Reddit reviews How to Render: the fundamentals of light, shadow and reflectivity
We found 18 Reddit comments about How to Render: the fundamentals of light, shadow and reflectivity. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
learn to use 3d tools and stick to the fundamentals
https://www.amazon.com/How-Draw-sketching-environments-imagination/dp/1933492732/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1540762345&sr=8-3
https://www.amazon.com/How-Render-fundamentals-shadow-reflectivity/dp/1933492961/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
don't bother learning art or how to draw. focus on technique and draftsmanship.
you're looking at 10 years though if your gonna do it solo. you need your drawing skills, then comic skills, plus writing comic scripts, plus plot skills, character design, and marketing/sales skill.
i gave up. now i just draw hentai and furry porn. life is good.
While your end goal might be cartoons, you will HAVE to learn to draw realistically to some extent. No way would you be able to animate anything in perspective otherwise, understand lighting, or know how to composite complex scenes. There are fundamentals that you must understand that are key to 2D animation, regardless of art style, which should be continuously worked on alongside your stylistic development.
Books:
Simple book on perspective
My favorite anatomy book
A pretty simple book on light (More pictures/examples than in-depth detail)
Overall beginners drawing book
This covers light/shadow and materials decently for beginners
I personally think you should focus on fundamentals alone until you have a decent grasp before looking at animation. But if you want to learn concurrently, this book is pretty well-known in the industry: LINK
There's tons more, but I already think this might be too much to take in all at once. Discover for yourself the rest, it's not good to have everything handed to you with fundamentals, gotta reign it in personally.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Draw-Thomas-Bertling/dp/1781166862 && https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Render-TP-Scott-Robertson/dp/1933492961
These, for a start.
Scott Robertson's How to Draw,
Scott Robertson's How to Render.
If you already know how to draw, then try Scott Robertsons books.
https://www.amazon.com/How-Render-fundamentals-shadow-reflectivity/dp/1933492961/ref=la_B0034O5O32_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1480449825&sr=1-2
https://www.amazon.com/How-Draw-sketching-environments-imagination/dp/1933492732/ref=la_B0034O5O32_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1480449825&sr=1-1
They are not about drawing gundam but about drawing hard objects in general. Which is much more important then learning to draw a single thing as you can transfer the skill to anything.
Looks really good. Now I'm not much of a vehicle artist so I don't want to lead blindly.
Have you checked out Scott Robertson? Phenomenal technical traditional artist, his techniques translate to digital also.
One of his books (he has many); https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Render-TP-Scott-Robertson/dp/1933492961
His YouTube channel; https://youtu.be/dzhyKtavwMU
Sorry I couldn't offer much direct help, however I hope these resources help you out.
Keep going at it!
Thank you, I appreciate it :)
Well, the only advice I can give you is to never stop drawing. I don't know how "good" your skill is or if you're just at the beginning but for most people that really want to draw the big let-down comes after a short period of time when they can't realize the progress they're making. Most of the people stop drawing when they can't see that they're getting better after some days or weeks. Drawing is a skill that needs alot of time and patience. Other than that it's just rinse and repeat. Draw what you like and just have fun. If you're over the first hill and start liking what you do, everythings going faster and faster. I don't know what art you're into but a good start would be to learn the fundamentals. For character it's anatomy, for environment it would be perspective. Learn to understand lighting, colour, shadow, perspective etc.
If you're not afraid and still really want to learn drawing I recommend How to Draw and How to Render, both from Scott Robertson. Both books are heavily influenced by product- and concept design but give a really nice overview about fundamentals - that's how I started.
I hope that helps :)
That's great to hear -- I'm really glad it's helping out.
I also find his "How to Draw" and "How to Render" books hugely valuable, as well.
You need to pick up an anatomy book because right now you're inventing muscles and applying too many shadows until the whole drawing becomes visual noise and it doesn't read clearly.
First off, I'd recommend you study Figure drawing for all it's worth by Andrew Loomis. You can probably find a PDF of it online for free and it's not overly complicated for a kid to understand. Then, if you feel you want to stick with drawing in the long run convince your parents to invest in these books:
Atlas of human anatomy for the artist
Human anatomy for artists : The elements of form
Classic human anatomy: The artist's guide to form, function, and movement
Figure drawing: Design and invention
How to draw: Drawing and sketching objects and environments from your imagination
How to render: The fundamentals of light, shadow and reflectivity
Color and light: A guide for the realist painter
I think it's a bit difficult and unfair for me to comment based on one painting alone. Do you have any sketches (line drawing, preferably) of this painting, or anything that showcase what you can do so far? Almost everyone will suggest we start designing anything in line sketches, especially if learning, so I'm interested to see what you got :D
Edit: Since you're looking for advice on how to start, I'll just say a few things that might be able to help you start.
