So last time I showed the roughs for what I was working on. With that done, came putting color. What I’m doing now is seperating the focal point from the background. This is done so that I can focus on one thing at a time and it makes it easier to draw/paint a background withought worrying of encrouching on the space of the focus (usually the character). It does come with it’s weaknesses though, by not having them together (background and focal point) I can’t merge and control the colors as effectively, at least not at my current level. Once I understand color a bit better I should be ok, we’ll see.
This is the background reference picture, which I got by going through the Legendary Meneauver episode and capturing stills.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35570290332/in/dateposted-public/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35570290862/in/dateposted-public/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35608325991/in/dateposted-public/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35570293682/in/dateposted-public/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35608327751/in/dateposted-public/
And here is what I painted.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35570635282/in/dateposted-public/
The colors came out much smoother and vibrant than with any other watercolors I have used so far. But I still have some more learning to do. I didnt want to add too much contrast yet, seeing as I am still learning. Plus I wasn’t sure if things would have changed as I put the background and the characters together.
Next is painting Sora and Layla.
It doesn’t look bad on it’s own, but I didn’t take into account the lighting that would be required from the background. I had to think in terms of blueish tints as opposed to what I had used here. I could have done it traditionally but decided to wait and do it digitally so that I could take my time and learn as I went along.
And fool (a very important, and funny, character in the series), those who saw the series know why he is there.
So this is how it looked like when I tried adding it to the background before trying to match the colors of Sora and Layla with the background. (Note that I did add a bit of more shadows by this point thinking that it could help). I was also experimenting with the sparkles around them (didn’t really go as planned).
Doesn’t really meld well together, so I went and tried to get them to a closer level.
Made it darker and added some glow around them.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35707963146/in/dateposted-public/
Kept it going, will now show without glow and with glow.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35707956936/in/dateposted-public/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35617173951/in/dateposted-public/
By this point it was getting close, but I had to push it a little further and actually change colors to their blue counterparts (if that even makes sense).
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/34939511643/in/dateposted-public/
By this point I have two options, go with the darker one or the one with more light. I still haven’t decided which one to use yet. And on top of that I want to make something a little different with the drawing of Sora and Layla by adding a totally different background and maybe even changing the paint on them too.
On top of that, I also changed the position of Laylas arm since it looked a little too still where it was originally.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/darkcloudxero/35617819221/in/dateposted-public/
I feel like the background is still too dark, maybe adding a light haze like in the reference picture might make it better. I’ll have to try and see if it makes a good difference. I’m still unsure of how it looks, I wonder what other people think.
But for now it is done. I will have to think it over for a little while if I will leave it as is or make some changes.
Hasta la proxima,
-Nube
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