Contents Chapter 01: Forest Fire
Levente Peterffy
Mikko Kinnunen
004
010
Chapter 02: Scary animal emerging from a forest
Carlos Cabrera
Mike Corriero
015
019
Chapter 03:
Ship hit by torpedo
Levente Peterffy
Rich Tilbury
024
029
Chapter 04: Tornado moving towards farm
Carlos Cabrera
Levente Peterffy
035
041
Chapter 05: The room made the explorers feel sick with the thoughts as to what had happened there in years gone by
Paul Davies
Rich Tilbury
046
051
Chapter 06: City street devastated by war
Levente Peterffy
Andreas Rocha
058
062
Chapter 07: Evolution had played its part on these creatures as their world heated up, but the thousands of years of forced hard labor had more impact
Mark Muniz
Rich Tilbury
067
072
Chapter 08: The party entertainers’ real twisted identities were very far from their bright, colorful disguises
Fred Augis
Rich Tilbury
077
081
Chapter 09: The citizens of the flooded city now resided in the tallest buildings connected by makeshift bridges.
Mike Corriero 087
Mikko Kinnunen 096
Emrah Elmasli 092
chapter 1
“Forest fire”
by Levente Peterffy & Mikko Kinnuen
Chapter 01
Speed Painting
Letting it burn! In this tutorial I will describe my methods for painting in silhouette.
Choosing the right colour
Lighting tree
The theme is ‘forest fire’. The first thing here is to choose the right colour
After some sketching and some testing with colours, this is the result
scheme, it can depend on a lot of things. The topic is a common one, so I
(Fig02). I used the same brush as before, during this first phase of the
know I’m going to use a lot of red, yellow and orange tones, representing
painting. It’s a rough brush, suitable for sketching. When sketching in
the warmth and heat of the fire. After having this clear colour scheme in
silhouette, it’s always important to paint whilst always first considering
mind, I started by selecting a background colour. I chose a red brown
the light, and secondly the shapes created. For example I paint the light
tone. I find painting with silhouettes easier if I have a dark background
around the tree, and not the tree itself, this is a fast way of painting when
and paint with light colours onto it. Here, in this image, I scribbled with a
both light and shape is established. I’m bearing in mind that I need a dark
brighter colour on top of the dark background. I didn’t have an exact idea
background, and a lighter colour on the brush I’m using.
of what I wanted to paint so I just scribbled (Fig01).
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Speed Painting Chapter 01
Burning more! At this point of the painting, the basic colours have been laid down. So in this next phase you can just reuse those colours to paint more objects as I have (Fig03 & 04). The use of the ‘colour-dodge’ layer style in Photoshop is pretty effective, but it’s very important to always use very low opacity on it, I always have the opacity set between 5-15%. The lighter tones in the fire were painted with the ‘dodge mode’ for the brush . I also used a default PS soft edged brush here to add some of the smoke effects, which had a low opacity on them too. I continued to paint more on the trees, using same colours as before. (Fig 04a)
Multiply This step is simple. I duplicated the painted layer and changed the layer mode to ‘multiply’, making the image a bit darker. I also adjusted the layer opacity, to tone it down (Fig05).
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Chapter 01
Speed Painting
Lake I felt that the bottom of the painting felt empty, so I decided to add a small lake there. The process of creating this lake is as follows. Draw a ‘marquee’ around the painting. Press “ctrl+t” to make a free transform. Flip the image upside down, basically grabbing the top and pulling it down. Then squeeze together the image horizontally so it looks like narrow broad box, and finish the free transform by hitting ‘Enter’. The last thing is to erase the hard edges of this flipped box so it ‘melts’ together with the background painting. (Fig 05a)
Last minute consideration I wasn’t totally happy with the background because I felt I still had some space to be worked on, also because I wanted to create more depth in the image. So, I decided to paint in some more trees, I used a hard edged brush for this. One of the default brushes in PS (Fig06)
Texturing It’s time for texturing, which is good if you have custom made brushes just for this purpose. And
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Speed Painting Chapter 01 I have a custom made brush (Fig07a) that has a sprinkled effect which I used to create fire sparks (Fig07).
Final touches! Alright. The painting is nearly finished but I then decided to play around by adding some more highlights, enhancing the light even more. Lake reflection, treetops, leaves etc. (Fig08). There is also a pretty cool trick you can use to make the illustration look rougher. It involves a flat texture, basically any kind used for 3D purposes. So here it’s and I changed the mode too overlay
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which was the last thing I did on this painting (Fig 09 a, b & c). Over the page is the finished work, which I’m very happy with.
Levente Peterffy For more from this artist visit www.leventep.com Or contact
[email protected]
Chapter 01
Speed Painting
otherwise people just won’t connect with the
trying to save him/her. I like to add small
picture. In this article I will explain the creation
suggestions of a story to my pieces. That also
process of a image called Forest Fire.
activates the imagination of the viewer a bit.
Grayscale sketch (Fig 01)
Adding colour (Fig 02)
I usually start to lay down my idea in grayscale
I start gradually adding washes of warm and
to make the process as intuitive and simple as
cool tones to the image. At this stage I’m not
Forest Fire
possible. In this case, I already had a given
concerned about the final look. I’m only trying
When I start to think about doing a new speed
theme I was going to do the speed painting
to get some basic tones in there to build the
painting, my primary focus is to portray the
of. To get a jump start to the process, I was
palette from. In this image the biggest challenge
idea behind the image as well as possible. This
visualising the idea in my mind much before I
will probably be in depiction of the fire in an
means that I try to tell something about the
even sat down in front of the computer. Just
interesting and convincing way. I put in some
story, mood and the emotion while minimizing
trying to nail some of the basic themes before
warm oranges and cool greens, something
the actual painting effort. If you leave out a
starting can be advantageous and you can
that would feel natural for a burning forest.
lot of the rendering process and deal with the
avoid being threatened by the empty canvas
Without going to extremes at this stage, I add a
problems of the painting on a more simplistic
staring at you. I start with simple brushes and
bit of highlight behind the characters to set up
level, you will learn how important it is to get
quickly sketch down the basics of my design. I’m
the focal point in the piece. I also add a bit of
some of the basics right before going further
going for some kind of Ewok-style tree house
overlaid texture to the background to get some
with the details. Doing a rough painting means
thing, with the fire surrounding it. There’s also
interesting variation. I keep checking my image
that most of it has to be well designed, or
characters in there. One of them is about to fall
as grayscale to find out how my values are
down from the tree and the other is desperately
working.
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Speed Painting Chapter 01 Defining the forms (Fig 03) This is the stage where I start to add opaque colours on top of the under painting. I get rid of some of the greens and add a bit of blue to enhance the mood. I want this to have some kind of night setting to contrast the bright fires. I put most of the saturation to the midtones, making them intense orange. The shadows are cooler, and the brightest highlights have a bit of yellow in them. I define the second tree house a bit along with the silhouettes of the trees. I notice that the horizon is perhaps a bit too tilted right now and that will be fixed for the final stages. You can easily spot errors like this if you flip your image horizontally every now and then.
Finishing the painting
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(Fig 04) When I have most of the basic forms and colours in place, I add a bit of random textures on top of the surfaces. I use a mixture of custom brushes and overlays to make some interesting two dimensional variation. I also define the ground plane a bit further by suggesting some sort of vegetation. The most important addition is the bright flames that really up the contrast of the painting. I put in a few more tree branches and define the forest in the distance a bit. The last thing I do is add a couple more of those bright windows to suggest that there’s some kind of interiors within the trees. Time is up and this speed painting is now finished!
Mikko Kinnunen For more from this artist visit www.artbymikko.com Or contact
[email protected]
chapter 2
“A Scary Animal Emerges from a Forest...” by Carlos Cabrera & Mike Corriero
Speed PaintingChapter 02
Created In: Adobe Photoshop 7
Sketch and Base colour I opened a new document of 2000x3000 (yup, that big) with zoom at 50%, and first of all tried to find in this particular sketch some harmony between the animal, background and the spaceship above it. You can see how the clouds and the mountains go together side by side In the sketch. (fig 01). For the animal design I combined a chameleon (you can see that on it’s eyes) and a dinosaur. I also add some elements in the scene such as the trees and birds to give the animal (or creature, as you wish) a more fixed sense of it’s real size. I did the sketch with black on a white background with the brush tool (fig.02) which I’m using a lot lately. To save time at the sketch or painting stage I usually use keyboard shortcuts to modify the opacity of the brush (fib.02b). The next step was to create a new layer set to multiply on the sketch with a base color for the whole illustration which in this case was a dark green in order to create a different atmosphere as if we were looking at an alien planet (fig.03). I added some projected shadows to display the animal’s volume in more detail and darkened the forest a little to focus the attention onto the animal and ship.
