercise one(?). I think you may be overblending to a degree - it looks pretty good but I think you're working too hard . I also think that perhaps your highlight is too near the sphere's percieved edge, hurting the form. Remember that you are actually seeing the sphere curve away from you near the edges and it covers more ground than you would think. Try it out with a baseball or something to convince yourself. Cheers!

Cup of Joe:
Good thoughts mate. And nope, wasn't my idea - I think even though the wording is a bit ambiguous it's a good thing and has started some good discussions. Hope they continue it. Btw, I have no idea the answer as I have no idea the proper question @_@.



Almost caught up, anyone ready for a new exercise yet?

[Idiot Apathy]

@christian223:
Hey man, sorry it's been this long @_@. Check this thread for the general response; here is a more specific response.
These are good! Colors are nice, shape is good too. I would note how the sides of the terminator might curl up a bit more. Your last one, the skyblue - feels a little more like a beveled surface than a sphere; I think this is probably due to the shape of your highlight - or rather the position. #2 feels a bit more cyan than I'd expect - but the definition of blue is a bit subjective . #5 feels a bit more yellow than I'd expect as well, on this one I think orange is fairly universal and this would be perhaps more yellow-orange? Good job keeping the saturation pretty much the same, in this situation only the amount not the purity changes.


Ok working on a new exercise - nothing too big right now... trying to remember where I was going with this...

[Idiot Apathy]

Exercise Six: Color Recognition Part B: "Brightness"

- - - - - - -

Intro:
Ok, been thinking about this - going to simplify it; tone we can't really do digitally - going to settle for brightness here - should still train your eye a bit as well as hammer in the concept that it's different . After this one, moving right on to the full shibang, blind recognition.

Ok, this is pretty simple so let's get to it.
- - - - - - -
Exercise Guidelines
a. The exercise will be set up with a goal in mind, sometimes specific, sometimes fairly loose. Focus on the concept, not on the final product.
b. As you do the project I want everyone to keep notes of their thoughts and reasoning. Why did you do what you did, that sort of thing. If for whatever reason you can't keep notes I still want you to think explicitly about what you are doing and write something down afterwards. In your notes and thoughts I want to take the key ideas and post them here. With this insight into your thought process we all can both learn and teach each other much more effectively.
c. Spend as much or as little time as you need to understand the concept. This is only a race against yourself.
d. All exercises are of course optional, feel free to pick and choose if there are activities you would rather do or rather not do. I will however note in the exercise if they are somewhat concurrent or if I believe it would be best to do a previous exercise before hand.
e. People who are too embarrassed to post their results will be shot on sight, you're here to learn not to show off.
- - - - - - -

Preperation Step:
Download the template below. You will use the empty spots next to the color swatches in an attempt to match the color. Hue and Saturation will be given all you need to do is determine the correct Brightness. This is going to work best with Photoshop, I don't think it matches up with Painter's scheme but you are welcome to try haha. Don't forget, brightness is not the same as tone. See #1 and #2, same brightness but which looks higher in tone?

Step One:
Guess at the brightness!

Step Two:
Is it right?! Compare with the original, too light too dark?

Step Three:
Is it right? If not keep trying!

Step Four:
Rinse and repeat for each color swatch.

Template: File is a PNG so you should be able to open it, create a new layer underneath and paint freely in the open space. I wanted to make a layered .tiff but couldn't host it properly.


- - - - - - -
I strongly recommend you read the discussions and analyses within others posts that will occur between these pages and exercises. In the past volume I saw and personally repeated the same advice over and over.

This being said, sometimes advice or critiques will be given that may be incorrect, or misconceptions; I most likely am not innocent of this either. If you spot mistakes be sure and correct them! Don't confuse these with opinions however, which are never wrong only different.
- - - - - - -

[Christian223]

No problems, thaks to you for taking the time to correct me and thanks for the excersizes, they are really good in helping me improve

Ex 4B


So, from left to right, up down.

Ball 1: Pure blue ball, reflects the blue light of the lightsource because its a white ball, reflects all hues, so... doesnt absorb almost anthing thats we see a blue ball.

Ball 2: The ball absorbs only blue hues, what a coincidence! the lightsource is blue too!, so we see no reflected light.

Ball 3: A back hole again because the ball only reflects blue hues, and since the lightoursce is red and there is no blue hues in red, then no light is bounced because red gets absorbed.

Ball 4: It bounces just a little of red light, wich means we see only a little of light, thats why its so dark, the absence of light.

Ball 5: If it reflects only yellow, then red is absorbed, wich means we see only the yellow hue of the reflected light.

Ball 6: I got this wrong, i dont know what i was thinking... but lets see, if the ball is green then it means it reflects green only, but yellow is a mix between red and green, so if we throw red and yellow light the red hue will be absorbed, and the yellow too because there is no red to bounce and mix with the yellow, both get absorbed and we see a black ball, we see no light.

Ball 7: its a weak light, so we must see little light, more darkness, wich means a grey.

