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Ah the grueling journey of art improvement. Just remember, sucking at something is the first step of being moderately better at something. You're doing great!
Or the second, the third, the fifth, the eleventh, so many times out of nowhere that will make you ask if everyone else is treating it like a number that always goes up and you are born as a failure in the thing you love the most. I am fine tho, why ask?😢
Even though I've been drawing daily for nearly two years now, I've only recently started regularly drawing backgrounds. By that, I mean make the lower half of the drawing one shade of green and the upper half a different shade of green. And, if I'm feeling particularly creative, I'll add a blue area at the top.
"I can't wait to enjoy my meal concept" I love how you're just as Drawfee-pilled as the rest of us, my vocabulary has also been irrevocably damaged by those funky fellas 🤣
In the tree house I think the mane problem is the lighting, in the sense that the tree house, which is the focal point, has the same dark values as the foreground which makes it all kind of meld together. I think it would be way better if the sunlight that is hitting the middle ground with the kids and the grass was also hitting the tree house, just make it really bright and with those warm tones. Having the tree with lighter values would make it stick out way more compared to the foreground and make it clearer. Another thing is that the colors all around are very similar, which is not necessarily a problem, but here it has the same effect as making the values similar, blends everything together. You definitely included a variety of greens like you said, but when it comes to separating the forest from the tree house I think it would be good to set up a base distinct color palette, for example: if you want to keep the house on the sunlight and make it really warm, try to make the colors of the forest in the foreground very cold, pushing to bluish tones, this will help build contrast. A great thing to remember is that when the sun is giving off a yellowish hue of light the shadows will be purple-ish and blue-ish because its the complementary color, you can notice this in real life, you can use this in your environments to build contrast and make more interesting color palettes. Having variety of hues is great but make sure that you have a reason for that variety, intention is very important in making art great and consistent.
So I went to commercial art school just before computer art took over. One of the arguments against the new tech artists was the lack of their working first in black and white and only then adding color. It was said that tech artists used color to make up for lousy perspective, values, and lighting. And that led to muddy color, etc. So, seeing you begin in gray scale first is heartening. Of course, tech artists have grown since then (i.e., dinasours). Anyway, I enjoyed watching your process. I think you're very talented, and your thirst for learning is actually exciting. Thanx for the journey.
Some of your terms are confusing so I might be getting this wrong, but I went to school for graphic design and traditional art under the same degree, back circa 2010s and I have to say that, especially these days, there are probably millions of talented digital artists who begin with black and white sketches first and i cant imagine why that wouldn't always be the case, and there was a trend of People doing whole pieces in black and white to get values right and then adding color, and it is still considered a good practice to add black and white filter to your art to see if the values are good, before finishing it. Many professional animators and illustrators use digital programs and know all the fundamentals. I cannot imagine what that argument was referring to, unless it was just that it was then a new field and so most who did it were still amatures. But muddy colors and bad proportion and perspective is something many amature trad artists struggle with in my experience, so it's not unique to digital art
Thanx for the info. I was in school in 1985 and 86. Very very early cgi, etc. My partner in the late 80's was an early commercial cgi artist. She spent days working out the creation glass. Cool to know artists still work from the basics. Seriously, I haven't kept up as I went into a different direction for a career. So if I sound like I don't know what I'm talking about, it's because I don't. What I do creatively now is I'm building a diorama for D&D 28mm and 32mm female characters. It does my heart good.
A very important point: You reduced the saturation in order to check the values, but that screws with the values, since those are affected by the colour. Meaning if you put down the saturation the values for blue and yellow will be similar despite that not being the case. Instead either use a sgrey filter or add a new layer, fill it with black and then set it to colour. Then you get the true values of your work ^^
Words cannot express how encouraging this is for me to continue on my art journey and stop being so intimidated by aspects of design I am unfamiliar with.
You critiquing your works/ setting goals was SO helpful because Im almost in the exact same situations (difficulty with values, breaking stuff down to understand it better, PERSPECTIVE)
One thing that really helps with perspective if you're struggling on buildings is do some studies of weird close up angles of parts of a building. Strange angles looking down stairwells, angle up at some interesting rafters, etc... Even doing a stack of blocks with multiple lights helps a lot. Jumping in on a whole building if something isn't clicking can really block learning the basics of perceptive.
The treehouse is very visually loud, I think something you could look into is that a lot of the values and colors are 'fighting' for attention, maybe play with other ways to show composition? Brightness, level of detail, placement, etc. It has so much potential and I think it's gorgeous! I think your choice of colors and overall process here is done well! I especially love the shapes and especially the colored windows(?) on the top.
your point about the spider-verse cityscapes stuff is so real. i eat up all the spider-verse backgrounds, fork and knife, they are all stunning, and your backgrounds were beautiful and a very good dessert for the evening!
This is great! Hansi of Nerdforge just did a whole course that Martina built for him, and I've been working my way through it, because I make abstract paintings, but can't draw anything from life/reference at all, and the value of many, many hours of practice can't be overstated, in my opinion. I love watching the process of building skills, because it motivates me to spend my own time building my own skills.
Ight I found your channel like a month ago now and INSTANTLY I felt that Jenna/julien energy and I must say I’ve been obsessed ever since, your work is amazing and so inspiring as a new digital artist!
If you ever do a sequel of this could you draw some building interiors? Maybe some landscapes that you don't usually work with like a desert or coral reef?