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Chapter 02
Speed Painting
Background To create the background I ran a search on my image folders and found a cloudy sky. Your best bet here would be to take your own photographs and create a new folder on your hard disk saving your textures, or simply use google to find them (always pay for copyrighted material but there are some good sites that would let you download photos and textures for free) ;). I created a new layer, pasted in the cloudy sky pictures and then I changed the layer properties to Overlay 85% so the cloud sky blended with the other layers. Then I just highlighted the green to create new shades. (fig 04). Before painting the mountains I decided to give the animal some highlights and volume. I added a dark red to the tongue and a yellow-green for the body volume. At this stage you only have to paint some areas leaving most of the background intact which is enough to produce the volume effect on the illustration as you can see on the animals jaw. (fig 05). Now we can paint the mountains. I used the same method of adding volume as I mentioned above for the mountains. One of the mountain faces recieves some light and the other one is in shadow but we only need to paint the light areas here. (fig 06). I also painted some of the forest areas with a more light green and started to add some texture
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Speed PaintingChapter 02 with the result looking more like a forest than just plain ground. (fig 07). At this stage (fig.08) I added a layer above everything and added a light green over the clouds to add a more atmospheric perspective to the illustration. The animal had way too many dark colours on its neck and that created an undesirable effect on its scale - we want it to be really big and not just a simple worm ;). Now with the top layer plus the opacity changes, I am able to transform the black to a more grey-green kind of colour and therefore giving it more depth and scale.
Time to clean the clouds I duplicated the cloud layers and placed them on top of everything erasing the areas where the animal and the mountains reside. Then with this new layer I changed the cloud colour (CTRL+B) to a more yellow- green to give the sky more variation. (fig.09). Having finished the background I then drew the spaceship (fig.10). I decided that the spaceship needed to be metallic so it became the only bright thing in the illustration and that way it would become a focal point along with the animal. Obviously the darkest color on the spaceship does not have to be the same as the mountain shadows. Next thing was to develop some of the elements of the sketch to help emphasize the animals scale. To help do this I painted some birds in front of the animal, and also added some trees flying around as if the worm had come from inside the forest. (fig.11). The last step was to correct some of the color and details. I re-sized the spaceship and most of the birds so the creature now looked more imposing over the rest of the elements. I added a new layer set to overlay 20% and I painted it in yellow over the animal’s neck, eye and over the mouth to highlight the parts a little more and bring the animal forward from the background.
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I then added a new layer with extra details and increased the volume of the neck and eye. I also played with another light; this time a blue-
Speed Painting
greenChapter light that02 improved the creatures form and volume even more (wow, you can almost touch
it!). (Fig12)
Carlos Cabrera For more from this artist visit www.carloscabrera.com.ar or contact
[email protected]
Fig.12
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Speed PaintingChapter 02
Introduction A trick to give your painting some texture in order to get away from the flat colour laid down, is to take a photo texture and overlay it with a very low opacity, above the image.
Painting Speed painting is a process, concept artist use a lot to convey a concept very quickly, while still retaining the necessary elements to communicate their idea clearly. There are a few key factors in speed paintings you’ll notice, which are often evident within the term “Speed
Painting”. These various factors consist of mood, lighting, texture, custom brushes, photo textures, colour, depth, atmosphere and focal point. Custom brushes and Photo Textures play a big role in the look and feel of a speed painting, it’s also one of the main factors, in painting quickly, while still retaining a good deal of detail. I began thinking about the topic “A Scary Creature Emerges from a Forest “, by producing some small thumbnail sized preliminary creature sketches and a few tree designs. These don’t take very long, but in the end will help make the actual painting process go a lot quicker. I also produced two rough compositions from which you’ll notice, I chose one for this final painting (Fig.01). Now that I have an idea of what I’m about to paint (with both the preliminary sketches by my side and the topic description in mind), I started the painting with a textured base layer. This base layer consists of the primary colours, I plan on using for the background which will be altered slightly as the painting progresses. (Fig.02). The base also consist of a couple of photo textures of various plants, leaves and a custom brush, which you’ll see later on as the process continues. This custom brush will be available for download as well as a few pattern files. (Fig.03). After having established a quick base to work on top of the next process is to block in some atmosphere, a horizontal line defining the ground plain using a couple other custom brushes for grass and dirt. At this point it’s not all that important defining anything other than creating a space to begin blocking in some of the main elements (Fig.04). One quick trick to give your painting some
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Chapter 02
Speed Painting
texture in order to get away from the flat colour laid down in the beginning is to take a photo texture and overlay it on a very low opacity above the image. This will provide some texture and break up the flat surfaces which supplies a kind of quick painted brush effect. (Fig.05). Now that I’ve basically finished the base layer of this painting which took maybe a maximum of fifteen minutes, I’m going to take that initial compositional thumbnail, set it at a low opacity multiply layer above my painting and use it as a quick guide to drop in the main forest elements. In the process of doing this I’ve used a couple of my custom leaf brushes to block in foliage and fill up the ground plain with my custom grass brushes. (Fig.06). You’ll notice in this line up that I’ve created an assortment of Custom Brushes early on to help cut down on the time of painting every leaf, every blade of grass and surface texture in the painting. There are 14 new brushes in total set into groups of leaf clusters, falling leaves, ground and dirt, and grass and weeds. These custom brushes along with some photo textures and custom patterns will all help speed up the painting process while still retaining enough variation from one leaf to the next. You can see the custom brushes below (Fig.07). A quick adjustment to the levels has been made to help boost the values and define the elements as well as a change in the Selective Colour and Colour Variation. Considering the background has been blocked in for the most part I’m now dropping in one of my preliminary creature sketches and applying a base colour to outline the silhouette. (Fig.08). Going back to one of the main key factors in a speed painting, this next step is quick and simple. Using an overlay
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Speed PaintingChapter 02 and screen layer I’m just going to push back some of the elements with a large soft airbrush while bringing in some local light colour into the creature. Outlining portions of the anatomy, fading some of the spikes, the rear legs and lighting the silhouette is all that’s really needed at this point. To provide some atmosphere I just produced some floating particles using the airbrush set to a sparse scatter and spacing between the brush tip. (Fig.09). Again another main key factor in speed painting is using high resolution texture photos from the Internet, I’m going to supply the painting with additional colour, foliage and texture in areas where I feel it is
needed. In order to do this I’m using the stamp tool with an airbrush while selecting areas of the photo texture and then painting it into my image. When I have it painted into my image set to a new layer I’ll lower the opacity, play with the overlay options and erase portions to help integrate it better into my concept. (Fig.10). The painting is practically done; the last step is the focal point and main element of the entire concept which is the creature. More specifically it’s the creatures head and neck regions. I want to keep a lot of the depth and atmosphere I’ve produced so I don’t really want to render anything other than a small portion of the neck and mostly direct the viewer’s attention toward the face. (Fig.11). Finalizing the image - I’ve basically just rendered out the main focal point, producing the creatures skin texture with a round scattered brush and some overlay highlights and multiply shadows. At this point it’s about two or three hours into the painting and it’s pretty much finished. In order to draw more attention to the creatures head I’ve decided to give the interior of
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its mouth a cold blue saturated tone and I also pop out the highlights on the structure of its face and plated body. (Fig.12). And here is the final
Chapter 02
image. (Fig.13) That’s all; I hope you found the
Speed Painting
image interesting and the quick step by step informative. You can download the custom brushes and patterns used in this speed painting for your own personal use.
Mike Corriero For more from this artist visit: www.mikecorriero.com or contact
[email protected]
Fig.13
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chapter 3 “Ship hit by torpedo” by Levente Peterffy & Rich Tilbury
Chapter 03
Speed Painting
Created In: Photoshop CS2 Build your confidence in just an hour: Levente Peterffy shows you how to whip up a ship hit by a torpedo with just a few digital strokes... Speed painting is an effective painting practice to achieve good composition, colour and lightinteraction with shapes and forms, and with the use of brushes - both default and custom - you can quickly create and simulate a realistic environment with just a few strokes. The topic ‘’Ship Hit by Torpedo’’ reminds me of World War II; I don’t really know why but I have always been interested in World War II and I was therefore quite taken with the topic set for this challenge. There are probably a million stories to tell about that period, which would all be very interesting to illustrate, and in this case is a ship being struck by a torpedo. In this tutorial, the focus on this article is that realistic images, or colours if you like, can be achieved with the use of custom brushes and blending modes in Photoshop. The software used to create this speed painting were Photoshop CS 2 and a Wacom Intuos 2. Let’s begin...
Background Colour I started off with a coloured background, as you can see in Fig 01. On this background I started to paint with custom soft-edged brushes (see brush example in Fig 01), often with a very low opacity of between 10-20%. I worked in this way until I could see some shapes evolving (Fig 02).
Ship & Fog At this stage I started to develop more of the shapes from the previous image which were slowly forming. Already, at this stage, one can see that it shows the shape of a ship in
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Speed Painting Chapter 03 the foggy atmosphere. I used similar kinds of colours to define the shape of the ship more and more (Fig 03). When I first had my shapes defined I started testing some new colours out. I used a light blue in this case for the sky, and also defined the horizontal sea-line. I used a simple gradient to make the ocean. The colours were all picked from the painting: one light colour and one darker (Fig 04). I cropped the image at this point, and at this stage was able to start going into more detail. I picked a small, hard-edged brush (see Fig 05) and started adding details on the ocean, and some smoky clouds (Fig 06). I flipped my painting horizontally a lot, helping to refresh
my eyes and so I could see if there were any flaws (proportions, perspective, and so on). I continue adding details and also building on the background, trying and testing hues of blue for the sky (Fig 07). There is one thing I usually try a lot, which is duplicating the painting layer, using a photo filter on the duplicated layer and
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increasing the density on the warming filter to 85, then choosing Multiply as the blending mode for the duplicated layer on top. To finish it off I took down the layer opacity to a fairly low level until I felt that the colours were just right. If you want more control you can erase parts of the top-layer, as I have in Fig 08. At this stage I added some more detail to the ship. There is an open crack on the ship’s hull, just as if a torpedo tore a hole into it (hence the topic for this speed painting) (Fig 09).
