[Digital Paint] Clouds *WIP*

[Aix]

Just some clouds. Inspiration comes from Makoto Shinkai's stuff. Not done yet, need to add in the sun and also probably going to try a person in the foreground later as well. Clouds probably need touching up too, now that I look at it more. Done in Photoshop CS6 with a Wacom Bamboo tablet.

[Toffee.]

need to add in the sun-

IMO, it looks better without a sun.

[Aix]

IMO, it looks better without a sun.

Hm, I'll try and see how it looks since I set up the lighting on the clouds to be there and made the glare off the cloud particularly intense close the part where I intend the sun to be. Probably not going to go well, but I'll try.

[Toffee.]

I was actually getting at the fact that because you have a gradient in the background, and given the paint-esque feel the clouds have, it already gives a presence of it's own light source.
Like, considering the clouds all form around where said gradient appears from, and it forces you to look up in the upper left corner of said image, and effectively creates it's own atmosphere where your now literally having your head up in the clouds.
Although... Maybe I just like the empty feel it has. It's subtle and calming(At least to me).
Of course, I'm not the one making this, so any changes that you see fit could also work. Since, after all, this is your piece.

[Twenty-five Zero Oh-oh]

MAKOTO SHINKAI IS DA BEST!!!!!!!!!

Anyhow, nice painting. The cloud shapes are very nice. Looking forward to see more.

Also, who exactly are you again (Aix of Hearts)?

[Aix]

MAKOTO SHINKAI IS DA BEST!!!!!!!!!

Anyhow, nice painting. The cloud shapes are very nice. Looking forward to see more.

Also, who exactly are you again (Aix of Hearts)?

YEAH MAKOTO SHINKAI!!!! Thanks. I'm probably not someone you know if that's what you're thinking. Most people just call me Aix and I appeared on this site about 1.5 years ago.

[Twenty-five Zero Oh-oh]

Haha, ok. I must've slipped from activity right around when you came in. Nice to see that other people have been keeping the showcase alive.

[.Rai]

Ah, Ken would have fun critiquing this. While they're definitely not bad clouds, they could be improved. If you look at the Japanese, more anime-esque thicker clouds, while their edges are sharper than in normal clouds, and the contrast is massively exaggerated, they still have a really great sense of texture. For me, tonal texture is what good clouds are about. If you stick with big, stunning gradients of tone across clouds, rather than a detailed tapestry of tone, they can look a little fake. Paint a face, then skin will look unnatural without imperfections and noise dotted across it.

By sun, I hope you don't mean 'big yellow egg in the sky' sort of thing. Rendering a sun realistically (i.e. white glowing mass) is nice. Personally, you probably don't need to render a sun too low: it's basically midday, your lighting, so the sun's not very visible at this angle anyway. I'd play around with the background gradient too. You have a light blue -> medium blue thing going on from sort of between the clouds outwards radially. If you look at the sky, it's more of a medium blue -> light blue straight downwards, so lighter at the bottom.

These are all fairly minor points, but worth working on since it's a WIP.

[Aix]

Ah, Ken would have fun critiquing this. While they're definitely not bad clouds, they could be improved. If you look at the Japanese, more anime-esque thicker clouds, while their edges are sharper than in normal clouds, and the contrast is massively exaggerated, they still have a really great sense of texture. For me, tonal texture is what good clouds are about. If you stick with big, stunning gradients of tone across clouds, rather than a detailed tapestry of tone, they can look a little fake. Paint a face, then skin will look unnatural without imperfections and noise dotted across it.

By sun, I hope you don't mean 'big yellow egg in the sky' sort of thing. Rendering a sun realistically (i.e. white glowing mass) is nice. Personally, you probably don't need to render a sun too low: it's basically midday, your lighting, so the sun's not very visible at this angle anyway. I'd play around with the background gradient too. You have a light blue -> medium blue thing going on from sort of between the clouds outwards radially. If you look at the sky, it's more of a medium blue -> light blue straight downwards, so lighter at the bottom.

These are all fairly minor points, but worth working on since it's a WIP.

The longer the time passes between working on it and me looking back at it, the worse it looks :(

 

[spoiler='The sun as in something like this:']

[/spoiler]

[.Rai]

Don't be disheartened about it. Seriously, mostly minor points, especially when your art is a WIP. Cloud work isn't easy, and you've done a far better job at it than I've ever done.

Might be fun to do two art pieces at the same time. Maybe do a different piece entirely, and if swap between the two, you can look at each freshly. You might notice something in this that you want to change, or just learn new techniques that you couldn't by just doing one thing.