• Author / Uploaded
• .

Citation preview

CONCEPT ART

Introduction

What is concept art? Interface Brushes

I N T R O C H A P T E R My aim for this PDF is not to be a tutorial or a step-by-step of how to paint or draw but instead to answer the question that we all have the beginning - what do i need to know to improve?

For the best learning experience I would recommend following each of these chapters in chronological order and being confident with the topics before moving on. I have structured the book in a way that you will always be building on the knowledge that you have just been shown, meaning if you skip a chapter it may make it much harder for you to learn and you will be missing out on crucial information.

Fundementals

Studies

Colour and light Perspective Composition

Application

Exploration Environment Design Character Design Masterclass

01 02 03

04 05

06 07

08

09 10

11

INTRODUCTION

CONTENTS

Let’s start right from the beginning. I get to draw pretty mountains and trees and people make it into games... that’s concept art right? Wrong. Well, kind of. Concept art involves drawing pretty things that people like to look at but that’s not technically the purpose of it. The focus is on ‘concept’ more than art, a concept is an idea. A concept artists job is to visualise and communicate ideas of yours and others. An illustrator can do this too but the artwork is the final product - concept art is the beginning stages and often may never be seen - the final product is the game / film / toy / etc that is inspired by it. This means that concept art takes many forms and is not always the same for every studio or contract. These tasks include and are not limited to paintings for inspiration, paintings for direct reference, line drawings, storyboards, 3D greybox paintover, reference sheets and more. Any job that involves 2D artwork and is used to inspire or direct other aspects of production will often be taken by the concept artist. Feng zhu has a very good video on this subject - but remember that everyone has different experiences and concept art is so vast that not one concept artist has the same skillset. Freelance > in-house job roles can also be quite different. Because concept art is not the ‘final product’ it can often be a little less finished or pretty - often the art you see in ‘art of’ books for games and films have been polished up for the book publishing. The process of concept art (thumbnailing, silhouettes, sketches etc) are just as, if not more, important then the final result - this is because the idea is explored and refined

multiple times to get the ‘best possible’ result for the job. There is a great article on this called ‘Let’s Get Real About Concept Art’ which will give you a good base of knowledge on the subject. Whilst concept art is all about the idea - it is certainly not false to say that the attractiveness of the concept art makes it easier to communicate / sell to the viewer (or art director...). This is human nature, especially in our more consumerist society we go for what is most pretty. We certainly cannot ignore this but we also can’t allow it to over-ride good design, this means there is always a balancing act going on.

INTRODUCTION

WHAT IS CONCEPT ART?

QUICK TIPS

INTERFACE There are many features and menus in photoshop that you may never use - remember that photoshop is just a tool and was originally designed for photo manipulation - digital painting has always been a side focus for the software. 1. The standard menus. The important ones are Edit, Image, Filter and Window. Most of these can be easily accessed through shortcuts such as undo, redo, copy, paste etc.

Image > Adjustment contains many useful tools such as Levels, Curves, Brightness / Contrast and more - These are some of the more powerful tools of photoshop - take advantage of them, there is no shame in adjusting your colour or values using these tools. Use the Window menu to find any windows / panels that you need. 2. Tool Settings bar. This section of the UI changes depending on which tool you have select-

Masking

Masking can save lots of time and there are multiple ways to do so. ‘Preserve transparency’ is the first way - this means that you cannot paint outside the pixels already on that layer. This would be useful if you have a shape and don’t want to paint outside of it. Similiarly you can create a new layer above your current one, hold down ALT and press the line between the two layers (you will notice your cursor icon ill change). This will lock the layer to the pixels of the layer beneath. This is the same as preserve transparency but because you are painting on a seperate layer you can easily erase anything that goes wrong. The last way is to add a ‘mask’ to the layer using the layer mask button at the bottom of the layer pallete. this allows you to paint in black / white to hide / show parts of the layer.

Value Toggle Values are extremely important in making sure that the image reads correctly - if your values are too consistent all over the image will appear flat and boring, if everything is too high contrast it can look offensive and hard to understand. This trick can allow you to work in colour whilst easily checking your values, painting in black and white and colour simultanously (almost..). To set this up go to View > Proof Setup > Custom.... then change ‘device to simulate’ to Dot Gain 25%. From now on if you press CTRL+Y your canvas will appear in values (greyscale). If you colour pick from your image whilst in values it will turn to colour once you press CTRL+Y again. This allows complete control over both colour and value management in your painting.

ed. The brush tool for example will allow you to change opacity, blending modes and flow - the same as layers but for the brush. If your painting is looking very washed out then its very likely your brush has been set to a low opacity. 3. Your list of tools available to you. Self explanatory. 4. List of your brushes.

6. Small icons. ‘collapsed’ versions of the other windows. 7, 8, 9. Optional. Navigator is helpful to have an overview whilst you are zoomed in. The colour pallet allows you to change your colours without extra effort. Layer window is always good to have open as they are very often added, removed, altered. Of course work out your own configuration and see what works best for you.

INTRODUCTION - INTERFACE

INTRODUCTION

BRUSHES Brushes will not make you any better. But they can help make the process smoother once you’ve already gained a certain level of confidence with your painting skill. Below are some tips and theorys about good uses of custom brushes. One of my favourites is perfectly summed up by Jaime Jones, in one of his demos he mentioned that he uses 1 brush per 1 material or object type. So if i use one type of brush for painting the sand i’ll use another brush to paint the wood, and only use those brushes on those types of materials. The reaason behind this is that each brush influences not only the look of the brushstroke but also the way you paint with it. If you use one brush for the whole painting it may look reptitive in the shapes and textures you are using, but if you use one brush for each material each part of the image will feel different and you will also paint it in a slightly different way because of this. You can more easily distinguish the different materials within the image other than for the obvious reasons. Of course this is not something you MUST do and is not something I always use - but it is a sound technique and a great way to get you used to thinking deeper about how to approach differerent materials and textures. Another good tip i have found is if you aren’t sure which brushes you like or should keep - open up a new canvas and one by one pick a brush and paint random shapes with it. Straight lines, curved lines, circles, squuares, textures, glows etc - after spending a moment with that brush you should be able to tell if you are comfortable with it or if it’s fighting against you. I have found this to be very helpful, some brushes are just more pleasent for me to use - and it varies from person to person, so try them alll or yourself and use your own juudgement.

QUICK TIPS I very rarely create my own brushes - usually becuase there are already so many good tried and tested ones free to download from other professionals. If you wish to create your own brushes then of course you can do this fairly easily. Start by making a shape (can even be a part of a photo or painting if you wish) ad select it with the lasso tool (or CTRL+click the layer to make your selection) this will enable the option to create a brush using this shape and add it to the endo f your brush list (edit > define brush preset). You can then select the brush and go to it’s options (window > brush options).

Brush Organisation

I prefer to view my brushes as ‘large list’ - this shows both the name and the shape of the tip. You can also make a new ‘1px brush’ and name it to be used as a header such as ‘----- Basic Brushes -----’ to allow you to categoerise your many brushes. An easy way to set this up is to download Jonas De Ro’s brush pack, he uses this method and has some great brushes to get you started. Others prefer to use the ‘stroke thumbnail’ mode as this shows a preview of the brush settings - if it has scatter, transparency or any other variations. Try which works best for you.