Detailing I like adding details. Adding details is kind of like adding more words to a story, and there are those details that you just simply have to add because they help the picture to make more sense, for example breaking waves, reflections in the water, and so on. I painted a silhouette of a bird on the left, because I felt that the skyarea in that section was a little empty. Another detail which I realised would help was the use
of a rusty texture - look at the ship’s lower part. I wanted to create something rust-like, so I painted with a custom-made brush which slightly resembles rust (see brush example on previous page) (Fig 10 -11). I continued adding more strokes to the smoke (Fig 12).
Colour Test These last stages of a speed painting are to basically test the colours to see if you can improve them and add more to the mood (Fig 13).
Final Tweaks Adjusting the resolution and adding sharpness are the last things that I do to my paintings. And there we go: finished (Fig 14).
Artist Tips & Secrets I can’t stress this enough but ‘’practice and practice more’’ is the key to success. Even with cool custom brushes as assets, you still
need to train your eye to see shapes and
for yourself, and try to solve it as best as you
colours interacting with light, in order to evolve
can. If you have a hard time starting to paint,
a painting. Try not to get too dependent on
then make studies from master paintings or of
tutorials; dare to experiment a lot, even if you
screen-shots from movies - that should help to
don’t know where to start, just scribble around.
get you started at least.
There are a lot of forums out there with speed painting threads, so post your work a lot and
Levente Peterffy
see what feedback you get. There are people
For more from this artist visit:
out there willing to help you so use their advice
www.leventep.com
wisely. However, do try to think of the problem
Or contact:
[email protected]
Chapter 03
Speed Painting
span of time. In the following exercise I have
resembled its real counterpart quite closely.
tried to limit myself to a couple of hours and
As I was looking through photographs I liked
Speed painting is a very useful way of quickly
have chosen to focus on the moment at which a
the camera angle of one of the ships and
establishing aspects of an image such as the
torpedo slams into the side of a destroyer! ...
decided to use it in my painting. The first stage
Introduction composition, colour scheme and lighting, and
involved roughly blocking-in the composition
a method of clarifying the mood of a scene,
Blocking-In
whether it be for a film, computer game or
As is my usual approach to any painting, I
areas of light and dark (Fig 01). The reason I
simply a digital painting. Depending upon the
firstly conduct a search for as many reference
chose this particular angle was because I felt
artist in question, the notion of a speed painting
images as I can find on the Internet. In this
that the foreshortened size of the ship seemed
can have different connotations. In some
case I gathered a number of photographs
exaggerated, and as a result gave it a more
peoples’ eyes the idea of a speed painting can
of battleships in order for my image to look
imposing quality, as well as adding a certain
be 45 minutes or so, whilst others may consider
convincing. As the ship was going to be the
dynamic. I predominantly used two brushes to
2 or 3 hours spent working on a piece as a short
main focal point I wanted to make sure it
establish the tonal range, which can be seen in
in black and white, and experimenting with the
Fig 02. They are both hard-edged yet retain a painterly quality. The top example (see Fig 02) is one of my custom brushes, and the lower one is one of Photoshop’s default hard, round airbrushes. They both utilise opacity set to “pen pressure” to enable more control and a level of transparency.
Building up the Details With a medium grey I then began to tie the sky and the sea together, and tidied up some of the lines of the bow and refined some of the structures above the deck (Fig 03). Having made a reasonable start on the tonal ranges it was then time to add some colour, which was done on a separate layer set to Overlay blending mode. In this way the light and dark
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areas remained, even though colour was being added (Fig 04). I began by using a subtle blue/green and also painted in some random horizontal strokes to help define the water a little. As this painting was meant to depict a torpedo collision it was about time we added some action into the scene! For this I created a custom brush, as seen in Fig 05, which is illustrated in the bottom-right of the image.
fading towards the edges (Fig 06). I added this
a new layer was because it needed to be set
on a separate layer so that it could be moved
to Overlay mode in order for it to appear darker
When some scattering was applied it created an
and altered with ease if need be, as it was
in the shadow of the ship (Fig 07). The way to
effect similar to the top-most brush stroke, which
done very quickly. To add some extra drama I
achieve a sense of perspective is to either paint
has the effect of appearing more broken and will
wanted to add a torpedo wake passing just in
in a shape and then use the Edit > Transform
be suitable for something else later... Anyway,
front of the ship, just narrowly missing the hull.
tools to Skew and Distort it so that it tapers off,
I decided to have the torpedo hit towards the
This was also done on a separate layer using
or alternatively one can simply use the Eraser
back of the ship, and with my new brush I
the same brush, but this time with scattering
tool to do it manually. You may also notice that
painted in a splash with a bright white, making
applied so as to describe the tiny air bubbles
I have painted in some evidence of a land mass
sure that the centre was more opaque and
made by the propeller. The reason this was on
on the far left of the horizon
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Chapter 03
Refining the Image At this point I thought that the torpedo splash was becoming somewhat lost amongst the very bright area of sky behind it, and as a result was subduing the impact - pardon the pun! Using the Gradient tool I overlaid a grey/green (inset square) from the top of the image towards the horizon, and similarly from the bottom up to reflect the sky. Being set to Multiply mode this also served to create a more ominous mood to the picture and also emphasised the splash (Fig 08).
Speed Painting
shadow was painted in below the larger ones to add some volume, as well as a few elements at the bow (Fig 09). You will also notice that I have continually added areas on the ship and then maybe erased them later down the line. Do not be afraid to change things and experiment as you work - it is good practice to keep things fluid and to try alternatives as you work as this often yields positive results that you could not have predicted. In Fig 10 I have added a wave along the bottom of the ship to show that it’s moving, as well as adding some more density to the torpedo splash. In Fig 11 I have put in some detail along
I worked back into it with a soft edged eraser in places to bring out some cloud formations, as well as adding some further refinements to the ship, together with a line of flags. I generally cleaned up the edges and put in some simple shadows and highlights to help describe the scale, as well as shifting everything back a little towards the rear of the boat, because the perspective seemed wrong as it was. The next step was to put the guns in, which were done in single strokes using a hard-edged brush. A little
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the hull of the ship to break up the consistency of the hull and to give some indication of scale by way of some metal panel. shapes.
Finishing Off The picture is now essentially complete and could be left, but a few quick enhancements can improve things. Because I left the torpedo wake on a separate layer I can now duplicate it easily, and after a bit or re-adjustment create a gap down the line of air bubbles which is more realistic. Also, using a simple brush, I added
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Speed Painting Chapter 03 some random strokes around the splash to widen the spray, as well as some swift random marks to add more definition to the water. I put in some evidence of railings and a few highlights and finally used a large soft airbrush to lighten the horizon and water and to paint in some simple suggestion of clouds.
Conclusion The finished picture can be seen in Fig 12. I am happy with the final result but as with any speed paintings the temptation is to get carried away with unnecessary details. I spent just over two hours on making this image and feel it was
a useful exercise. I may well attempt to paint another image on the same theme, except next time limit myself to one hour, just to see how the result compares. The crucial lesson to bear in mind with this type of painting is to acquaint yourself with the subject matter beforehand and have as clear an idea as possible about composition and colour schemes before you begin, as it will inevitably save you much time during the painting process.
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Rich Tilbury For more from this artist visit: www.3dtotal.com Or contact
[email protected]
chapter 4
“Tornado moving towards farm” by Carlos Cabrera & Levente Peterffy
Speed Painting Chapter 04
Created In: Photoshop 7.0
Sketch: I opened a new document of 2000 x 3000 and started the quick sketching phase with a 50% zoom over the whole document. In this
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particular step, I don’t like to be held by the little
people to try this technique. You can see how
details, but rather work more on the harmony
the twister and the farm house are there in the
of the illustration using quick and simple forms.
first view with just a couple of strokes (Fig01).
Drawing in black and white is the quickest way
Now it is time to add some grey colours to the
that I know of for obtaining good compositional
sky and to the ground (Fig02).
details without wasting too much time; it almost develops on it’s own and I always encourage
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We can start to give the farm house a little bit more detail now. For the twister I use black with 50% opacity; this adds a cloud/smoke effect, and allows you to accomplish the effect in a short space of time. After we’ve finished the grey colouring stage, we can start to add more detail to the farm house. You can see the chunks of wood on the house’s roof are just little brush strokes, some of which are darker than others. This creates the effect of small, flying pieces of wood. At this stage, it’s pretty obvious that you’ll need to work the details in 100% zoom, to be more comfortable. We can then add some grass and fences to the scene, and we are then we’re done with the farm house - that easy, that quick (Fig03). If we compare this step with Fig02, we can see how throwing some dark colour at the farm will focus the viewer’s attention exactly where we want it: on the farm house (Fig04).
