Environmental concept art processes 01
Ok. This class i had to design and create a final environmental piece of a Sci-Fi Farm landscape.
My idea was to make a cool looking farm with a large centralized structure that aids in the farming process.
First thing first. Referencesss
This is what i got as my initial set of references in a pureref.
Looks fine right? I have sci-fi related farm things, a specific kind of farm for a unique aesthetic (The Sundrop farms), and one or two references for composition.
But lets move onto the sketches
These were my initial ideas and sketches for how i wanted the farm to look. An imposing tower in the middle with farmland and mirrors to help show how the system works.
But "I" didn't like how any of these were looking yet...
A lot of my time on these was spent stressing about it "not having enough detail, the composition isn't interesting, how do i fill the empty space, and most importantly: Where's the storytelling??"
SO i changed things up a little.
Sketches 2: I experimented with different things.
I started to sketch without a frame (adding it in later to help with composition.) But just drawing shapes and objects i wanted to have in the scene. Like:
The center tower will catch light reflecting off the satellite dish objects (I was imagining them as giant sun reflecting mirrors instead of satellite dishes but we'll get to that.)
I needed farmland
And i needed some object to help draw the focal point (The tubes and pipes.)
I was liking these sketches more that the previous ones. Making a close up sketch of the main building to get two different camera angles.
It was at this point that i changed my references to reflect my goal better.
I gathered references from artists i know and their painting styles i like:
Sparth https://www.artstation.com/sparth
and Simon Stalenhag https://www.simonstalenhag.se/
I gathered real life references of the objects and buildings i want in my scene to get a better understanding of them.
And better references for colour.
This definitely helped me get a better understanding of my scene.
I then went onto make value and colour sketches. Deciding that i liked the wide shot better than the close up.
It's at this point i started to realize some cracks in my workflow and process.
How will i actually paint the fields?
Is this the final shape of everything in the scene?
Where is the sun pointed?
Where will the shadows fall?
Are the colours even working???
The way i fixed some of these issues was to make a simple blender scene to find out the light and shadows.
This helped however i'll explain later why this might make more problems...
With a due date quickly closing in i knew i just had to finish this to the best of my ability and solve my problems afterwords...
Then i found the biggest problem...
I didn't know how to break down my shadows and light shapes into more interesting parts...
I couldn't decide where and where not to put detail.
I was lacking knowledge of how to keep my values the same but making them more enticing and interesting...
This was BIG. There were other issues but this was a major thing to me.
From here i did everything i could to make a final piece with the short timeframe i had left. Knowing i have gaps of knowledge to learn from.
After everything i've said i doo like it. But i know it could be better!
The most glaring thing is story. It's hard to know at a first glace what this scene is showing. Where we are or why it is here.
I had nothing visually showing what the satellite dishes are doing, where the centre tower is getting light from, the types of crops growing, who lives here, and so on...
It's just missing purpose.
Artistically speaking i'm happy with the composition. The big med and small shapes could be designed better, the colours are fine but it's not harmonious with the scene, the shadow shapes in the mg and bg could be stronger, and the lack of knowledge about value shapes just makes the scene feel flat.
The blender work? I could of spent more time on that, making it more realistic in program. This would of made my paintover muuch easier and made the piece better as a whole.
SO how would i solve some of these problems??
Better pre-production workflow.
My pre-production for this assignment was everywhere. I changed references, my idea changed, my colours changed, and certain sketches and ideations were weak.
Spending more time on my pre-production could of solved a lot of my issues throughout this assignment.
I worried a lot about my time constraints. This lead me to rush sketches and continue on with what i had without going back and fixing what wasn't working. By saying "I'll fix it later" and when later comes i either completely forget about it or still don't know the fix.
The Pre-production should be my problem solving stage. I should know what the final product should be before moving onto production.
Post production?
This is the cherry on top if the pre-production is good and the production reflects it in a larger scale then the post-production is the fancy cool stuff i can add on top without interfering with the piece as a whole.
I struggle a lot in post production. I barely get to do it so i have no process here. I have ideas but need to experiment in the future.
SO in conclusion.
This assignment allowed me to find gaps in my knowledge that i can spend my spare time drawing fun things to experiment and fix.
I know this is long. But i hope this isn't just helpful for me to look through and pick out things that i can improve upon but i hope it's an interesting read and maybe helps someone else's art process too.
Thanks - Mia :)
Ps I'm newissshhh to tumblr but i will try to communicate and read comments if people post ideas or things that helped them in their art journey. :D
