/loomis/ - Art Gains

>>8982

>>8982 >>8983 >>8984

So what I think is that you're really focusing in the particular rather than looking at the simple impression, the big light/shadow relationship. You're grabbing on to any "feature" you see and just put it down without thinking much and this is super common. All these small details grab your eye but they're often surface details and without anchoring the information in your image, all things become equal. The highlight on the forehead grabs the same amount of attention as the crease under his right eye but in reality, the highlight is in much higher contrast, so whatever you do in your drawing/painting, you should keep this relationship. You've made everything equal in your image because you're not looking at the relationship of things.

Commonly the most important relationship is between the light and shadow. Yes there are half tones but if we look at the big impression, it's the most striking feature. The light starts at the contour and ends where the shadow begins, it's generally a sharp shape on the contour and depending on the form, hard or soft on the shadow transition.

I made this little thing for you. Super quick sketch of what your approach could be. Just looking at the big light and shadow relationship, just using two colors, very little halftones, trying to hold back as much as possible and keeping the big relationships in check. For example if the general color of the skin is too dark, a sharp line has lower contrast even if the sharpness is exactly the same. If the contrast is too high between light and shadow is too high, a soft line can appear to stand out too much even if it's the same amount of softness. This is why the contrast relationship is very important. you can make both lighter or both darker but make the relationship correct. The same goes for the halftones and details between the shadow and light.

Also, just try and get it accurate. The thing I made was a quickie to show you this

Don't "brute force" it. Take a step back and think about what you're doing. Just grinding away doesn't do much.

Finally a thread that I can bitch my progress to.

Basically I need to do the guy's weapon. it has a lot of chains.

I haven't made a completed image in like a year. I don't even know what I'm doing anymore. It's not like I stop drawing entirely-but it some ways it's like I never even start and I literally don't even know why it's so hard for me to commit to anything.

back to work.

>>8986

Thanks, I was more focused on value but as >>8987 said. Accuracy matters.

On that topic:

>You're grabbing on to any "feature" you see and just put it down without thinking much and this is super common.

>looking at the big light and shadow relationship

For some reason it's a tough concept for me to grasp. I really appreciate the help. Focusing on big relationships now instead of trivial details. That comes later.

Massive improvement in 20 minutes of rework

>>9006

It's very unintuitive and to learn to do it, you have to fight against your instincts. Everyone, even professionals forget or buckle under the pressure and end up putting something down that is like you say, a trivial detail and they make it too sharp or too dark and they later go over it and go "oh look at how dumb I was".

I get having all those colors on the side, I do that for oils too (pic related) but to start off with, try to see something in 2-3 colors/values and keep the colors very flat but with carefully studied edges. That's what my example was (light shape, shadow/background shape and the highlight), just a little super light "glazing" over the side of the face after I was done. You'd be surprised at how well you can paint something with just 3 values if the shapes are carefully studied with very specific edges.

took a break then worked on another update. done for today.

>>9010

it's tough to stop yourself from indulging in having a lot of values and colors to play around with. it's even tougher to get things as accurate as your subject. pulling the head back and looking at the differences is a must.

>>9011

Took a break off of this one to work on a few other things and jumped to this, trying to interpret other artists' work.