23:30 To fix the distance issue, the trees in the WAAAYYY back, like on the horizon, should be way more LIGHT blue (they're like a vibrant light green.) This will at least draw the eye to the base of the tree where the swing is. You might want to try either graying down, or taking out some of the detail of the trees in the up close foreground. Or de-contrast them and take out a stick/thin trunk or two on either side. I like your use of contrasting colors (the overall subtle red and vibrant greens, some yellow/purple accents, and also the blue/orange accents.) It's a very cute piece, and hopefully that helps! And I like the fence kitty!
when she said she couldn't wait to enjoy her meal concept my drawfee braincell activated immediately hahaha, in all seriousness the video was really good and a nice display what progressing as an artist also means ! (it's not all pretty characters done in a few hours even if we do love that as well ^^)
That spiderverse piece 👌 plus you add a cat to anything i will automatically love it. I don't do digital art and really enjoy hearing you learning and pushing your skills further
Omgg those are so gorgeous, I love seeing artists who admit they need to practice, you inspire me to paint and work on my characters, I'd love to see some interior design/backgrounds
Will have to rewatch this one - the background drawing was so chill and calming that I was put into a calm, semi-hypnotized state. Very sorry for the artblock, but my anxiety thanks you for the relaxing vibes.
oh my gosh dude ur art is so inspiring i was just trying to learn backgrounds and was starting to loose motivation im really bad at them also im just not satisfied with my art in general recently this videos helping me gain the inspo and motovation to keep trying, thanks!
Honestly it’s so comforting to know I’m not alone in struggling with composition and value. It’s soo tough!! I get stuck in the details and then step back and realize everything is off in scale or composition and then have to redo everything. We learn and grow with everything we do at least!! The forest are such a vibe also!
This is very inspiring for me, young artist who loves illustrations of backgrounds but definitely struggles with them & with the fact that i need to work on stuff to actually get better at it. Loved the lay out of the video too, thank you for sharing your art !
These look so great! your critiques were really nice to hear too. One thing I want to point out is that your values in that building piece are actually a lot neater than the desaturated image gives it credit for. That bright turquoise you used in the horizon is a lot brighter in value than the grayscale image shows! :o
I love this! Very inspiring!!! If you ever feel the slightest want to do another environment/landscape/backgrounf etc focused video, i will be there metaphorically foaming at the mouth for anything like that!
You can try to add light blue gradient that start from the bottom of distant object to give atmosphere or fog effect, it will start to show depth on your arts.👍
The volcano city is amzing !!! But feel like the majestic and sinister feeling was a bit lost because of the city building rising too high on the horizon. it kinda diminished the perspective and scale created by the bridge, and it makes the volcano look smaller
Awesome video! I have been struggling with painting backgrounds, shadows, and highlights on Procreate. I am a beginner and I am used to drawing traditional art, but looking back to your old videos for tutorials how to paint shadows, highlights, and don’t over blend the shadows. I have learned everything from your videos and they were very helpful. I would love to learn more about this video because the way you explained about painting background is really interesting and it helps me to understand and not confusing. Much respect thank you for sharing this Kira and keep it up the good work.
hey! even though im not an expert, for the treehouse composition that you did, i think that the main focus is on the three characters and not on the treehouse itself. the way that i would fix it is that i would move the treehouse and the characters more to the left, so that the tree is more visible and the characters are kind of hidden by the trees in the foreground. hope that helps! also great video and all in all those were great studies!!
Honestly, this is one the most inspiring videos I've seen from your channel so far! I have a very similar taste in background art, especially with cityscapes as a focal point, so the resources are going to be a huge help in the future! On top of that, just listening to you go through the process of practicing and improving over the last couple of videos has really inspired me to go back to practicing more fundamental ideals of art, even when I'm working on full scale pieces! Over all, I had an amazing time joining you on this little practice session, and I hope you find your way out of your art funk soon!
Kira this video is amazingly helpful, not only the process, but the resources and the commentary, as an artist this is one of my favorite videos in the internet
What would be pretty fun is If you'd start making Backgrounds based on some of the Charakters you Made, so you could Talk about the Charakters lore more, while learning how to Paint Backgrounds! I mean, i would definetly watch it 😃
Omg! Thank you for the shout out! You did a fantastic job on the cityscape and all of the colours in the windows too ☺this is such an inspiring video to keep trying things out and pushing yourself as an artist
Loved seeing all the background pieces you made. My favorites of the first sets was the mountain with flowers. For the second set I absolutely adored how the castle with the volcanos at night looked! The lighting and silhouettes were just sooo pretty!!! Would love to see more of these. A background for your fairy and witch oc's would be cool. Witch houses! Fairy houses!
FUN FACT: Alberto Mielgo was the artist for both Entergalatic and spider-verse i studied him for my Uni project hes said himself the way he colours is inspired by Impressionism
Wow!!! These studys are so gorgeous. It can def be hard to pick good refs without getting overwhelmed by all the options, but you really brought the magic out of the images you chose!
New viewer here! It’s very inspiring and helpful to watch you break down your pieces and what you were trying to improve on. For the treehouse piece, I think adding those trees in the far background messed up toe composition. Before, you had a white space around the treehouse that led your eye to it, while separating it from the foreground trees. Even just lowering the opacity on the farthest background trees would’ve helped.
