cipher's ciphers

cipher · August 2, 2011 06:05 PM

So for the past many years of my life I have been drawing in flash. So this past summer I've decided that I was tired of that and wanted to learn how to paint properly in photoshop (I only knew image manipulation). So anyways after a little under a month of learning and making some quick black and white paintings (which sucked and will not be posted here), I decided to make my first color painting. I decided I didn't want to do anything original yet, so I decided to draw something directly from a reference just to see how well I could shade in color. So the below image is what I came up with

W.A.S.I.M. · August 2, 2011 06:15 PM

i never knew u could draw thats actualy pretty dope painting u got there

Crabarms · August 2, 2011 06:20 PM

That is the happiest Baneling I have ever seen. I think it looks pretty cool.

psi43 · August 2, 2011 07:08 PM

that mouth, that smile, those lips. They remind me of something but i can't remember what it was AHHHH Wfsdf

either way, this looks really nice. Make the background black and the green stuff glow, that'd look way cooler!

cipher · August 2, 2011 07:24 PM

He's totally smiling in the reference too!

well a little

rtil · August 2, 2011 08:05 PM

i don't think it would hurt to use a little linework here and there. it doesn't have to be a dominant part of the piece, but it's good to use line in places where you need more definition. what i usually do is start wiht linework, paint underneath it, transparency lock the line layer and color the lines, merge those layers later, and paint over the places where i don't want line anymore at all. what you get in the end is a healthy combination of both line and color.

other than that there's some nice detail but i feel like it's a little flat. could use some darker darks and lighter lights. maybe a highlight here and there.

cipher · August 2, 2011 10:31 PM

Quote from: rtili don't think it would hurt to use a little linework here and there. it doesn't have to be a dominant part of the piece, but it's good to use line in places where you need more definition. what i usually do is start wiht linework, paint underneath it, transparency lock the line layer and color the lines, merge those layers later, and paint over the places where i don't want line anymore at all. what you get in the end is a healthy combination of both line and color.

other than that there's some nice detail but i feel like it's a little flat. could use some darker darks and lighter lights. maybe a highlight here and there.

Yeah I totally agree with the flat part, I'll try to push colors some more on my next one. I'll try experimenting with small amounts of linework, but one of reasons why I decided not to do it was because the previous tests I had done with linework looked really messy.

The way I did this was basically make a super messy (aka fast) version of the baneling using basically one color per section, then went back in and added 1-2 colors to each and cleaned up the lines and then went through it fully to make it look nice.

Anyways I'll see what I can do

cipher · August 11, 2011 10:39 PM

Well, here's another pic

(I decided to sort of skimp out of the background of the image since this took forever and I was ready to move on (for now at least). I may come back to it another time).

Anyways, I still don't think it's great or anything, but I think I may have fixed a few issues I had with the baneling picture. It still looks a little flat in some places, trees are hard to make look good, for me at least.

Also here is two little things that I did. I gave myself 20 minutes for each and said no zooming allowed (something I did too much of with the baneling). The waterfall looks okay, but I'm not a fan of the volcanoes, but I'm posting it anyways

yep

SHADOWFOX2 · August 12, 2011 12:45 AM

These are really soft feeling and I like them

rtil · August 12, 2011 12:51 AM

these are cool. the one with the trees could use some depth. stuff closer to us should be more saturated, stuff further in the background have more 'atmosphere' covering it, typically a blue hue that washes out the color more and more. if you look at pictures of horizons with layers of mountains , you can see it.

cipher · August 12, 2011 12:56 AM

Quote from: rtilthese are cool. the one with the trees could use some depth. stuff closer to us should be more saturated, stuff further in the background have more 'atmosphere' covering it, typically a blue hue that washes out the color more and more. if you look at pictures of horizons with layers of mountains , you can see it.

I totally see what you are saying here. I'll probably go back to this one and add more stuff eventually, but I'm going to do something new first

cipher · August 21, 2011 12:19 AM

After spending a bunch of hours on projects I ultimately scrapped, I decided I would just draw one thing (with no background). So I drew this weird plant. Then ended up adding a quick background so it looked less lonely

sev · August 21, 2011 12:24 AM

cipher so kawaii sugoi

rtil · August 21, 2011 04:56 AM

i recognize the brush you used on the purple leaves coming out of the trees. it looks cool, but for some people familiar with photoshop they may recognize it and it takes a little bit away from the piece. but i do like the piece as a whole. i think the horizon could be a little further down. i think the silhouette of the island would have more impact that way

cipher · August 21, 2011 05:18 PM

Quote from: rtili recognize the brush you used on the purple leaves coming out of the trees. it looks cool, but for some people familiar with photoshop they may recognize it and it takes a little bit away from the piece. but i do like the piece as a whole. i think the horizon could be a little further down. i think the silhouette of the island would have more impact that way

yeah I originally wanted to make actual leaves on the trees, but no matter what I did it just looked flat, so I just started scrolling through my brushes and picked something that looked cool.

thanks

cipher · September 11, 2011 12:10 AM

doodle I made during a skype call with a bunch of people since I wasn't actually talking anyways

5 mins or so, but I like it

Crabarms · September 11, 2011 12:29 AM

I think aquatic creatures are interesting or at least I think that what it is.

cipher · September 11, 2011 12:48 AM

Quote from: Crabarms on September 11, 2011 12:29 AM
at least I think that what it is.

probably

rtil · September 11, 2011 01:05 AM

it's a shootie (in larval form)

cipher · October 6, 2011 07:48 AM

Didn't plan on posting this, but will anyways. It's okay I guess, perspective is kind of weird

Flat as fuck, as usual. The top half looks good, not to crazy about the bottom half. Conceptually a cool idea but I can do better

yeh