Transfer vs Opacity The first method is to set the ‘transfer’ option of your brush to ‘pen pressure’ this means that the opacity of your brush is controlled by the pressure of your tablet pen. If you press lighter the stroke will be more translucent, harder it becomes more opaque. This allows you to control your strokes in a more natural and dynamic way - similar to when you draw or shade with a pencil. Another method is to instead control the opacity of your brush through the ‘brush opacity’ option at the top of the screen or You can also simply press the numbers on your keyboard. This mimics traditional painting, you apply paint to your brush - this starts out very thick and opaque and then you apply more water (just like changing the opacity) to change how translucent the paint stroke should be. I have used both methods and bounce between the two.

How to achieve a painterly look Many digital artists use the hard-round brush exclusively and are able to achieve impressive results yet i find it results in a ‘digital’ look due to the lack of texture from the brush. My favourite brushes are those which have react with pressure sensitivity and have a very chalky texture when pressing lightly, pressing harder gives a much more opaque but still slightly textured stroke. This diversity allows for full control over your values and blending whilst giving some more spontaneous texture so give the natural painterly look. My current favourite brush is ‘Texture Brush’ in Jonas De Ro’s brush set. Remember this is all down to personal preference, try it my way but use your own opinions and search for what works best for you.

INTRODUCTION - BRUSHES

INTRODUCTION

FUNDAMENTALS

F U N D A M E N T A L C H A P T E R Now that you have learned more about the interface of photoshop and explored different brushes and become more familiar with digitial painting it’s time for you to learn Fundementals. This next chapter will teach you all of the key skills so that you will be able to draw anything without issue - after lots of hard work of course. Each page starts with a chunk of text that will give a brief insight and overview of the specific topic aimed to prepare you for further learning. There will then be 3 tipics and tricks that you should be able to implement into your work without much prior knowledge but will have a

big impact on your work if applied correctly. Once you have practiced the topics and techniques, on each page there are also links to books, webistes and videos that others have written on the subject. I have been careful to pick only the best sources - each will be written by a professional and someone who has a good teaching ability to make sure that you are able to understand each key skill with as little challenge as possible. Many of these links are also ones in which i have used myself and personally found the most accessible. I have given a very brief description as to why each one is useful for you so hopefully it should be clear.

Make sure to pick up a wacom tablet ! It is a must have and a good idea to start out with the entry level Intuos tablet. It will take some getting used to but give it time and it will soon feel natural.

STUDIES The technical skills known as ‘fundamentals’ aim to provide you with all of the knowledge required to depict believable and realistic artwork. The main fundamental skills are:

Colour / Light Perspective Composition The best way to learn these skills are from studying and observing life. Although the exact methods for you to learn best are very personal to you - your tastes, personality, habits and lifestyle. I will do my best to show you multiple ways in which you can begin studying. When discussing the topic of studies a few names come to mind - Algenfpleger, Miles Johnston and Alex Negrea. These are people who have been very prominent within online communities and became famous for their prolific studying habits. All three of the above artists have 100+ page sketchbook threads on conceptart.org that you can still view today. Miles started when he was only 14 (in 2007) and by the time he was 18 he was already a full-time professional artist. This is down to his years dedicated to studying art fundamentals. These sketchbooks are great sources of inspiration as well as to provide hints of how you might want to spend your time - certain topics to study and how to approach them. You get to see where they started and how much better they became once they dedicated the time to it.

QUICK TIPS

As i mentioned before, studying art is a personal journey just as much as a technical one. I highly recommend trying every form of studying that I have described on the opposite page and those you find in the previously mentioned sketchbooks - try everything and see what works for you. I have been on this exact same journey, i have my own sketchbook thread where i did many studies - but i personally found that hardcore studies weren’t the way that i learned best. It took me a long time to realistic but i work best by observing as i create my own artwork. I always have reference images open so that if i need to draw a mountain i have them right in front of me - instead of simply copying them i will recreate them for the context of my painting. This is in theory the same as a study but just in a different form which works best for me, i can do this for every work that i create instead of forcing myself to do a specific study. But before trying it my way I urge you to try everything and devote a good chunk of time to it, find the way in which you learn best, it will take time but you will become a stronger and more confident artist because of it. One word of caution - it is very easy to spend months on studies and not actually ‘learn’ anything. I have seen this happen to many friends and to myself. After every 1-2 studies you must then either try to redraw that same thing from memory directly afterwards, or at least something of a similar theme. By doing this you are testing how much you actually learned from the study and by stressing your brain right away with these new skills it helps to solidify them even more and also point out the flaws you should study next. We learn through failure so a study should never be easy.

What should I study? There are many ways to study, but first you must have an idea of what you aim to learn - to get the most out of a study you must analyze the subject as best as you can, knowing where to look will help you very much here. Still life paintings and drawings are a good general starting point - set up some simple objects such as an egg, apple, banana. Try to paint or draw these as close as possible to reality - focus your attention on how the light produces the form of an object - where is the core shadow, the bounce light, highlights. Why is the light and shadow transition very soft? why is it sharp ? how or why does the object look hard instead of soft, rough instead of smooth? Asking these questions forces your brain to look deeper and question why things are happening. Slowly you will want to focus on specific things that you are finding tough, such as how to paint cloth folds or different types of textures - set up a new still life with objects that have these qualities and study them - with the focus on those areas. When you have learned what you set out to learn, a study will be finished, therefore some will be quick and some will be slow but i highly recommend taking as much time as possible. Other forms of studying include photo studies, drawing from educational books (most notably for anatomy), copying master paintings or even painting using a film screenshot as reference There are also websites such as pixellovely which provide timed reference images that you can challenge yourself with.

FUNDAMENTALS - STUDIES

FUNDAMENTALS

USEFUL LINKS

Am I Improving? You will notice that your first drawings will look good to you, you are unable to see the mistakes at first but this is good. Keep ALL of your drawings or paintings, save them all somewhere you can find them later. It is very important to look back at these drawings when you have done 2-3 more of them, you should notice a difference and you should be able to spot mistakes in your previous drawings that you couldn’t at the time - this is 100% proof that you are improving, which is something that is easy to miss.

[website]

[video]

Example for how to study / proof that it works.

Good insight on how to study.

[video]

[video]

Some of his latest video studies.

Example of one way to practice material painting

Alex Negrea Sketchbook

Alex Negrea Photo Study

One very important and helpful source of study are screenshots from films. Photographs allow you to replicate life but cinematgraphers build upon this by composing, lighting and staging a shot in a way that informs and enables storytelling. This is all very valuable information for a concept artist - as we utilised all of these skills also. Knowing how to better inform each of these job roles specifical for films and games is a major bonus over just simply creating a pretty picture. The same as you would do so for a photo study you must break down the image and ask questions - why is the scene lit this way, why are certain colours used, why are the characters stood where they are stood? everything is a choice and has a purpose.

Material Sphere

[website]

[video]

Example for how to study / proof that it works.

Valuable knowledge of gesture drawing

Miles Johnston Sketchbook

Film Studies

Anthony Jones How to Study

Vilppu Drawing From Imagination

[website]

[video]

Download all of Algenflegers study.

Valuable knowledge of gesture drawing

Algenfleger Sketchbook

Vilppu Drawing Demo

[website]

[video]

My thread for comparison.

Guideance on how to create master studies.

My Sketchbook

Noah Bradley Master Studies

[website]

[video]

Massive collection of painting videos.

Advice on how to improve your character poses.

CTRL paint

How to use a manequin

[website]

[PDF]

Timed character reference challenge.