(1) Drawing, imo, is the very foundation of all art. I think before you start painting, you should start drawing first! Here are a few links that may help you start with drawing:
(2) I suggest you follow an art school's course outline so you can progress pretty well. Feng Zhu Design School has an outline that they use for their students to learn how to do concept art in 1 year (16 hours per day). You can also download a detailed version of what they offer in their course, then you can have an idea on what each component means.
(3) There are also a few books that would be really useful to you when learning how to draw and render. These are supposedly the best on the internet (I only have two, the first two books in the list) Here they are:
I think those are all I have for you now. I'm not in any way a professional artist (I'm currently studying Industrial Design), but I think the above things I've mentioned should prove useful to you. If you have any questions, you can send me a PM :D Work hard and practise every day!
if she is into digital art i wold recommend that one or
"How to Draw: drawing and sketching objects and environments from your imagination"
How to Render
I have Scott Robertson's How To Render, but I haven't started working with it yet, as I'm still focusing on some other fundamentals. It's a very exhaustive book that's very information dense. Not for the faint of heart. It's essentially the follow-up to How To Draw, which is one of the most recommended art books on the internet. This one builds on that.
Framed Perspective Vol. 2 by Marcus Mateu-Mestre is similar, but is more basic (and also a bit more accessible) and focuses more on how to shade characters. There's a section in chapter 3 that's devoted to the major plane changes of the human body and how that affects shading.
Both books assume you know the basic principles of linear perspective, which they teach in their respective predecessors.
Someone more knowledgeable about teaching art as a subject may have recommendations that are more appropriate. I'm still a learner myself, but the teacher in my weekly art classes often pulls exercises from these books (usually in a more simplified format for us novices :P).
https://www.amazon.com/How-Render-fundamentals-shadow-reflectivity/dp/1933492961
All of these are linked to Amazon, if you have an account, you can make a wishlist to keep track of ‘em:
This one teaches you how to see shapes objectively, which will improve your drawing from photo or real life. I recommend getting it from the library because you’ll only need the book once. Drawing a lot of still lifes/self-portraits helps achieve the same goal even without the book, though the exercises are awesome and will speed up the process. You can ignore the author’s rambling about the brain, it’s been debunked by science~ I’ve republished the first exercise of the book on my blog here - trying to build a step-by-step guide for beginners, but I only have a few hours a week. :)
Do the exercises! They’re simple yet awesome. After you finish the book, apply perspective to stuff you draw from imagination. When I finished it, I didn’t use what I learned, but once I started applying perspective to every drawing I made, my skill skyrocketed. I believe perspective is the second most important drawing skill, but it can be tedious.
Teaches you a variety of solid fundamentals, like construction and composition. Useful for after you’ve got the basics down with Loomis and Perspective.
If you've got the time and resources to spare, try making maquettes. You can get modeling clay fairly cheap, and it can be incredibly helpful to throw together a quick maquette, chuck it under a lamp, and see what happens with the light.
If you want a great pair of books on light and form by a master painter, check out James Gurney's Color and Light and Imaginative Realism. His blog is worth a read as well, it's always informative and interesting.
If you want a more technical approach to lighting, How to Render is a fantastic technical examination of how light behaves on various surfaces. The associated How to Draw is an excellent technical book on perspective. Both are a bit dry and clinical, but quite excellent.
Anything by Andrew Loomis is also well worth picking up.
http://www.amazon.de/How-Draw-Sketching-Environments-Imagination/dp/1933492732
http://www.amazon.de/How-Render-Fundamentals-Shadow-Reflectivity/dp/1933492961/
how to draw gibt einem die grundlagen wie man objekte/landschaften perspektivisch korrekt zeichnet bzw. konstruiert. how to render baut auf how to draw auf und zeigt einem wie man die linien mit farbe füllen muss. dazu gibts noch links auf seine website mit 30+ stunden videomaterial.
I'm late to the party, but I made a cheat sheet for my boss niece last week: here's all the ressources I can think of to kick butts at matte painting.
The sites where we pay per month
Gnomon Online School
Super school of vfx in California. They have on their site a lot of tutorials from 8 to 20 hours to learn to make your own camera projections. You can either pay (expensive but worth it) for a private class with a teacher via Skype. Or you pay (cheaper) for a bank of tutorials.
private lessons
https://www.gnomon.edu/courses/online
the bank of tutorials
https://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/tutorials?tags[]=matte-painting
I recommend: All the tutorials of Dylan Cole (vol 1, 2,3), Camera Projection Techniques in Maya, Matte Painting Production techniques, etc.
