dines sketch book

[Taron]

Here's a quick little experiment I've painted for you in Vervette. I've tried to consider the subtle bounces of the light. When would it add, when would it subtract or leave behind what things didn't absorb.
It's very messy (cough ) ...but maybe you can see what I mean.

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Wow - awsome!... thank you! The seamless texture and I am not able to see any stroke from the brushes.... I really love the subtile reflections ... show exactly what you described.
I will try to replicate that in my tomorrows painting... lot's to study and observe! Thank you so much. I realy love the blue colors of the ball!

Today's painting is some kind of a wormy thing ... I try to be more colorful in the texture and also in shadows. Reflection might not work at all places but I kind of liked the one in the eye .. even if it might not be correct...

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Exited for my next painting ... trying to give the shapes a shot!

[Taron]

You absolutely have managed to give the eye a sense of gelatinous material, which is great! Since you don't have any hard contrasts in the environment, the reflections are rather subtle, but one can still sense them.
If you were hoping to create a sense of reflection in the ground, then that's not quite working, because of the perspective placement, which is very off indeed. Imagine all the geometry and yourself as the camera.
It's a great exercise, too, and all these exercises belong together. That's very good!

I must say, though, there's something particularly evil about reflecting spherical objects, because any reflection on those spheres would get flipped upside down in the reflection of them, but the placement of those reflections in those reflected spheres would be where it would be, if the sphere was where it then appears to be in the reflection. Tricky stuff, hehehehe... some interesting mind-benders!

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You'll see in the reflection that the balls have both the reflected highlights as one might expect them, but also what looks like a direct light reflection, as if those phantom balls were lit by the light source as well. Very curious effects...

As told yesterday ... I want to give the shapes exercise for todays painting a shot. I started like ... hold my beer just a ball and a square ... but damn ... those fine nuances that I see when staring at this piece for some time... and from seeing to replicate is even more challanging... sigh ... here it is ... took me forever ... I bet you just doodled it in like 10 Minutes ...
But great exercise ... lot's of observation and still more to learn. Will to the bullets in the corner next ...

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[Taron]

EXCELLENT JOB!
Not at all, it took me a moment for sure! Mind you, Vervette's Sandbox has NO layers, which means that I have to do all blending on the canvas, wet on wet so to say. So, yeah, it took me a moment, too. Let alone thinking about it all carefully.
You've really done a fantastic approach and it looks even more painterly, which I love about it!

But this is just the beginning of a next level of observation for you. To think about the physical events you try to replicate is quite a journey and it's easy to mistake things when merely observing.
Always consider the path of the light, when does it diffuse and where could it reach to, when do things accumulate, when do things get reduced... it's a heavy thinking exercise, probably more so than the observation itself. You only observe to confirm your thoughts.

There's another really important observation about light and surface colors:
Assuming you have a white light, the more of that light hits your surface, the more saturated- or original- your surface color will be. Less light will bring out less of this original color as it mixes with the surrounding bounces. However, internal bounces on the surface, like in crevices or other folding, may intensify the saturation, because only what's left of the light's spectrum continues to illuminate the surface, filtering more and more the color of the light and a fold will allow less of the outside illumination in.

I may paint a little example for you on that, too... we shall see!

[Taron]

Okay, here's a little example...maybe a bit subtle and exaggerated at the same time?!

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Thing is, in Vervette's Sandbox you can paint in "Overlay" blend mode, which is awesome for these sort of experiments, along with "multiply", of course. This allows really controlling the saturation quite well.
Anyway, I just wanted to show you the difference between internal bounces and external facing surface parts, how internally it gets more saturated, while to the outside it gets less. Not a brilliant example, but well...

Whow ... lots of great stuff to study ... I had a hard time blending those colors ... that they will look so colorful like yours ... I was especially fascinated by the blue of the ball... but maybe that is the thing with blending saturation in multiply mode (and your skill obviously).... my painting was also all painted ... no layers no modes...
But maybe that is a good idea for a new experiment

I like that wormy little caterpillar thing ... fantastic that "boring little shape" can already look fancy and interessting if they got some cute eyes on it. Especially the warm illuminated color on the top some sort of translucent (.. I think I do not have the right words to discribe it )
Since you mentioned vervette sandbox a couple of times (and you not using your Vervette on seriods version) ... maybe it's time to experiment with this again... But all thos controls and options again ... I am kind of happy that I am just starting to know what I am doing with all those controls and nobs within Verve ... but definitely like the look of it and how it is shaded and blended ....

Lot's of fantastic new things to exercise ... ...
Thank you for you examples ... they help a lot.

[Taron]

Eh, yeah, that's a little evil of me, because this is my internal sandbox and not the online version. It has opacity based smudging, which allows for very gentle blending and feels amazing. Verve, by the way, has aspects of this, too, which can make smudging in Verve also absolutely fantastically smooth. It takes a bit more finesse, though.
What's amazing in Verve is the chroma smudging, which allows you to control saturation extremely well. It's a matter of picking the "right" colors. You'll have to choose more consciously your colors, but that's almost "better" in a way of learning about all this and not relying on computational tricks as much like with overlay or multiply.
...just turned on Verve again. It takes a moment to remember everything, but- man- it's amazing. ...I almost forgot just how amazing it is. Ah well. Key is to really make use of its features and nature. This includes using the alpha values as well, the build-up amounts and paint mode, the pen pressure switches, the smudge percentage. But then there's probably nothing else like it. Pfffffff...yeah, I have some work to do.

Still trying to decypher your last post to extract the gems that you provided. I experimented with chroma smudge but it seems like it has no effect - so I musst be using it wrong for sure. I usually work with different brushes with varies of opacity to get a smoother look. I start with the standard build up and then I reduce it further to be almost in the paint mode (if this is 0% build up). I guess picking the right color is key ... and I more and more come to the conclusion that I have to vary to colors and put in colors that I just learned to include and thought off a couple of weeks ago ... for example I added a redish and a greenish color to the bullets ...

The bullets in a the corner was a tough one. Your absolutly right...painting shadows is really hard. ... but was fun

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