Best book on drawing human poses through gesture.

Pixel Lovely [website]

Pose maniacs

Timed anatomy reference challenge. [website]

Blu-ray Screenshots

Collection of good cinematography for study

Vilppu Drawing Manual

[website]

Material Spheres

More examples of material sphere practice. [website]

Androidarts Tutorial

Extremely valuable tutorial on many subjects.

INTRODUCTION - STUDIES

QUICK TIPS

COLOUR AND LIGHT Colour and Light (also known as value) are not only one of the most important aspects of making a belieavable and interesting image they also play a key role in leading the eye towards focal points, balancing a composition and communicating the form and setting of an image. Without the correct colour and light combination it is harder to know the temperature, time of day and mood of an scene. These don’t have to look ‘realistic’ neccessarily, fantastical and wild colour and lighting combinations can all be used but there must be enough within the scene that is believable, to allow the viewer to understand how and why it could work - otherwise it can become disorentating and will make it much harder to sell your concept. Despite this, it is best for newcomers - and those less confident - to start by learning how to use light, shadow and colour to replicate ‘realistic’ tones, values and lighting situations. Aiming for realism makes it much easier for us to know when you are right or wrong and to find feedback for how and where you can improve as we see these conditions on a daily basis. I will provide some basic concepts and theorys but i strogly recomend you to study and read through the many books written on the subject, most notably James Gurney’s colour and light which is one of the best books you will find on the subject. Another book that you must read and follow is Scott Robertson’s ‘How to Render: The fundementals of light, shadow and reflectivity’ - this is the bible of all fundementals of light and it covers everything you need to know. Once you have more knowledge of realitic values, colours and how light works in the ‘real world’ you can begin to break the ‘rules’ and stretch these theorys further to create more stylised and artistic inerprations of reality. Ruan Jia and Theo Prins are one of the many perfect examples of how you can infuse wonderfully wild and unrealistic colours into your work yet have them still feel ‘right’ becuase the values and other fundemental skills are

there to back it up and bring everything back into a believable realm. Learn the rules and then you can break them sucessfully to make your mark. There are many different aspects to colour and light both individually and combined. A few key words that are worth researching into are: Colour temperature, Reflected Light, Hue, Value, Specular and Local Colour. Of course these aren’t all the important aspects of colour and light, but knowing what they are and how they work will be important for when you come to look deeper into the theorys as these keywords will come up very often.

QUICK TIPS Light and Shadow General rule is that if you have a wam light you have a cool shadow and vise versa. Best shown at sunset during golden hour when the light is very strong - it becomes more apparent yellow/orange (warm) and the shadows appear more blue / purple (cold). This doesn’t mean light should always be yellow and the shadows always blue. It can be much more effectve to use greys within your colour scheme (as mentioned below in colour comparison) A grey has 0 saturation and takes vibrations from other colours around it. If you have a warm tone (even very sublte) the grey next to it will both enhance the intensity of the warm but it will itself also feel very cold. The same goes for grey next to a cold tone, it will feel very warm. Play with saturation just as much as hue and value. Linran explains a great theory for how to mix colours and easily adjust colour temperature using RGB, linked below.

Colour / Value Comparison Our eye and brain see colour and light through comparison to their surroundings or context. In the famous ‘Check Shadow Illusion’ we have a checkerboard which has a cylinder casting a shadow over half the board. The ‘light’ checker in the shadow is actually exactly the same value as the ‘dark’ checker outside the shadow. This is because of local contrast, when a value is surrounded by darker values it will appear to be lighter than it is and vice versa, it would appear darker if surrounded by lighter values. The same goes for colour temperature - a grey value surrounded by warm colours will appear cooler than it is, but the same value surrounded by cool colours will feel warmer than it actually is. Understanding why / when and how this works will improve your work massively - naturally if we want to have a very cold environment we think we need to add lots of blue, this isn’t neccesarily the case and can look amateur and unanatural. Instead we can utilise greys into the pallette to offset the other tones and make our colours feel much more punchy and inense than they are oriignally.

FUNDEMENTALS - COLOUR & LIGHT

FUNDAMENTALS

USEFUL LINKS

Too Much Black! Unless it is a conscious decision (which should be quite rare) you will always want to stay from pure black and pure white. This comes back to the importance of value and balancing composition - you will want to have the full range of values to make an interesting and dynamic feeling image however using pure black and white too early on will mean that you cannot go any higher than that so everything will feel very contrasted and hard to read. If you start with a smaller value range (25-75%) you can then start to increase intensity - going more towards black and white - and these values will now feel much more punchy and intense compared to the rest of the image. I will go further into this in the composition section. (Research the ‘halfway to black’ theory for further reading)

[website]

[book]

Detailed tutorial on light.

Good introduction to all fundemental skills.

Itchy-Animation Light Theory / Tutorial

Bold Visions, the Digital Painting Bible

[website]

[book]

Good example of colour / value comparison.

Further reading for all fundemental skills.

[website]

[book]

Goldmine of information for mixing colours in RGB.

Further reading for painting techniques.

Checker Shadow Illusion

Lin Ran Tutorial on Light and Colour

[website]

Lin Ran mini-tutorial

Small tutorial on his workflow and how he applies this information. [website]

Lin Ran Portfolio

Examples of Lin Ran’s work to see how he applies these theories. [website]

Theo Prins Portfolio

Perfect example of how you can use crazy colour if values are right. [website]

Ruan Jia Portfolio

Perfect example of how you can use crazy colour if values are right. [book]

James Gurney colour and light

Regarded as the best book on colour and light MUST READ. [book]

Scott Robertson How to Render

A complete course of the fundementals of light MUST READ

Digital Painting Tricks & Techniques

Digital Painting Techniques [website]

Androidarts Tutorial

Extremely valuable tutorial on general painting knowledge and skills. [video]

The Art of Colour and Light

Extremely valuable tutorial on general painting knowledge and skills. [video]

Foundations of Light and Shadow

Great video series of fundamental light and shadow theories [video]

Colour Tutorials

Another great video series of fundamental colour theories.

FUNDEMENTALS - COLOUR & LIGHT

QUICK TIPS

QUICK TIPS

PERSPECTIVE Perspective is the fundamental skill that allows you to create depth within an image. The most simple way of creating depth is by making objects smaller if we want them to appear further back, larger if we want them closer. This effect is much more apparent if the objects are identical or similar in shape, If that shape is repeated smaller our brain will treat it as being further away, a powerful trick to utilize.

The most taught version of perspective is using the horizon line and vanishing points to calculate object placement. By establishing a horizon line we can tell where the viewer is looking. The area above the line is the sky, below is the ground. There are 3 versions of perspective: 1 point: All objects converge at the same point on the horizon and those facing us are always parallel including the verticals. This usually only exists facing something straight-on. 2 point: In this type of perspective, which is most common, there are two vanishing points. The only paralleled lines are the verticals. This allows for objects to be seen from different angles and is a more dynamic shot. 3 point: Same as 2 point but the verticals also recede to their own vanishing point above or below the horizon line. This simulates the distortion that happens when we look up or down long distances. Very powerful if used correctly. Fox-orian has a very good step-by-step tutorial explaining 1, 2 and 3 point perspective which i would highly recommend, it was one of the first tutorials that allowed me to understand perspective atleast to a basic level. There is also the draw-through method’ which helps you to think in a more 3 dimensional way. I highly recommend Scott Robertson’s ‘How to Draw’ book where he covers this technique among others, i have given a full description of it in the ‘Masterclass’ section at the end of this PDF.

