Rush's All-Purpose Extra-Strength Sketchbook With Bleach

**rushwolf** · March 3rd, 2009, 05:24 AM

.....

**amika** · March 3rd, 2009, 06:38 AM

awesome work, the last one is looking cool

**rushwolf** · March 5th, 2009, 05:30 AM

Been wanting to do this for a while, try to describe form without value.

I still want to do that [I failed at keeping a single value]

Basically I made a medium [40%] grey canvas. Made a new layer, set it to color and tried to paint a face without being able to change the color value, just hue and saturation.

This was more of an experiment and a way to train my eyes to be more sensitive to color. My eyes hurt now.

Found some pretty gosh darn interesting things. Without value warmer hues are dominate as usual, but they seem to read as "darker"- while cooler hues appear "lighter"

The first image is the unaltered hue/saturation only painting.
The second shows the same image desaturated- Now it looks like an inverted painting.

The third is the inverse of hues from the original painting. To me this seems like an inverted painting, the orange doesn't read like highlights like the blue did on the first hue/sat painting.
The Fourth is the inverse of hues desaturated. This looks like a normal, yet low contrast] black and white painting.

Weird. Interesting!

Fifth was me taking the original color painting, copying it, desaturating and inverting one then slapping the color version over it and set to color and lowering the opacity... I think. Its late. My eyes hurt.

**rushwolf** · March 5th, 2009, 05:37 AM

Hmm shoulda numbered them- If you watch the brush mark on the left side of the image it does something weird, as most of the raw colors are doing- kind of tricking the eye into thinking its the opposite value of what it really is.

Educational!

**Kan Muftić** · March 5th, 2009, 05:59 AM

lovely stuff, dude.

**rushwolf** · March 5th, 2009, 06:10 AM

Hmm, set my monitor to greyscale and those hue/sat painting turned into a blank box of grey.

So I took them back into PS- set it to greyscale vs just desaturating them. Not a blank box of grey- but less contrast and different, more predictable results.

Made a fun chart to illustrate the concept. Im not sure of the exact "scientific" mechanics of hue/saturation vs "innate value"

In the end it doesn't matter so much the exact mechanics, but its nice to know how the brain interprets color- for make help painting pretty pictures. Very nice.

**MsMaverick** · March 5th, 2009, 07:56 PM

Wow, that's... kind of crazy. And really hard on the eyes, heh. You're like, blending art and the science of human sight, man. Nice work, and impressive dedication.

On another note, I really enjoy looking through your sketchbook. You've got a way with faces, and the eyes especially. Really gorgeous works.

**mark malone** · March 7th, 2009, 04:23 PM

Awsome. Nuff Said!

**young paddy1** · March 7th, 2009, 05:07 PM

that's a really weird optical illusion, if you just invert the colours instead of making it negative you can see it clearly, must be the intensity of the blue.

p.s. that painting near the top is great makes me think of constantine for some reason, any way it kicks some ass.

cheerio

**William b. Hand** · March 7th, 2009, 06:57 PM

Aaahh, so this is where your sketchbook is! Timely for me to see this, as I was just (earlier today) using one of your Sith Lord w.i.p.'s for ref as I try to learn how to paint people. Actually, that's part of my own current sketchbook update. Can't wait to see your further updates and any further explanations of your process! Great work.

**rushwolf** · March 8th, 2009, 04:07 AM

Noticed I never posted this update on the sith from... well lil over a week ago.

Still haven't had time to fix the leg or finish it.

William b. Hand -Sweet- thats pretty flattering. Honestly I pull out reference all the time to help. Can't learn too much from those fragmented images in your brain.

**revenebo** · March 8th, 2009, 07:28 AM

I love your style, so painterly. The b&w works are awesome...

**Peter Berkovski** · March 8th, 2009, 08:48 AM

nice work man, really like your sith design, one thing that looks little off to me is the right leg (her right) that part between the knee and the foot looks little short, isn't it?
regards!

**Sublimus** · March 8th, 2009, 07:52 PM

God damnit rushwolf, you're too awesome!

I notice you still didnt draw the face on your sith, haha.

**rushwolf** · March 8th, 2009, 08:04 PM

haha no time to fix anything on it since that update yet.

**Jackwhat** · March 8th, 2009, 09:35 PM

Argh, I love your stuff... i aspire to a style similar to yours only you handle your colours/values and everything about a hundred times better!

Seriously awesome shit, makes me wanna fuck sleep and start painting shit!

Shower me with more value things like those on page 6! :3

- Edit; Wait, I remeber one of your sketches from absolutely fucking ages ago, the dude in post #104 with the wavey lines coming off him. Didnt you do more to that? remeber seeing it on deviantart ages ago and saving it.

**rushwolf** · March 15th, 2009, 04:02 AM

Boo its a dragon wip

**rushwolf** · March 15th, 2009, 06:29 AM

................

**Teundeboer** · March 15th, 2009, 06:55 AM

very cool and well rendered stuff. I would like to make a suggestion for the dragoncritter wip. I think the sun in the background is a big part of the mood and composition in the picture. But as of this moment it's light is not being used as a primary light on the critter. My two cents.

**Josef K.** · March 15th, 2009, 07:31 AM

wow love that experiment - lots of interesting information - guess you got whole lot more out of it! the last piece rocks too! thx for sharing!

**spoonbender** · March 15th, 2009, 12:34 PM

the creature in the last piece is great, however the way you've lit the environment is opposite to the way you've lit the critter, separately they are good but together they don't really work.

cheers

**rushwolf** · March 15th, 2009, 06:30 PM

hehe yeah he's not backlit yet- I did the lil environment then was too tired to render the dragon.

**William b. Hand** · March 15th, 2009, 06:55 PM

What resolution do you work at? I love how soft and smooth that glow is, but when I attempt something comparable, I get these rather abrupt changes that spoil the effect. My computer is old and crappy, which forces me to work at between 72 and 100 ppi, and I'm wondering if that has anything to do with it.

**rushwolf** · March 15th, 2009, 09:15 PM

For most cases I just work at 72 dpi- typically 2000xwhatever image size-- this one was 4500x4000...

But I shrank it down to 1000x800 or whatever to save a jpg... and forgot to undo the size change so now im stuck with a small psd. Just remembered I did that last night. Joy!

**rushwolf** · March 16th, 2009, 02:49 AM

yar- color vomit lighting action... supreme!

**rushwolf** · March 17th, 2009, 04:51 AM

Ok, I've yet to really make my own set of brushes for certain situations. So I've started a set for organic rendering. Uhm-- typically the best brushes are made to solve a problem.

I was just making brushes then creating problems for them. These seem to fit how I go about rendering organics-- gritty monstery organics.

So here's an example of the brushes in action.
Theres also a link to the brush file for photoshop.

C&C welcome! Lemme know if ya nab em and use em!

rushwolf.googlepages.com/RW_Organics_V1.abr

**Gloominati** · March 17th, 2009, 05:32 AM

uh man, your stuff kicks major ass! More please!!

**rushwolf** · March 17th, 2009, 01:00 PM

Thankee!

**carakhan** · March 17th, 2009, 02:44 PM

Really cool stuff, and I did the same exact thing with my dragon, I resized it to post and then kept working, and then an hour later I was like NOOOOO! I've been looking up photoshop scripts to do autosaves, I get way into the drawing to remember to do it all the time.

**meticulous** · March 17th, 2009, 03:17 PM

You've got some inspiring stuff! Really enjoyed looking through here! Great imagination and love your lighting! Looking forward to seeing more! Keep em coming!