Exercise 26: Shading Gems Results
Check out the results of our Shading Gems exercise here along with the explanation to create your own HERE!I love this tutorial SO MUCH.
These are the brushes I usually use.
I use Paint Tool SAI for most of my images.
Some of the blotmaps and textures are from this pack.
I don’t take credit for any of the shapes or textures in the pack, I have borrowed them all from other artists.
I need this again here!
Wow, this makes folds and wind blown things a lot more clear!
Oh wow I was looking for something like this lately oAO
Oh Christ reblogging this for myself.
OH…
OH!
Ok, so I’ve been getting questions on this, and a couple of dudes that I’m mentoring on the side is still having trouble with this, so I’m gonna make a post on this. Here’s a free lesson that it took me years to learn on my own and (LOOK!) you don’t even have to go to school…
Occasionally if i’m going to do something large and i don’t feel like messing it all up by sketching and erasing a lot, i’ll blow up a thumbnail in photoshop and then transfer the rough pose onto the actual paper i’ll be working on so i can skip some of the rough sketching.
It’s an extra step that is extra work, but in a way it saves some work too. Thumbnail sketches almost always look great, whereas fullsize sketches sometimes fail utterly and end up fucked up proportion-wise. XD
Nsio explains: Simplifying the Complexity by Nsio
(copied from artist’s comments)
Seeing basic shapes
Human body has always been one of the most fascinating subjects of study for artists. It’s also very complex thing, so drawing human body may seem overwhelming at first. However, this is where simplifying kicks in. When drawing complex things, you first need to break it down into very basic shapes, such as cubes, cylinders, spheres, cones and so on. It’s significantly easier to sketch things quickly with basic shapes than actually render the details exactly.
Really low prices make me less likely to commission an artist.
Me: I’m not an artist. I do commission artists - I spend around $300-600 a month on digital art commissions.
I sometimes find an artist who has really impressive work, or a unique style, or something else that makes me think “I should commission this person.”. Then I look at their prices and they are crazily low. As in less than 20 dollars for a colour full body character.
And I don’t commission them. Because I can’t pay prices that low and feel good about myself for doing it.
I know it takes hours to draw even one character. Plus the time it takes to study the brief, look at the references, communicate with me, etc etc. No way are they making even minimum wage this way, let alone a living wage.
I commission art because it’s fun. It’s my hobby. If I’m knowingly paying someone slave wages to support my hobby, it isn’t fun.
To artists who undercharge: Please reconsider. I’ve heard many reasons why you decide to do this (see below). But if you price your work like you don’t respect it, you won’t get clients who will respect you or your work either. You charge peanuts, you get monkeys.
To commissioners who push for these prices: Have some respect. Not just for the artists, but for the other commissioners out there. You’re giving us all a bad name. If you can’t afford decent prices, don’t be mean about it. Save up, or find some other hobby. Or hey, learn to draw.Comments I get whenever I say the above:
- “No-one will buy commissions from me at decent prices.” - That’s a pity. But you realise by underpricing like this you are making your problem worse, by contributing to the “art should be dirt cheap” mindset that seems to exist in dA and other places? (okay mostly dA, that place is a cesspit) Besides, there are other things you can do than keep lowering prices. There’s tons of advice in dA:
‘Official’ Pricing Your Commissions or Artwork Thread
Finding Freelance work: pricing and self doubt!
And other places:
How to get commissions: A guide
Getting the Most Out of Commissions
If none of the above helps you… maybe you need to reconsider if you are at the right stage in your development to be offering commissions. Sorry.- “I’m only doing this for fun, I don’t care about the money.” - Good for you. But there are others that are trying to make a living doing this. Have some consideration for them, yes?
- “It’s the clients pushing my prices down.” - Gah. Then your clients are awful people who don’t respect you. It’s a trap though - you charge low prices, you get cheap clients. There’s only one way out of that trap.
- (Commissioner says) “But I want this drawn and I can’t afford higher prices.” - I want to live in an exact replica of Wayne Manor, but I can’t afford that. So, um, I don’t. Simplify your idea, or don’t commission it until you can afford to do so without ripping off the artist.
- (Commissioner says) “By paying less per artist I can support more artists.” - No. Just… no. You are not supporting artists, you are exploiting them. Paying less per artists lets you exploit more artists.
- “Just tip the artist.” - I have done that, but it sends the wrong message. Tipping isn’t the norm in this game, so when I tip artists assume it’s because they did an extra-awesome job, when in fact I’m tipping them because they did their normal-awesome job. Plus if an artist is charging one-third or one-quarter what they should be, do I tip them 300%?
