Where to start with environment design?

[CarloPiantini]

I was wondering if there are any good books/dvds to start someone on environment design. I have come to understand over these last few months how important it is to study the aspects of what you want to draw, and I was wondering where is a good place to begin in this area. I'm interested in both interior and exterior environment design. What's a good jump off point?

[Noah Bradley]

Betcha haven't heard this one before:

Study from life!

:)

No, seriously, study from life. :) Learn to paint landscapes/cityscapes/indoor-scapes. Yes, there are some more technical things to take note of (perspective and such), but getting out there and whipping out landscapes will give you a solid basis for how to come up with your own environments. I recall an artist from one of my favorite blogs (whose name eludes me) saying that "learning to paint landscapes in the studio is like learning to swim by sitting on your couch."

Get out there and paint! :)

[Aphotic Phoenix]

I really enjoyed Whit Brachna's Environmental Speedpaints (http://media.massiveblack.com/downloads.html#whit3), which comes with the additional benefit of some included brushes in the download. The perspective brushes created by m@. are available here (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=73169). Unfortunately he only does one interior in the download however.

devArt user concept-on-mac (http://concept-on-mac.deviantart.com/gallery/) has a few tutorials/step-by-step posted in his gallery although I can't remember how useful they are, and a collection of free brushes that have some good ones in there.

[Musselfarmstudios]

Dream Worlds by Hans Bacher it has a lot of basics about production design really good book!

[Shard]

Ciao Carlo,
I also recommend Whit's dvd.. its very good.
also anything about perspective..there should be a few free tutorials around and a few videos if you dont mind spending..they'll save you a lot of headaches..
perspective in all environment types is what you're gonna be focusing on for enviro work so its good to have good knowledge of it..
good luck :)

[CarloPiantini]

thanks guys. noah, i think you're definitely right about getting out there and paint. I was gonna do some hand drawings today, but I think I may get out and do some landscape stuff instead. whit's dvd looks like a good one, I think i'm going to grab it. same with that book dream worlds

[Mock]

Dobsky's perspective videos and Feng Zhu's sketching environments DvD over at Gnomon.

[Zazerzs]

Syd Mead's stuff is pretty cool.

Start with tiny thumbnails :)