Celebration of February!

Lol, I should stop experimenting.

but, an experiment! I'm not thrilled with the results, so I'm glad I saved the PDF so I can go back and paint it the way I normally do.

I wanted to experiment with different ways of painting lighting, and this time, instead of using the additive method of colour I usually use, I wanted to try something else. Instead of painting shadows and highlights on top of flats, I wanted to try removing shadows to reveal the colours underneath. Subtractive painting, oooo.

So, that being the goal I had in mind.. I painted in the flat colours, duplicated the layer, locked the transparency and filled it completely with a dark blue colour. From there, using a pressure sensitive eraser, I picked where I wanted the light to be strongest, and picked away from those areas. Kinda like how you would use an eraser to pick out the highlights on a conte drawing.

After I picked out my highlights to my satisfaction, I lowered the opacity on the blue layer. I still didn't have all the depth I wanted, so I duplicated the blue layer and repeated the process, so I'd have two levels of shadows, instead of just the one.

I'm not really happy with the results on this particular piece, but I think if I were to use an image with a more direct lightsource (twilight = bad idea) and try it again with just a little more solid understanding of where all the light and dark would be, I'd be much happier with the result. Next time I'm going to aim for some stronger contrast. Perhaps an orange or yellow light, to match the remaining natural light.

So no, not totally happy, but confident enough with the process to give it another spin on a different picture.

Woo! Headed to business class in another twenty minutes or so, so I'm going to have plenty of opportunities to draw.

Funny story about my legal name... Today my phone rang, so I picked it up, assuming it would be my sister. Instead, the caller asked for 'Sarah' which threw me off. I responded that I was Annie, thinking in my head why someone looking for Sarah would have my cell phone number. I asked if she was looking for Sarah Davis, and was informed she was looking for either Sarah Davis or Sarah Hughes. At which point I abruptly remembered my legal name is Sarah and I gave my legal name to the dentist when I booked our appointments.

I'm so smart.

~Annie

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