Studying Value.

[Luke25]

I am trying to study values in an attempt to better my work.

How would i got about doing this? Are there any tutorials out there?

Or is it best just to pop pictures in greyscale and copy these?

Thanks Luke

[J Wilson]

Best is to NOT pop them into greyscale. You want to practice seeing the values, and if you convert some images to greyscale, then you aren't strengthening your value understanding as much as you should be.

My advice, if you don't feel ready to jump into a full value drawing, is to start simpler. Try just breaking things down into 3 values first: light, mid-tone, shadow.

If you don't mind spending some money on this, buy a package of Prismacolor markers in greys. They'll be marked by percentages 10%-90% (0% is the white of the paper, and 100% would be black). You can also use a set of drawing pencils in different hardnesses, but the actual tone you get out of any pencil will vary by how much pressure you use, where as the markers have relatively locked values.

The exercise will be to block out any drawing in the most basic values, then practice refining to more and more specific values. For example, you can use the 3 values I mentioned above and block in the light, mid, and shadow tones. Once you feel you have a good feel for that, try using more and more values.

[Christian223]

Here is a thread that talks about values, it has some great resources, good luck:

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=165667