Plural Sight (formerly Digital Tutors)
a site that has courses on a little everything. This site is very good when you want to learn new programs. Excellent serie on the 3D which becomes more and more present in the matte painting, and some tutorials
https://app.pluralsight.com/library/
related to 3D
Quick start to modeling in Maya (volume 1,2,3)
Professional Tips for Modeling Complex Shapes
related to matte painting
Photo manipulation and Clean Plating Fundamentals
Matte Painting Basic and the Static Camera Shot
Sites where we pay per tutorial (Gumroad, etc.)
The tutorials of Anthony Eftekhari
Good DMP tutorials that show you the latest techniques and how to do it step by step.
https://gumroad.com/anthonye
The tutorials of Eytan Zana
More concept art, but the main lines apply just as well to the DMP.
https://gumroad.com/eytanzana
Free sites and tutorials
Garrett Fry's blog
He also has a Facebook group that helps each other in DMP, it is THE technical reference for matte painting. His blog is full of technical stuff for camera projections (aka moving your matte painting). A treasure of information.
https://www.gfryart.com/blog
Other
TEXTURES! (Or can we find good textures to make DMP)
CGtexture
http://www.textures.com
Flickr (Matte Painting References)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/tjframe/sets/72157605581901392/
Flickr (Matte Painting Resources)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/dman3d2000/sets/72157629164518650/
Photobash.org (paying a card)
https://www.photobash.org/
Pictures of Jacek Pilarski
https://gumroad.com/jacekpilarski
Books (yes yes, it's a thing)
Digital Matte Painter Handbook
it's old, the drawings are ugly, the photoshop stuff in it is pure candy though. Full of stuff in DMP that I have never seen elsewhere but that is the basis of the trade. Still actual today. The matte painting of the castle in is also an excellent starting point if you start from scratch.
https://www.amazon.ca/Digital-Matte-Painting-Handbook/dp/0470922427/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1523975893&sr=1-1&keywords=Digital+Matte+Painting+Handbook
How to draw and How to Render
Scott Robertson, a big shot of concept art, shows the basics of traditional drawings, perspective, etc. An essential.
https://www.amazon.ca/How-Draw-sketching-environments-imagination/dp/1933492732/ref=pd_sim_14_4?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=GWB27RDDYF5E0JG7TTY0
https://www.amazon.ca/How-Render-fundamentals-shadow-reflectivity/dp/1933492961/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=K9W1RK5K9KVWMPY14EAE
Imaginative Realism and Color and Light
James Gurney is an illustrator who specializes in realistic fantasy artwork with traditional mediums, excellent cues on light and color
https://www.amazon.ca/Imaginative-Realism-Paint-Doesnt-Exist/dp/0740785508?th=1&psc=1&source=googleshopping&locale=en-CA&tag=googcana-20&ref=pd_sl_2y2j9az9y9_e
https://www.amazon.ca/Color-Light-Guide-Realist-Painter/dp/0740797719/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=YCNYYJCTNJ4405KD1S6B
Nuke 101
We can make the projection of matte painting in Nuke or Maya. An excellent book for Nuke.
https://www.amazon.ca/Nuke-101-Professional-Compositing-Effects/dp/0321984129/ref=pd_sim_14_8?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=FNST5YS1F7464SZY3QZV
There are three things I would recommend to you. :)
You'll find that a lot of information on color out there is almost strictly theory oriented (not a big surprise considering it's called color theory), and there isn't much practical help on how to apply that information. Each of the things I just suggested are all very practical sources of information for learning how to work with color.
Some things you should note, though...the Scott Robertson book is designed to build on top of his book How to Draw. That book teaches you perspective and how to create proper 3d forms in 2d space. How to Render builds on that by teaching you how light will interact realistically with those forms you now know how to create. If you don't want to work through How to Draw, that's fine (though I highly suggest that book as well)...but you'll probably be losing out on a fuller understanding of the concepts.
Make sure that before you move too much into painting and color working that you can make well constructed drawings and can handle value properly. Those two are the most important. Why? Because if you don't have a proper looking drawing then no matter how well you can render and lay color over it...that won't save it...it will still look wrong. And if you can draw well constructed things but you're weak in values, then you're really in trouble. If, when you lay down color, the values of those colors are wrong, then your well constructed forms that you drew will no longer read as the forms that they're supposed to because the "light" that's interacting with the form isn't interacting like it would in real life so your eye reads it as a different form than you intended.
I understand that they style you're going after isn't at all realistic. On some of them the color that's there isn't even being used to render...it's simply there as a graphic element. Which is fine! Really awesome style. But you will be well served if you put in the time to learn the technical application of light and color. That way, since you know the "rules", you'll have control over the color...when to use it realistically and how and when to use it graphically...rather than the color having control over you. :)
Hope this helps! :)