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Now we just need to add some light and shade to complete the drama of our scene. It isn’t really that complicated; if you picture it in your mind it will come out naturally. One thing I added in the foreground was some extra detail (the fence), as I felt there was an empty space there to be filled. You just need to have fun and play with your illustration! There are a lot of rules of composition, but I think the best one is the eye, imagination, and mind of each artist. It’s better to be creative and have fun working on your illustration, than working over a preestablished grid (Fig05). Now we need to make the twister something scary, and to do this we add a layer on top of everything and start adding some dust and clouds around the body and base of that mean twister - look how big it is! This particular part is pretty fun, and I bet you will spend quite some time on it (Fig06).
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After we’ve finished our twister, we need to go to the next stage of the illustration, and to be honest, this is the step I personally enjoyed the most. By painting wood and dust flying around the house in a mortal ballet, with just a few small strokes we can easily create the path of horror of this twister, and the fallen debris that it leaves behind (Fig07).
Speed Painting Chapter 04 Finally, the Colour. Now we create a new layer and place it above all the others. Press Ctrl + Shift + E on your keyboard to merge all the layers in just one single layer, and then rename this layer “colour”. After this, we press Ctrl + U, and the HUE window should come up. We need to check the Colorize checkbox (it will be un-checked), and then Hue: 54, Saturation: 25, and Lightness: 0 (zero) (Fig08). With these values we will get a nice brown colour that we can use for this illustration. We are almost there now! This first grey-painting technique is used many times to clear our mind from the colour of the subject, and to cut straight to the chase. On the other hand it’s good practice to upgrade our render skills, and so it’s very useful either way. We now create another layer, above all the existing ones, and paint onto our piece the farm, the floor and all the colours that we can now see added in Fig09. We switch the layer to Overlay and leave everything at 100%. By doing this we change the floor tint, farm tint, and finally have given our illustration a new variety of colour and contrast. Lastly, we just need to have some fun applying the last touches, and that’s all!
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Carlos Cabrera For more from this artist visit: www.carloscabrera.com.ar Or contact:
[email protected]
Speed Painting Chapter 04
Created In: Photoshop
Tearing things apart The theme for this tutorial is “Tornado Moving Towards Farm”. OK, so before we begin painting, let’s think about the theme. The first thing I thought about was the typical shape of tornados, and the type of colour schemes that they usually have. Another thing, which is recommended, is to research the subject; references, photographs, movies, and so on - anything that lets you become more familiar with your subject. First of all, I aim to pick out a background colour which will fit as a base for the sky and tornado (Fig01 - 02). I then start to block out the sky and field with a lighter tone.
Painting Carefully But Precisely When you are painting in new objects, try to paint using low opacity of the colours. That way you can gradually paint and read the image as you go, which is a lot easier than using colours of extreme value. Light blues and saturated greens were used to paint the field and sky, as you see in Fig02. Whilst I was painting Fig02 I tried to block out the shapes and composition at the same time. I felt a diagonal composition would suffice for creating the dynamic and destructive power of the tornado, and so that’s what I went for (Fig03 - 05). What you can see in Fig03 - 05 is simply a follow-up on Fig02 where I have added more dynamic details to the tornado and to the green grassed field.
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When you paint sky, a soft-edged brush is recommended. The shape of this brush can look like anything basically - it’s totally up to you when you make one, but just remember to have soft edges. To give the tornado a more destructive feeling I introduced some new colours to it, using browns, oranges and reds to create the dust clouds surrounding the tornado. Here, as before, I used low opacity on the brush strokes. An image crop was also done to put more focus on the tornado.
Re-using to Create New Fig06 - 08 illustrate the process moving forward. Since the basic colours and shapes of the image were already settled in the initial phase, the rest has just been a continuation of the very
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same colours and shapes. I introduced a new
Curves (the most precise way if you really want
they do. Books, online tutorials, videos - the
object in Fig08, as you can see. The colours for
to be picky), and Colour Balance (I rarely use
choice is yours. Try to get dependent on these
the house/farm were picked from the sky. The
this; I just try it out when I feel like experimenting
resources though, as it’s more important that
shapes of the wood were created with the lasso
with colours). The best way of learning these
you try things out for yourself.
tool which I duplicated a couple of times.
tools is to go into Photoshop and simply
The Finish
experiment and learn how they work and what
Not a lot new was done in Fig09-10; I was basically just trying out some colour adjustments. There are several ways to work with colour adjustments. The easiest way for me is by using the Variations function in Photoshop, and this was basically how I created the bluish tones in these final images. Other ways of adjusting colours are using Hue/Saturation (a good way to enhance the colours you already have, but not so good for introducing new ones),
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Levente Peterffy For more from this artist visit: www.leventep.com Or contact:
[email protected]
chapter 5
“The room made the explorers feel sick with the thoughts as to what had happened there in years gone by” by Paul Davies & Rich Tilbury
Speed Painting Chapter 05
Introduction UK based artist, Paul Davies, takes us on an honest journey through the Speed Painting titled “The room made the explorers feel sick with the thoughts as to what had happened there in years gone by!” ... Speed painting can be used to accomplish many tasks. It can be a way of quickly comparing a series of designs based on the same theme, or it can be used as an exercise to improve an artist’s skills. The purpose of many speed paintings is to quickly portray a desired mood and atmosphere by focusing on lighting and composition without worrying too much about detail. This can be a difficult task for beginners; you need to have a good understanding of values, colour and composition to be able to work quickly, so the key is to practice. The more you do, the better you’ll get. When beginning any illustration, whether it’s a speed painting or a portfolio piece, it’s important to have a reasonably good idea of what you are painting
point I’m not too concerned about design, I’m just concentrating on the general mood and feel of the
in your mind’s eye before you begin. In this
piece. I try to work as quickly as possible here, using a round custom brush to block in a large area
case, after reading the brief, I spent ten minutes
of dark grey and give myself an idea of where the main light source should be coming from. I enjoy
looking through stock photographs of ruined
working with a lot of custom brushes, and one of the things I like to do at this early stage is use the
churches and temples until I had a good idea
Photoshop’s Smudge tool with one of my scattered brushes. This gives a blending effect similar
of what I wanted to do. In the next few steps I’ll
to what can be achieved in Corel Painter and enables me to blend colours quickly and easily until
take you through my process of creating a quick
I’m happy with where my colour palette is going. Once I’ve established my basic values, I choose
sketch painting concentrating on mood and
a much smaller brush and start picking out small, linear highlights. These will suggest architectural
atmosphere.
details and give the impression that we are looking at a man-made structure rather than a natural rock face. Using the Eyedropper tool I grab colours from around the image and keep things very
Step 1
loose and sketchy, again not focusing on design but on the mood and feel. Already we can start to
I start by laying down a range of basic shapes
see some indication of the space and scale of the piece. At the top we have a glimpse of the sky
using dark and light shades to quickly establish
broken up by a dark, grey structure. In the mid ground we have a darker area which will be the focal
my colour palette and some basic values. At this
point of the illustration, and at the bottom we have the darkest area where the explorers will be.
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Step 2 The next thing I want to do is to start establishing what type of environment our explorers are going to be in. I start by blocking in a large archway which will serve as the focal point of the image. Using a small round brush, I then clean up the sky area and add a few more linear highlights to the surrounding areas. The piece of architecture jutting out at the top of the structure acts as a mini focal point and also helps to remind us that we are looking at a building rather than a natural formation. Finally, I use another custom brush to add some areas of hanging vegetation to the mid-ground. Another thing I like to do is to use layers to quickly add texture to my work. I create a new layer and set it to Overlay with 50% opacity. I then use a few of my custom brushes to instantly build up rough areas of dark and light which give the impression of dirt and grime. Later on, these areas of texture will help me find a rough design to suggest architectural detail. I’m trying to keep things loose throughout the painting so I don’t lose focus on the mood and feel, which is what I want this speed painting to be about.
Step 3 The next step is to block in our explorers and to flesh out the focal point of the image, which in this case is the large archway dominating the mid-ground. Using a small round brush I add a hanging corpse and start to pick out areas of light and shade, adding a strong highlight to the right hand side of the arch and some more leafy areas around the sides. I also add some rough lines to keep my perspective consistent from left to right and also to suggest some detail at the base of the arch. Once again I’m still not being too specific about design, I’m just using highlights to suggest areas of varying depth around the structure. I continue by adding some more definition to the area behind the arch and the background structure. Once this is done I choose a large round brush and block in the explorers on a new layer. By using varied pressure, my brush automatically creates interesting shapes that I can work with later when I add more definition to them. I use a very dark shade as the characters are in the extreme foreground and are the nearest thing to us. I then add a thin layer of mist between them and the arch, adding some extra atmospheric depth and helping to bring the characters forward.
