Heyy Steemians!This is my continuation of the previous post , related to the painting process used to create most of my images, where I showed how a drawing would look when done with a few quick strokes, set the shape so I move to the values of light and shadow component that I think is fundamental and that enriches the drawing giving him the visual sensation of volume and texture for example…
This is a basic step I usually do: in a separate layer I apply the effect of multiply in the sketch and leave it above the other layers, usually I apply a half shade of gray to begin the painting, the reason is that a color applied in a white background tends to get less saturated and clearer which may leave the final result "less interesting"... well a simple gray background corrects this.
So I begin to isolate in my drawing the points where I consider to be "clearer" and the "darkest" in the form of large, flat shades of gray, a good way to train the eye is to take any image and transform it in gray in your favorite picture editor and start painting it by approaching close tones on a single level and highlighting the contrast between the others.
Made that much of your "headache" in defining more volume and gradient in your drawings will be solved, from there a new layer can be created and with a soft brush and multiply effect selected, the intersection points between the light and shadow (ambient occlusion) can be created, I do not think there is a final measure of when you can work at that stage, I believe the best answer to this is the constant training with references until you feel comfortable enough and "see" the various levels of gray.
Finally I begin to refine the shadows adding the highlights with a new layer above and the effect of "screen" selected... from there you will be able to better define where the most exposed parts are the light and the outline actually gains more volume and shape... also note that using this process part of the colors "hotter" and "cold" can also be created without major complications since the painting process basically consists of applying flat colors on top of the created gray... but I think this can be better explained in another post with a more specific approach...
So thats it I hope this “tutorial” may have helped in some way or clarified some doubts... I again emphasize that the “best” way to learn to draw is with the practice/study and the "best" way to render is the one you feel most comfortable with right now.