Atmospheric Perspective As mentioned previously, objects will lose contrast as they fall back into the distance as there are more air particles between the viewer and the object. As a general rule they will take on the sky colour as this is the colour of the atmosphere in most cases. For a very simple atmospheric perspective you can sample the sky tone and wash it lightly and evenly over backgroud objects to make them feel further away in comparison to foreground objects which are left to their original local values. Atmospheric perspective is more intense depending on the different partiles in the atmosphere. A desert, snowy, rainy, misty or foggy day will likely have much heavier atmosphere meaning you can ramp up the effect. You will want to be careful not to make all of your scenes feel foggy, remember to be subtle and look for reference.

Horizon Placement The first step of perspective is placing your horizon line, when doing so try to consider the mood and context of your end shot. Placing the horizon line lower will give you more sky and you will see under any objects that are high up - this can be good for showing scale, that the environment is larger than the viewer. Placing the horizon line higher up will show more of the ground and usually give the effect that we are looking down onto something. This is often used for larger environment shots when you want to show a large area or when we are to be looking down from high up. Out of an areoplane, down from the top of a building for example. Tilting / rotating the horizon line can also change mood and add a more dynamic feeling, experiment to see which works best for what you are trying to convey.

FUNDEMENTALS - PERSPECTIVE

FUNDAMENTALS

Distorted Perspective It will take time to understand and build confidence but be aware of how far apart you place your vanishing points on the horizon line. . When using two-point perspective It is most common to feel as though you must have both on the page (or canvas) however this will often distort your perspective. It tends to work best when you have at least 1 point outside of the page, this will stretch it into a more natural perspective whilst leaving 1 point on the page to direct the depth into the image.

USEFUL LINKS

[website]

Fox-orian Perspective Tutorial

Detailed tutorial on the basics of perspective. [website]

The Perspective Tutorial

Another detailed tutorial on perspective. [website]

Scott Robertson How to Draw

Best book on perspective and how to apply it MUST READ [PDF]

Loomis Successful Drawing

Advanced Perspective, not neccessary but good to have an insight. [video]

Atmospheric Perspective

Overview about how to create atmospheric perspective [website]

Androidarts Tutorial

Extremely valuable tutorial on many subjects.

FUNDEMENTALS - PERSPECTIVE

QUICK TIPS

QUICK TIPS

COMPOSITION

Rule of Thirds The rule of thirds and golden ratio are theorys that have been with us for hundreds of years, this is becuase this ratio is pleasing for us to look at - it works. Rule of thirds is very simply that you must never place your focal point in the middle or at the edges of your image. Instead you can split the image up into 9 equal parts and let your focal points sit at the intersecting lines. It is a very simple concept, but look at part 2 of ‘The Secret Composition’ below for more in depth advice.

Composition is the glue that holds all of the pieces together, allowing all of the elements to work with eachother to portray the story, mood or message that you are aiming to communicate. There are many elements to a sucessful composition but one of the most important is how you lead the eye around the image. Placing objects too closely to the edge of your canvas, arrow-like shapes point out of your image or too many interesting elements will lead the viewer out of your artwork or confuse them as to where they should look, creating an uncomfortable feeling. This is also linked to another important aspect - focal points. You should have aleast 1 focal point in your image in order to give a purpose. A focal point is the point in the iamge that should have the most importance - where you want your viewer to look to first, or end up looking at the end. You can have more than one focal point but they must be less important the more you add - so that you don’t add too many and confuse your viewer. As with anything else in art / concept art you must first think carefully about what you are try-

ing to communicate, what is the story? what is the mood? what feeling do you want to portray? A very busy composition is usually a bad idea - but you can utilise his chaos and balance it with your colour and values to control that chaotic feeling. If you are aiming to communicate the chaos and business of war for example this may be a good choice. Without making these choices however, you can end up with chaos that doesn’t work, can be jarring to the viewer and put people off looking at your work. This also wouldn’t work if you are aiming to create a peaceful mood, of course. Analyse other artists work to see how and why they are making you feel a certain way whilst looking at their work. Cinematgraphy is also a major inspiration and reference for composition - turn off the sound and see how much you still understand and what emotions and story beats are still coming accross. As i mentioned in the study section, taking screenshots from films with good cinematography and trying to recreate them can be a very valuable excercise.

Leading The Eye / Focal Points It will take time to understand and build confidence with this but there are many ways of directing the eye to your focal point - reserving higher or lower contrasts to the area around your focal point so that it stands out, framing the focal point with objects, arrange elements to point to your focal point, use negative space as a guide for the viewer to look and allow space for the eye to rest. Take a look at the link below ‘The Secret Composition’ for a more in-depth guide to all of these points and more.

FUNDEMENTALS - COMPOSITION

FUNDAMENTALS

1, 2, 3 3 Is very much the golden number. Every successful image has a good 1,2,3 read. 1,2,3 can refer to foreground, midground, background but can also refer to balancing your composition - 3 being the larger shapes, 2 being the smaller shapes and 1 being the smaller details. You will want more big shapes, less medium shapes and even less details. If you have more details than large shapes you will end up with a very hard to read image or design. You will want to balance these so that, just like your composition, it will be interesting to look at but still have resting places. This theory can be applied to individual objects and even characters.

USEFUL LINKS [website]

Fox-Orian Composition Tutorial

Detailed tutorial on the basics of composition. [book]

Ian Roberts Mastering Composition Great comprehensive guide to composition MUST READ [book]

Dream Worlds

Great insight into master disney artists and their work on many well loved films [website]

The secret Composition PT1

Extremely valuable tutorial all aspects of composition, part 1. [website]

The secret Composition PT2

Extremely valuable tutorial all aspects of composition, part 2. [video]

Composition for Artists

Great information on rule of thirds and golden ratio theories. [video]

Nathan Fowkes Composition

Extrememely experienced information. [website]

Androidarts Tutorial

Extremely valuable tutorial on many subjects.

FUNDEMENTALS - COMPOSITION

QUICK TIPS

APPLICATION

A P P L I C A T I O N C H A P T E R I have structured this PDF in a way so that by the time you get to this section you should already know the majority of the technical skills required for environments, characters and props. Now it is time to apply these skills. First you will want to start out by deciding what you want to create. Resear ch & Refer ence Explor ation Envir onm ent Concept Char acter Concept

RESEARCH & REFERENCE

QUICK TIPS Visual Library Don’t underestimate research and reference gathering. Each time you go through this process - and spend a good chunk of time doing so - you will be retaining this information, especially if you end up having to paint similiar topics over and over again. you will be building up something called your visual library - this means next time you come to paint a dog or a sunset you will already have some knowledge that you can build on, you will get closer and closer to achieving the best result possible. This is why professional artists seem as though they can draw almost anythng with ease - it’s because they have done it before and studied their reference for years - it’s in their visual library. Starting building yours up early on and you will find your art will become much easier.

