A lesson in Light and Color

When working on illustrations, there are a number of things I like to take into consideration to make a solid piece. As an artist, I'm aware of all of the 'official' ones, but I don't necessarily remember to execute them. This sometimes leaves the illustration imbalanced in quality.

For this piece I focused on Composition, Line Quality, Color, Texture, and Light. But I think that Light and Color were the most important factors in pulling this together.

Composition

I think I did a pretty good job of this, I have a number of things that help direct the viewer to the focal point (the two sleeping heroes). I have the boy looking at and taking a picture of them, I have things in the foreground literally framing the characters, and I already determined what parts of the piece will be darkest and lightest.

Line Quality

When creating line art, I don't always go the same route, but I prefer lines that don't look too clean. My lines tend to have an almost pencil line quality to them, just a little bit of texture, and very few perfectly straight lines. This works well with my style, which doesn't tend to be very rigid.

If you notice, the lines for the objects in the foreground are just a bit thicker than those in the mid-ground. This is enough to help the eyes not become confused when looking at a complex image.

Color

I don't usually do this, but for this illustration I tried limit my colors to only variations of a base 5. It evolved beyond that as I worked, but that starting point kept the piece incredibly unified.

Texture

It isn't always necessary, but a simple texture added to a piece and prevent something created digitally from becoming too flat. Some artist prefer that look, but I've found that I my work looks most finished when I use it. Although, it possible I use it to just hide some of my mistakes...

Light

But besides that, this piece looks as good as it does because of the lighting I chose, and how that works with the colors. There is an atmosphere that is warm and soft that you just can't feel looking at just the line work alone. If I chose any other option, in all likely hood I would have confused the viewer on what to focus.

In conclusion, I had a lot of things pulling this piece together. And honestly I can look at this piece and see several mistakes I'd love to fix, but that's just the curse of a developing artist. But I think my choice of using a palette and pushing the lighting to be as dramatic and soft as possible made it one of my best pieces.

Afternote

These are the characters Clint Barton and Kate Bishop from Marvel's Hawkeye comics. I made this for a Comic Book Covers class last year.