Even the greats use references for their masterpieces so doing so is not "cheating " or showing a lack of knowledge/ imagination. I used to get down really hard on myself about using reference photos or drawing inspiration from different sources thinking that "true" artists can see an image in their mind and then create it all on their own. Then I started taking college courses for my art major and I quickly realized that my original idea of art was inherently flawed. The "greats" like Picasso, Da Vinci, Rembrandt, Boris Vallejo, Luis Royo, and even the modern digital media "greats" all use references to work from. It is always good to go back to basics when art blocks hit so you or anyone else experiencing it, it's ok, and just like she mentioned in the video art block is just the stage that we all Plateau on before we break through and improve apon our craft. I'm so happy that this is a safe place for us to be open and honest about the ups or downs of our art journeys. 🎨 ❤
23:02 -- an idea that popped in my head to bring the focus to the treehouse is maybe to but a light blur on the closer trees at the edges, because when you're looking at something intently everything else is slightly blurred, and maybe decrease the saturation of the non-focal points a little (idk about that one tho just a spitball idea) maybe that'll help! I don't do backgrounds either so i get the struggle
I need to do a bunch of " boring " art improvement exercises ,, i have hern studying ary for nearly 2 years now ahd i still havent done that , 1. Life drawings 2. Backgrounds 3. Specific materials 4. Perspective
This is so comforting! I have been drawing for awhile now (nowhere near professional) but I have been pretty art blocked, it’s like “Yeah, I can draw, but I could probably draw this better” and with art deadlines coming up my art frustration from lack of fundamental practice is getting to me. In total, nice to see I’m not alone in the never ending process that is art
as always - you DELIVERED! love everything! did have an idea for the treehouse piece that might be worth a test-drive: Lock the foreground layer(s), group the mid and background, and scale up the mid/back ground so that the tree house is larger (pan it as needed to frame with the foreground). I think what may be underwhelming you about it is the scale.
The first building you drew actually has a 1 point perspective, right in the middle behind the central building =) It is funny cuz I envy your ability to draw such fluid characters and I am a drafter who has been drawing square buildings for far too long... lol
I super love this video since I LOVE doing landscape and background art, more on nature, it’s definitely my comfort art. Though I get you in cityscape/architectural art even though I do it on the daily since I’m an architecture student so im crying, kicking and screaming to get through it all. The advice I have learned as a student in terms of emphasizing that distance between objects is keeping the balance of the foreground, mid ground and background. I was taught to tint (more to sky’s colors) & less detail (since the focus was on drawing the main building I was case studying and everything else was to paint a picture of the surrounding environment the architecture was located in, so I had to learn how to keep it vague) the background, putting more detail on the mid ground (or your focal point), and then again with less detail but darkening the foreground. I definitely see that in the beginning in the thumbnail sketch and putting all the values but it gets lost as soon as you started putting in more of the details and colors. Overall, you’ve got most of it down so you’re on the right track on improving and I feel very inspired to do more with my art (even ones I have to do for school ;w;). Thank you for this video, I didn’t know I needed this until now. ^^
Something that really helped me with environments/backgrounds was watercolor. Watercolor is all about layering, You can see every color you put down. I always struggled with environments but with watercolor, Its my favorite part lol
the way you just breakdown the backgrounds is so MWA like watching the pieces come together was so satisfying, i wish i could paint backgrounds like you
With the tree house my personal recommendation, which kindly take it with a grain of salt cause I have 0 understanding of color theory or perspective, I'm a idiot, BUT. I noticed that the my eyes were drawn to the treehouse pretty consistently until you started sharpening up and detailing the trees in the foreground, I found it hard to focus on the treehouse afterwards, I think if you possibly made it less detailed and a little less saturated that the eye would fall on the tree house as the focus point more consistently, as well as if you brightened up the hues on the house a bit more, the colors are really really pretty but they lacked in definition, the house felt a bit more abstract compared to the surrounding trees. Hopefully my recommendations make sense? These are things I struggle with myself so I could absolutely be making up nonsense in my brain
I've been getting a lot of tips and advice from art communities, especially when I see that others utilize forms and lines, or just shapes to be able to picture your landscapes. Observational drawing can be good, but it's better if you can apply what you remember, and then make a twist out of it.
When you went with the waterfall I was impressed by your shapes and I wonder how you can see shapes like that. Shapes are not my favorite thing to do especially if they are super organic like the shapes liquids make. How do you do it?
Studying how other artists simplify shapes really helps! For water and more fluid shapes, Loish is a great reference point to start with. When I'm studying a specific reference, I also sometimes break down the silhouette of a certain object by tracing over the ref with blocks of color so I have a little more clarity on the shapes. Then I can use that as a reference to simplify them further when I'm doing my actual painting study. Shape language is also a great thing to look into if you're new to the concept. Its normally used for character design, but edges and shapes are an essential part of painting so its super useful for stylized backgrounds as well! When I'm blocking in bgs, I also love to use a more square brush/brush with sharp edges because it forces me to be decisive with my shapes. That's why I used the calligraphy pen for most of my studies in this. Hope some of this helps!
The volcano one is really cool! I've never done digital art, outside of sketching with a tablet, so this is fascinating to watch (it seems so arcane 😅)
i loved all of these backgrounds so much! its so hard to grasp that they're beginnings for you... but man I hope i can get to a point where i'd make something of similar caliber and think it's not enough (if that makes sense). one little note that i had as someone who read into things a lot: for the volcanic castle islands (the volcastle islands, if you will) image, the character holding the torch facing the right side of the screen seems to communicate more of a feeling of 'discovery' and gives an implication of them heading toward the island. since you said they're escaping, i'd probably have them face the opposite direction, so it gives more of an immediate indication of them turning their backs on it, so to speak. obv, i'm not the most knowledgeable, so take what i say with a grain of salt, but i always like to give people an insight into certain ways tiny details might be interpreted, if even just by my own brain
So grateful for this video! It's come at a time when I've just started to put effort into practicing environment art, and being able to see your workflow (even including your pinterest boards full of references) is so helpful. Also a big fan of your channel in general, all of your work is amazing!
