Reddit reviews How to Render Matte Surfaces 1: Shading Planar Surfaces

You're far too kind to me!

Most of my digital painting skills have come from several sources. The first, and and by far best resource I used to learn was this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Beginners-Guide-Digital-Painting-Photoshop/dp/0955153077

Best book on digital painting ever written. Ever. a solid 80%+ of my digital painting understanding and tools mastery came from this book.

I studied Scott Robertson's Gnomon videos on Perspective, and Value. These are the best tools for understanding these subjects I have ever found.If you spend any real amount of time practicing his techniques, its impossible to not get good at them.

http://www.amazon.com/Techniques-Scott-Robertson-Perspective-Drawing/dp/1930878818/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404610130&sr=1-2&keywords=gnomon+scott+robertson

http://www.amazon.com/How-Render-Matte-Surfaces-Shading/dp/B000GETV6O/ref=pd_sim_sbs_b_10?ie=UTF8&refRID=17MGSE75N3Q0BAGD0GYJ

As far as color and light goes, Jeremy Vickery was the best source I could find. He works for Pixar and is the mastermind behind their unbelievable redering. This DVD is a good source to check out-

http://www.amazon.com/Theory-Application-Jeremy-Vickery-Practical/dp/B0013TPNPY/ref=sr_1_1?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1404610239&sr=1-1&keywords=Jeremy+Vickery+Gnomon

Finally, if you wanna learn human anatomy at a boss level, Go to Alienthink.com and buy Riven Phoenix's anatomy videos. All of them. They're worth ten times their cost easily. You cannot still be bad after learning his methods. I'm serious. It's literally impossible.

http://alienthink.com/

Finally, If you wanna learn from one of the best artists in the industry about everything possible about digital painting, go to Youtube and look up Feng Zhu Design Cinema. Start at #1 and watch every single on in order. You will get the kind of design education most artists only dream of. I cannot tell you how much I have learned from him. Hell, this painting right here was an experiment with a new painting workflow I learned from one of his videos. Check him out and see.

I hope all of this helps!