AGS Awards BG - Volume vs Linework

[Ali]

I recently drew a backdrop for the AGS award ceremony, and I wanted to use it as a chance to try a different technique for colouring and brushwork.

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At full resolution (1280x960) it's a bit soft. I tried that because of something I read Loominous say while researching other folk's techniques.

I also looked very hard at Zyndikate's Well Backdrop and Theo's Harbour.

I noticed that volume and shading are much more prominent than linework. They seem to use quite hard-edged brushes with bold strokes.

That's not something I'm very comfortable with. I've never painted non-digitally and I tend to depend on colouring-in outlines rather than capturing volume, light, shade and texture. Here's some examples:

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And more in my portfolio: www.abeckettking.com/illustration.html

I took three attempts at colouring the AGS Awards backdrop, and the one I posted was the closest to the style I was aiming for. However I still think there's a lot of softness in the shading and a lack of boldness and energy in the brush-strokes. Part of the overall fuzziness at full-scale is the lack of hard linework, which is normally what I'd rely upon.

I would appreciate your thoughts on the volume/linework issue. As well as any tips on what photoshop brushes you find most useful.

[Anian]

First of all, I love this style. Lighting looks nice, although lines might be a bit firmer on the Workshop and Coffee shop backgrounds, right now they seem unfisnihed/like sketches, first Nelly game had similar look, but the style was less realistic so it worked better then.
The Awawrd room looks fine to me, maybe just put a sharpen filter on it or up the contrast so the lines look darker and it'll be fine.

But on the off topic note of some things that kind of catch my eye (if you don't mind):
1st pic (AGS award room)
- the columns on the far right and left seems unusal and wrong because the bottom/foundation is widening for no reason
- the squareish/wall decorations (I don't know what the name is in english) are off, even if the room is roundish, they kind of have the wrong perspecitve, it wouldn't usually be so distracting but those are straight lines that make it seem perspective is all ove the place, even though the rest of the room is fine

2nd pic (Workshop)
- is there supposed to be a shed in a basement? also what is the source of that light circle, if it's the light on the shed of the roof then I think the roof would be more in the shadows. I see you did this in the next background as well, but here it really looks strange and the light is really strict, while in the Award room it's nice and gradiented. Maybe if you added a gradeinted light so the transition is not so abrupt, it wouldn't look like theres a source of light so much as you would just naturally draw attention to the point of interest.

3rd pic
- here you have a source of light through the window but again there's a spot light there in the middle
- I'd check the perspective here, if you look at the wall (which looks ok) both the table in the back and the floor (although floor a little less) seem to suddenly start exponentionally forshortening and the table (if you look at everything else in the scene) should be just a cardboard cutout thick, everything else seems to point that it has no volume

[Ali]

Thanks for the thoughts. I see what you mean about sharpening the lines in backdrop one. But that's really what I want to avoid. How can I create detail and depth without just putting a hard outline around everything?

I should be clear, that I'm not trying to make the second two backdrops look like the first.

I'm quite happy with the difference, and I rather like the wrong points and rule-breaking on the two Nelly backdrops. I was mainly looking at 101 Dalmations and the more cubist disney and Warner backdrop styles.

The cardboard cut-out look was something I was aiming for in the first game as well -  I had in mind that each backdrop is an old theatre set mad out of flat pieces. The floorboards are always out of perspective, and I find it interesting to put more detail and perspective realism into important objects, and allow less important objects to be looser and weirder.

I don't mean that I think the latter two backdrops are perfect, but I don't see all the points you mention as problems. You're right about the light on the shed roof (it's a shed in the lobby of a manor house, as it happens). But adding a gradient would be breaking an unbreakable rule here!

[Anian]

I don't mean that I think the latter two backdrops are perfect, but I don't see all the points you mention as problems. You're right about the light on the shed roof (it's a shed in the lobby of a manor house, as it happens). But adding a gradient would be breaking an unbreakable rule here!

Very well. I mean, I guess the style choice has some play in it, backdrop looks really nice and it certainly is better than I could ever draw it so carry on I guess. 