one of my favorite ways to practice this kind of thing is taking screenshots of shows/movies i'm watching with interesting lighting/composition then using those as the reference
Hello! Excellent video as always ^^ your skill and speed at these backgrounds is really inspiring and now i want to try some too! You mentioned not being sure of how to fix the range of greens in the treehouse piece and I have a suggestion. I believe that the hues are less planned out than they could be. You definitely used a good range of yellow green all the way to blue greens and even full blue, but I think the arrangement of them could be made a bit more purposeful. For example, with the atmospheric perspective, as I'm sure you know things further away tend to be a bit more blue tinted and less saturated, whereas those closest to the viewer keep their more vibrant tones. Yellow is lost first, then red, so if the main focus of the warmer tones is near the foreground and the greens get cooler as they go back it could help with the depth and clarity that you seemed to be missing when you mentioned the lack of distance. Since you did use cooler hues in the foreground for this particular piece, you could also do a stylized reversal of this where the furthest parts would still be less saturated but also stick with that warmer colour, as if the atmospheric perspective is created by the sunlight bouncing off the particles in the air instead. Since the overall look is a warm afternoon/evening closer to golden hour than a bright blue midday I think it would work nicely as well ^^ For the second and third pieces you incorporated the brushes really well! That can be really tricky so excellent work ^^ (gasped for joy when you added the rain in the spiderverse piece. The VIBES ARE IMMACULATE and we are thriving) Do you tend to flip your canvas? I do it all the time especially in the sketching. It can really help your eye find those little "off" things that may not stand out enough to know what's wrong without a fresh *perspective* hehe Such a fantastic video, Thank you so much for sharing your studies and process!!! (enjoy your meal concept got me diving into the comments liking everyone that pointed it out, love from a fellow drawfreak!!!)
Everytime i draw my mind just goes blank, like just no thoughts, head empty. Then I come across a great artist, or amazing art pieces - specifically the spider verse ones - and those works motivate me to draw more. But the perfectionist in me makes me doubt my artistic skills so i go back to scrolling mindlessly on my phone. It's definitely annoying, but your video is actually helping me open up my creative mind, maybe because i relate to the art block part a lot. Really loved the pieces you were able to produce, they looked incredibly amazing, especially the castle, and your painting style is really good. It's really important to keep in mind that you'll have to draw wonky before you produce something close to perfect, I believe that every artist should remember this And this is off-topic but I really love the way you speak. I'm not an English speaker but i really like your way of speaking great work 🖤💫
I love the details on all of your background and I think some of the stuff can be improved further, especially the value The value already nice on the draft, but I think you should choose where is the center of attention to the artwork and not adding highly saturated bright colors to the part that wasn't meant to be the focal point.
Thank you for mention that concept artist photo bash and use brushes/assets to save time, time is money. so many people think its cheating doing that I really really need to do this, would help my art so much!
i feel like the actual problem that you had on the treehouse was the foreground was so big and dark it actually leads the eyes directly to it that doesn't allow you to pay actual attention to the house. And also, I know that we all have issues when we do art, and tbh I'm trying to sound pretentious, most of the composition work outside of all of the stuff you were saying about hues and values (which I agree with) is just try to be more conscious about what kind of composition we wanna make or which kind of composition adapts better to the piece we wanna make. Btw I loved so much the last one of all, that city looks incredible.
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Can you show us how you made the texture for bricks in a separate video?
And how you applied them :)
im pretty sure that mountain reference is AI
We enjoyed YOUR meal concept! (The meal concept was this awesome video)
almost two mil and no verification, huh, champs? (hi jacob!)
Congratulations on the verification, Drawfee! It certainly didn’t happen in the last 48 hours, did it?
@@wrenholt1958Nah, they certainly couldn’t have gotten verified WHILE on the 2Mil creep. Impossible.
Wow, is that THE verified Drawfee?
New sub. Jacob gave you a shout out during the Secret Sleepover Society stream tonight. I look forward to all your concepts. Meal or otherwise.
Ah the grueling journey of art improvement. Just remember, sucking at something is the first step of being moderately better at something. You're doing great!
Jake the dog
ohh my god im saving that, so many times ive immediately given up because it looked ridiculous 😭 some wips dont ever go anywhere but thats alr 😌
Or the second, the third, the fifth, the eleventh, so many times out of nowhere that will make you ask if everyone else is treating it like a number that always goes up and you are born as a failure in the thing you love the most. I am fine tho, why ask?😢
Thankyou so much!❤ God bless you and thank you for this. Jesus loves you.❤
@@lakhanyakhwela4262 And Finn the human
Even though I've been drawing daily for nearly two years now, I've only recently started regularly drawing backgrounds. By that, I mean make the lower half of the drawing one shade of green and the upper half a different shade of green. And, if I'm feeling particularly creative, I'll add a blue area at the top.
me. most of my backgrounds are abstract shapes and outlines LOL
"I can't wait to enjoy my meal concept" I love how you're just as Drawfee-pilled as the rest of us, my vocabulary has also been irrevocably damaged by those funky fellas 🤣
The brainrot is so real
What’s the point of being an artist if you’re not a drawfee fan
we can never watch brave the same way ever again
this entire comment thread makes me unexplainably giddy
I have not watched enough draw fee then. My vocabulary is still the same .
In the tree house I think the mane problem is the lighting, in the sense that the tree house, which is the focal point, has the same dark values as the foreground which makes it all kind of meld together. I think it would be way better if the sunlight that is hitting the middle ground with the kids and the grass was also hitting the tree house, just make it really bright and with those warm tones. Having the tree with lighter values would make it stick out way more compared to the foreground and make it clearer.
