City Environment - Need help with details

[OneBigCelt]

.ve been working on exspanding my drawing ability... trying out environments.

I've got a handle on perspective but I really need help with details that make environments interesting and that complete the transition into another world for the veiwer

are there any tutorials or a good resources particularly in detailng....

thanks if any one wants to have at my drawing do illustrate something I don't mind... this is practice


http://www.macnider.org/images/posts/environment.jpg

[TJ Verhagen]

Ok.. hmm lets see...

First of all, ofcourse, is the textures of everything. add some lights here and there.. and you'll probably want to make it look like the city is very large, so you could make silhouets of other buildings, fading in the background, like the city is going on beyond the edges of your paper:)

Ofcourse lighting is important. get a good fix on your light points and work from that.

as you make more details, just picture what you have in cities today.. building lights, streetlights, cars (perhaps floating cars, like in The Fifth Element) taxicabs... you name it.

[jeroentje]

Yep, I agree with TJ. And if you decide to continue in Photoshop, I suggest that you use the Free Tranformation tool to take out a whole lot of the down perspective and than make a crop. You should have put your vanashing point a lot lower. The pic will look a lot better than, and it will be a very good basic drawing for your city. This could become pretty cool than.
Keep updating :chug:
(And the 5th element is indeed a perfect reference for stuff like this, you might want to do a search for Bladerunner aswell, or for that crazy chase-scene in the beginning of Episode2)

[MolvaDo]

all i can say is i like the tv show futurama and this reminds me of it. as for detail all i can tell you is check out the second disc on Final Fantasy The Spirits Within, there is a special clip in the french dude that did all their matte paintings in the movie and he is f***ing amazing. In there you will see some awesome detail work. Check that out it probably the only thing that made it worth buy the DVD

[espaki]

i'm not sure if it is the same guy you are talking about, but Craig Mullins at http://www.goodbrush.com did some matte paintings for final fantasy. those and everything else on his site are amazing all around. For the final fantasy pics go to the "projects" section of his site.

-Nate

[AfroLaxMan]

for the details for the buildings, I buy/borrow/read architecture books, magazines with tons of photos of cities I don't live in, get on the web and search for photos of major cities. With all the wonderful images I compile together, I pick out the interesting parts and add them here and there. Try to spread the love around as much as possible, (unless one building is the focus).
Neat thing about a city is it is made up of millions of people, each has a unique idea of what they like, so keep that in mind when drawing up different buildings. I live in Austin, and we are in the midst of a growing phase, so I can see all sorts of different buildings everyday (and this is a small city still).

looks good, can't wait to see the finished piece.

:afro2:

[MolvaDo]

it could have been craig mullins, but i am not sure i went to his site and looked at those matte painting and some are features on the movie in great detail as to breakdown of layers and processing. If you haven't seen it check it out, not the movie the second disc on DVD.

[Kambei]

I'm pretty awkward when it comes to city and landscapes myself.. still trying to nail perspective also..

Blue pencil is great isn't it?

I would just vary the line widths and your strokes..
Thicken the foreground lines and deemphasize the background lines..
Maybe put in some SOLID darks to give it some volume

Not much.. hope it helps..