background in psp - C&C

[Sn4k3s]

this is my first attempt at drawing backgrounds using photoshop. would really love C&C and guidelines on how to improve this background.
thnx a lot  

[Czar]

well i think you just came here to show off , cuz i like your bg, and i think it is good as is, but if you want to use it in a game you could say for what purpose is this meant...
Anyway maybe you could change the moon, but i still am not sure.
Anyway great for your first try, keep it up

And yeah, even i didnt notice i was looking at a reflection on the first look.

[D · Y · D · O]

The coloring could be a little more interesting, not sure how though. The water could use some effects, like blurring, ripples, or stuff floating around. Not too much, just to accentuate it, I didn't see straightaway, that I was looking at a reflection.

[Andail]

In order to make the reflection work, I think you should make the waterline horisontal.
Also that little bay doesn't look like a bay, more like some sort of bulb the water is making. You could try just a straight line instead.
Also the sky appear with a higher hue in the reflection, which makes it less realistic - it should be dilluted somehow IMO.

Otherwise the picture is good, it is simple and nice and could work as some sort of cut-scene background, as it is not very suitable to walk around in, perhaps.
Good work on the whole.

[Ghormak]

It looks really nice to me. I don't know much about art, so I can't really comment much about the details. I agree with dydo about the water, though. Maybe some soft ripples would make it more easily discernable from the landscape.

I only really posted because I thought I should point out that usually Photoshop is abbreviated PS, while Paintshop Pro is PSP.

[Ginny]

I like it overall, and I wish my first attemp could look like that, but I think it needs contrast, if it's to be used in a game, even in a cutscene. There must be a lot of dust in the air to make the water have that colour, lol.
Maybe if you change the water's color (I didn't actually realise it was water at first) it will give the image some contrast.
That depends of course on what lies at the bottom of the water, and also on how deep it is. If there's sand beneath then I guess the color is appropriate.

Overall though, great background, the shading is splendid.

[Pessi]

That is really good for a first try! I'm impressed! You've got a real nice texture on the sand.

The single one thing to make it EVEN better, would be adding contrast, as GinnyW pointed out. Make the darker spots even darker. Currently, there aren't any shadows that you could easily make darker. If you'd like, you could add them. You could shape the dunes even more with them.

At this point I'd like to add, that if you ever feel uncomfortable with the result of your image or you will have to draw something you're not very good at - use reference! They're a great source of detailed help, as images are worth thousand words.

For this subject, for example, I used Google's image search to find the following images:

http://www.photo.net/photo/pcd0738/great-sand-dune-hills-dark-16.3.jpg
http://www.cometchaser.de/namibia1998/dune.jpg
http://www-robotics.usc.edu/~shrabar/images/namibia/big/dune-2.jpg .

Examine them for a while and apply what you've learned to your image. And in this case, I think the shadows would be the thing that makes your image different from these. I know, different doesn't mean bad, but you need contrast to make the image read better, in my opinion.

The other issue is the water, it seems. I didn't recognize the water at first either, it took a bit of deciphering. You could start with Andail's suggestion and make the shore line more horizontal. Often you can get what you want only with shapes. Which means that DYDO's suggestions should also be added. You wouldn't have to even touch the colors.

However, if you'd like to reinforce the watery look, you could add some blue on the bottom of the image. This is due to the fact that water reflects when you look at it at small angle. The smaller the angle, the greater the reflection. This means, that on the bottom of the image, the angle you're looking at the water is pretty big, there's practically no reflection at all - the 'local' water color shines through. That would be deep blue, or any color you wish, but blue probably conveys the message the best. To accomplish that, you can use two layers. The bottom layer would be the deep blue, and the top layer would be the reflection. Now, erase the bottom part of the reflection layer with a soft brush, so the blue color shows through. I hope that makes sense. Looks a bit more like water.

Here's what I got with these things in mind:



I was also going to post the .PSD file so you could see how I used the layers, but unfortunately I saved the one with flattened layers, so the layers were lost.

[Sn4k3s]

WOW!  :o
Pessi, what you did with the background is simply breathtaking, it looks so much better.

First of all, sorry for the confusion with the "psp" in the topic name and
Ghormak, thanx for clearing it up. I shall use "ps" from now on when I abbreviate photoshop.

Czar, I wouldn't even dream of coming here to show off. For some days now I've been a guest to this forum and I was intruiged by it, so I registered and I don't seem to regret it.   I think this forum is full of talented individuals, whose creative skills surpass mine many times.

First to comment on the original background. It really doesn't have any real contrast, thanx for making me aware of that. The reflection of the sand on the water seems really just as it was copied and mirrored verticaly. No considerable improvement could be made from my side, because I'm not familiar with drawing water and waves, but I'm looking forward to follow Pessi's advice on collecting reference  .
Now to comment on Pessi's improved background, IMO it looks fantastic, those shadows really add to the contrast and the atmosphere of the image. The water looks great as well. May I ask how much time you spent drawing the whole thing? And a little request, could you tell me which brush you used to make the water look wavy.
Btw when the background is finished it will hopefully find it's place as an intro screen  .

I can surely add this to my experience points.. (joke )
Everyone, I really appreciate it, thnx  

[Sn4k3s]

[Ginny]

Amazing, Pessi!

I looks like Pessi used a gradient on the water and smeared the reflections with the smudge tool for waves, though I can't be sure.

[Pessi]

Thanks for the compliments, guys!

Yeah, GinnyW is correct - I did use smudge for the waves. If I were to draw realistic (and bigger) waves I probably would use regular brushes, but smudge works really well for waves like this. I just moved 3-pixel wide soft brush around. Really simple.

I think I used about 20 to 30 minutes on the drawing. The changes were so little that it only took very little modifying.

Keep up the good work and keep us posted!