Another thing is that the colors all around are very similar, which is not necessarily a problem, but here it has the same effect as making the values similar, blends everything together. You definitely included a variety of greens like you said, but when it comes to separating the forest from the tree house I think it would be good to set up a base distinct color palette, for example: if you want to keep the house on the sunlight and make it really warm, try to make the colors of the forest in the foreground very cold, pushing to bluish tones, this will help build contrast.
A great thing to remember is that when the sun is giving off a yellowish hue of light the shadows will be purple-ish and blue-ish because its the complementary color, you can notice this in real life, you can use this in your environments to build contrast and make more interesting color palettes. Having variety of hues is great but make sure that you have a reason for that variety, intention is very important in making art great and consistent.
Wonderful critique!
I can't believe Alpaca spent 80,000 hours painting backgrounds
So I went to commercial art school just before computer art took over. One of the arguments against the new tech artists was the lack of their working first in black and white and only then adding color. It was said that tech artists used color to make up for lousy perspective, values, and lighting. And that led to muddy color, etc. So, seeing you begin in gray scale first is heartening. Of course, tech artists have grown since then (i.e., dinasours). Anyway, I enjoyed watching your process. I think you're very talented, and your thirst for learning is actually exciting.
Thanx for the journey.
Some of your terms are confusing so I might be getting this wrong, but I went to school for graphic design and traditional art under the same degree, back circa 2010s and I have to say that, especially these days, there are probably millions of talented digital artists who begin with black and white sketches first and i cant imagine why that wouldn't always be the case, and there was a trend of People doing whole pieces in black and white to get values right and then adding color, and it is still considered a good practice to add black and white filter to your art to see if the values are good, before finishing it. Many professional animators and illustrators use digital programs and know all the fundamentals. I cannot imagine what that argument was referring to, unless it was just that it was then a new field and so most who did it were still amatures. But muddy colors and bad proportion and perspective is something many amature trad artists struggle with in my experience, so it's not unique to digital art
Thanx for the info. I was in school in 1985 and 86. Very very early cgi, etc. My partner in the late 80's was an early commercial cgi artist. She spent days working out the creation glass. Cool to know artists still work from the basics. Seriously, I haven't kept up as I went into a different direction for a career. So if I sound like I don't know what I'm talking about, it's because I don't. What I do creatively now is I'm building a diorama for D&D 28mm and 32mm female characters. It does my heart good.
1. That last painting is JUICY
2. pricklyalpaca drawfee guest prayer circle
A very important point: You reduced the saturation in order to check the values, but that screws with the values, since those are affected by the colour. Meaning if you put down the saturation the values for blue and yellow will be similar despite that not being the case. Instead either use a sgrey filter or add a new layer, fill it with black and then set it to colour. Then you get the true values of your work ^^
Ah yes my mortal enemy, backgrounds
Words cannot express how encouraging this is for me to continue on my art journey and stop being so intimidated by aspects of design I am unfamiliar with.
You critiquing your works/ setting goals was SO helpful because Im almost in the exact same situations (difficulty with values, breaking stuff down to understand it better, PERSPECTIVE)
One thing that really helps with perspective if you're struggling on buildings is do some studies of weird close up angles of parts of a building. Strange angles looking down stairwells, angle up at some interesting rafters, etc... Even doing a stack of blocks with multiple lights helps a lot. Jumping in on a whole building if something isn't clicking can really block learning the basics of perceptive.
It’s not squarespace I’m confused it’s always squarespace
or skillshare...where skillshare???
The treehouse is very visually loud, I think something you could look into is that a lot of the values and colors are 'fighting' for attention, maybe play with other ways to show composition? Brightness, level of detail, placement, etc. It has so much potential and I think it's gorgeous! I think your choice of colors and overall process here is done well!
I especially love the shapes and especially the colored windows(?) on the top.
your point about the spider-verse cityscapes stuff is so real. i eat up all the spider-verse backgrounds, fork and knife, they are all stunning, and your backgrounds were beautiful and a very good dessert for the evening!
This is great! Hansi of Nerdforge just did a whole course that Martina built for him, and I've been working my way through it, because I make abstract paintings, but can't draw anything from life/reference at all, and the value of many, many hours of practice can't be overstated, in my opinion. I love watching the process of building skills, because it motivates me to spend my own time building my own skills.
As a non artist your skill and attention to detail are really impressive and make me want to learn too!
Ight I found your channel like a month ago now and INSTANTLY I felt that Jenna/julien energy and I must say I’ve been obsessed ever since, your work is amazing and so inspiring as a new digital artist!
All of these backgrounds are so pretty. I'd get them all as prints.
If you ever do a sequel of this could you draw some building interiors? Maybe some landscapes that you don't usually work with like a desert or coral reef?
23:30 To fix the distance issue, the trees in the WAAAYYY back, like on the horizon, should be way more LIGHT blue (they're like a vibrant light green.) This will at least draw the eye to the base of the tree where the swing is. You might want to try either graying down, or taking out some of the detail of the trees in the up close foreground. Or de-contrast them and take out a stick/thin trunk or two on either side. I like your use of contrasting colors (the overall subtle red and vibrant greens, some yellow/purple accents, and also the blue/orange accents.) It's a very cute piece, and hopefully that helps! And I like the fence kitty!
when she said she couldn't wait to enjoy her meal concept my drawfee braincell activated immediately hahaha, in all seriousness the video was really good and a nice display what progressing as an artist also means ! (it's not all pretty characters done in a few hours even if we do love that as well ^^)
That spiderverse piece 👌 plus you add a cat to anything i will automatically love it. I don't do digital art and really enjoy hearing you learning and pushing your skills further
BABE WAKE UP ALPACA POSTED!!!
i talk about you so much that my friend teases me when i talk about art things "dang did you learn that from Kira?"
buildings are my nemesis in drawings, i feel your pain -_-
it is so humbling drawing a castle wow
I like the wonky castle. I think people should draw more wonky castles
Omgg those are so gorgeous, I love seeing artists who admit they need to practice, you inspire me to paint and work on my characters, I'd love to see some interior design/backgrounds
Will have to rewatch this one - the background drawing was so chill and calming that I was put into a calm, semi-hypnotized state. Very sorry for the artblock, but my anxiety thanks you for the relaxing vibes.
oh my gosh dude ur art is so inspiring i was just trying to learn backgrounds and was starting to loose motivation im really bad at them also im just not satisfied with my art in general recently this videos helping me gain the inspo and motovation to keep trying, thanks!
Honestly it’s so comforting to know I’m not alone in struggling with composition and value. It’s soo tough!! I get stuck in the details and then step back and realize everything is off in scale or composition and then have to redo everything. We learn and grow with everything we do at least!!
The forest are such a vibe also!
This is very inspiring for me, young artist who loves illustrations of backgrounds but definitely struggles with them & with the fact that i need to work on stuff to actually get better at it. Loved the lay out of the video too, thank you for sharing your art !
These look so great! your critiques were really nice to hear too. One thing I want to point out is that your values in that building piece are actually a lot neater than the desaturated image gives it credit for. That bright turquoise you used in the horizon is a lot brighter in value than the grayscale image shows! :o
THIS IS SO PERFECT TIMING!! I’ve been planning to focus on environment painting this summer! TYY
I love this! Very inspiring!!! If you ever feel the slightest want to do another environment/landscape/backgrounf etc focused video, i will be there metaphorically foaming at the mouth for anything like that!
You can try to add light blue gradient that start from the bottom of distant object to give atmosphere or fog effect, it will start to show depth on your arts.👍
The volcano city is amzing !!! But feel like the majestic and sinister feeling was a bit lost because of the city building rising too high on the horizon. it kinda diminished the perspective and scale created by the bridge, and it makes the volcano look smaller
Awesome video! I have been struggling with painting backgrounds, shadows, and highlights on Procreate. I am a beginner and I am used to drawing traditional art, but looking back to your old videos for tutorials how to paint shadows, highlights, and don’t over blend the shadows. I have learned everything from your videos and they were very helpful. I would love to learn more about this video because the way you explained about painting background is really interesting and it helps me to understand and not confusing. Much respect thank you for sharing this Kira and keep it up the good work.
hey! even though im not an expert, for the treehouse composition that you did, i think that the main focus is on the three characters and not on the treehouse itself. the way that i would fix it is that i would move the treehouse and the characters more to the left, so that the tree is more visible and the characters are kind of hidden by the trees in the foreground. hope that helps! also great video and all in all those were great studies!!
Honestly, this is one the most inspiring videos I've seen from your channel so far! I have a very similar taste in background art, especially with cityscapes as a focal point, so the resources are going to be a huge help in the future! On top of that, just listening to you go through the process of practicing and improving over the last couple of videos has really inspired me to go back to practicing more fundamental ideals of art, even when I'm working on full scale pieces! Over all, I had an amazing time joining you on this little practice session, and I hope you find your way out of your art funk soon!
Wow, I used enough exclamation marks to exhaust weird al, didn't I... oh well
@@judee.7186 Didn't even notice until you pointed it out friend.
Kira this video is amazingly helpful, not only the process, but the resources and the commentary, as an artist this is one of my favorite videos in the internet
What would be pretty fun is If you'd start making Backgrounds based on some of the Charakters you Made, so you could Talk about the Charakters lore more, while learning how to Paint Backgrounds! I mean, i would definetly watch it 😃
Omg! Thank you for the shout out! You did a fantastic job on the cityscape and all of the colours in the windows too ☺this is such an inspiring video to keep trying things out and pushing yourself as an artist
18:06 don’t think we wouldn’t notice the drawfee reference
I wouldn't dream of it 🍽️
Loved seeing all the background pieces you made. My favorites of the first sets was the mountain with flowers. For the second set I absolutely adored how the castle with the volcanos at night looked! The lighting and silhouettes were just sooo pretty!!! Would love to see more of these. A background for your fairy and witch oc's would be cool. Witch houses! Fairy houses!
FUN FACT: Alberto Mielgo was the artist for both Entergalatic and spider-verse i studied him for my Uni project hes said himself the way he colours is inspired by Impressionism
i really like your editing style and humor!!
Wow!!! These studys are so gorgeous. It can def be hard to pick good refs without getting overwhelmed by all the options, but you really brought the magic out of the images you chose!
New viewer here! It’s very inspiring and helpful to watch you break down your pieces and what you were trying to improve on.
For the treehouse piece, I think adding those trees in the far background messed up toe composition. Before, you had a white space around the treehouse that led your eye to it, while separating it from the foreground trees. Even just lowering the opacity on the farthest background trees would’ve helped.
Even the greats use references for their masterpieces so doing so is not "cheating " or showing a lack of knowledge/ imagination.
I used to get down really hard on myself about using reference photos or drawing inspiration from different sources thinking that "true" artists can see an image in their mind and then create it all on their own.
