Environments - Tumblr Posts
I want to write a book called “your character dies in the woods” that details all the pitfalls and dangers of being out on the road & in the wild for people without outdoors/wilderness experience bc I cannot keep reading narratives brush over life threatening conditions like nothing is happening.
I just read a book by one of my favorite authors whose plots are essentially airtight, but the MC was walking on a country road on a cold winter night and she was knocked down and fell into a drainage ditch covered in ice, broke through and got covered in icy mud and water.
Then she had a “miserable” 3 more miles to walk to the inn.
Babes she would not MAKE it to that inn.
!! ART TUTORIAL !!
This is my first real attempt at doing a walkthrough for one of my landscapes, I’d really appreciate some feedback!
it is pretty much my workflow process, there’s always something slightly big to change during render I should have solved earlier!
Anyway everyone, feel free to message me if you have any questions and I hope this helps anyone!!
A master post of Thomas Romain’s art tutorials.
There’s not enough space to post all of them, SO here’s links to everything he has posted (on twitter) so far : 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12.
Now that new semesters have started, I thought people might need these. Enjoy your lessons!
friday night tutorial time
this post is massive but i tried to cover both the conceptual and technical side, hopefully it’s somewhat coherent
continued under cut
Keep reading
Art I’ve created in 2016
I didn’t include all because this post is already ridiculously long, but thank yall so much for all the support! It makes making art a lil easier haha.
Wood painting process. by artcobain
(Not in English but the steps are still pretty clear!)
Caves are weirder and more varied than you think
![Computer Wiring Tunnel Inside An Abandoned Coal Power Plant, Photo By Bryan Buckley [1280x854]](https://64.media.tumblr.com/62446623f76b5d31016f29ee1228efaf/tumblr_phof9ytcde1uky4nio1_500.jpg)
Computer wiring tunnel inside an abandoned coal power plant, photo by Bryan Buckley [1280x854]
there is so much to figure out when you make comics. next time I’ll set my story in a featureless white room
North American Purgatory, Marc Trujillo
Could you explain how to do lighting in landscapes?? I'm thinking specifically of how the heck they do it in Steven Universe. They have beautiful artwork and I'd love to be able to achieve that sort of lighting. Thanks!
Ah well lighting in animation backgrounds are done with the express purpose of guiding the eye to where the animation is going to take place - think of it like setting up spot lighting on a stage!
In fact, in a lot of cases the su team do literally set things up with what are essentially spotlights
Note that all of the characters are in areas where the light is shining. This is done because your eyes are drawn to the areas with the highest contrast, so your eyes jump to the spotlights - and by extension, the characters!
Now if i show you some backgrounds without the characters, can you guess where abouts the characters are on the stage?
Now the thing to understand about the lighting in these backgrounds is that there are some rules and guidelines that inform the colour choices and value ranges.
Scenery is divided into planes, the Foreground, Background, and the Middleground which is generally where the characters are staged.
In outdoor scenery there is also often Deep Space, which is things waaay off in the distance like mountains.
Take a look at this background for example:
This background has all of the different planes, you can flatten them each down into a solid colour
as i mention in the key there, the foreground is generally in contrast to the background and deep space.
If the background is full of cold blues and purples, the foreground is going to be warmer colours like browns and greens.
It’s also going to be on the opposite end of the value range - deep space is usually pale in colour and uses the higher end of the value range, whilst the foreground is usually darker and uses the lower end of the value range.
the colour of the sky is very important to the rest of the colour scheme!this is because of aerial perspective. It’s a simple enough concept, but it does need a little explaining
This is easiest to understand if you think of a really foggy day - you know how things get really hazy the further out in the fog they get?
This happens on regular days too! It’s just that it needs to be super far away for it to be noticeable.
So, basically, the further away something gets, the less contrast there will be and the colour will become closer to that of the sky.
The reason for this is because of the water in the atmosphere - the sun shines on it and it reflects the colour of the sky, which is particularly noticeable on foggy days due to there being so much water.
most of the time, this means that things in the distance will turn bluer, due to the sky normally being blue.
However! SU regularly takes place at different times of day, so you can see how the colour of the sky and how bright it is changes the aerial perspective
as for actually setting up the lighting, there are some simple rules to follow.
the area of highest contrast is where the viewer is going to look. To understand this better, look at the backgrounds in black and white only:
Your eyes are drawn to Beach Citywalk Fries because there is a stark contrast between the shadows and the spotlight!
It has the highest range of values going all the way through from black to white in the middleground.
The areas your eyes are not drawn to, however, only have a small range of values. The foreground goes from dark grey to black, and the background goes from light grey to white.
Generally, the foreground will be darker than the middleground, and the background will be lighter, whilst the middleground will have a full range of values.
I say generally as this is not always the case, there are lighting situations where the background will be the darkest part of the image
but they’re pretty unusual!
so in summary:
- figure out where you want the viewer to look, that should be the area of highest contrast. That means that there should be strong shadows and strong highlights.
- make use of aerial perspective to add depth to your scenery, the further away something is the less contrast it should have.
- Set your scenes up with the planes in mind, use the most values in the middleground and use opposite values for the foreground and background.
And also, you might want to check out kevindart, ducksofrubber, and ellemichalka, because they’re the art directors for steven universe! i also believe amandawinterstein and rickycometa are background painters c: