Even the best of the best artists use reference photos but you'll get it if you keep using references. Don't expect to be the best of the best over-night; it takes time and practice, practice, practice. just take your camera everywhere with you; you never know when you're going to see that perfect thing or perfect action that you can snap. even take pics of several different things and then apply them into one painting. You would have to adjust the colors for proper shading to match. With that said, you've done a great job; it's a beautiful flower. I love it.
It's not that I mind using reference photos, it's just that I wanted to be able to depend on them less. For a long time I felt constrained by them because I could only copy, never deviate or simplify, or even use multiple refs. I've gotten a lot better at that now though. Thank you for the suggestion about the camera, I did do that when I could, though I never got a photo nice enough for a painting (because my phone camera is abysmal, and I can't take my DSLR, it would get stolen), but those times were few as I couldn't go out much at the time because of various health problems. I'm much better now though and I'm trying to find a figure drawing class to go to as I think I've gotten to the point I can handle the challenge of a live figure.
That's great. Once you can draw a live figure then you can paint that or any drawing that you draw, you can paint it. I know exactly what you mean about wanting to paint a painting from your imagination, though. I've not been able to do that yet; everytime I try then there's always... Well, let's just say, it's always dud. LOL But like you, I won't stop trying. But you've gone further than I have, I've not had the guts to even try my web cam much less make a video for youtube. You're a very good painter; you'll get there. You're selling and that's fantastic. I can see why. you're a good artist.
Thank you. What's really helped me is the approach I described in this video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Pqoqua2Vj8s.html (~the middle). Also reading James Gurney's Imaginitive Realism book (review here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-GZIWGMqte2A.html) really helped it click for me how I should try to approach moving towards my goal of being able to draw from imagination. It's not that more advanced artists don't use reference but they don't use it in the same way if that makes sense. At first you copy, you learn to measure, match colors, etc, then you learn to modify, simplify, and combine references by understanding and drawing from the structure of what you see instead of the reference, and then the next step (for those that want to go there) seems to be to build a reference library of the structure of things in 3d space so big in your head, you can draw without reference. Of course that library needs to be maintained though, for example, Kim Jung Gi says he studies references all the time, but the way he and other artists like him seem to use reference is a lot different than the way most of us do when we start out. The reference becomes more and more a loose reference than a strict guide like when one is first starting out.
Oh, cool, I'm going to copy this and use it for myself if you don't mind. I'll look up Kim Jung Gi and James Gurney and read what you've read. That makes so much sense. In all honesty, I'm still learning colors. I'm trying to the right adjustments for toning, shading and tints. But the toning is the hardest where we have to use compliment colors to actually shade or tone down something in a painting. This just takes a lot of practice, I know. I'll keep practicing. :) You're so smart; you write great. Did anyone ever tell you that? You explain everything so well and use good references. Thank you
Ooh if you've never heard of Gurney, check out his blog (gurneyjourney.blogspot.com), most of the stuff in his books (he also has one on colors, might help you) comes from posts there. It's a treasure trove. I should really make a post about recommended sites, but as a starting point Muddy Colors (muddycolors.blogspot.com) is a great blog as they have a variety of artists writing posts about their process and different things. I've never had much of a problem mixing the colors I wanted (unless like in this video the light was messing with me) because I learned to mix colors pretty young, but you could try Richard Schmidt's color chart exercise or some variation of that. Physical painting is weird compared to like mathematical representation of color (a hue, a saturation, and a value like in digital painting) in that you actually have to mix it not just know a color plus it's different in that different pigments behave differently. It's much easier for example to create a natural looking green with a cold yellow and black than yellow and blue and then trying to tone that down. But those are only things you learn by mixing, hence why the color chart exercise helps. Also I always feel this urge to paint my first impression I guess I would call it of a color. It's like the urge to draw a triangle when you see a tree. I always have to shut that part of my brain and take a moment to analyze the color. If it looks blue is it really blue? Or is it just a gray next to some saturated red? Will adding the blue I see improve it (like the water around the flower, it works because there's touches of blue in the flower itself) or will it ruin it because that color is nowhere else in the painting? I do struggle with creating color schemes from scratch though. I have yet to find any resource to help with that, but I think I've slowly started to figure out WHY sometimes a color scheme works and sometimes it doesn't. Usually the answer given is not universal, but I think I've found something that is (with the help of studying how light bounces in a 3d program), but that's a video for the future. I haven't quite put it into words in my head yet.
have you tried to paint a water lily, looking straight down on it? I've been trying to do that, it's been difficult. As for painting from your imagination, that's very difficult, what are you trying to paint? Even the masters have used or use reference materials.
I haven't but it wouldn't be much different to me than this. All I'm doing is copying what I see plus any stylistic choices (e.g. trying to paint looser). If you haven't seen my review of Jame's Gurney's book I talk a bit there about what I think it takes to paint from observation vs from construction/animation. I've not been working on many paintings from imagination (though I did some ink drawing for inktober and 2 quick digital paintings from imagination, see twitter/instagram). Mostly when I've been able to, I've been practicing anatomy (e.g. the September's Sketches video). I haven't been posting in the last few weeks just because of some personal issues and I've been busy redoing the perspective videos. Of course it's always nice to have reference. I'm not against it or anything (I drew/painted from reference in most of my videos). It's just something I'd like to not be as dependent on. When I was young I thought that if I could just draw realistically I'd be able to draw anything which is very misleading and led me to put too much focus on drawing from observation and rendering. I can do hyper-realistic paintings if I want. But what I really want to draw is the fantasy scenes in my head and I would immediately get frustrated because I needed perfect reference. Now that I've switched to focusing on practicing from construction I've made a lot of progress (e.g. not needing the exact pose in my head, just something close) also it's a hundred times easier to at least get a quick sketch out of an idea. And going by my progress and other artists (see Kim Jung Gi and also most professional concept artists) it certainly seems possible to draw without reference. Yes, they often do look at reference before/after, they even make a point of having large reference folders, but they aren't reliant on it in the moment, if that makes sense. They use reference in a different way then one uses reference when drawing from observation. At one extreme you're just copying mechanically (like I used to when I was young) at the other extreme it's just material to fill your memory with (it verges on inspirational reference) or the occasional factual reference (e.g. what the model of some car looks like). In the middle you have some mix (many of the technique's in Gurney's book).