(Image by me. Not an artist, remember? The price list is made up, but based on real lists I’ve seen recently.)
submitted by -badgermushroom
wow this is actually one of the best things to ever come out of artist’s confessions.
I will never not reblog stuff like this.
I don’t know if this can be useful to anyone. It’s not perfect by any means but perspective is a lot based on the artist own sensibility, I merely offer a starting point.
These are some really great tips on perspective! :D
This is kind of a lengthy read.
Files are in .PSD and .AEP format. (Opened in Photoshop and After Effects)
Source files: ajhay.7z (13mb)
Provided files in the 7z:
- ajhay.psd - Raw PSD before resize
- ajhayAE.psd - Resized psd for AE to use
- ajhayAE.aep - After Effects project file
Incoming huge tl;dr
How do you feel about the use of photographic references in the making of photorealistic/realistic portraiture or paintings? I've recently found that using reference photos has allowed me to elevate my paintings considerably, but I always feel like a hack when I do--and people always seem to be disappointed when they find out that I used a reference photo. Advice? [Some paintings at elosee(.)tumblr(.)com if you're curious]
Well first, do understand that the vast majority of the best realist artists in the world use photo references in some form. Not just now, but since photography became available, artists from Courbet to better known like Rockwell used reference heavily — hell, even the magical master painters we learn about in art history were doing everything possible and utilizing the latest technology in order to reference reality to make their works. That ranged from technical devices to grid out the scene in front of them for make capturing proportions easier, to physically dissecting musculature as reference. If you feel inadequate for using what literally some of the greatest artists in history use, that seems rather strange to me.
Now, while I think that how you use reference is entirely up to you, do understand that it comes in many forms and people respect its use to wildly varying degrees. There are hyper-realistic artists who literally just painstakingly replicate a single photo in various mediums. Some of these artists are massively respected, but creatively — many just view them as human printers, a technical marvel, but nothing more.
Many comic artists these days actually use 3d programs to create rough cityscapes and buildings in perspective that would be very complicated to freehand, even one of the gods of illustration, James Gurney (of Dinotopia fame) uses references, both photos and actual miniature models of dinosaurs that he lights and shoots. Does this lessen their work? I don’t think so — if anything, it shows an astounding levels of creativity utilizing multiple art forms and technologies to better your craft. Hell, a ton of concept artists literally use photos and 3d renders by their fellow staffed artists as portions of their paintings. A concept artist’s utility is often to bring to life ideas of a team and doing this makes sense in their workflow: not needing to replicate existing assets, while still employing an incredible amount of understanding of form, function, light, and space.
For me? Though several years ago reference was used individually and directly in many instances as I tried to grasp the basics of realism, as I’ve worked to improve my understanding of form and light, this changed years ago and continues to. I use many, many references of the people I draw so that I can make a pose, expression, and light that exists only where I’ve created it — and if I have an established area to reference, I can imagine the rest. Things like the Janelle Monáe covers for example, they gave me thousands of photos, but neither of the final images they wanted existed in any form — expressions, hand positions, emotions, body language, lighting, hair styles, clothing, accessories, environments, they’re all things that don’t exist yet, but tiny fragments of them do scattered across a thousand pictures that helped make the final paintings possible. There were times when I painted her mouth closed but because I had a full sense of what she looked like in every angle in many expressions, when they wanted me to redo it with it open, while keeping her other features in line, that was a simple request. When I had to design her neck piece or reflective skull from imagination, that was fine because I had a reference for how the light worked on skin and cloth so I did similar research in my studio of how it might reflect and refract across some imaginary space-age chrome. For me, this is where I feel happiest. Where reference plays a large role, but it’s observed, researched, and understood instead of directly replicated. I struggle constantly and I’ll be spending my life trying and failing to figure it out, but that’s exactly why I love it — it’s observational problem-solving. That’s not how YOU need to use it, but like most debates in the art world, how you do anything will be judged in a mostly arbitrary manner that negates history as much as it expects you to adhere to its misconceptions.
My best advice is to create how you feel best about what you’re making. I place labyrinthian limits on how I make things simply because I feel better about it when I’m solving my mistakes instead of shortcutting around them. You should enjoy creating things and if you’re doubting yourself, create new rules that makes it exciting and fun again. Often the challenges we place on ourselves elevate our capacities the most.
A must read for anyone who feels bad about heavily using references ^^