[Monsieur OUXX]

Every artist has their limitations, which eventually becomes their style (that's my opinion). I think that your kinda-cubist background (with the stage appearing almost as facing the viewer) is really cool.
And then again it's not shocking/not too experimental for the casual viewer, as it's really really really well drawn and shaded.

[Ilyich]

First of all - I like your style a lot - it's quirky, recognizable and vibrant. And I think you've pulled the slight change in coloring style on the AGS background splendidly well - I don't really see any problems with it per se, but if you're trying to do something similar in style to theo and zyndikate, you should consider doing less soft, gradual transitions and think more in terms of shape, planes and contrast between the surfaces that are well lit and those that are in shadow.

Your design relies heavily on fluid, wobbly lines, so in order to get rid of them (which I'd advise against because that's a really strong point of your art ) you have to approach the design and composition differently too. Placing proper, but easily managable light sources is essential. Starting coloring the piece with 2-3 different contrasting colours (in theo's harbor it's yellow-orange for primary light, dark purple for shadows and soft blue-ish for ambient light) and then mixing them should make working with lighting instead of object's inherent hues easier.

As for the hard-edged brushes - both theo and zyndikate actively use Sharpen filter, it really helps to achieve that crisp, sharp look, so I suggest you try it too (you can also try to make a layer of the whole background with the 'Sharpen More' filter and then adjust it with opacity to your liking). Also, using some bold, sharp bright lines on the surfaces that face the light should help to make them pop a bit.

Hope this helps a bit. Love the Nelly Cootalot backgrounds too, and thanks for the link to the cubist Disney and Warner experiments - fascinating stuff!

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

I liked your work in Nelly 1 and I still enjoy it here.  I see no reason for you to try and emulate approaches that don't seem 'natural' to you unless you feel it's a fundamental flaw in your own style that needs fixing.  Loominous tends to paint everything with an ethereal, glowy atmosphere and while I think it's brilliant for certain themes there are other times that it doesn't work for me and comes off like too much bloom in a 3d videogame (if you know what I mean).

Your approach currently bends more towards the cartoony with the thick, high visibility of your line work and the relaxed application of color.  There's absolutely nothing wrong with this if that's the approach you want.  If you want to go towards more realism then you'll need to pay more attention to color vibrance and especially light and shadow; for instance, the coffee shop has a very lazy light and shading look to it, much like you'd see in a cartoon.  A more realistic application would account for bounce light, the hue of the light source (in this case the sun?) and how it affects objects and shadows, turning the window into a secondary light source, higher contrast, and so on.

These are all things you could certainly do if you were determined to push yourself, but it's a matter of whether you feel you need to or not.  I don't think too many people will complain about what you produce as it stands.

[InCreator]

Dammit, I wish I'd know how to draw like this. Not draw... I think I can, with pencil, but use computer to turn drawing into digital painting as those. There's loads of tutorials, including superthread, but I've yet to see on that exactly tells how to scan and color.

I like others but coffee shop one looks unfinished. I think it needs more soft shadow... how do you name it in 2d art, in 3D it's ambient occlusion. The way all sharp corners get less light. Exactly what stage background has a lot of.

[Ali]

Hi guys, thanks for the feedback.

@anian: Thanks for the feedback, I hope I didn't sound dismissive of your points!

Monsieur OUXX: I'm was thinking of looking for a bit more work drawing and so I was keen to try a style I was less comfortable with. It was much hreder than I expected!

@Ilyich: Thanks for the suggestions, the sharpen filter was news to me! I'm glad you like that blog. It's an amazing resource, but it's a pity he's not updating it any more.

@ProgZ: Thanks for the positive notes. I suppose the Nelly style has become natural only because I've drawn quite a lot of backdrops like that. I've done a bit of 3D work and photography so I have a reasonable grasp of lighting principles (which I was ignoring most of the time with Nelly), but I do find it hard to get away from a watercolour look in photoshop.