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Speed Painting Chapter 05 Step 4 This step is mainly about refining the characters and adding a few extra highlights to the background. I start by adding hats to the two explorers furthest away from us; this helps to make the closest explorer seem more individual and vulnerable. His pose also suggests that he is the least brave of the three. Often, small touches like that can help tell a story within an illustration and make the characters more believable. Working very loosely, I then block in highlights to suggest the type of clothing they’re wearing and add a backpack to one of the explorers. I use warmer colours for their clothing and skin to help separate them from the background. Finally, I add some edge highlights.
Step 5 By now we are almost finished, all of the detailing should be complete, and we are ready to make any final colour adjustments. Firstly, I adjust the levels to make the highlights slightly warmer, then I use the Colour Dodge tool to brighten up and add focus to a few of the key areas around the arch and the explorers. So there we have it. Our finished speed painting now portrays a moody, atmospheric scene as our explorers venture into the unknown...
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Paul Davies For more from this artist visit: http://www.pdportraits.co.uk Or contact:
[email protected]
Speed Painting Chapter 05
Introduction For this tutorial I initially imagined an image of an abandoned laboratory wherein some rather gruesome experiments had once taken place. As the title suggested years since the given events took place I decided to give the explorer a flare so as to imply there was no longer any power supply feeding the building. I also liked the idea that the flare would provide very strong shadows and a theatrical light that would help add drama and give the scene an intense unnerving quality. I chose to paint the image at a moment just after the flare had been ignited, with our explorer seeing for the first time the figure of a giant humanoid partially dismembered and strung up above some sort of tank. Around him would be a suggestion of some macabre machinery and tubes that were used to experiment on him and preserve his body .
Blocking In The first thing I did was to quickly sketch the explorer and corpse and establish the spectators viewpoint. I wanted the eye level to be quite low so that the scene looked more imposing, with the focal point of the picture ominously looming overhead (Fig01). I concentrated on the two characters as they were the key components and essentially the most difficult aspects to draw. I added some suggestion of pipework and shading around them but would mainly leave this area to the painting phase. After scanning the drawing and importing it into Photoshop I made a new layer and started to block in the light and dark
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areas in greyscale. The two brushes I used for this initial layer are shown in Fig02; one is a custom brush I made, which I often use to provide a textural quality for metals and stone, and the other is a standard hard round brush which is perfect for denoting edges and details, such as the pipework. The explorer is meant to be holding out a flare in his right hand and so the main highlights appear on the tank directly in front of him (Fig03). I have now got a diagonal line of light running from the pipe in the bottom left up to the top right where I have blocked in an arch. I shall eventually offset this with the flare which will run opposite to this, but for now it’s time to refine the level of detail and tidy up some of the edges. In Fig04 you can see that I have painted in some pipework and cylinders on the left and along the ceiling. I have also clarified the arch and put in some shading across the explorers clothing and tank. I used the standard hard round brush to add this detail, but as this is supposed to be a speed
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painting it is time to leave the detail and put in some colour. I do this on a separate layer which I set to Overlay and stick predominantly to semi-dark red. In Fig05 you can see that this now provides the main light from the flare with the brightest highlight being on the tank. Overlay is a useful blending mode as it maintains the tonal relationships but allows a colour range to be introduced. You can see when I set this layer to Normal mode how the colour works and how roughly I have blocked it in (Fig06).
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Finishing the Detail To speed things up I am now going to flatten the PSD and add the final details on a single layer. As I was working on the image there was something that just didn’t feel right and I could not decide where the problem lay. In the end, I tried increasing the canvas size and making the room much higher to accentuate the perspective. I don’t normally do this so far into a painting, but as this was about speed I didn’t consider the composition quite as carefully to begin with but it only added on about ten minutes or so to fill in around the image and it solved the quandary. In Fig07 you can see where I have extended the canvas. It is a little wider but much higher now. I have intensified the light from the flare on the right side of the explorer and added a ceiling vent from which the tubes emerge. You will also notice that the shadows are more pronounced and the pipework has more clarity, but more importantly I have “fleshed out” the corpse (pardon the pun) and given him some volume.
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Final Adjustments This is all the detail that I am going to add as I have spent about two hours on the painting, so far. The next thing to do is to add an adjustment layer by clicking on Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Colour Balance (Fig08). This will enable me to alter the overall colour of the scene but be able to edit it at a later date if need be. In this case I have added a warmer hue by increasing the sliders towards red and yellow to reflect the flare (Fig09). This has helped the image but there should be a greater intensity of red light emanating from the source of the flare, so to combat this I am going to add another layer which I will call “Flare glow”. This is going to comprise of a red Soft Airbrushed area around 50% opacity painted around the centre of the picture and then set to Overlay mode (Fig10). This does in fact destroy much of the subtle colour variations but is necessary to intensify the flare, as we will see. We are almost there but barring one vital component: the flare!
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Speed Painting Chapter 05 Conclusion The painting took around two and a quarter hours to do and was great fun. It is always tempting to add more detail and spend too much time on specific areas of an image during this kind of exercise, and I would like to try and get to the final stages within an hour ideally, but with a bit more practice… I prefer the range of hues visible on the corpse in Fig08 and the fact that you can see the full extent of his injuries, but in a way, having the flare obscuring the abdomen does leave more to the imagination as there is a suggestion of a cavity in the final version. I may well go on to do a more detailed version, but perhaps moving the explorer over somewhat to fully show the gruesome nature of the subject!
This will again be done on a new layer using a standard Hard Round Airbrush and a Layer Style which can be found under the Layer menu. I painted in some strokes in pure white and then used the Smudge tool. I applied an Outer Glow layer style using the settings seen in Fig11. I added just one last layer at 20% opacity and using the Gradient tool added in some subtle shadows along the left edge (Fig12). My PSD file now looked like Fig13 with four new layers above my main layer. This all sounds like a lot of extra tweaks but it only took around 5-10 minutes to add all of these as most of them simply involved altering parameters and the handpainted ones were straight forward.
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Rich Tilbury For more from this artist visit: www.3dtotal.com Or contact:
[email protected]
chapter 6
“City street devastated by war” by Levente Peterffy & andreas locha
Chapter 06
Speed Painting
Created In: Photoshop To start with, let’s think about at the topic: Destroyed City. The topic gives us a clue about the type of colour scales to use. If you feel you still can’t grasp what colours to start with, try studying war movies and looking at imagery from World War 2. I feel they always have very saturated colours and a lot of dark tones. You almost never see extreme values of reds or yellows. Of course, this is a general way of looking at it and there are examples where a great variety of colours are used, but let’s stick to the dark and rainy overcast moods that we usually see in movies... Study the example (Fig01) and see if you recognise the colours that I used to start the painting with. You will notice from Fig01 that I have picked dark saturated colours, using a soft edged brush that has already given some vague hints of smoke clouds. In Fig02 I blocked out the base of the buildings. The very same colours from Fig01 were used in Fig02 to paint the buildings. This tutorial is about focusing on certain areas, and so I will concentrate on working on the centre of the building and will not spend too much time on the building to the right. From my experience, when you gain more and more
destroyed central building, and even there the
The top of the building in Fig03 contains details
experience with painting, you will notice that it
details are not spread throughout the whole
in its small textures. At the base of the building,
is very ineffective to paint everything in great
building - where the light is stronger you can see
the details are larger. The main reason for
detail. The final image, especially for speed
details more clearly. You will also notice that
making them larger was because of the need to
paintings, only needs to have the most important
in dark or contrasting shadows there can be a
covey the shapes of debris. I only painted the
details. In this example, the details lie in the
great amount of detail, depending on the light.
top of the debris.
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Since painting debris requires more of a texture than structure, we can use a custom brush to paint the textured details. A good and easy way is to use the dual brush setting in the brush settings and combine a hard-edged brush with a brush that has a “sprinkled” texture. Also try experimenting with the scattering setting while you are in brush settings. Above is an example of such a brush. To paint windows and doors, all you need to do is to follow the structure lines and paint these objects parallel to them. Paint in low opacity and use the same type of colours you have already. I enhanced the light to bring out the centre building even more. Some new colours were introduced on the building on the right, however you will notice that these aren’t extremes (Fig04). I then decided to tear out a part of the building on the right, in order to create more chaos (Fig05).
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Levente Peterffy For more from this artist visit www.leventep.com or contact
[email protected]
Some silhouettes were created in back to add more buildings - this is a city after all (Fig06). Colour adjustments in this examples were very minor, and after this step I was basically done. An unsharpen mask can also be used if you want to make the image crisper. And there we go: Destroyed City (Fig07).
Chapter 06
Speed Painting
Created In: Painter and Photoshop CS3 When I first heard about speed painting, I thought that it would simply be a quickly executed painting, but speed painting is so
I started out in Painter by creating a new 1000
does this extremely well in his conceptual art.
much more than that! As soon as I grasped
x 600 pixel document and filling it with a brown
I had to apply these initial strokes with
the concept behind it, I understood its value
wash colour. I then took a Thick Acrylic Round
some confidence, since I really didn’t know
as practice for putting down the essential
brush and quickly laid down some brush strokes
where I was going. Speed painting is often a
ingredients of a painting in the least amount
to define the bigger masses that would compose
subconsciousness-led process where you don’t
of time, for example line, value, colour,
the painting (Fig01).
always have the time to be rational.