As concept artists i highly recommend taking the time to figure out what it is that you are aiming to create and then spend even more time researching and finding suitable references, especially for important projects. Concept art is all about design and communicating that to people so they can recreate it in another form wither that be physically or digitally. Of course if you have a very tight deadline you will have to be much quicker with your referencing but as much as possible especially when you are creating personal work - spend atleast an hour researching and gathering reference before you start your painting. Aside from all of the technical drawing and painting skills, In order to create believable designs, scenes and moods you must know your subject matter. If i asked you to paint a newfoundland dog at sunset would you be able to do this from your imagination? Would you know the exact shape and details of this breed? would you know how light reacts when it hits fur or the effect it has on colours within the scene? By doing your research you will now know the type of dog breed, it’s body type, length of fur and typical colouration. You will know the usual colours that come with the sunset time of day and you will know how the fur looks when hit

by direct sunlight, how it creates a rim-light that glows against the rest of darker body of the dog. Whilst doing this you can collect images of these specific things, multiple variations so that you can understand the full spectrum and not just one examples. You can display these images as a reference sheet and have them laid out in front of you whilst you paint to make sure you always have this information at hand. This process is most important when a client requires you to create a concept based on a real topic such as costume designs for a period drama - you must get all of these details as accurate as you can otherwise your client won’t be happy and you will be to blame - no matter how well you painted it, it must fit the purpose. Going through this process can also conjure up new and interesting ideas that you may not have thought about - look at any of your favourite designs from games or films. For example The Last of Us fungal disease is actually based on a real fungus - just exaggerated and manipulated in a way that fits it’s purpose for the story. This basis in reality can make your otherwise fantastical concepts feel believable and realistic.

Flickr Advanced Search Flickr is a very powerful tool for you to find high quality photographs to use as reference. I suggest using the advanced search feature and at the bottom select ‘Only search with Creative Commons-Licensed content. This means the images that become avaialble will be free to download and allow you to modify them in your work. You can also do this within Google image seearch and i would highly sugget using this also - but in general the quality tends to be much higher at flickr.

APPLICATION - RESEARCH & REFERENCE

APPLICATION

USEFUL LINKS

Imaginative Realism James Gurney’s book on Imaginative Realism is a complete guide on how to paint what doesn’t exist - it covers everything from composition and colour and light but it also delves into how to conduct research and how to find reference. He even talks about how to create your own reference - he will very often construct a macquette out of realworld objects / materials and shine lights upon it to see exactly how it would react. This is of course a very long and hard way to get your references but thinking in this way can allow you to come to much deeper and meaningful designs and imagery. I highly recommend grabbing a copy of this book and giving it a read through, it will help to open your eyes to the possibility of taking your art that step further.

[website]

Flickr

Great source of high quality and free to use photography. [website]

Pinterest

Use search to find hundreds of already collected reference photography. [book]

Imaginative Realism

Great book with lots of advice on how to paint what doesn’t exist. [video]

Visual Library PT1

Great informational videos on how to develope your visual library. [video]

Visual Library PT2: Memory

Great informational videos on how to develope your visual library. [video]

Visual Library PT3: Applied

Great informational videos on how to develope your visual library.

APPLICATION - RESEARCH & REFERENCE

QUICK TIPS

APPLICATION

VIDEO EXAMPLES

EXPLORATION

Click the video thumbnail for a playlist of carefully chosen videos on the subject.

Environment Thumbnails

Exploring your ideas is the main aspect of concept art. We can great beautiful finished artwork but this only serves part of the purpose of our job. The majority of the time we are sketching and drawing out every design solution possible. Why do we do this? Two reasons. One: The theory is that as you draw an idea you will be creating generic designs, because they are our first instinct - the more you draw the harder it becomes, causing your brain to work harder and you will come up with more creative solutions for the design problem. Two: We

aren’t producing work for ourselves - these designs need to be given to other members of the team to direct and influence other products. If we provide many solutions for a problem then it allows the art director or lead artist to give you better feedback and suggestions, it can spark ideas in the rest of the team which can lead to you ending up with a better result. A more ‘finished’ peice of art has less room for building upon and could halt the creative process before better ideas appeared.

Environment thumbnails are a very efficient way to experiment with compositions and experiment with possible directions for your scene. Keep them small, no more than 2 inches wide (on paper), this will make it harder for you to add details and force you to focus on the scene as a whole. This can be harder if you are using Photoshop as you can zoom in no matter how small the sketch is and you can alter the size of your brush more than you can with a pen or pencil., meaning you can always add details. A good way around this is to section your page into multiple equal boxes, have them all on screen at the same time and draw an environment into each box. This is where you use the knowledge you’ve gained from your fundamental studies. Start out by placing your horizon line this will be the first step of establishing the type of shot you are creating and how we experience the scene. A lower horizon line will give more space in the sky for us to add taller buildings - a higher

horizon line will mean more ground in view, perhaps looking down from up high and may serve better for a distance landscape shot. Keep to the larger shapes, make the composition work with these shapes first and it will still look as good when you make it larger and add the details later on. Use thumbnails to also experiment with mood through lighting and colour. If using Photoshop (or scanned thumbnail) you can duplicate the layout linework and sketch in a new lighting scenario for each thumbnail, try different colour schemes and values. Because these are still small it won’t take long to create new variations - keep your brush larger and squint your eyes. When you have a thumbnail that works small - enlarge it and continue to refine the smaller shapes and details.

APPLICATION - EXPLORATION

t

APPLICATION - EXPLORATION

t

VIDEO EXAMPLES Character Sketches / Sihlouettes

Just like with the environment thumbnails you will want to keep your silhouettes small and draw multiples on the same page to force you to stay zoomed out. Start with the larger shapes to establish the general overview of your character - chop into the shapes and add to them, pay attention to the negative shapes, such as the holes created under arms or between legs, as they can add lots of interest to the form. Once you have an established shape, continue to chop into it with smaller brushes to create smaller details such as implied cloth folds or accessories that will break out of the silhouette, this provides a deeper understanding of the materials and specifics of the design. Take advantage of the speed and efficiency of this process, as soon as you are happy with a

Design Sketches

shape duplicate it and continue working, even if it is earlier on in the design. Creating duplicates of successful shapes and then tweaking them will allow you to keep building on successful designs and attempting different variations. Also take advantage of working digitally - using the lassos tool to select sections of your silhouette and distort them using transform, this can be a quick way to create variations from existing designs and create ‘happy accidents’. Keep in mind the type of character you are aiming to design - is he likely to be fat and short or tall and skinny, think about the style of the end output, should it be realistic or stylised? These restrictions will help when narrowing down which design is best for your goal.

Design Sketches cover a wide variety of subjects which i believe are most heavily focused on their piratical use such as objects / props / assets, weapons, vehicles or armour. These must of course look appealing and be interesting but must also be designed toward their purpose - a cup that can’t hold water is not a very good cup. If you are designing for film and the prop needs to be built in reality then you will need it to be much more functional - designing for games or CG means you mostly just need to make sure it looks believable as it won’t need to be handled for real. Again keep your sketches small and multiples on a page to keep you focused on the main shapes and features and not the details. Keep in mind the purpose of the object and make sure to do your research and find reference so that you aren’t guessing. Starting with a generic design can help you to know key features and general patterns to build from, to make sure that your de-

sign is based in reality and making it easier for it to be believable. Once you have shapes that interest you it can be useful to sketch the design as if it were being used so that you can visualize and test to see if the design looks functional. For example how does the pot hold water and what happens to that water when it’s poured. How does the driver sit within the vehicle? Can they reach the controls comfortably? It can be good to quickly sketch out the design in a flat orthographic view to quickly communicate the overview of the object and then redraw it again from a more 3D perspective to check if the design works from all angles. A good angle for drawing objects is from a 3/4 top down angle - this allows you to see the front, top and side of the shape. Perspective is hard to figure out - draw loose and quick until you have a design that you are comfortable with before investing time on the final drawing.