Then I started taking college courses for my art major and I quickly realized that my original idea of art was inherently flawed. The "greats" like Picasso, Da Vinci, Rembrandt, Boris Vallejo, Luis Royo, and even the modern digital media "greats" all use references to work from. It is always good to go back to basics when art blocks hit so you or anyone else experiencing it, it's ok, and just like she mentioned in the video art block is just the stage that we all Plateau on before we break through and improve apon our craft. I'm so happy that this is a safe place for us to be open and honest about the ups or downs of our art journeys. 🎨 ❤
Backgrounds are always super challenging but these came out fantastic
Luz riding king was so cute!!
23:02 -- an idea that popped in my head to bring the focus to the treehouse is maybe to but a light blur on the closer trees at the edges, because when you're looking at something intently everything else is slightly blurred, and maybe decrease the saturation of the non-focal points a little (idk about that one tho just a spitball idea) maybe that'll help! I don't do backgrounds either so i get the struggle
I need to do a bunch of " boring " art improvement exercises ,, i have hern studying ary for nearly 2 years now ahd i still havent done that , 1. Life drawings 2. Backgrounds 3. Specific materials 4. Perspective
spiderverse one was fantastic :o. amazing.
This is so comforting! I have been drawing for awhile now (nowhere near professional) but I have been pretty art blocked, it’s like “Yeah, I can draw, but I could probably draw this better” and with art deadlines coming up my art frustration from lack of fundamental practice is getting to me. In total, nice to see I’m not alone in the never ending process that is art
as always - you DELIVERED! love everything! did have an idea for the treehouse piece that might be worth a test-drive: Lock the foreground layer(s), group the mid and background, and scale up the mid/back ground so that the tree house is larger (pan it as needed to frame with the foreground). I think what may be underwhelming you about it is the scale.
I could never put my Pinterest home page and boards on full display on RUclips in the same video my face is in. You’re so brave
The first building you drew actually has a 1 point perspective, right in the middle behind the central building =) It is funny cuz I envy your ability to draw such fluid characters and I am a drafter who has been drawing square buildings for far too long... lol
I super love this video since I LOVE doing landscape and background art, more on nature, it’s definitely my comfort art. Though I get you in cityscape/architectural art even though I do it on the daily since I’m an architecture student so im crying, kicking and screaming to get through it all.
The advice I have learned as a student in terms of emphasizing that distance between objects is keeping the balance of the foreground, mid ground and background. I was taught to tint (more to sky’s colors) & less detail (since the focus was on drawing the main building I was case studying and everything else was to paint a picture of the surrounding environment the architecture was located in, so I had to learn how to keep it vague) the background, putting more detail on the mid ground (or your focal point), and then again with less detail but darkening the foreground. I definitely see that in the beginning in the thumbnail sketch and putting all the values but it gets lost as soon as you started putting in more of the details and colors.
Overall, you’ve got most of it down so you’re on the right track on improving and I feel very inspired to do more with my art (even ones I have to do for school ;w;). Thank you for this video, I didn’t know I needed this until now. ^^
Something that really helped me with environments/backgrounds was watercolor. Watercolor is all about layering, You can see every color you put down. I always struggled with environments but with watercolor, Its my favorite part lol
Drawing castles is an absolute NIGHTMARE but I love them so much I can't stop trying! Your backgrounds are all amazing
i would like merch saying ✨fantasy nonsense✨ mushroom mug, sticker, sweater etc.
As my good friend Sean says "Keep doing good art, keep doing bad art, 'cause the bad art makes you better at the good art!"
the way you just breakdown the backgrounds is so MWA like watching the pieces come together was so satisfying, i wish i could paint backgrounds like you
Your backgrounds are looking gorgeous and I relate to your art journey a lot
With the tree house my personal recommendation, which kindly take it with a grain of salt cause I have 0 understanding of color theory or perspective, I'm a idiot, BUT. I noticed that the my eyes were drawn to the treehouse pretty consistently until you started sharpening up and detailing the trees in the foreground, I found it hard to focus on the treehouse afterwards, I think if you possibly made it less detailed and a little less saturated that the eye would fall on the tree house as the focus point more consistently, as well as if you brightened up the hues on the house a bit more, the colors are really really pretty but they lacked in definition, the house felt a bit more abstract compared to the surrounding trees.
Hopefully my recommendations make sense? These are things I struggle with myself so I could absolutely be making up nonsense in my brain
I loved watching this on my break between studying during my college's final season. Keep up the great work!
1:23 off topic, But that Owl House piece is DOPE. Love seeing king as a big boy 😊
I've been getting a lot of tips and advice from art communities, especially when I see that others utilize forms and lines, or just shapes to be able to picture your landscapes.
Observational drawing can be good, but it's better if you can apply what you remember, and then make a twist out of it.
What a great sponsor! This is my first video of yours and I'm excited to see more!
Love Devin Elle Kurtz!!! Super happy to learn that you use their brushes
Hey just wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed this video concept and definitely wouldn’t mind seeing more of it in the future!
Once again the queen has posted a banger❤
My toxic trait is thinking I can draw buildings now bc I watched somebody do it 😀
WHY AM I THE SAME WAAYY
When you went with the waterfall I was impressed by your shapes and I wonder how you can see shapes like that. Shapes are not my favorite thing to do especially if they are super organic like the shapes liquids make. How do you do it?
Studying how other artists simplify shapes really helps! For water and more fluid shapes, Loish is a great reference point to start with. When I'm studying a specific reference, I also sometimes break down the silhouette of a certain object by tracing over the ref with blocks of color so I have a little more clarity on the shapes. Then I can use that as a reference to simplify them further when I'm doing my actual painting study. Shape language is also a great thing to look into if you're new to the concept. Its normally used for character design, but edges and shapes are an essential part of painting so its super useful for stylized backgrounds as well!