Concentrating on the essential infuses the
The great thing about Painter’s “thick” brushes
I then filled the canvas with a 30% opacity
painting with character. Digital speed painting
is that their relief helps to add an interesting
magenta (from the “Effects” menu), to somewhat
benefits from some really helpful tools that
underlying texture with a lot of character, since
unify the colours. Taking the magical glow brush
software has to offer, like custom brush creation,
it follows the brush strokes’ direction. I was
(found under the F-X brushes) I added a strong
painting at different magnifications, ease in
actually inspired by the artist Erik Tiemens who
light source to the painting (Fig02).
composition, light, theme, mood and so on.
picking colours, layers and their associated blending modes, and (rather importantly) keyboard short-cuts for almost every command. Everything meets in a creation process where the mind goes beyond the tools and focuses only on content. For this tutorial, the Destroyed City brief was a theme quite to my liking, because I’ve always had a fascination for ruined buildings - there’s just something about them not being represented in their natural state and having been deconstructed to something abstract... To get the juices flowing, I did a quick image search on the Internet from where I collected some photos and put them all into one document. I kept it open next to the painting most of the time so that I was able to quickly draw inspiration from it.
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Please be advised to use dark “not too saturated” colours when painting with this brush in order to achieve rich saturated effects. I then took an Oil Pastel and a Blender brush and started defining the actual scene (Fig03). It’s interesting to see how Painter keeps the “relief” information below, as if I had gessoed the canvas previously. I then brought the painting into Photoshop to add more detail. (Why not use Painter all the way? Well, for me, Photoshop is much more intuitive when it comes to detail, adjustments and custom brushes.) First of all, I doubled the painting’s resolution, and then opened a new document and painted a section of a facade (Fig04). I brought this new object into my painting as a new layer which I copied and transformed several times to build up my destroyed city - which is quite a paradox! Keeping these copies as layers, I erased
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portions and painted some quick brush strokes over them to add some variation. In the final stages, I added some dead trees, which I had seen in some reference photos.
Andreas Rocha For more from this artist visit: www.andreasrocha.com Or contact:
[email protected]
Their branches broke up the rectangular look
In the end, I applied the Smart Sharpen Filter,
of the built environment (Fig05). Then finally, to
which is something I always do to bring out all
add a bit of character and give the composition
the detail of the brushwork (Fig06).
a human scale, I added a small figure silhouetted by strong reflections from the sun.
chapter 7
“Evolution had played its part on these creatures as their world heated up, but the thousands of years of forced hard labor had had more impact” by Mark Muniz & Rich Tilbury
Speed Painting Chapter 07
evidence to suggest that larger nasal cavities
making the rear legs almost useless;
would help humidify air. Longer limbs would also
e) thick, hairless, callused skin;
help by giving more surface area to aid in the
f) large nostrils to humidify air
efficiency of perspiration. As to the forced labour
I believe that a speed painting should convey the essence of an idea. This month’s topic was to create a creature that has undergone evolutionary changes due to the world’s increased temperature, as well as forced labour. The idea of evolution is fascinating and endless. We have seen that evolution can be due to physical and social environmental changes. I did some background research and found that, in arid climates, creatures would develop denser and coarser skin as well as
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environment that would affect the creature,
I scanned the thumbnails into Photoshop at
I used the premise of underground gem
300dpi. I then erased all of them, leaving only
mining. Underground could be a slightly cooler
the fifth pose that I had created (clockwise from
environment than the surface’s temperature,
top left) (Fig02). I used the Lasso tool to re-size
but it would still require adaptations to occur in
and shift the position of the head and hand. This
order for the creature to perform a specific duty
layer was set to Multiply mode. I then created a
by hand only. I felt that forced labour would
new layer below it and started blocking in some
also leave the creature with a sombre, almost
basic greyscale values (Fig03).
oppressed expression.
The next step was to do some texture overlays of rock and rough skin (Fig04). I specifically
I started with a series of thumbnail drawings
used the skin texture of a hairless mole rat; I
(Fig01). These quick sketches had the primary
felt it was the perfect fit for the creature I had
characteristics that I had in mind:
in mind. One layer was designated for the rock
a) long and powerful front limbs for digging;
texture and another was created for the skin
b) large eyes for improved visibility
texture. I created the two separate overlay
underground;
layers for their independent editing options. On
c) large scoop like fused hands;
the rock texture layer I erased the solid shape
d) a posture suited for the job, eventually
of my creature. I then used the Magic Wand
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tool to select the erased area. I switched to my skin texture layer, inversed my Magic Wand selection (Ctrl + Shift + I), and deleted all of the texture that I didn’t want outside of my creature’s contour. Both layers were created above my greyscale layers. Note: remember to hit (Ctrl + D) to deselect once you’ve done editing. At this point I adjusted the opacity of the texture overlay layers to my desired liking, and then merged them with my greyscale layer. On my newly merged layer I decided to make some hue and saturation adjustments (Fig05). To do this I went to Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation. When I got to that Hue/Saturation options, I was given lots of room to make colour selections and adjustments. I chose to go with warm tones that lent themselves more to the theme of the topic. I created a new layer above all of the others and began the process of over painting. The first evidence of this can be seen in (Fig06). My intent was to mimic some of the textures that existed in the earlier overlay layers, as well as to establish a hint of a light source. I wanted to render the form more by hand, rather than distorting an existing texture. I then moved on to work on the head and face (Fig07); I felt that the face should really reflect the emotional and physical changes that would have taken place throughout this particular evolutionary period. I wanted the face to be able to tell a story simply on its own. I tried to emphasise the large nostrils to help humidify the air, the large eyes to gather what little light there would be, and the rough skin formed from the dry and harsh environment. Next, I started detailing the skin of the body and rendering the scoop-like hand (Fig08 - 09). I started adding some details to the background: small embedded gems and rock textures (Fig10). Finally, I merged the top colour and the bottom overlay layers. I did a little colour dodging and burning, cropped the image, and added my signature (Fig11).
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Speed Painting Chapter 07 Note: I used a small airbrush and a custom ‘rock’ brush that I created to do the entire painting, and the final document size came in at 1200 X 600 pixels. A fair amount of time went into research for information for this piece, in order that I met the criteria of this topic. Once I had the textures and physical characteristics established in my mind, it allowed me to paint the whole piece in about two and half hours. Having a good base of ideas will help speed up any creation process. Keep them simple and consistent. This concept was fun and challenging and I hope that I managed to do it some justice. Thanks for reading this tutorial now go set your stop-watch and start painting!
Mark Muniz For more from this artist contact:
[email protected]
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Introduction This month sees the exercise primarily orientated around creature design. The description conjures up an image of an animal which has been exploited by another race or species and used as a “pack horse”. For this painting I started as usual with a quick sketch to establish the overall shape and look of the animal. I imagined something that was once similar to a human and which walked upright on two legs. Due to its strength it was adopted by another humanoid race (surprise) and used to carry large, weighted packs of supplies and building materials on its back in order to navigate the mountainous and rocky planet. Due to the strenuous effort involved in transporting ever increasing weight, it gradually forced the
set this layer to Multiply and then created a new
and warm browns for the shadow areas (Fig02).
layer underneath on which to start the painting.
To add some interest I added a wall on the
This meant I could use the drawing as a guide
left hand side which would contrast with the
whilst adding colour. As the title implied a hot
mountains I will add later in the background.
environment, I naturally went for a warm colour
The next stage involves blocking the creature in
scheme. I chose yellows and pinks for the sky
and deepening the shadows. I used a custom
creature onto its hands to help support itself, and thus in time the shoulders and upper body became exaggerated to cope with the lifestyle. The feet also developed large, flattened toes similar to hooves to help it balance and spread the weight, as well as providing a larger surface area to prevent it from slipping on steep, rocky ground (Fig01). You can see that the design has characteristics of a gorilla, but with more humanlike legs. The eyes are set deeper in the head and I have made the nasal cavity bigger to allow more air intake as it carries heavy loads.