@InCreator: I think I see what you mean by 'unfinished' but I must say I don't a problem with the lack of soft shadow. I do agree about the difficulty of moving from linework to colour. I was also searching the forums, but couldn't find anything that dealt with how the strokes of colour are laid down to create certain effects - what kind of brushes, opacity and so on.

Incidentally, Zyndikate PM'd a quick paintover (which I hope he doesn't mind me posting). I think the atmos is a little too strong, but I really like what he did with light values and the use of repeated objects to give depth to the scene:

[Monsieur OUXX]

Zyndicate's paintover fixes the overall flatness of the scene but ruined the contrast...

[theo]

I agree with Ilyich , your "original style" rocks, and I see no reason to replace it really. Though as an artist, I understand and respect your will to explore and try new stuff. Challenges are a big part of the fun.

My best tip if you want to work more with volumes is to CONSTANTLY think about your light sources. Having few distinct sources that you quickly can braintrace is a very good idea. Casting light is about always making approximations whether a certain area will be affected by a light source or not. Failing to do so always results in flatness and a more difficult picture for the viewer to read. After all, we read volumes pretty much entirely after how they are shaded.

On a side note, I too usually start out with line work and then gradually paint on top of it until it in the end pretty much disappears. The only times I do sketching with areas instead of lines is when I'm trying out shapes, especially organic ones such as nature or characters. Different artists prefer different approaches to the blocking out of their scenes though, so if you're comfy with starting out with lines, heck, start out with lines. I find it easier to do my shading if I first have a pretty solid linework idea of where I've got my different volumes, their angles, and how they all hang together. Painting volumes from scratch, at least for me, often feels like I'm doing too many things at once and thus risks it all just winding up in a big blur of unfinished shapes and ideas. But again, it's all about preference.

Some feedback then.


Awards room:

I think it looks real good and I like the paintover too. My usual complaint would be "ADD A FOREGROUND" but I'm not sure how well that would mesh with how this scene is intended to be used. The audience will, in fact, act as foreground here which is pretty weird but very cool from an artistic perspective. Compositionally I hope the character sprites will be very dark, thus helping frame the scene and putting focus there instead of on the crowd.


Basement:

There's no reason for your shadow to be blue. Blue is the color of outdoor shadows when there's a clear blue sky. This scene has no clear blue sky. The only source of light in this scene is the little warm lamp on the roof of the shed. Hence, the color of the rest of the scene should reflect this and also be warm because of bounced light.

This is not what I would do though.

I would add a second cold light source from above/beyond, representing moon or starlight filtering through the basement windows, adding cold higlights allover the place to contrast the warm shed-lamp. Pretty much exactly what I did in the harbor scene you linked to. This will allow you to keep your shadows nice and cold, and will add a ton of ambiance to the scene due to the warm/cool lighting.


Kitchen:

I think it looks great, though I would agree with previous poster however that the circular lit area on the floor feels a bit awkward. If you still want to keep that stylistic on/off shading look you've got (which is cool, btw) - I'd say keep the shading but change the shape of it so it feels more believable that this area has beeen shaped by the window, from which I presume the light is coming. More square, simply. Maybe even add a window-cross in the middle of it to really define where the light is coming from.

If you intend to shift this scene to a more volume based shading technique, go back to the basics and ask yourself "why can I see this object? - "What/which sources of light can reach it, and with what intensity?".

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I look forward to Nelly II! Keep up the good work.

[Ali]

Wow, thanks for the detailed response Theo. Thanks for describing your workflow and thanks for the breakdown of the other scenes.

I've always painted underneath linework, rather than on top of it, so it's interesting to know you work on top. The emphasis on light sources is interesting too. I realise that I tend not to think about light source at the sketching stage - only when it comes to colouring. I have lots of things to try, if only I had more time for drawing!

(Also looking forward to more Journeying Down!)

[Iliya]

Woow! Lovely screens! I'm looking forward for Nelly Cootalot 2!!!

[Darkdan]

Ali,

I feel comfortable with your style of background (probably because I come from the world of comic book) and I tend to color the same way as you do. I think this technique is mainly problematic when a high-contrast shadow does not match the linework.