I miss going into camping parks. When I was a kid you can feel confident when an adult goes with you. When you are an adult how do you find people to go with?
Tree practice. Cloud study. I put some guy in there.
Process video from last week's experiment: lots of Dissolve Mode brush, Free Transforming with "Nearest Neighbor" Interpolation, and compositing Bitmap Mode copies of the same image into the final using the Halftone Screen method for that pixelated aesthetic... jury's still out on how I feel about the final product, though, ha ha!
So, I don't paint, I don't understand painting, whether on canvas or digitally, and I don't draw landscapes. And my grasp of color theory is about as strong as a Post-It on a wet railing on a stormy day.
But I tried one of Bob Ross's painting tutorials and What. The fuck. Who in the world was this angel of an Art Teacher???
Like. I made that!!! Following his instructions!! I didn't even know why the fuck I was doing what I was doing half the time! I was just trying to find a decent digital analog to the flat brush or fan brush or what have you. And he led me to digitally paint THAT!!!
Compiling some notes about drawing trees & leafy vegetation. Might make a TikTok about it! Some thoughts:
- I've found I like to split trees into multiple layers depending on the lighting! For example, if the tree is lit from the opposite side as the viewer, then I like to put the most lit layer down first, then I'll put the shadows on another layer on top, and then often I sandwich the trunk & branches layer in between. Meanwhile, if the tree is lit from the same side as the viewer, then I put the most shadowed layer down first, then put the lighting on another layer on top.
- Colors are hard, but my rules of thumb are: during the day, I like my shadow colors to be a bit blue-green-ish, then the lighting is bright green (just barely edging into yellow-green for the highlights). During sunset/sunrise, shadows are somewhere in the yellow-green area, and lighting is more yellow-orange (ended up kinda mustard yellow in my sketch).
- Ambient lighting *inside* the shadowed areas is SUPER important to prevent them from getting too flat. In the first pic, I added a secondary subtle light source I kind of thought of as being the "sky light" (remember, even the sky itself casts a soft ambient light, not just the sun!). In the third pic I layered dark tones with clusters of lighter tones to give the impression of ambient occlusion & give a better sense of depth
Once upon a time, in a bustling city, a young woman named Amelia looked out of her office window at the concrete jungle that surrounded her. Amidst the stress and chaos, she found herself longing for something more. She yearned for nature, for open skies, rolling hills, and serene lakes. What if, she thought, she could bring these landscapes into her urban existence? And so, the seed of an idea was planted: she would learn how to draw landscapes.
Like Amelia, you may be yearning to create, to make your mark on a blank canvas. Well, you're in the right place! This comprehensive guide on "how to draw landscapes" will demystify the process, with step-by-step instructions to turn your artistic aspirations into reality. Let's embark on this journey together, picking up our pencils, brushes, and palettes, and create masterpieces from our minds and hearts.