Ball 8: Ok, blue is at 100, so we add a little of green and a little of blue, wich will make the blue a little cyan and a little magenta, wich will result in the color we see in the example i made but with a little red added, because wee take out blue and green, making it a little more darker red...

Thats it. Thanks a lot again.

About the metals, i think that it can be thaught as being a surface wich has a very diffused reflection, if you stand in front of a metal plate like in a mirror, you will see a very blurred version of yourself, the degree of blurryness and clearness depends on the grade of polishness of the metalness What you think? its good or im totally wrong?.

[Henrikg]

Last night I found this great link site here on CA. I read a couple of tutorials on color theory, probably the ones by Ron Lemen mentioned above. He talked about chroma and the color wheel. There also were alot of other tutorials on light, value, perspective etc. However today I am to my extreme annoyance not able to find this page with the links again. Can anyone help me? I think this was the link. It is actually situated in the beginning of this thread but it doesn`t work

http://url=http//www.conceptart.org/...0&postcount=32

[Idiot Apathy]

Uhm, not entirely sure what it is you are after - but the problem with that link is just a 'typo' or two;

Try this; http://www.conceptart.org/forums/sho...0&postcount=32


@Christian223: Give me a bit to get to this mate, cheers.

[Henrikg]

Thanks! - That helped.Anyway, just recently I contemplated about all the different ways you can light a ball. I also have been thinking long and hard about partly contradicting information I have read here on CA. I will post some pics and my comments +questions below. I feel that I need to clarify these things, and hopefully it will be of benefit to others as well. ( I hope it is ok that it isn`t directly related to the assignments above).
In the pics below I have consentrated on direct lighting, but I have worked with the following information.( some comments are noted on the pic to clearify things.)

All the puple balls have been illuminated by a white light, except for the third which has been illuminated with a reddish light ( just because I wanted to test it out) .Anyway:

In the first ball from the left I have tried working with a shadow that has the complimentary color of the ball.Since the ball is purple the shadow should have a yellowish tint, but I could not make the core shadow to look realistic+ it all looks like to much reflected light in stead of a shadow area.

Anyway- over to my main question(s): I followed Briggsy@Ashtons "ball tutorial" - the red ball. According to him, under white direkt light all of the red area will have the same saturation and hue, only the values will change. + I hope I placed the specular reflection at the correct angle.

Anyway. In Promotheus ANJ`s tutorial I`ve read and noted the following:

the shadows are usually less saturated
then the lit areas, wihch is logical, however that does not eem to be the case with the red ball, anyway.

-GRADIENTS ARE SATURATED IN THE MIDDLE.

The sentence I wrote out in capitol letters have really troubled me. How would you relate this to the ball?

In Briggsys tutorial you do not have to bother with saturation because it stays the same ( Also in the shadow part of the ball ) .+
According to the concept og gradients saturated in the middle. - The middle tone on the ball shold be the most saturated?

Please do help me out. As you can se I am probably confused by TMI!( To much information)

(Oops! I just noticed that I have thrown down the cast shadow without thinking about the direction of th light which is shown by the specular reflection!-my fault

[Idiot Apathy]

That's awesome dude, probably the best coloring I've seen you do even. Small crit as I'm not a fan of asspats , You might consider curving the shadow caused by skullkid's leg to follow the form of the ballon a bit more.

Christian223:
Great man, I'm glad! Sending you the 'key' to ex4 via PM as well as a more specific response. About metals, blurry relfections - I'm not entirely sure. Polish is really just how smooth something is, so how intact a reflection will be. I think perhaps, not sure - but perhaps a blurry reflection like you might get off of metal is caused still by a high degree of gloss but an uneven surface therefore an uneven reflection.

Henrikg:
Great, glad to help. Any and all questions you think I or anyone else active in this thread can answer are of course allowed - promoted even. Ok, just going through your notes here - touching on things. On using complimentary colors - this doesn't have too much use digitally as we don't need to mix colors. With paint complementary colors are used to dull colors, lower the saturation for the most part. Also note the word is complemetary - meaning to complete. Now, onto Briggsy's Jaffa (ball tut), he is of course right - but so is Prometheus. We'll start with Briggsy's. In his set up we have a white light and a pure red object and no real interference and as interference (or other lights etc) is what really creates drops in saturation we have no change in saturation only in the amount of light which can be measured as value or tone. Specular looks fine, I'm still looking for a mechanism to calculate where exactly they should be; not sure if there even is one. Just make sure not to make it in the dead center of the lit area or too close to the exterior edges. Now - Briggsy's setup is a hypothetical situation used to reinforce how light works, though I'm sure there are many occasions when it's not too much different in life.

