First off I ought to say hello, as this is my first post in these forums. I've been reading the forums and looking at your guys' work for a while: excellent stuff by the way. Anyway, now that I need some advice, I realize I actually need to post ;-)
So anyway. Here's the painting. It's a forest glen: WIP. Please critique honestly and brutally. I realize it's not that good or realistic, but I want to learn and any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Only one rule: if you're going to critique some part of it, you also have to suggest a FIX.
hi and welcome stargorger, ok well firstly can you tell me what sort of style you are going for? at the minute it looks very stylised, which is not a bad thing, the perspective looks wrong though, i'm not great at perspective myself so i can't offer any useful advice, only that it all looks as if it's going uphill, is that your intention? if not i would make the furthest tree trunks a little longer as that is also giving an uphill impression.
I also don't get any sense of distance, it could be up close or far away, you could give a sense of depth by making the furthest trees proportionately smaller, which i think you have tried to do by shortening the tree trunks.
You also need to increase some shadows in areas too as that will help.
The colours are also quite strong so you might want to tone them down a little. I like how you've done the colouring of the leaves on the trees with the dark and light areas.
If you can face making some changes, post again & see how you've got on. There will most likely be loads more people to help soon.
Hmm... I totally agree, but I'm not sure how to change it... No, it's not suppod to look like downhill/uphill, but rather like you're looking down through a break in the trees....I lengthened the tree trunks, added shadows for depth help (I hope) . . .
Not sure what you mean about the colors. If by wash or simply brightness, then I'd rather not change that too much... I'm going for a fairy-tale look... but if you could tell me what shades/colors/etc are particularly off, let me know.
Here's the updated version.
As you can see I blanked-out the flowers for now too, just in case.
Hi Stargorger, congrats on having the guts to finally post, thats your first hurdle covered. Half the battle is about having some confidence. You say you're looking for a fairytale look, but do you mean in a realistic style, or a more cartoony style? Kaz is right, a sense of depth is missing from the image at the moment and also the perspective seems a little off. I think the most obvious evidence of this is the tree on the right, it looks like we're looking at it straight on, whereas you've got your eyelevel set a little higher than that, looking down. Also again as KAZ said the size of everything as it moves back is slightly inconsistent, the width of the trees, and particularly the flower stalks look the same width and height the further you move back. The colour also needs broken up a bit, for example, the green in the leaves of the trees at the top are all basically the same colour. Add a little yellow and/or blue just to make it a little more interesting to the eye. From a depth point of view, of you greayscale your image you will see that there is nowhere on the image that really attracts the eye. If you darken the centre, and lighten the foreground, it was create some depth. One of the easiest ways to do this is to create a new layer and set it to Overlay mode, then paint on that. Try not to use white and black though, in this case to darken it use a dark blue, and to lighten use a light yellow. One last thing, the bush on the left is very distracting because it is red, being a complimentary colour to the rest of the image which is mainly green. That's probably enough to be going on with for now, hope that all helps, and didn't sound too patronising, it isn't meant to be. Plus, I'm no expert myself, so as I always say, feel free to ignore me lol. I've done a little paintover, which sometimes proves a better explanation than anything.
Wow! That's a lot to do ;-) but all great suggestions. Yes, I see what you mean. Forgive me if I dont use your paintover though ;-) won't quite be my work if I do that ;-)
Cool. Alright I will work on those change. So, to summarize: add colors to leaves, change tone of maple tree, lengthen foreground and change tree shape, shorten background weeds, darken center/background, and.... that seems to be it, right? I will work on it and try and post again tomorrow. In the meantime, any other comments are still welcome!
And yeah, by fairy tale I meant cartoony: but not, like, anime cartoony. More like, stylized. Kazky said it best.
Well, it turns out I'm more emotionally connected to this painting then I thought ;-) as I went to work on a personal piece I'm doing and couldn't keep Starfox's words out of my head. So, here is the updated version, both with and without the unfinished parts: The blue in the grass is flowers, and the floaty things are going to be little magical light thingys, like fairies. Again, comments welcome. Also, if anyone can direct to a tutorial or give me some tips on painting that rock up, that'd be great. I kept the tree on the left... I really like the color, but, if enough people agree with Starfox that it needs to go, lemme know.
so it's looking better, well done for taking the crits onboard, sometimes people ask for crits but don't really want them, and get offended if they do get them.
now to me, this is looking like a little grove/secret sheltered place, if you wanted to you could really make it a magical piece now, your fairies could have a strong light which would light the underside of the tree and the tree trunk in the little area! now the world is your oyster! well that painting is anyway!
Alright well, I tried my hand at it anyway. Again, please crit. Here's the updated version with fairy lights and highlighted trees. THe rock is finished too (with some lichen on it).
I see you've added shading and more depth to your painting. It is looking much better now.. I too am a noob to this site (my first post actually) but I've been painting for about 6 years and started in oils so I hope I can help. I didnt read the previous posts so I hope Im not repeating what has already been said.. but here are some tips--
1. Always start with the furthest away elements. Usually this is the sky. Things that are very far away should have much less (almost no) detail. 2. Do the dark colors first.. once you have everything 'blocked in' , then you will come back and add your mid tones, then highlights last. (some people like to do midtones first.. not me tho) 3. Build up layers. This gives the impression of depth. Work 'horizontally' .. put a horizontal layer of grass blades, then a lighter color right in 'front of it (slightly below) , then do another layer of dark below that, etc etc.. this builds up depth. Every time you put something over top of your last layer, you are 'pushing' the previous layers back. The more layers you do, the more depth. Also still water should always be flat. 4. Colors should get brigther in the foreground, and 'fade' away when far away. For example, a grassy hill that is a mile away will appear much lighter than a hill that is 10 yards away. You achieve this by using lighter, duller colors, and also by 'blurring' things in the distance (with very minimum detail) , and keeping things up close sharper, with max detail. 5. Dont give up! Anyone that tells you they started off painting like a master is a liar. It takes years to develop skills to the point where you will be really happy with your work.. and never be happy with your work! because once you're happy with it, you stop getting better!
ok i think thats enough tips for now.. also a great beginning guide to learning the basics of painting is the TV show 'The Joy Of Painting' with Bob Ross.. it teaches you tons of basic painting skills. It comes on tv still pretty late at night, TIVO it or get on Youtube there's always some vids up there too, and just try and get as much knowledge from every different source you can, books, videos, artist, forums, etc. Goodluck!
Wow, great suggestions. And yeah, even though I work with Painter and Photoshop, I can see the same techniques applying well digitally as well as in oils. So thank you!
The fade Idea is good...
I'll keep this threat open for a few more days, in case anyone has any more suggestions... let me know...
Looking a lot better Stargorger, and its all good that you take on
board some advice and not others, it is after all your painting. Here's
a few workshops which might be worth you having a look at:
Well thank you. I will work on fading-out some of the background stuff.
Wait, what advice didnt I take? Did I miss something? I really do appreciate all the advice, and I'm perfectly willing to implement it... I must have just forgotten something...
Well, I already saw some of those, but since I mostly use Painter, most of the brushes dont do much for me ;-)