USEFUL LINKS

[Videos]

John J Park Gumroad

Cheap videos from one of the best teachers and Prop / Mech artists. [Videos]

John J Park Sketchbook

Glimpse into John J Parks stunning sketchbook. [website]

Let’s Get Real About Concept Art

Great article on misconceptions of concept art. [website]

Sihlouettes in Concept Art

Great article on Sihlouettes in concept art. [video]

Mark Molnar character sihlouettes

Great article on misconceptions of concept art. [website]

The Skillful Huntsman

One of the best concept art books - focus on the actualy pre-production concept art stages MUST READ

APPLICATION - EXPLORATION

t

ENVIRONMENT CONCEPT

VIDEO EXAMPLES Fully Painted Workflow

Ask yourself questions - where is this environment? Which real-world environment is it inspired by? Who lives here? Which type of animals make this place their home? What is the climate like here? What is the general mood of this location, is it meant to be scary or welcoming? Am i trying to tell a story or just visualize the location? What is the purpose of this environment, are people looking for a mood, colours, lighting? or are they wanting something much more refined they can build from? By asking yourself these questions you can make a checklist of what you require for the scene (either literally or just in your head) You will now have a much better idea for what th environment should and be able to visualize it in your head in some form. This will also help with the next stage - gathering references and doing your research. Take note of the answer to each question and research all of these topics. If you have decided that eskimo’s live here - or a fantasy race wth similiar traits - you can now conduct some research. What clothing do they where? Why does it have fur, and why is it placed in certain places of the clothing? What skin colour do these people have and why is it this colour? Even if you aren’t going to include characters it can still be good to

analyse who would live here theoretically - the design choices of clothing can give you ideas for their shelters, architecture and other purposes. You can then conduct research into everything else - snowy mountains. Do we actually know what they look like? How does the snow fall, does it have any patterns when it sits on th mountain tops? how much of a mountain does the snow cover and why? Collect references of each of these things and create a board. You now have no excuses. You already have the skills to paint - you know how colour, light and perspective work and you know how to compose an image using composition. You also now know exactly what the mountains in our image should look like, the people, their homes, the ground, the sky colours, the amount of atmosphere etc. Even if you are creating a fantasy environment you don’t have and shouldn’t just copy these references - analyse and study them. There are many patterns and reasons to why things are the way they are. By looking at a snowy mountain and a snowy rock and i can paint any shape rock with any amount of snow on it with some level of believability.

This can be an effective way of injecting style and character into a scene which may be harder to achieve with photos or 3D. There are many ways to get started with a painted environment. You can start out with a line sketch - this can be more accessible for those with less painting experience who want to get into environments - you can easily figure out composition and even communicate values and atmospheric perspective through line weight. These can be very loose and quick - like a napkin sketch - or very refined. I personally don’t enjoy takig my line sketch too far as i feel too restricted when i come to paint it, causing it to feel like a colouring book instead of a painting - but you must go with what works best for you. If this isn’t for you then another methood known as finding forms in chaos. Start by painting ‘random’ chaotic shapes, a quick way can be to use very noisy and randomised custom brushes. Change your values and colours as you go. Once you have a good range of shapes on the canvas you can start looking for shapes and patterns that jump out to you, like in ink blots. Continue to refine the image

and be inspired the shapes, go with the flow and bring it forward into reality - creating elements we can relate too such as sky, mountains and ground. I personally find this technique hard to pull off as it relies heavily on experience and confidence with painting.. and a big chunk of luck. The last method is to simply start off by painting the environment, similar to starting with line but by defining value ands forms from the start. No matter which method you use you will always want to define the horizon line, the sky and the ground planes as soon as possible. This gives you the base to work from - you will know the angle from which we are looking at the scene, the rough value and colour range from the sky and the base for all other component to sit and the perspective from the ground planes. Remember your knowledge of how to depict forms, define the top, side and front face of objects to bring them into the scene quickly ready to be defined with details and textures later.

APPLICATION - ENVIRONMENT CONCEPT

APPLICATION

Photobash Workflow - Realistic

The photobash workflow is quite different from painting from scratch. First you must spend even longer on the referencing stage and find as many creative commons photos as you can and at a high resolution (above 1024px), if you can find them with a more even lighting scenario, similar to an overcast sky, that would be perfect as it allows you to add your own lighting to the objects instead of being restricted to an already specific or extreme lighting condition. Depending on how much of an idea you have for how the environment should look you will either want very specific photos - or example they would need to be the correct time period and geographical location. If you are’t sure exactly what you need to be creating then vary your references to a wider range of subjects to spark your imagination. One you have a good range of photos you can get started. Select one that will serve as your ‘photo plate’ - detirmining your photo plate comes down to a few factors; it may have the correct sky type and colours that you are aming for or it may be the same sort of environment that you are trying to create. The

Photobash Workflow - Stylised

main point is that this plate must be at the right viewing angle, or close to the one you are trying to achieve for the final scene. You want to get the correct sky into your scene as soon as possible, if the sky in your plate is wrong you can mask out the original sky and replace it with the new one, you may need to colour match your plate to the new sky to help the two meld together better. The sky will determine the atmosphere and general colours of the scene. Place new photos into your scene and skew them into perspective as best as you can - use masks to extract the objects from photos, this means you can always alter the mask at any time. If you are trying to add patterns to objects or textures to walls or floors you can take the photo, skew it into place and then use blending modes such as darken, lighten or overlay / soft light to merge the texture on to the surface beneath. To maintain the photo-realistic look you will want to avoid painting onto the image - use selections and sample the colours to make sure the painted areas match the photo if you must.

You can still use photos in your workflow yet end up with a more stylised or painterly result. This is my favorite method. You can do this by simply overlaying photo textures onto your fully painted environment. Or you can use the same process as the realistic photobash workflow but with mre painting and altering of the photographs to take them beyond what is already in the photos. With this method you can be less sensitive about your photo plates and references, drop them into your scene and skew, rotate, scale them - alter their values and colours using colour match and adjustment layers. Use blending modes and masks to merge photos into each other. The joy of this work flow is that you can experiment as much as you like and come to results in a very quick way - however it does still rely heavily on your fundamental skills, your composition and perspective knowledge will still determine the outcome of the shot and your painting skills will need to be on point to match well with your photos. You can reduce the details in your photos by using Blur > Surface Blur, this won’t always work well but it can help

to blend your paint and photos together quicker. Use filters sparingly and be subtle as their effects can be quite easily noticed and can look amateur if used too much - you don’t want to end up with a blurry mess. As-long as all of the photo elements are colour matched and their values work together you can start to paint over the whole image. Sample the wide variety of colours on the canvas already and use paint to turn the photo base into something that works better for you and your desired outcome, but don’t be afraid to leave parts of the photos showing - this is the power of the workflow, photo details and shapes with painterly imagination and style. You can use adjustment layers to change colour schemes using hue / saturation, replace colour, colour lookup and others. You can also change lighting conditions by making a brightness / contrast adjustment layer and turn the brightness all the way down - paint out (black) into your mask to reveal the light beneath - light the scene how you want to with this powerful method.

