Digital painting "how to" of beach (Give away)

A follower of mine has asked if I could give a demo on my painting style. So I hope this will help others. This is my digital painting process. Feel free to ask any questions.

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This painting is from a beach close to my home in Evias Greece. I loved the S curve of this beach and with the sunset I thought it would be a nice easy painting to do a demo of. First of all the composition is made simple for me because of the S curve of the beach. I love when nature takes the guess work out for me. The figure in the background makes for a nice subject and it gives a human element to the painting.

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As always I start my paintings with an under painting. Just scratching out the elements and borders of the subjects.

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As I draw out the whole painting I make sure everything is in perspective and true. I have drawn and erased may times at this point.

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I then lay down my first glaze. Well I dont know if you call it glazing in digital painting but it is just a color that is transparent letting the drawing come through. I slowly build up the color of the sky and beach. Adding layers of darker colors later on. We just want the color pallet to be established early or things can be muddy up very easily.

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Just to let you know I changed the color of the sky a little because the first attempt was off. I was not going to say anything but I thought you should know not everything goes as well as it looks.

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See how the under painting gives the painting life early on? I harden the edges of the drawing in the under painting so you get the feeling of paint strokes. Much like a shadow would be. Easy but effective. I am working in layers in Photoshop. So if I make a mistake I can easily adjust it.

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I add more and more glazes. I'm building up the tones of color and contrasts. This is where many hours of painting come in. It takes time build the basics and years to trust yourself. At least for me.

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At this point I am still using glazes but color pick a color and start painting on the main image. Sometimes I smudge a stroke around to get the effect I want. Like using a finder in oil painting to move the paint around.

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Lastly I strengthen the under painting on its layer and use curves and contrast to POP the image a little. After many strokes and blends, glazes and smudges, I get a painting that I hope will give people the feeling they are near the beach on this warm sunset night in Evias Greece.

I hope you enjoyed this post. Thanks for reading my post and please consider #upvoting this post, #following me, and leaving a #comment. If you would like to help me even more please consider re–steeming me so I am able to reach your audience as well. I look forward to posting daily content with all of you.

As always I will give five chances to win this original digital painting for free. original digital painting for free. Signed by me Angeliki Z to the steemit community. Why give away my paintings? To give back to the steemit community that supports my posts. Just #upvote my post and leave a #comment on this post so I can let you know that you have won. That simple. The 5 winners will be picked by random between each level of votes. So, the first painting will be picked between the first 1-10 commenters, second between 11-25 commenters, third between 26-50, the fourth between 51-100, and the fifth between 101-200 comments. Good luck.

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