questions derived from a few pro paintings!

[SmallPoly]

Hi nders,

This should help with your gradient question:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v394/rrimgeaper2/tutorials/pshopBlend.jpg
In practice, the steps all go by pretty quickly, and you don't really need to worry about being too exact about blocking out the gradient with a middle color. Most of the modeling is done while building it out. The last two steps are just polish.

Also, having a noisy background helps make your gradients look smoother by comparison.

For the highlights, you need to have a good understanding of PhotoShop's blending modes and how light and shadow show form in a painting.

[nders]

hi velenosangue,

thanks for the input. But I find the gradient thing hard to follow... firstly, we block in a middle color, then we build out witht transparency... and how exactly do we "build out transparency"?

the last step is even more alien to me... applying filter in the middle of blocking out gradients? that's kinda inconvenient... or did i got it wrong?

would u mind clearing it up abit for me? thanks again.

[SmallPoly]

Hi nders,

First off, blur between colors=gradient. Same thing.

Sometimes you want the blend to be wider and sometimes to be thinner, and sometimes you need it to have both in different places. While you can get a blend using just the smudge tool, it won't give you as much control as if you create one as best you can using a pressure sensitive brush and carefully blend that together with the smudge tool at a small size.
If you want it super-smooth after that step, you can use photshop's blur and nosie reduction filters to get rid of the small grainy details that are keeping your blend from looking as smooth as possible. You would probably wait to do that step until you're finishing your painting rather than in the middle of making it.

[Lunatique]

You should read the tutorials sticky thread at the top of this forum--you'll get your answers there. Linda Bergkvist in particular posted a wonderful tutorial on how she blends smoothly.

Also, one of the most obvious things that novice digital artists using Photoshop don't think about is to simply use a soft round brush set to opacity controlled by pen pressure and size variation set to none, and then simply let the brushstrokes depict the soft gradation.

Essentially, that painting style is not hard at all. It's more or less a matter of practice. After all, painting does require muscle memory and eye-hand coordination, and just like with musical instruments, takes practice to get it right.

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