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Thread: Watercolor WIPs- Sharing and Learning

  1. #111
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    ... Tigermoth ... yeah it's all good ... I just couldn't see any real motivation for texture in the dragon picture, so it was hard to track along with the discussion ... Steve, your portrait is excellent ... its relative heaviness to my eye gives it the feel of silk screen or certain types of prints ...
    xiěyì, n. freehand brushwork, spontaneous expression
    Artrage Gallery
    / Leaning Tree Ink Studio

  2. #112
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    Steve, I've been able to view video #4 onbrush settings ... there's a wealth of information there for such a brief video -- am I the only person hoping for longer in-depth treatments? :-)


    ... I'd like add something to your discussion of Paper Wet settings, which I've studied because I'm hoping one day to be able to emulate basic Chinese brushstrokes, these rely on loading and other factors to achieve what I can only call a "dry in wet" kind of yin-yang opposition, but without the signficant rim effects you prefer (for good reason, as they do look more convincingly like Western natural media watercolor brushstrokes) ...


    ... in the attachment, you can see a matrix of brushstrokes done using basic settings that approximate those in your video, initially everything (including brush size) is set to 50% on basic AR Watercolor paper ... Then I varied only Paper Wet On/Off, and InstaDry On/Off, so reading from the left, you have Paper Wet Off and InstaDry Off, then Paper Wet Off and InstaDry On, third stroke is Paper Wet On and InstaDry On, and finally Paper Wet On and InstaDry Off ...


    ... for my purposes, the last brushstroke, Paper Wet and InstraDry Off, comes closest to the effect I'm looking for, but is far from perfect, for reasons that go beyond this post ... Each brushstroke has been turned at a 90 degree angle to illustrate brush direction -- this is a feature of brushwork I hope you will touch on in a future video, as straightline strokes are rare in watercolor ... The fourth brushstroke shows some sign of registering the movement of the hand as the brushstroke is completed, as you can see in the slight paling and thinning at the inflection point as the brush turned ...

    edit: what I'm calling brush direction here is of course related to pressure sensitivity and variable load, issues I assume will be addressed with the advent of the pressure sensitive stylus ...

    ... it is worth noting that although brush size has not been varied, of course one main effect of Paper Wet is that the brushstroke widens by some pre-set multiple (double?) ...


    ... by the way, I'm not big on commercialization, but I wonder if you are aware of lynda.com, it's a tutorial site for all things digital ... at present, there is nothing on that site for ArtRage, but there could be ...
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    Last edited by chinapete; 08-12-2012 at 05:50 AM.
    xiěyì, n. freehand brushwork, spontaneous expression
    Artrage Gallery
    / Leaning Tree Ink Studio

  3. #113
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    Aug 2012
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    Hello everybody,
    I've just purchased my copy of AR3, but I've been following the forum and especially this thread for a while.
    I would like to thank everybody for very useful information and of course Steve B for his great video tutorials.
    Here's a sample of mine, using some of the techniques Steve laid out in his lessons.
    As time permits, I'll explore this deeper - I've seen in other threads some custom textured brushes that look mighty fine but I still have to learn how to install and incorporate them.
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  4. #114
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    Hi Steve b now I know why he painted the Shriek

    ChinaPete


    P/gramax Like Like Like

  5. #115
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    Spain
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    Well I am liking these tutorials and have done a little experimentation myself using your method "Steve B". I am pleased with the result so far, but need some more experimentation with it. I just wanted to say keep up the good work, I am learning a lot as you can see.
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    TeresaW
    My Art blog can be found here and
    PaperTree's Images in the ArtRage Gallery can be found here.

  6. #116
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    ... this might be a good time and place to explain a series of paintings I posted on this forum called "chalk washes" ... I was trying to avoid what might be called illustration techniques when line and color are combined (I had a different goal), and I experimented with ways to have the underdrawing to blend with the overpainting, and this it seems to me was easier to accomplish in digital than in real media ...

    ... if you can get past the rough sketch and poor anatomy, the two images are meant to show, in A, the chalk tool set to 1% and pressure less than 5% to draw in the outline and areas where the color of the future wash is indicated ... in B, Delicate on Dry washes have been set to 50%, and Paper Wet off, and you can see how the wash picks up the chalk color indications (single layer) ... The great thing is, unlike natural media, the chalk can be reapplied over the wash immediately and frequently, as for example in the darker shaded areas ...
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    xiěyì, n. freehand brushwork, spontaneous expression
    Artrage Gallery
    / Leaning Tree Ink Studio

  7. #117
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    Wow, there is some really great stuff coming along here! I've been viewing this all on my phone for the last few days, but hadn't really had the chance to sit down and LOOK at stuff till this morning. The things being produced are really good. I'm kind of curious what techniques you two are using from the videos-- knowing what is ending up being the most useful to others might help guide me in terms of what I'm showing.

    pictogramax, I'm amazed that that's your first first post! LOL. What sort of art background do you have? I think there's too much control of form and shadow for there not to be. There's some great dry brush stuff in the garment the man is wearing, but the movement from warm yellows on the top of the head to the cooler green on the shoulder in shadow is very nice. The greens work on the fabric for me, because it makes me feel its pulling on the natural color of the material-- I'm unsure about the greens on the shadows of the face though. I'm surprised you didn't use more blue or umber there. Thoughts? Also, look to my new video on Blenders-- I think this might help you achieve more varied effects with your brush strokes, for example, in the beard or on the top of the head.