When I'm blocking in bgs, I also love to use a more square brush/brush with sharp edges because it forces me to be decisive with my shapes. That's why I used the calligraphy pen for most of my studies in this. Hope some of this helps!
@@PricklyAlpaca This absolutely helps thank you so much! I’m definitely gonna look into the artist you recommended thank you so much!!! :DD
The volcano one is really cool! I've never done digital art, outside of sketching with a tablet, so this is fascinating to watch (it seems so arcane 😅)
I feel like this is exactly what I need to do right now
Your videos always give me so much motivation to draw and improve
i loved all of these backgrounds so much! its so hard to grasp that they're beginnings for you... but man I hope i can get to a point where i'd make something of similar caliber and think it's not enough (if that makes sense).
one little note that i had as someone who read into things a lot: for the volcanic castle islands (the volcastle islands, if you will) image, the character holding the torch facing the right side of the screen seems to communicate more of a feeling of 'discovery' and gives an implication of them heading toward the island. since you said they're escaping, i'd probably have them face the opposite direction, so it gives more of an immediate indication of them turning their backs on it, so to speak.
obv, i'm not the most knowledgeable, so take what i say with a grain of salt, but i always like to give people an insight into certain ways tiny details might be interpreted, if even just by my own brain
Scars super fast build mode music. You get it it your get it!
So grateful for this video! It's come at a time when I've just started to put effort into practicing environment art, and being able to see your workflow (even including your pinterest boards full of references) is so helpful. Also a big fan of your channel in general, all of your work is amazing!
one of my favorite ways to practice this kind of thing is taking screenshots of shows/movies i'm watching with interesting lighting/composition then using those as the reference
I personally love all the outcomes and just wanted to tell you that you inspired me to go out and do some plain air painting today :)
Subscribing for that good good ai critique! (And as motivation to also practice backgrounds this week) HUMAN MADE ART FOREVER!!!!
Hello! Excellent video as always ^^ your skill and speed at these backgrounds is really inspiring and now i want to try some too!
You mentioned not being sure of how to fix the range of greens in the treehouse piece and I have a suggestion. I believe that the hues are less planned out than they could be. You definitely used a good range of yellow green all the way to blue greens and even full blue, but I think the arrangement of them could be made a bit more purposeful.
For example, with the atmospheric perspective, as I'm sure you know things further away tend to be a bit more blue tinted and less saturated, whereas those closest to the viewer keep their more vibrant tones. Yellow is lost first, then red, so if the main focus of the warmer tones is near the foreground and the greens get cooler as they go back it could help with the depth and clarity that you seemed to be missing when you mentioned the lack of distance.
Since you did use cooler hues in the foreground for this particular piece, you could also do a stylized reversal of this where the furthest parts would still be less saturated but also stick with that warmer colour, as if the atmospheric perspective is created by the sunlight bouncing off the particles in the air instead. Since the overall look is a warm afternoon/evening closer to golden hour than a bright blue midday I think it would work nicely as well ^^
For the second and third pieces you incorporated the brushes really well! That can be really tricky so excellent work ^^ (gasped for joy when you added the rain in the spiderverse piece. The VIBES ARE IMMACULATE and we are thriving)
Do you tend to flip your canvas? I do it all the time especially in the sketching. It can really help your eye find those little "off" things that may not stand out enough to know what's wrong without a fresh *perspective* hehe
Such a fantastic video, Thank you so much for sharing your studies and process!!!
(enjoy your meal concept got me diving into the comments liking everyone that pointed it out, love from a fellow drawfreak!!!)
Everytime i draw my mind just goes blank, like just no thoughts, head empty. Then I come across a great artist, or amazing art pieces - specifically the spider verse ones - and those works motivate me to draw more. But the perfectionist in me makes me doubt my artistic skills so i go back to scrolling mindlessly on my phone. It's definitely annoying, but your video is actually helping me open up my creative mind, maybe because i relate to the art block part a lot.
Really loved the pieces you were able to produce, they looked incredibly amazing, especially the castle, and your painting style is really good.
It's really important to keep in mind that you'll have to draw wonky before you produce something close to perfect, I believe that every artist should remember this
And this is off-topic but I really love the way you speak. I'm not an English speaker but i really like your way of speaking
great work 🖤💫
Plz try background studies on real paper!! I'll be so happy then.
Btw your so talented:)
aaww.. your spider sona up there is awesome.
this is so good its hard to watch. it eats up my confidence as an artist
i absolutely LOVE every piece you did!! especially the castle/city-escape piece 😍
I love the details on all of your background and I think some of the stuff can be improved further, especially the value
The value already nice on the draft, but I think you should choose where is the center of attention to the artwork and not adding highly saturated bright colors to the part that wasn't meant to be the focal point.
Wooooooooo! Spider sona!!!
Thank you for mention that concept artist photo bash and use brushes/assets to save time, time is money. so many people think its cheating doing that
I really really need to do this, would help my art so much!
Love seeing your process ❤
Your artstyle is just so unique and cool, this very much motivated me to practice backgrounds myself. Thank you 💕
i feel like the actual problem that you had on the treehouse was the foreground was so big and dark it actually leads the eyes directly to it that doesn't allow you to pay actual attention to the house.
And also, I know that we all have issues when we do art, and tbh I'm trying to sound pretentious, most of the composition work outside of all of the stuff you were saying about hues and values (which I agree with) is just try to be more conscious about what kind of composition we wanna make or which kind of composition adapts better to the piece we wanna make.
Btw I loved so much the last one of all, that city looks incredible.
That castle in the first round had a crooked window (like the actual reference image!!) and I COULD NOT unsee it