I've started drawing a picture, for practice and fun. The pose is based on Jessica Alba. I'm not really that great with shading or hair, so if anyone has some tips they'd be appreciated. Thanks!
~RJ
[img]http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/1400/lilywip1ht3.jpg[/img]
http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/intotheblue/site/extras/wallpapers/i… I assume it's based on that one.
Looks like you want to change the light sources. Really hard to give tips if I don't know what style you're after.
Anyways, did a google search and found some of her pics like that hair on this http://www.journal.lv/blog/2006/01/31/jessica_alba_1 site
Yep, I used that one for the pose - she's so gorgeous. But obviously other than the line art, I've been changing things. I'm not sure what style I'm after either, this is mostly just for a bit of fun.. and to try and learn how to use photoshop. This is my 3rd picture in it and I'm liking it so far.
The shading and light sources thing is really hard for me as I'm not sure how to do it.. I've really just been guessing where to put the shading.
I figure the more I practice, the better I'll get.. and I'll learn where to place the highlights and shadows.
So anyway, this is what she looks like so far (although I haven't touched the shading on her face, I plan on coming back to it after I have a bit more practice).
[img]http://img76.imageshack.us/img76/4273/lilithrf8.jpg[/img]
I was also wondering, how do you figure out what style you want to paint? I like cartoony styles like the GTA one, or danger girls.. they just look so cool. I'd love to do something more realistic sometime, but I think I'll just learn the basics first.
With shadows, I've also just been using a 'soft light' layer in photoshop. Are there any better methods to use?
Thanks heaps :)
Best way to learn different styles is to get a few pieces in that style and copy them, all the time disecting what makes that style work. Why is that picture different from anything else? What are the major things, and what are the subtleties? Then try some of your own and compare. Keep working towards getting it nutted out. It's heapsa fun @:-)
On shadows, there's many methods. Straight colour picking, choosing the correct complimentary shadow colour and setting the brush to Multiply, working in greyscale first and then colourising, or whatever else someone uses out there. I'd definitely recommend reading in to some colour theory on how shadows work first, and then you'll understand how to get to the end result quicker.
Keep up the learning! And the piccie @:-D
I want to see some planes!
Not the aircraft type, but the ones that are in the beginning stages of a painting.
What you do is you paint in some nice big blocks of either light/midtone/shadow that make up the basic foundations of form of what you are trying to paint; Like sections of light and shadow.
Of course its all based on your lightsource (so know where your lights are coming from too and always keep them in mind!)
Here i did a guidline based on the pic your using...
[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/makk/20069810435_mmmalba.jpg[/img]
There is better advice on this on various tuts on the net, so might be good if you did some digging around.
Thanks heaps for the advice Makk! I've started to study colour theory and it's very interesting! It's helping me already, although I still have a long way to go.
So, I'm working on this guy sketch for a friend and I'm trying to do better shading - it's something that is way hard to get right. I keep re-doing it over and over again.
Anyway, here's a peek at where I've got so far. In this pic, I'm going to try and end up getting rid of the black line art some how.
I also really want to learn how to make nice eyes, but I'll get there. So much to learn! Thankfully it's 100% enjoyable.
[img]http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/6033/khortis6ug8.jpg[/img]
This one has more contrast and better defined shadows in it :)
I think I might have made much the same comment to moonunit regarding painting on white, but it is worth repeating: unless the area is intended to be 100% white in the final image, fill in some colour/tone on the white areas. This will allow you to judge neighbouring tones (especially the dark shadows on the side of the face in this example) with more accuracy.
Do you have the line work on a seperate layer? to incorporate the line work into the painting better you could try this - copy the line art, change its hue & tone to a dark skin skin tone, drop onto painting layer, turn off black line art layer, continue painting. this will allow the line art to be incorporated into the painting better. If you find you are losing the line work too much you can just repeat the process. Alternatively, lock the layer opacity and paint the black line work with an appropraite hue/tone and leave it sitting over the top.
I second Makk's comment about planes - that is very much something I look for when I am deciding what is light/dark
Thanks for the tips :)
I've redone the skin colouring and shading a million times now, but the good thing is that I'm starting to look at my paintings objectively - and I think one of my problems is facial structure - like if it was a real person, both cheeks would be different sizes/shapes or the eyes wouldn't line up properly.
Before, I used to just try to immitate the colours from various photo references, but now I'm learning a lot more about "why" there are different shades on a face - that people don't really have technicoloured skin. It's a really cool subject to learn about and it sure does have a fun learning curve (except when I get frustrated because it's not perfect).
Cheers :)
looks like a fine start Angel. I think you just need to keep plugging away at it!
If you are feeling a bit stuck with how to proceed... I think I would look at increasing the contrast between the light and shadow values on Jessica's face next and tightening up where these light and dark area are excatily.