    Papertree, the layering of colors is good on the cat too-- the eyes in particular are quite successful. Nice translucent colors blending together! I'm curious though about your Layer Textures and brush size. Your strokes, for example, on the little hairs, as well as at the bottom where you're doing a color fill, look relatively smooth (and small). I was actually wondering if there was a more... "watercolorery" way to achieve the look of the fuzzy hair? I feel like you're still using a pencil kind of technique with the watercolor tool, where perhaps something with rougher, larger, and drier brush strokes might get you a kind of "fuzzy hair" texture that would look more like natural media watercolors. Alternately, you could soften the edges of the form, and use two media instead (watercolors and pencils, for example). That's a nice technique too. Mostly, I feel like you're using the WC tool for the hairs the way you use the Pencil tool. I think that specific technique works marvelously for you with the Pencil, but I think you could leverage the WC tool to greater effect by doing something different. Just a thought. I'd love to see that experiment.

    My next video is on the Blenders (I've finished it, and just need to upload it to YouTube and annotate it), and I think you all will find some very useful stuff in it-- I still think people aren't really using the Knife to as good effect as they could, and there's LOTS of really useful things to do with it. If you're interested at all in achieving some of the looks one gets with wet dispersal of pigment (on the rims, for softening or blending colors, etc), I think these are the tools you would need.
    Check out and submit to the thread on Watercolor WIPs in Artrage-- lots of good tips and conversation
    My YouTube video tutorial series- How to Paint with Watercolors in Artrage
    Try out the free
    Artrage Pen-Only Toolbar to improve your workflow and reduce clutter
    List of other good tutorials on using watercolors in Artrage
    List of good sticker sprays for watercolor effects in Artrage

    My blog- art, poetry and picture books- http://www.seamlessexpression.blogspot.com/

  8. #118
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    Jan 2011
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    Chinapete,
    Re: the kind of brush work you're looking for-- can you upload a pic of it? Your pic showing what Artrage can do is useful, but it sounds like it too is largely unsuccessful. I had a thread from last fall where we tried to work out certain effects for painting with india ink and brush. It's here in this thread. If you scroll down to the bottom and the second page, there are some interesting opportunities to explore in terms of settings. I actually see, going over that thread, that I've had a misunderstanding about what the Pressure setting does for the watercolor brush as well.... What I now recognize is that a higher setting doesn't just increase the size of the tool, but actually increases the sensitivity of the brush, allowing a wider breadth of size within the same range of pen pressure. Essentially, with a higher Pressure setting, I can still achieve a very small stroke size with minimal pressure, but have a greater range of opportunity and can also create a larger sized brush stroke with greater pressure. That seemed to be some of what you were looking for.???

    I'm not sure if that would provide what you're looking for, but I thought it might be a good place to start, and see what others have discussed-- the work being produced there seemed similar to what you were showing up above-- no rim, varied width of line weight, etc.

    @ Tigermoth-
    It's all good! I like what you're doing in the sky with the imported Texture Overlay. Also, the bit of glowing light (for lack of a better description) at the tip of the lance-- there's a nice bit of blooming going on there. Cool! I also like that you've really muted your background colors-- it reads easily as being distant. I saw you used a Sticker Spray by the way, which is cool! But watch out! Some of them (like yours) are meant to simulate other media, and therefore have height. I can see on your dots (particularly the ones above the knights head) that these have a shadow. I'll be going over some of the Sticker Sprays as well, in another upcoming video.

    Re: textures and viewing size--

    I think this actually is a really pertinent point you bring up, tigermoth. I think the final size of the image you intend for others to view your painting at is really critical. If you're only planning on having people view your image online, as as a relatively small thumbnail (3" x 4" or something), than I'm unconvinced you need tons of texture. Although I will say that I think those ambient Inner Textures and Rim Textures go a long way towards believability, even when seen at a distance. I think, however, if you're planning on having your images seen in a larger scale-- where someone might click it and open it full screen or where you hope to have it printed out or in a book-- then I think all the texture you can get is of value. Truthfully, if you're planning on having an image seen only at a small size, there are times where I actually think painting more gesturally and on a smaller canvas can help-- I think it helps you compose an image that is appropriate in terms of its detail, linework, and texture for how it is being viewed. Of course, I also have always loved those illustrations that have been shrunk down and just seem to have an amazing amount of detail in them-- old Beatrix Potter books and whatnot. What's your intended purpose for some of the images you're planning on painting?

