Need outside eyes

[Springheel]

I've been working on this piece for a while, now, and I think I need some outside perspective. Something is bothering me about the woman's face...I've been working on the lighting there for ages, but I'm still not sure it's right, or if it's something else entirely. If anyone can see anything that I can still catch at this point, especially in the lighting department, please let me know. Redlines welcome.

http://www.mindplaces.com/save/balladar2.jpg

Detail of faces:
http://www.mindplaces.com/save/balladar.jpg

[Carlton Hamilton]

there where two different styles back in the day, one is the painters and the drawers, the drawers always used an outlineand the painters never used an outline.even though they did both drawing and painting i thin your concept came from a drawing. all im saying is that use less of an outline you only nedd to show your planes in your painting with the idea of hinting of color not so much of a bold outline for example; the artist vargas.;) and if you want to use an out line in your art use the artist simon bisley:chug:for the example i think this will give you an idea for what you are looking for

[Chris Beatrice]

Springheel,
Three cheers to you for all the effort you have obviously put into this piece. You are well on the way to being a great picture-maker my friend! I know very how frustrating it can be to struggle and struggle to get the lighting right in a piece. Believe me, it gets easier and easier, and the way you are approaching this is the right way to learn. You will learn a lot this way, vs. copying from photos.

One thing you can think about when trying to ensure consistency in lighting is, to establish where your light source is, draw a perfect sphere somewhere in or over the scene (or on a separate layer, or even a separate piece of paper). Shade the sphere, to establish the direction of your light, and add the specular highlight to relate that to the viewer's eye. Now, look at all the forms in your scene, and for any given location on the surface of a form, identify which plane of the sphere it most closely parallels. Do you know what I mean? Identify which part of the sphere is facing in the same direction as the area of the form you're working on. Then you can assign the relative shaded value from that part of the sphere to the area of the actual form you're working on in your piece. You can also draw a few other forms to serve as additional guides, like a cylinder, cone, cube, etc. Of course this doesn't take into account cast shadows.

This is actually how 3d rendering software works. Though the interface presents you with virtual "lights", all the software is really doing is measuring what direction each facet of the model is facing. All facets that face in the same direction receive the same value. The closer the facet is to facing the point defined as the "light", the higher it's value. So rather than imagining a light moving out and shining on your objects, imagine the facets, or various surfaces of your objects "looking" at the light source. If they face the light source exactly, they are the highest value (not dealing with specular highlights at this point). If they face perpendicular to the light source, they recieve hardly any light. If they face away from the light source, they receive no light (not dealing with reflected light, ambient light, radiosity, etc., at this point). Does that make sense?

The specular point, or "highlight" occurs where the light bounces off the object and reflects exactly into the viewer's eye. That is, the angle between the light source and the surface, is the same as that between the viewer's eye and the surface. Imagine you're looking at a sunset over still water, while standing on a beach. Now pick a random spot on the surface of the water, somewhere between where you're standing and the distant sun. If you move that spot toward the sun, the angle between that spot and the sun increases (gets steeper), while the angle between that spot and your eye decreases (gets less steep). At some precise point, though, those angles will be the same, and that is the point where you will see the highlight the water, because really all you are seeing is the reflection of the sun on the water. That's really all a highlight is, a reflection. As such, this can never occur in the exact center of the lightest area of a surface (in terms of its shading), unless your eye and the light source are in exactly the same place.

If you applied these principles to your piece you would identify a lot of the inconsistencies.

Now, if you'd like some specific help in resolving some of the lighting issues in this picture, I think I can provide it. I really don't like drawing on other people's work, so I'll try to touch on a few points verbally and hopefully you can take it from there. I'm seeing a few inconsistencies in the lighting, and this is making it a bit hard for me to know which is correct. The light is obviously coming from the right, and maybe slightly higher than eye level? Or is it on the same level as eye level? Since you asked about the woman's face, specifically, I will start with that: Look at her forehead, as a good model for where the light is coming from. The center of her forehead (i.e. the center of her 3d forehead) is fairly dark, and the highlight is falling to the right of this. But the bridge of her nose, which essentially faces in the same direction as the center of her forehead is much lighter than the forehead immediately above it. The right side of her nose should be the lightest part of her nose, and the front (all the way up to her forehead) should be darker than this. Do you see that?

The highlight on the woman's "love handle" is way off on the edge, as if the light is directly to her side. But on her eye socket, forehead and right breast the light is more out in front. On her left breast, it's off to the side again.

[Springheel]

One thing you can think about when trying to ensure consistency in lighting is, to establish where your light source is, draw a perfect sphere somewhere in or over the scene (or on a separate layer, or even a separate piece of paper). Shade the sphere, to establish the direction of your light, and add the specular highlight to relate that to the viewer's eye. Now, look at all the forms in your scene, and for any given location on the surface of a form, identify which plane of the sphere it most closely parallels.

Hey, thanks for the in-depth reply, Chris. The above idea is a very interesting one which I'll have to try. I'd prefer something that can be made easily...do you know if Photoshop has a way to do this?


The light is obviously coming from the right, and maybe slightly higher than eye level? Or is it on the same level as eye level?

It should be higher than eye level, but you make some good observations about how it doesn't look like it in spots. I needed an impartial eye to point some of those out. Thanks again. :)

[Chris Beatrice]

I'm not sure what you mean about Photoshop having a way to help you with this. In your painting here, with each form, you are obviously trying to imagine, or envision, how the light is striking that form. But these forms are very complex. So I'm saying first just draw a simple form, like an orange, apple, ball, etc. Then, imagine that form (or thousands of instances of it) inside the complex forms you're really trying to draw.