APPLICATION - ENVIRONMENT CONCEPT

VIDEO EXAMPLES

QUICK TIPS Colour Match

[Videos]

James Paick Gumroad

Cheap videos from one of the best teachers and environment artists. [website]

James Paick Portfolio

Portfolio of James, wide portfolio. [Videos]

John Sweeney Gumroad

Cheap videos from a Naught Dog concept artist. [website]

John Sweeney Portfolio

Stunning use of shape and colour, storytelling. [Videos]

Maciej Kuciara Gumroad

Cheap videos from a Naught Dog concept artist. [website]

Maciej Kuciara Portfolio

Stunning range of styles and workflows. [website]

Steve Messing Portfolio

Beautiful range of concepts and storytelling. [website]

Noah Bradley Portfolio

Great concept artist, illustrator and storyteller. [website]

Conceptart world

Great collection of concept art.

Edit > Image Adjustments > Colour Match is a very powerul tool. When on the layer you want to adjust the colours for, open colour match and select your document from the source drop-down menu and then select the layer with the colour and value that you want to transfer. I’ve found that it’s always worth scrolling through the layers and seeing how each one effects your current layer - sometimes there can be unexpected results you might prefer. You should try to avoid using a source that has too much colour variation as you will end up with a rainbow effect - you can always cut a selection from an image to use as a source if the full image isn’t working well. You can always use adjustment layers to such as hue/saturation or colour balance to further adjust the colours.

Mixer Brush The mixer brush can be very powerful in aiding a painterly result from photobash work-flows. You sample a section of the image - similar to the clone stamp tool. But instead of stamping it you paint with it, the colours merging into the brush stroke. You can also adjust the settings so that the brush mimics traditional painting from watercolour to oils. Lastly you can still use any of your custom brushes with the mixer brush which all react differently. I would advise not using the mixer brush too much until you are comfortable with digital painting as it is a more advanced tool and can have an opposite effect if not used with confidence.

APPLICATION - ENVIRONMENT CONCEPT

USEFUL LINKS

CHARACTER CONCEPT The same as we dId for envIronments I recommend that you do your research and reference gatherIng fIrst. ThIngs to consIder are; WHO Is thIs character? What Is theIr job or purpose? Where do they lIve? Under what condItIons do they lIve? What Is theIr personalIty? Are they easIly angered? TImId? Cute? Tough? Scary? What tIme perIod does thIs character resIde? What the character’s job role I purpose Is wIll unveIl what they would be wearIng, theIr accessorIes and costume. The tIme perIod would also help determIne the style of these thIngs. For example If he Is a lumberjack In modern tImes he may have stIll have the typIcal checkered shIrt, burley arms, haIry body and other traIts of a stereotypIcal lumberjack but he would lIkely have a chaInsaw rather than an axe and maybe have harnesses and gear to help hIm clImb trees. A formal lady from VIctorIan era would have a corset, drapIng fabrIc and maybe a feathered hat. WhIlst a formal lady In modern tImes could well have a fItted suIt. If the character Is meant to be cute there are many stereotypIcal traIts that come along wIth It - perhaps they wear ‘cute’ colours such as pInks and lIght blues. They may have oversIzed clothIng and accessorIes to accentuate theIr small sIze. They may have larger eyes and certaIn facIal expressIons. All of these would be dIfferent to a character that Is meant to be scary or strong. Stereotypes are often seen In a negatIve lIght however they can be one of your strongest skIlls If used correctly. They are stereotypes for a reason - when we see any cue from a known stereotype we wIll Instantly have those assocIated feelIngs that come wIth It. If I see a large pInk bow and a raInbow lolly pop on a chaIr I mIght assume they belong to a small gIrl. If I see chopstIcks and rIce graIns left on a table I would assume thIs was an asIan household. Just lIke

any other ‘rule’ you wIll not want to follow It too closely and to use It all the tIme as thIs can lImIt creatIvIty and orIgInalIty, but In order to break the rule must fIrst know how to use It. A very powerful method can be to use juxtaposItIons - use stereotypes that are meant to perceIve one thIng and make them gIve you the opposIte. A very common example of thIs Is the cute gIrl In pInk dress used In horror fIlms to actually make you feel very scared - If our guards weren’t down from the cute stereotype we mIght not have been as afraId. UtIlIse your references, just lIke wIth envIronments, to open your eyes to those small features that wIll help your desIgns to be belIevable and engagIng. One of these feature often overlooked Is the amount of colour and texture found In skIn, especIally around the face. HavIng reference open wIll gIve you a dIrect guIde to thIs and allow you to utIlIse It In your work. Other features to keep In mInd Include how clothes are made - where are the seems, buckles and joInts. Make sure your costumes look man-made and unrealIstIc.

VIDEO EXAMPLES Fully Painted Workflow

Similarly to the painted environment work flow there are multiple ways of approaching characters. After you have finished with your silhouettes and sketches you should already have a good idea of how your character should look. If your silhouettes are already developed to a level that you are happy with them, you can take enlarge one and use the ‘preserve transparency’ lock type to make sure you can’t paint outside of the silhouette. Then either draw lines inside or paint forms directly to refine the further details of the character. This process allows you to figure out and troubleshoot the character design through the silhouette and build on an already successful shape. If you have chosen to skip the silhouette process or started with a sketch instead you can reduce your threat to a lower opacity, create a new layer above and start to refne your sketch by drawing more precise line art based around the sketch below before adding the base colour below the new line art and then painting over the top. This gives you the opportunity to start with a very loose and dynamic sketch to figure out your

pose and then refine it, add the anatomy and figure out any extra costume details through the line art. You can then paint in the values and colours knowing that the design is already figured out. The last approach, as always, is to paint the character right away - straight into colour, values and forms. This of course is the hardest way as you have no guidelines to fall back on - it can be wise to create a very quick sketch to paint over depending on your confidence - references will help you a lot here to help visualise what you are painting. When painting on either on either of these process i would start by placing the base colours, the local values of everything - skin, clothing. this can help evaluate a good combination that will work. You can then use these local colours to figure out your light and shadow colours to build up the forms. Figure out your cast shadows - these are shadows that are cast onto the body by the body itself such as an arm casting shadow onto the torso - this helps to communicate where each object is in space and grounds the design in reality more solidly.

APPLICATION - CHARACTER CONCEPT

APPLICATION

Photobash Workflow

This process is similar to the environment photobash workflow - instead of starting with line art or painting you start by finding a photo that suits your needs. If your character is human you can simply find a human with similar proportions and body type to your brief - if you are creating an alien or another humanoid design different to humans you can find a human photo base and use either puppet warp, liquify or other transform tools to stretch the base into your desired proportions. This won’t give you the most accurate of results instantly but it will provide a good starting point. Assuming that are creating a human character we start with our normal human photo and it is best to decide early on what the focus of the character design is - is our focus on the costume or the anatomy / head / face of the character? - it is best to find a stock photo that is evenly lit in all cases but most importantly you need something that is closest to what you are trying to achieve. If you are aiming to create a costume design the face won’t be as critical but still best to find something

3D Paintover Workflow

close to the character that will be wearing it. In this case the body type is most important, the clothes will be designed to match the frame so start with an accurate body first.. If you are aiming to design a character through it’s face and anatomy you will need to find photos that will be the best base to work from - for example if your character is a fat gamer you won’t be using a skinny athletic base. Once your base is ready you can start by layering new objects on top - replace body parts, add clothing and accessories. Don’t feel too restricted to your photos, you can lasso sections and stitch them together to Frankenstein a new design. As long as you match the values of each of the photos and make sure the lighting is consistent the new design will feel believable. This is very useful for fantasy and sci-fi designs. Of course if you are having to create something in a modern time or historically accurate you will have your limits to how crazy the new designs can be. Making sure you do your research and find the correct photo reference will help you massively here.

