WorkOfArts Art Advice 5
Hey guys! I love giving art advice or critique. I can only give advice and critique to the best of my knowledge and ability, though. I've never taken an art class or had any type of formal training, so things I say might be different from what you may have been taught.
If you want critique, feel free to post below or send me a PM!
[header]Art Advice #1[/header]
[b]Practice coloring in gray-scale[/b]
Grayscale is a method of coloring. You color in black and white and everything in between. No color. Grayscale allows you to practice your values. Understand your lighting and your shadows.
Some people focus way too much on their colors, without even understanding how lights and shadows work. Then they continue learning their colors, but they end up having just that. Colors. Abstract art. And this is just my opinion, but ONLY being able to do abstract art just shows a lack of practice.
Try practicing in grayscale. Take a step back from colors and just focus on your gray colors. If you can't make something look good with grayscale, you absolutely won't be able to do it well with colors either. Besides, there are some fantastic coloring techniques using gray-scale, so you would get that going for ya.
If you don't have a tablet, you can use pencil (no color pencil) to practice. Some of you may be unwilling to try in gray-scale but trust me, if you can't do it, then you don't understand colors either.
[header]Summary version[/header]
Coloring in grayscale allows you to learn lights and shadows. If you can't do it in grayscale then you can't do it in color either. Practice first, perfect later. Get the basics down first. Values are harder than you think. Lighting and shadows are significantly harder than most people think.
3 Comments • Newest first
I agree with your advice. I've always preferred drawing and shading with a pencil. I don't like coloring cause it's harder to bring out the values and shades.
@Keane
Impeccable work, somehow you made gray turn into color! Black magic.
@Msstopposting is right. I frequently turn off saturation to observe the values. Alternatively, you can also just color entirely in gray scale, then use photoshop to add turn it into a basic beige color, then use a color layer over it. A lot of people use that coloring technique and although it's a different coloring method than what you may be used to, it allows you to focus on color theory after the grayscale coloring, without worrying about messing up anything
[quote=Keane]How'd I do? http://i.imgur.com/uG1vDkl.jpg[/quote]
Fairly impressive, but you need to add eyebrows.