Blocking In This sketch was enough to get started, so after having scanned it into the computer and importing it into Photoshop I began work on it. I
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brush to create the background, which can
layer, but as this exercise was intended as a
the brightest section. One more touch added on
be seen in Fig03, but the creature itself was
tutorial I added new layers to help separate the
this layer was the molten rock and lava which
painted using a standard Hard Round brush.
stages and allow quick changes to be made to
can be seen in the middle distance across the
You will notice that I have used a few different
the image. The next step is to increase the tonal
ground on the right. On the base layer I put in
colours which will help break up the skin
range in the image by adding a cooler grey/blue
some eyes quickly as a test, and added some
tones eventually and add some much needed
colour overlay (R126, G148, B169) across the
warm highlights across the arms and right leg.
randomness - which always appears more
creature, set to Multiply at 50% opacity to keep
At this point I had been working on the image
natural. On the same layer I now used a warm
him within the shadow of the wall (Fig05). You
for about an hour and a quarter and could have
brown/red hue and darkened the foreground.
will also notice that I have added some evidence
called it a day so to speak, but wanted to make
Using the Lasso tool I then created a quick
of stones and rocks across the ground and
a few more tweaks, yet...
mountain shape in the background and blocked
darkened the base of the wall (set to Soft Light).
in some shadow areas and blended them with
If you look at the Layers palette (inset), you will
the foreground (Fig04). Using the custom brush
notice that I have also included some shading
and a lighter pink colour, I then roughed in
across certain parts of the creature on this layer.
some highlights and cloud formations, quickly
At this stage, I flattened the file and then added
establishing the light source in the upper-left
a new layer set to Screen in order to increase
area above the wall.
the intensity of light. Using a pale yellow, as
Adding New Layers So far everything has been painted on one
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seen in Fig06, I brushed in some lighter areas and clouds across the sky and had some light filter over the wall, making this upper-left corner
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Final Touches The creature is almost complete, but in order to make the skin more resistant to the increasing heat I decided to add some sign that it was evolving scales, similar to a reptile or lizard. For this I made a quick custom brush using four ellipses, as seen in Fig07 - 08. You can see from Fig08 that the Spacing slider has been moved about half way to create a tiling pattern. To align the brush with the various parts of the body, change the angle by rotating the arrow highlighted in red. You can see how these revised settings appear in the brushes palette in Fig07. Now it’s simply a case of painting in some areas around the highlights on a separate layer. I did this using an off-white and then set the blending mode to Overlay, which means they will not affect the base skin colour too much. You can see the final version in Fig09. I painted in some extra highlights across the shoulders and arm, as the new scaly skin would be more reflective. I also changed the shape of the nostril to closer resemble a camel’s, which can close up in the event of a sandstorm.
Conclusion Without doubt the most difficult (and most interesting) aspect of this particular topic was trying to conceive a design that looked at once “fantastic”, but also physically correct. Not being a zoologist, I cannot say how successful I have been, but it was good fun to invent a new life form. As with most of these exercises, they do inspire me to consider the subject matter in more depth and in this case design another variation. The whole piece took about one and three quarter hours, barring a few minor tweaks. As speed painting is essentially about the structuring of an image, i.e. the colour scheme, lighting, form, shape and composition and so on, I believe it is not necessary to create complex customised brushes. In this case however, my main brush already existed and certainly helped add atmosphere to the background scenery, but I would not normally spend time making one especially. Unless you have a set of customised brushes already, the standard set should prove ample enough to achieving the desired aim with this type of painting.
Rich Tilbury For more from this artist contact:
[email protected]
Chapter 8
The party entertainers’ real twisted identities were very far from their bright, colorful disguises by Fred Augis & Rich Tilbury
Speed Painting Chapter 08 Picture 02 I then had to integrate the light from the candles, as this was to be my principal source of light. I was therefore able to pose ‘volumes’ for each silhouette. Whilst placing the three characters in the lower part of the lit scene, very close to the source of light, I was obliged to hide certain zones of their body, adding mystery to their characters.
To evoke this subject I chose to settle my work in the middle of a Baroque scene, where we discover guests who are fascinated by the dexterity of the juggling acts carried out by an entertainer. In spite of the good mood evoked by this aristocrat clown, he acts on a tormented heart which carries the blood of his victims on his hands...
Picture 01 Using Photoshop, the first stage in the construction of this speed painting was to establish the composition of the scene; to pose the masses of each element in order to obtain their silhouettes and to benefit from them in order to deposit smaller subjects at the bottom. To detach the elements from one another, I contrasted many levels of grey, in particular for the main subject.
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Picture 03 I continued this work by detailing the characters - always in black and white - until achieving a satisfactory quality. I concentrated on the masked man and added elements such as the cigarette smoke in the foreground. I then started to add colour to my composition...
Picture 04 I selected a sepia colour which I applied to the whole of the painting in order to evoke an environment reminiscent of the past. I then gilded the masks in gold to slightly detach them from the other elements. I then integrated the most conspicuous colour: red – the blood that the three men around the subject have on their hands. I benefited from posing a halo of light around each of the burning lights.
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Speed Painting Chapter 08 Picture 05 - 06 For the final phase I contrasted certain zones using the Overlay filter, by concentrating the light on top of the image and adding some textures at the same time. Using the Smudge tool, I sought to apply movement to the three tormented men. To finish off, I refined the proportions using the Fluidity tool.
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Fred Augis For more from this artist contact:
[email protected]
Speed Painting Chapter 08
Introduction For this month’s exercise I decided to situate my scene in a traditional theatre setting and imagine it was set at some point during the Victorian era. I chose to use somewhat traditional costumes as a result, such as a court jester and man wearing a variation of a Napoleonic hat, which I believe is known as a Tricorne. Anyway, the idea was that it gave the picture a historical feel and hopefully established it in at some point in the past. The idea behind the image is that a man is seated on a stage and is about to take
part in some form of illusion or trickery, but what is in fact going to happen is that he is about to have his throat cut!
Blocking In As is usual for me during these speed painting exercises, I start on paper with a quick sketch as I find it easier to draw on paper than I do using a Wacom. Fig01 shows my initial starting point, which shows a portly gentleman sitting with his head tilted back and a masked entertainer behind him. I like to begin with some form of template even if it does not fully describe the final composition. Once the drawing was scanned into the computer I started by laying down a brown/grey background and set the drawing to Multiply above this layer so I could see the line work over the blocking in. I chose a warm grey because the scene is set in a theatre under bright light and will help add warm undertones to the final image. I then added a new layer on top of this, on which I will begin establishing the highlights and shadows. Fig02 shows the drawing above the tonal layer which was done in black and white, with the brown background showing through underneath.
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Adding Colour. The next stage involves adding colour, which I will do on a separate layer to begin with. It is not necessary to keep adding new layers each time you add more detail, but when you have to break the process down into a step-by-step tutorial it is very useful! The first colour layer is set to Overlay, which means that it can be painted over the tonal layer but still adhere to the black and white values. This is a technique I have begun using lately but sometimes only as a starting point. It does have a tendency to subdue colour somewhat even though it is an effective approach, and I often flatten the image after experimenting with a colour scheme and then paint entirely on one layer to refine things. Fig03 shows the early stages of a colour layer being added, which was done in two ways in this case. The green arm of the left entertainer was done on an Overlay layer, and you can see how the green has remained faithful to the tones underneath when compared
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to the previous illustration. The jester character on the right has been painted on a separate layer set to Normal mode, and so the colour is opaque by comparison. I find it helpful to always experiment and mix things up a bit as you never know what you may learn from exploring different avenues. The tonal range has established the light source in the top left and with the colour layers added I now have a clearer idea about how the painting is going. It is now a question of tidying up what we have so far and then putting in the final details. Fig04 shows the picture at a further stage with some additional colour and modulation, particularly across the seated man and jester. Perhaps more importantly the razor which helps to unlock the sinister aspect behind the image has been hinted at in the lower left.
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Finishing the Picture The picture is coming together now but there are a still a few problems with the overall feel of the image. The characters are satisfyingly colourful and contrast nicely with the hapless victim, and the red curtains add a theatrical and symbolic streak of red in the background. However, one thing that looks wrong is the light, which does not seem very intense seeing that the scene is set under a bright spotlight. To counter this I add a new layer set to Soft Light, and add a gradient blending from a pale orange through to transparent, from the top down. In Fig05 you can see, compared to the last stage, how this adds a warmer value to the colour scheme, particularly the red curtain which now looks far more vibrant. To mirror the brighter light, the floor also needs some highlights cast across the wooden boards, so I put in some reflections. Perhaps, more importantly, I add a glint of light across the razor to emphasise the sharp blade and to make it stand out against the dark background. The last thing to do is make the final refinements and changes that will help improve the image.
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Fig06 shows the final picture with all the cumulative tweaks, which includes a Curves adjustment layer. This helped add just a bit more intensity to the spotlight, which I felt was still a little weak. I toned down the floor highlights to hide the chair and also to emphasise the characters, as well as warming up the backdrop with a grey/brown showing some evidence of stage scaffolding. One small aspect I added was a blindfold, which I felt made the man feel even more vulnerable and unaware of his impending doom!
Conclusion The image is complete and, as usual, has been an interesting challenge. I could have made the faces of the two entertainers look more twisted and evil perhaps, but I actually quite liked the fact that their intent is hidden. I thought in the end that the blindfold and razor injected the picture with an unnerving aspect which did not necessarily need to be portrayed by the faces themselves. I may however do another version with more stylised and darker characters, in the future. I decided that the jester should be holding a shallow bowl in a rather ambiguous manner to help keep the viewer guessing. Maybe I could have blindfolded the guy with the razor? ...
Richard Tilbury For more from this artist contact:
[email protected]
chapter 9
“The citizens of the flooded city now resided in the tallest buildings connected by makeshift bridges.” by Mike Corriero , Emrah Elmasli & Mikko Kinnunen
Speed Painting Chapter 09
Introduction Touching on a subject that involves some architecture for a speed painting can either be extremely simple or extremely difficult; it all depends on how you handle it. If the architecture is meant to be abstract it’s likely you may more easily get away with a lot of technical details. If you choose to produce a more modern or less complex style of architecture you can make it easier on yourself with creating a few quick custom brushes.
