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December 2nd, 2006 |
This looks like it's going to be a particularly hard landing. The flared webbing implies more of a vertical descent than a lateral one. I think I captured the feeling of motion accurately here.
The shadows were all guessed. The picture seemed to jump out at me after the shading than the simple line drawing I was faced with earlier.
I didn't apply any ambient or atmospheric value, just hard sun shadows. |
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| Comments |
| Name |
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| Stickman |
December 3rd, 2006 |
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Some day I'll get around to adding up some more info and sections to Gimpystick. Hopefully around Christmas break in a couple weeks. One of the things I want to put up is the general rules of critiquing.
Rule 1: Before you start telling someone what they did wrong, tell them what they did right.
Rule 2: It's ok to state opinions, but start with facts. Before you state an opinion, make sure they know it's an opinion.
Rule 3: Use common courtesy.
I think those are the basics. Naturally, I'd end up writing some kind of essay on them, including bits like how to tell fact from opinion, and what to do (and NOT to do) when someone breaks these rules.
Also, your picture reminded me of Light Logic, as taught by Betty Edwards in her book The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. [url] ("The New" is there to make sure everyone knows it's the third edition of the book.)
Light Logic, or how light interacts with objects, has four elements.
1. Highlights. This is the brighest spot. The brighest spot is where light hits perpendicular to the object. (Perpendicular is the opposite of parallel.)
2. Crest Shadows. The shadows that the object casts on itself. Such as the underside of the dragon you have there, both the wings and the body.
3. Reflected Light. Light hits other things and bounces back. Such as the light bouncing off the ground and coming back on the underside of the dragon. Reflected light, in my opinion, is one of the key things to making something look "real" instead of just "shaded."
4. Cast Shadows. The cast shadows are always the darkest part. These are the shadows that the object cuts out of the light that's shining. For example, the wings may make a cast shadow on the dragon's body, and the shadow of the dragon's silhouette on the ground would be cast shadow.
Digest that for a minute and think of the problems. ... Done? K. Here's the things I thought of.
If you do highlights properly, you're going to end up adding value to almost the entire figure (or even image), except for the highlight spots. The easiest way to do that is to "set a ground." For example, take a stick of graphite and apply it all over the page, then smear it evenly. This creates a "base" or "ground." (This image used a ground: [url] ) Then you draw the lines, the crest shadows, and the cast shadows, and erase the highlights. The value of the ground will determine what you draw and what you erase. A dark enough ground would mean you have to erase everything except the cast shadows.
As such, it's probably easier just to leave the highlights out of it and stick to cast and crest shadows.
Then we meet the matter of making cast shadows darker than crest shadows. The easiest way to deal with this, I believe, is to deal with it logically. Let's hop back and take a look at the threshold of an absolute scale in simultaneous contrast.
In an absolute scale, such as a black to white value scale, differences of less than 20% of the scale are surpressed by the retina of the eye. Differences of greater than 20% are amplified. So to create the appearance of difference between the cast and crest shadows, we should have a difference of at least 20% of the value scale we're using for our drawing (generally our scale would be: as white as the paper to as dark as graphite/medium).
How talented are you at creating a value scale? If you make a value scale of five values (including black and white) they will be 20% differences. That's right on the contrast threshold. But what if you mess up and go under that 20%? You don't get the intended effect. But drop the value count to four and you get 25% differences on the scale. That's the white of the paper, the darkest graphite possible, and two grays inbetween. It's also much easier to play with 25% differences than 20% differences.
If you use those four values as your bases -- highlight, reflected light, crest shadow, cast shadow, then things pop out a lot better as to what they're supposed to be.
But as I said, if you're lazy like me, you can probably get away with just adding some reflected light and it'll look a lot better. How much light is reflected depends on the situation, I'm sure. But take a egg and put it on the counter and look at it. Compare the reflected light to the normal light. You may be surprised with how bright the reflected light is. (Reflected and normal light on a egg are just about the same, in my test. This was on tan carpet in sunlight.)
And now I'd just like to point out that I didn't actually critique your picture at all. |
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| Name |
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| Ember |
December 4th, 2006 |
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I need to pick up a kneadable eraser before I can really play with grounding. The plastic's edges are rounding. Sure, I could use the other end, but I prefer consistancy.
I can draw my "standard" design dragon in very little time, which is going to help me a lot when it comes to devoting time to play with post-processing effects like value. I still feel kinda bad that I haven't been doing wild new creature designs every time. That looks like something I'll just have to practice. I'd think that playing with texture and value would lend themselves to more interesting initial designs. :)
This picture was really to play with crest and cast shadows. Reflected light would depend on two things which my picture does not include. The texture of the ground is not defined, and the texture of the dragon is not defined. I know these aren't necessary to get a basic render of reflected light, but it would make the scene a LOT more effective for what I wouldn't consider to be too much more work. He could be flying over asphalt, grass, water... his scales could be reflective or flat. :)
Hm. Also, what the surface below the dragon consisted of would also affect how his cast shadow looked... |
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