    Re: "Texture" and what I mean by the word-
    I guess, in my mind, for the videos and what I've been aiming at, I see texture as 2 different things. I agree it's an ambiguous word, and so I try to add additional descriptors to help makes things more clear. I don't care to normally spend tons of time labeling things, but I think that here it's of real use to facilitate clearer, more helpful conversation. So, I see it like this--

    1) Representational Texture/ Texture of the Object- to make the surface of things in a painting look like the surface of things in real life. This, to me, is the root of your point about the lemon nib. Or I think it is! LOL. I looked the lemon nib up and took a look-- nice gestural painting! This is where we want an image we paint, to whatever degree, to explore and/or represent the texture of the world we see-- clouds are soft, pebble beaches bumpy, plumes of grass wispy, etc. Whatever the case might be, or painting is having a conversation with the world. And we sort of transmute that as artists into something new on the canvas that might explore that texture, even if not perfectly representational.

    2) Media Texture/ Texture of the Medium- This has been more my focus for the videos-- just getting things to look like we're actually painting with natural media watercolors. More the technique and less the expression, so to speak. So, #2 means (to me) things like creating effects such as tilting your board to wash color, or having a very dry brush that scrapes a canvas (what I call "rim texture"), or achieving those sorts of inner bits of visual grit where a pigment settles into the depressions of a paper, etc (what I call "ambient texture"), as well as all the other techniques I'm going over.

    Although my videos touch on and are clearly guided by my personal opinions re: art and what makes a engaging image, I don't feel like my videos directly deal with telling you how to make an invigorating image (that's more the realm of Representational Texture, in my mind), but instead are more about how to give each of us a set of tools that get varied and interesting results that approximate the expressive textural potential of natural media watercolors.
    Last edited by Steve B; 08-13-2012 at 03:39 AM.
    Check out and submit to the thread on Watercolor WIPs in Artrage-- lots of good tips and conversation
    My YouTube video tutorial series- How to Paint with Watercolors in Artrage
    Try out the free
    Artrage Pen-Only Toolbar to improve your workflow and reduce clutter
    List of other good tutorials on using watercolors in Artrage
    List of good sticker sprays for watercolor effects in Artrage

    My blog- art, poetry and picture books- http://www.seamlessexpression.blogspot.com/

  9. #119
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    Aug 2012
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    3
    Thanks for the warm welcome:-)

    Steve, I'm new here, but I draw professionally for more than 20 years. I'm a graphic designer by formation, but I worked more on illustrating, story-boarding and even animation (although that was long time ago). For over ten years or so I'm drawing comics for French publishers. Drawing is really my "forte"; I did very little painting or color work generally and especially since I work in France and all the coloring is handled by their studios.

    But watercolors, being my love from childhood, always were lurking from the back of my head and recently somewhat re-sprung to life as I discovered drawing with fountain pens and washing the sketches over (I'm attaching a New Year's card I did for my blog as a sample of my real pen, brush and paper sketch)

    As I always carry a tablet PC that I draw on in my backpack, I wanted to try something similar in ArtRage, but my version 2 would not let me:-) So I finally succumbed and bought version 3, even though I postponed the purchase several times because I was disappointed that the team decided to replace the bottom-navigation bar with a compass-like canvas positioner (which just takes far more space but is more restrictive, at least to me). For my BW work version 2 is quite sufficient, but for color stuff version 3 obviously rocks. Being able to fine tune the tools and save the preset is also a big plus, of course. I'm guessing I just need some additional time before I'll grow to love version 3 as much as I like version 2:-)

    Concerning your suggestions on colors used in posted sketch, I see your point. But I just went for a limited palette, by the feel of it, being concerned more of exploring the possibilities of glazing and texturing than producing a quality image. I find I overdid the shadows on the face, using to many glazes resulting in somewhat gouache-like appearance. But I was into exploring glazing at the moment:-) I would like it to be more simple and more luminous in the future, but there's a lot more to learn:-) The image I posted is actually the fourth I did.

    The very first AR watercolor I drew with ink pen on one layer and did all the painting on just one other layer. This was before I watched your videos, which is obvious by lacking of any textures:-)

    Thanks again for your great videos. I'll be checking a new one later tonight.
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  10. #120
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    Jan 2011
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    601

    Video #5 is up-- Blenders

    Ok people I've got a new video up. It's kind of a two parter.

    Video #5 is on using your Blenders or, as it's called in the interface, your Palette Knife. Hopefully, some useful stuff in there for you.

    I also made a quick video #5b. This goes over how to make custom Groups for your Presets. This is nice if you want to make something that only lists those presets you use for watercolors (or other media). It's just a nice way to organize things.

    Hope these help. I've got more that'll roll out over the week I think-- something more on Layers and glazing techniques, as well as the Sticker Sprays and how I use them.
    Check out and submit to the thread on Watercolor WIPs in Artrage-- lots of good tips and conversation
    My YouTube video tutorial series- How to Paint with Watercolors in Artrage
    Try out the free
    Artrage Pen-Only Toolbar to improve your workflow and reduce clutter
    List of other good tutorials on using watercolors in Artrage
    List of good sticker sprays for watercolor effects in Artrage

    My blog- art, poetry and picture books- http://www.seamlessexpression.blogspot.com/

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