As a first step you can see I have just set up my
instead of going back and forth to the Colour
canvas with the horizon line, a couple of simple
Picker window (Fig01).
perspective lines and a base for the water and
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sky. To the right is a reference image that,
Under the brush presets you can adjust a lot of
although won’t set the basis for my designs,
the settings to get endless effects. This is just
will just help keep me on track when working
a simple brush I use a lot, called an “Airbrush
quicker than usual. Then I have just set up a
Pen Opacity Flow” brush; with the brush shape
small colour palette to sample some hues from,
flattened and the scatter option applied it will
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serve as water ripples. You can also apply Colour Dynamics and play around with the brightness and contrast and the two colour boxes, so you’ll get a nice mixture of values and colour shifts without switching your settings (Fig02). Only a few minutes in and I’ve laid down a quick base for the water, light for the sky and some clouds. This will be worked on top of and always kept as the background layer with the simplest of details and the main base. As I laid the water lines down I made sure just to keep a couple of layers and size variation in perspective and in line with my grid (Fig03a). The colour palette can be seen in Fig03b. Producing a colour palette like this is sometimes much more affective than randomly choosing colours off of the Colour Picker window. All I did was take a photo that had a nice colour scheme that I wanted to apply to my painting, added a quick smart blur and the pinch filter.
Quickly laying in the large main elements in
The brush list is a quickly created group of
the foreground, I’m using a custom brush from
boxed brushes. They were not all used but it’s
a set of construction boxed brushes I made
nice to have them handy so that when you begin
for this very purpose. A quick and easy way to
painting you have most elements and shapes
produce a speed painting involving architectural
already set up . The presets have been kept
designs such as buildings is by laying down
off because with all of these brush shapes I am
a perspective grid and using custom brushes.
playing around a lot with the angles, the spacing
I’ve set the Brush Presets so that the spacing
and the sizes to produce my buildings and
of my brush is far enough apart to produce a
bridges (Fig04b).
kind of pattern effect. Just click one spot on the
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canvas then hold shift and click where you want
On a new layer some small buildings and
your brush stroke to head. You’ll get a perfectly
minimal detail are added to the far background;
straight line, and with the spaced brush it will
notice as the buildings are pushed back further
give you an interesting design effect (Fig04a).
the value has become lighter and details are
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lessened. I’m keeping each plane of buildings
keeping the base lighter around the object
on their own layer for when I produce the
where it connects and meets the water will help
reflective effects in the water (Fig05).
distinguish the reflection from its origin (Fig 06).
I’ve started to beef up some of the details on
Here you can see how I’ve copy-flipped the
the buildings, mainly in the background first of
buildings after their details; the bridges and
all, as I start to produce reflections and water
windows were added and then set the reflective
ripples. A very quick and easy way to produce
layer to a lower opacity. Checking out the
a reflection is to simply copy the layer and flip it
painting at 100 percent resolution you would
vertically, then just lower the opacity, darken the
see how choppy and simple the water effect
colours and overlay a few water ripples. Usually
is, as shown in Fig02. Increasing the size and
lining the base of the buildings with a more scattered version will help provide a splashed look (Fig07). At this point I have flipped the painting to check the composition and decided it would be more interesting to cut down the second foremost building so that we can see the base swallowed up by the flooding waters (Fig08). Here I have just utilised one of my custom brushes to lay in some foreground bridges. All throughout the painting process I’ve been
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keeping most of this monochromatic and will apply a touch of additional colour towards the next few final stages (Fig09). Once most of the painting has been completed I’m just going to do a quick level adjustment. It doesn’t always work, but using the Auto Levels option can quickly adjust the values and might produce an affective change. In this case I like what it has done and will keep most of the changes it made (Fig10). Coming down to the final stage here, what you’re seeing is just some colour applied on a new layer set to Colour, then using my colour palette I’ve just painted some warm lighting in the background and pumped up the saturation in a few key areas. The entire painting was widened on the edges so as not to lose some elements when I decided to give a tilt to the composition, adding a bit more dynamic to the perspective (Fig11).
Final Touches Final steps taken to bring this speed painting to a final image included the addition of some
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important details for scale. I’ve added railings and stairs to the bridges, touched up some of the rooftop textures and lighting, added a few figures in the foreground, some satellites for communication, as well as a billboard. Last minute adjustments to the values and saturation are made specifically to the sun, and this painting of a flooded, high, sky-rise city connected by makeshift bridges, in what has become a near future disaster scene, is complete (Fig12).
Mike Corriero For more from this artist visit: www.mikecorriero.com Or contact:
[email protected]
Chapter 09
Speed Painting
Step 1 As the first step, I open up a new canvas in Photoshop CS3 and select the Gradient Tool (G) to create a sky colour gradient to achieve a feel for the painting. Starting to paint on a full canvas is better then painting on an empty canvas. I preferred a purple and grey combination for this painting, but it would be nice as blue and pink, as well. It’s your choice really (Fig01).
Step 2 Then I start blocking the colours in with a bold brush. I paint in the silhouettes of the buildings very roughly. I add some tall buildings to the far distance to achieve a nice depth of field feel, as well. I never zoom in at the first step. I always paint at 25% or 50% percent. I also need to get
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the composition right in this step. It’s not easy to
to get satisfactory results in a short amount of
and colour richness in my painting, so I create
fix it later on (Fig02).
time. So, my brush strokes are very fast. I was
some adjustment layers like Curves and Colour
planning to finish the painting in an hour, but I
Balance to adjust the brightness, contrast and
decided to put some more details on it (Fig03).
colours (Ctrl + M; Ctrl + B). Then I paint in some
Step 3 I start to add some colours to increase the
dramatic clouds. A mixture of purple, orange
saturation and I also apply the main light
Step 4
source from the left hand side. This is a speed
Now the rest is just adding the details and
custom brushes that I created whilst painting
painting so the time is important. The aim is
adjusting the colours. I need some contrast
them. The rest of the painting needs a lot of
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and yellow would be good for this. I used some
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detail, so I just paint in a lot of minor details on the building. Any brush of your choice would do (Fig04a & b).
Final As the final step, I zoom in and add little lights and details of the flood verses the city. To make the lights glow, I create a new layer and change the layer properties to Colour Dodge. Then I select a dark orange-ish colour and paint them in with a default brush. That’s it: 90 minutes work in total.
Emrah Elmasli For more from this artist visit: www.partycule.com Or contact:
[email protected]
Chapter 09
Speed Painting
Introduction In this Speed Painting tutorial I’m going to explain a little about the use of 3D tools in the process of designing an image. Most of the best 2D artists I’ve met do not like to use 3D that much. Many won’t even touch these applications for whatever reasons. I was one of those guys, until I was forced to move into the 3D world when I got my first, proper job in the games industry. I’m going to show a process that is almost invisible in the actual finished image, yet helped me a lot when nailing down the composition of this speed painting.
Quick Composition In a matter of minutes (or seconds, depending) I create a quick sketch which includes most of the relevant compositional information regarding my painting. I start off with a long, cubic shape on the left, which will eventually become my major makeshift bridge, as suggested by the title. I’m not worrying at all about screwing things up at this point. It’s always better to work intuitively in the beginning, unless you’re working under the very specific constraints of a professional assignment (Fig01).
The Dreadful 3D Part Having envisioned the basic premise of the composition in my mind, I start putting together a scene of very simple box geometry in 3ds Max. I’m not going into specifics of any 3D application here, as there are better tutorials for that. I basically just create a flat ground plane, a few repeated box shapes, and a camera setup with a wide-angle lens which suits my needs the best. Then I put in two light sources from opposing directions, with the sun being the stronger one. The other would be the fill
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Speed Painting Chapter 09 light from the sky. I don’t use any heavy global illumination-type settings which would make the image take a while to render. I hit the render button and make sure I have enough resolution so that I won’t get too much pixelation (aliasing) around the edges (Fig02).
Blocking in the Colours After my 3D layout is finished, I start glazing colours on top of it in Photoshop. I use a mixture of opaque and transparent layers whilst trying to find the kind of colours I’m intending to use in this piece. My approach is very experimental, and I’m not afraid to use tools like the Selective Colour adjustment layer to find the right tones. This time I’m going for a very stylised red and blue palette. I proceed with the colouring,
the image as a .tif file, and open it in Painter
result without any 3D, by using more traditional
always thinking in warms and cools (Fig03).
Essentials 2. It’s a free app. that came with my
perspective drawing, and you might do the
Wacom tablet. Basically, any version of Painter
blending with some custom smudge brushes in
Wrapping it Up
has this great brush engine which is good for
Photoshop. I just like to shuffle my software a bit
This is the most defining stage in terms of
blending. I start using the Palette Knife brushes
and use everything I can to the full extent. It’s
the final style of the image. I go for this rather
to soften my rather straightfoward and edgy
all about getting your creative vision across, and
graphic and painterly style, with strong shadows
Photoshop colouring. There isn’t really one
you shouldn’t let the sometimes clumsy digital
and a lot of saturation. I save a version of
way to do this; you could achieve the same
tools hold you down!
Mikko Kinnunen For more from this artist visit: www.artbymikko.com Or contact:
[email protected]
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Image by Chris Thunig
Image by Richard Tilbury
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Image by Michel Roger
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