realism

#1

well I been practicing and I have finally learn coloring, shding, and everything but I cannot get my pictures to look “real” I mean I can color lineart but I can never get them to look whithout the lines and stuff. I draw out my pictures first though but I seen a lot of wonderful art here that don’t have those lines and started from sketches and read some tuts but it never explains that. Can anyone help me?

http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/25824291/ that is my first one without lines, see how crappy it is? please help I’ll be grateful

#2

I’m not the best at figure drawing, but if you post your work in the 2d WIP section or the Artistic Anatomy and Figurative Art forum, I’m sure someone will give u some help. Here’s a link.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/forumdisplay.php?f=177

#3

Everyone works differently. so i suggest u work in a way that is comfortable to u. I think the perspective is off in your sketch, i suggest u spend more time in the sketching phase, cuz i find that once the sketch is well composed, the rest is easy. Also, never paint on a white surface!! Except if u looking for the commercial style feel. Paint on a off-white surface is easier for the colors and good lighting. Don’t just use white for the highlights and black for the shadows, cuz they have colors too, its pretty hard to explain in words but i would suggest u look at some traditionnal paintings or linda bergkvist had some really good color mixing tutorials.

#4

I know how to paint the face and everything but I can’t get the outline to look human like

#5

Youngbloo,

There are two threads you should definitely check out:

[b]Beginners’ Lounge
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=297229

[/b]I5 Minute Sketchathon
[b]http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=295498

[/b] Come join us! You’ll have fun. :slight_smile:

Cheers,

~Rebeccak

#6

You mentioned that you learned drawing and shading and whatnot, but did not say that you have mastered “value”, which is what define form to a collection of colors. Your drawing is lacking in variation of values so it looks flat. Take a look at this article:

http://www.digitalartform.com/archives/2004/10/color_vs_value.html

#7

Good read Nafa, it really tell what he is missing.

#8

a key to realism are definately colors.
You can turn the same linework into manga style and/or make it look totally realistic just with different colors.

You made some beginners mistake and I am not sure how much of theory you have read about colors and values yet.

First of all - don’t paint on a white background. Colors get influenced by eachother. Skin color reacts on ambient light and what colors someone is wearing for example.
Besides white lets colors that lay next to it look quite different then they actually are.

If you’d turn your painting into grayscale you would notice that it lacks a lot of values meaning you need more highlight and shadows. That doesn’t mean more white and black though.
The next point would be the different shadows that make up forms…

There are some more little mistakes a lot of people do (add more subtle colors to your skin tones for example). You might want to check out some tutorials about color theory. :slight_smile:

#9

I struggle with color when it comes down to realism, but what I have learned is that skin is transparent. paint transparently, I also would suggest, not painting on a white canvas! Happy hunting dude good luck!:thumbsup:

#10

I’ll read up on values and thanks for the white background thing

#11

Actually, I think it could be clarified a bit. If you’re talking about painting “realistically” then your primary concern (ESPECIALLY when dealing with color) should be value (the range of light to dark). Remember that every color has a value, and you can’t forget that this is how you define the form. If your values are off, no clever use of color is going to make that image look “real.” However, if they’re spot on, then what colors you used don’t really matter much in terms of the image looking “correct.” Think in grayscale.

Another thing about realism. No matter how realistic you’re trying to paint, you still have to break things down into abstract shapes. You’ll find that the most realistic paintings are often extremely simple shapes put together in such a way that our brains fill in the “gaps.”

#12

Reminds me of some artist, look at lucian freud, jenny saville, rembrandt for reference

#13

Lucian Freud—>Irish. Funny seeing irish artists being known worldwide as it’s not a huge world leader in art…

#14

play a little with dodge and burn in photoshop to define shapes, paint shadows in area’s where the form drastically changes, and a dark bakground helps to let the center of interest be the human, here’s a noob try of me it makes alot of difference eh? :slight_smile:

and a grayscale version to see the values

#15

Try calibrating your monitor. The grey face isn’t intentional, right? I checked and there is red there, but it looks like grey on this end.

If you do stuff on Photoshop you can check whether what your monitor shows as black or white is what it seems to be.

#16

lol the cap. american painting looks like it was done with watercolors… well im not pro at painting but ive done a few paintings and ive realized u can prolly substitute the line work with darker hues sorta like shadows but not really… i dunno how to explain it but the lines are there just to show u the outline of the figure u could just use different colors to “outline” the figure instead of using regular bold black lines or whatever color ur lines are… dunno if that helps or not… just my 2 cents hehe

#17

Howdy, I may be a bit late offering my thoughts but when I saw the question and then your example I know exactly where you are coming from since we I remember this strugle many years ago when I was starting out into portrait art.

Some of the best excercises to help eliminate this is drawing from a cast figure for example or if not that then anotherone that is good is to take a ball or cylinder like a can give them a light source then paractice drawing them with the strong contrast of dark to light will greatly improve your realistic touch.

My favorite excersise that helped me acheive realism was drawing an egg and making it look real.

This forced me to have to examine the values from dark to light and even reflective lights.

Also it was mentioned to not work on all white background. I tend to disagree with this line of thinking, though I understand the thinking behind it, I just dont feel the rule should be absolute. It may be the effect you are wanting, as a matter of fact white backgrounds can really make a piece pop if done right. So its really a matter of desired effect. IN fact, many top illustrators, and some of my favorite protrait artis or figurative artist work with white backgrounds for alot of their work. It all has its place, but like anything in art it takes practice.

If I can get a moment of time to do this I might throw a couple of great excercises I do together to show what I am talking about.

MBStudios

#18

MB, I’d highly appreciate those examples :stuck_out_tongue: I’m pretty much in the same boat. The hardest things to find are good excersises. Speaking of which, a bit off topic, are there any good excersises for pressure and or smooth curvature of line? Obviously it’s a lot of practice mostly, but excersises do help in achieving practice time :stuck_out_tongue:

#19

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