Lacrimas wrote:
*drools* This piece is amazing. I love the lighting, the details, textures, colors...the works! The photorealism of his face has me in awe!
I'm checking out your deviant art right now too. Would you maybe give me a few pointers sometime? This is exactly the level of painted realism that I am trying to attain in my own work.
Thanks so much for such generous comments!! I hope you enjoy looking at my other art (I actually just uploaded a bunch today after you seemed interested in seeing it...
)
Hopefully it won't disappoint you to know that I do use some photo-sources when building the base pieces I reference when digitally painting the final image. I VERY carefully glean the different reference images I decide on while skimming through the really large reference library I have put together while creating my game... With these things, along with one or two visual references I find on the Net (such at the stethoscope, which I had NO IDEA how to draw..
),..and a large degree of hand-painting and sketching, I assemble a base image that I refer to when I finally move to Corel Painter to do the actual painting itself... This base reference image (assembled somewhat like a collage), is carefully color-balanced and shaded by hand in Photoshop to insure that all the shadows and light-sources seem to match (here is where I usually do all my tedious hair creation, laying down first the darker hair,..then slowly work in the lighter and lighter hairs till I create my highlights. Much of this gets lost or distorted in the final painting,..but the essense of it still tends to show through). This initial base image then becomes my line-guide and color palette-helper when I start working on my fun and juicy pressure sensitive monitor using the Corel Painter 9 program (which I HIGHLY recommend),...though you can certainly achieve similar effects (if not the same) using a Wacom Tablet....
This is my method, in general,..but let me tell ya,..the BIGGEST thing that I think helped me out when I first started drawing, and most recently, digitally painting, was to take the time to set up various situations where I could REALLY study the effects light and shadow-play has on three-dimensional figures and objects of different kinds. How light passes through and visually alters the look of a translucent eye from different angles, how light seems to catch on fur in different ways than it does stone, crystal, or treebark,..and even more importantly the specular effect light has as it bounces around an environment and carries with it light and color from all the objects in it to some degree, bathing parts of other objects in colors you sometimes wouldn't expect... Seeing how the rounded and angular dimensions of objects and figures are truly defined by the way texture variations, light, and shadow seem to wrap themselves AROUND their forms in ways that make them contrast beautifully against one another. Understanding and studying light, I think, is truly the secret and the key....
I'll be more than happy to answer any questions you have concerning things that you may feel stumped with anytime,..just PM me! Sometimes that can be helpful... To be honest, though,..the truly best way would be to have me demonstrate a technique right in front of you, as I do for my computer art class I occasionally teach at ACC... Alas,...not an easy thing to pull off... I wish sharing a virtual desktop were easier to do,..then you could just watch as I showed you a technique on your own screen as I gabbled over the phone!
Jadúgara ^_^
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