One last approach to create characters is to start with a 3D base. This has become much easier with the rise of Zbrush. If you are experienced with maya or other 3D software you can create game-ready character meshes. Once they are at a good stage you can take a render or screenshot into photoshop and paint over the top, add photos to explore the design - because you are basing it from your current 3D base you can then go back into 3D afterwards and directly create it from your concept, ready to be put into a game. As a concept artist in a studio you may be supplied with these 3D renders from another member of the team. If you are not as confident or have no interest in 3D from a technical perspective you can jump into Zbrush. Zbrush mimics clay and allows you to sculpt a face or character with ease (once you have overcome the interface and tools). You can start from scratch, sculpt on top of your own base mesh or ue one of the full-body or

bust meshes that are in Zbrush to use as a start. You can take the sculpt as far as you like and can even use polypaint to add texture and colour to the scupt before taking it into photoshop. You can also render out different passes and materials - there are good guides to this online - which you can comp together and play around with in photoshop. The power of using a 3D base is what you can provide to the other team members. You can give them multiple angles by taking multiple screenshots - much quicker than re-drawing each one. You can also provide the 3D artists with this 3D concept which they can take clean up and build on to create the final mesh for the game and speeding up the process. This will also give you practice with 3D skill and methods which will improve your worth to a studio and give you more job options. This workflow is also used for environments and the process is mostly the same.

APPLICATION - CHARACTER CONCEPT

VIDEO EXAMPLES

[website]

Wesley Burt Portfolio

A fantastic and prolific character concept artist. [website]

Brad Rigney

Another fantastic and prolific character concept artist / illustrator. [Videos]

Anthony Jones Gumroad

Cheap videos from one of the best teachers and character artists. [website]

Street Peeper

A good collection of street fashion from different cities. [website]

Pinterest

Search for collections of armour, weapons, clothing from different time periods.

APPLICATION - CHARACTER CONCEPT

USEFUL LINKS

SCOTT ROBERTSON HOW TO DRAW [book] Confidence with drawing forms in perspective

M A S T E R C L A S S If you are serious and dedicated to improving your art would highly recommend following this masterclass that i have set out for you. It will teach you every skill that you need and they will be provided by professionals and great teachers. Stage one covers general drawing skills, getting you comfortable with using your pencil, drawing confident lines, the ability to draw forms in perspective and an introduction to anatomy and human proportion. Stage two will build on these skills and apply light, shadow and colour to help build depth and life into your drawings and will also help you to transition into painting.

Stage three will teach you how to take all of these skills and create a beliavable and interesting scene out of them using composition. The last book will also introduce you to ideas of how to apply these skills for real-world work and help you to add more creativity ino the pipeline. I would advise taking one or two days per week to dedicate yourself to this masterclass. Don’t burn yourself out and remember to keep applying the theorys and technques in your own work. If you are not confident enough to get started right away i would suggest going through all of the sections i mention in this PDF and doing standard studies alongside your university work.

I recommend working through this book step-by-step. Imagine it as a classroom, each section is a lesson. Get out your sketchbook and the tools that he recommends in the first chapter. Read all of the text and draw along with him - copy what he is doing and relate it back to what he is saying in the text - think about why he is telling you to do this instead of just blindly copying it. You may want to go over each section more than once until you feel confident that you understand the theory and techniques. This book will teach you how to DRAW and you will be introduced to other fundamental skills such as perspective for both objects, vehicles and environments. It will also improve your general confidence with a pencil and drawing confident lines.

FIGURE DRAWING FOR ALL IT’S WORTH [book] COMPLETE GUIDE TO DRAWING FROM LIFE [book] Anatomy and proportion for characters Next i recommend that you learn anatomy skills, this is the one subject that Scott doesn’t cover in his book series. Similar to the Scott Robertson books i would ‘draw-a-long’ with these, have your sketchbook open and a pencil ready. It is best to at least skim through the information that is provided to give you further knowledge of the subject matter and not just it’s face-value. The understanding is the key to studies, if you don’t understand then you are wasting your time. Sit and copy all of their drawings over and over and over again - coupled with the knowledge you gain from the reading, you also gain muscle memory - you will be understanding why certain proportions and shapes exist and where in the body, your hand will follow suit and draw them more comfortably from memory.

MASTERCLASS

1

STAGE ONE

STAGE TWO

SCOTT ROBERTSON HOW TO RENDER [book] Confdiently add life an depth to your lines This is a more intermediate book and will show you how to take your line drawings and give them form, depth and life through knowledge of how light and shadow work and how they are effected by different materials and surfaces. Just like before i recommend that you read all of the text and follow along with all of the tasks and challenges. By drawing you have to think and observe much more closely allowing the information to sink in. The knowledge you gain from this book will likely feel restricted to vehicles and industrial design (which is Scott’s primary field) but as long as you are understanding and practicing the theories you can apply this knowledge to any thing you wish to paint.

3

STAGE THREE

IAN ROBERTS MASTERING COMPOSITION [book] turn those objects into meaningful scenes By now you should be able to draw objects in perspective using line, know the correct shape and proportion of the human body and able to paint them in full colour under different lighting conditions. Now it is time for you to learn how to compose an interesting scene My suggestion to learn from is Ian Robert’s ‘Mastering Composition’ it is well-liked by many and has been highly reviewed as being a good book for both beginners and experienced artists - it is also one of the books i started out with and i found it extremely insightful. I recommend reading every chapter of the book but unlike the previous books i would suggest that you create your own personal painting or drawing for each section using the theorys mentioned - this will force you to compose a shot and not just copy his examples, you will learn and create new work. Remember to pay attention to why these things are important, this is the valuable information to take with you.

JAMES GURNEY COLOUR AND LIGHT [book] further knowledge of colour/light Scotts book will teach you the broad aspects of light and materials. James Gurney’s book on the other hand will take this information and inject mood and purpose. Focusing on Colour and Light this book will walk you through a variety of different lighting conditions both artificial and natural and offers a detailed approach for how to tackle each one. Unlike the previous books i would not recommend studying the example images by just copying them. Instead i would suggest to read through the book thoroughly and analyse the images matched with the text until you really understand the concepts. Then create your own paintings using the theories in the book to guide you, applying the theories in a more practical way. I always have this book at hand and use it as my go-to guide for any lighting or colour situations that i find myself having to tackle, it’s not the only reference i will use but it helps to provide solid information to get me started and to keep me on track.

HANS BACHER DREAM WORLDS [book] focused and practical compositions The last book of the masterclass is Dream Worlds by award-winning Disney artist Hans Bacher. This book provides composition advice in an actual production setting instead of just simply to create a pleasing image. This will take you one step further into knowing how to apply all of this knowledge to be used for a product. An example for games would be knowing how to design your environment in a way that stages the interactive objects in an interesting yet not completely obvious fashion, making the environment feel impressive to navigate or simply to evoke a mood or feeling to the player. Each of these aspects are focused around events outside of the single image. Read through the book over and over, analyse as best as you can why they successfully communicate their message and why they help production. Create your own paintings whilst using this book as a visual aid and you will become more aware of storytelling and creative expression.

MASTERCLASS

2