Now, Prometheus's words; Shadows are usually less saturated - is probably right "usually" just like he said. Think of saturation as a measure of purity and interference. In a real world situation you are going to have lots of interference which is more apparent in shadows. Interference could come in light reflected off the resting surface, surrounding objects, secondary lighting, the sky, your shirt even. Do note that said 'interference' could actually add saturation, say a blue background with a blue object. Now, when Prom refers to Gradients - I imagine he's talking about an entire shading scale, from black to full intensity to white. Black has no saturation nor does white, The properties and how your object reacts to light will determine where in this shading scale it will be. So, you may not actually experience a less saturated full-light. Also check out some overexposed photography to see things like this in action.

Your *ahem* balls - #1, mm, looks 'wierd' huh? More like a real acute relfection or secondary lighting. Well first off - you have a purple sphere why would it reflect the resting surface so perfectly? Right now it would almost appear to be white in the way it's reflected. Now, you could have a really glossy purple object that might appear this way perhaps. #2: Something I learned through discussion with Briggsy is that the main or major hue shifts will be between the full-light and shadow - or may really only be between the two. Not much else to say on this one, looks good but perhaps over blended - making it hard on yourself. #3: The whole ball would probably be a bit 'less' violet and more red-violet I think. Shadow would really only be cooler because full-light is 'warmer'.

Let me know if anything needs clarification, it's confusing stuff and so are words...

[max xiantu]

I did the first exercise twice (so far). The first time I only read the instructions and Briggsy's post. The second time I also read through Prometheus' tutorial. Which I need to read again (that's a whole lotta good information there). I plan to read all the other suggested articles/posts and try this again, but I think I'll wait for some crits here. And now, without further adieux, my paintings and thoughts ....

1. Notes ::
How much distortion for ellipse of cast and form shadows?
The cast shadow was easy to figure out, using the light source as a kind of 1 point perspective vanishing point.

How do I create the specular without getting an 'eyeball' effect?
How do I get the right amount of dimension in the ball using the value ranges Briggsy articulated?



2. Notes ::
The ball still seems flat and unnatural, even with increased contrast, and a more defined terminator. How do have the ball seem more naturally placed in the surroundings?

A slightly heavier cast shadow, gives a bit more fullness to the ball. How do show the reflection of the blue on the ball in the cast shadow without creating to much mud?

Painting an apple for bumskee's thread helped a bit with the specular, but it still looks really fake. And I tried to follow Briggsy's values, but it still seems like the ball needs more contrast.



Miscellaneous type question :: Would it be more beneficial to paint everything freehand instead of using selections? Or does that not matter?
And does anyone know how to get PS Save for Web setting to show color mor accurately?

Sorry for the long list of questions.
Thank you thank you thank you for this super helpful thread. My learning curve is becoming crazy exponential thanks to cA

[Christian223]

Hey max, instead of using selection try using a really big brush.
To make the specular highlight just add a circle at 3/4 from the center of the "circle" to the edge, just like in the bryggsby jaffa example.
Your ball looks too flat, do this: (read this first or after http://www.anticz.com/drawing1.htm ) imagine an orange, cut it in half, now you have one half in the shadows, and the other in light, now to the example, do the same with your spehere, cut it in half, the upper half will be in light, the higher part will have like 90 of value and goes getting slighty darked as it goes down to the other half, reaching a 70 of value before touching the middle, now the other half is very very dark compared to the other half, it goes from lets say 40, to a 10 of value, see my last excersize to see what i mean, it is lighted at the top and slighty gets darker, but suddenly its very very dark, you sphere would get some reflected light from the table, so light that darker half a little bit.
Ok, i hope that helped.

Thanks apathy!!! u rule!!!! xD, im going to re-read it and maybe ill ask you something later, cya.

[Henrikg]

Hello Again!

I spent 5 hours or something last night reading thru the whole peer projekt 1+2. It gave me a headache to say the least. For a moment it made me more confused. However, I must have thought about everything I read last night subcontiously and felt I wanted to post some schematics here, showing what I have pulled out from all the info. Please do correct it if it is wrong.

Especially the part where it turned " crazy scientific" in PP1. All the talk about HSV vs. HSB , tone, value, brightness bla bla seemed a bit unessesary.
My personal opinion is that it would be a shame indeed when a painter starts relying to much on the computer readouts of saturation,value etc.

Value ( greyscale ) ,saturation and hue + chroma seems to be the things to consentrate on.
I really don`t care how photoshop measures brightness vs. painters v parameter.But of course some people might find it interesting. To me Painter is superior to photoshop because of its advanced brush engine and bleed function, and painter users such as Ryan Church, Feng Zhu,Don Seegmiller etc. should be testament to that.)

Ok exuse me, I didn`t mean to seem grumpy or anything. I just don`t see the point in "badmouthing" painter alright.

I`m interested in hue variations on objects under different light sources, because as it will be possible to read in one og my notes below I find objekts with uniform hue , only varying values dead boring. Would it be correct to say that Hue variations on objekts ( e.g a ball or cube ) are primarily a result of the light source`s color, the "ambient light" , diffuse reflection\reflected light?

[Henrikg]

I sincerelly hope that you can read my hand writing. There also are some important questions in there.E.g: " Are the shading scales normally of uniform saturation under white lighting?"