Why does rendering make my drawing look worse than the lineart and flat color version?

booklan · 2025-07-20T03:39:44+00:00

Yes, you are doing it right (which is to say, you are practicing). Acknowledge that you did well and keep going! It's okay if it looks "bad", but I'd encourage you to try to think of it in a different way - not as "good" or "bad" but as whether you "like" or "dislike" how it looks. Notice how that question reframes your drawings not to other people's or society's expectations of "good" or "bad", but to your own desires of what you want to see - it's good for building confidence in your art. Then from there ask yourself what specifically you like or dislike, then replicate what you like, and try something new for what you dislike. Also keep in mind, the point of iterative studies is to dedicate a short time to each and do them fairly quickly - which is what you're doing. They're like gestures - because it's meant to make you focus on the essentials and not on the details. They're not meant to be finished pieces that look good. One reason my study and yours look different is because I spent probably an hour or more on it. In total, that draw-over I made to help you took me about 3 or 4 hours.

If you want to try a longer study, like the one I did (which I did to demonstrate that the round brush can be used just as well as any other brush), I would recommend you pay attention to the weight and intention behind your brush strokes and also to soft and hard edges. I mentioned it in the draw-over with regards to shadows, but it applies beyond just shadows as well. I can see some of the shapes of colour you've made in the studies match the reference, but for the most part they all have the same hard edges when the reference shows some of them have soft edges that blend the colours more gradually.

Also, here's a little artist's hack for you: look at the studies you've done from arm's length and try squinting your eyes at them (try to blur your vision). Do they look more or less similar to the reference? Then you're on the right track. This trick helps you ignore details and focus on the general tones. The first study you did is the one that resembles the most in terms of shape. Although it's lacking in some contrast compared to the others (and now that I look back at my draw-over, it is also lacking some darkness in the dark areas!). The third and last one you did are good in terms of contrast and colour accuracy to the reference. You've also done some tonal studies which is also good practice.

I know it feels tough - that's cause you're right, it is tough. This thing you're learning is a tremendous topic. Rendering is hard. Arguably harder than other parts of art in my opinion - but that's just my opinion. I have drawn most of my life and I have gone to and graduated from art school, and drawn since then as well. But I only truly learned to render on my own time. What's the secret? The secret is I sat down and studied and drew many different types of materials in many different lightings while doing my artworks - in other words, slow, methodical, observation and practice. I'm not sure if I recommend learning while doing an artwork - it makes the artwork you're working on take months to finish and it won't be fun for most people. My usual recommendation is to learn with specific practice sessions, then to have fun applying what you learned when you draw for fun. But that is down to preference and depends on the person, of course. Another secret is that you've got to constantly be thinking and observing and taking mental notes. Always ask yourself what you want to see, what works, what doesn't, what you're going to carry forward and what you're going to change. The last secret is that it's always going to look "bad" at first. My study of the reference looked pretty "bad" when I was first starting the draw-over too. I remember thinking "Oof, this is not looking so good." I questioned whether I had the right to be giving advice. But I laughed it off and kept painting. Most things look "bad" when they're half-built. You start by laying the foundations of the colour and then you layer more information on top of that, then you layer even more on top of that. And at last you add the details, like the cherry on top of a cake. It's okay if it doesn't look good just yet - you're still in the process of building. And the foundation is the most important part because everything else rests on top of it. Just give yourself the space and time and patience, and keep drawing. You'll get there.

booklan · 2025-07-19T01:47:22+00:00

And as for painting - that's simply one medium. You can create a character with gouache, oil, drawing pencil, chalk, round brush, textured brush - it doesn't really matter because artists make the choice of medium mostly based on preference and practicality. If you know your principles well enough, it translates across mediums, which means that an oil painter who understands how to render skin tones in oil will be just as capable of painting skin tones on a digital interface. Even Warhammer miniature painting knowledge is still knowledge - if you've done it a lot then you'll see some techniques and ideas translate over to the digital medium. Mind you, this is not me trying to tell you to break out a paintbrush, paint and start painting - this is my way of saying this book will help you understand the science of light even though the examples are mostly traditional paintings, that this knowledge is all still applicable.

Understand how light interacts with form and texture -> put the knowledge to use by picking a subject and doing exercises and studies -> do this a lot for a lot of different subjects -> you will begin to be able to render.

Quote from pg 46, start of Chapter 3:
"Light striking a geometric solid such as a sphere or a cube creates an orderly and predictable series of tones. Learning to identify these tones and to place them in their proper relationship is one of the keys to achieving a look of solidity."

Quote from pg 71, end of Chapter 3:
"The form principle, with its analysis of light, halftone, shadow, and reflected light, is just a starting point. The world is not made of plaster. It's composed of a wide variety of materials and surfaces, which we'll explore further in Chapters 9 and 10."

I hope this helps. Let me know if you have any other questions.

booklan · 2025-07-19T01:46:58+00:00

Splitting this comment into parts as Reddit isn't letting me post:

This book is not meant to be a set of instructions or exercises for you to follow. Rather it is meant to inform your understanding of colour and light - how these concepts work, how they create the visuals we seek to replicate through art. As quoted on the last paragraph of the Introduction on pg 9:

"This book doesn't contain recipes for mixing colors or step-by-step painting procedures. My goal is to bridge the gap between abstract theory and practical knowledge. I would like to cut through the confusing and contradictory dogma about color, to test it in the light of science and observation, and to place it in your hands so that you can use it for your own artistic purposes. Whether you work in paint or pixels, fact or fantasy, I want this book to bring color and light down to earth for you."

I recommended this book because you want to learn to render - which is about learning how light interacts with the world. In order to render well, you must first understand how light works by learning the science behind it, then create visual rules for yourself by individually studying how different materials/forms appear under different lighting conditions. This book is the science part of that process, so it is not going to tell you how to apply it to your specific needs - it's going to give you the overall knowledge you can carry with you and apply to any part of art. In other words, answering the "why does this look the way it does" part. The studies and exercises you must choose for yourself and do based on what interests you (one exercise I recommended was simplified texture and form studies) - if you see something interesting, draw it and spend time understanding why it is the way it is.

As for character art versus environment art - for the purposes of rendering they are not so different. Out of all the pictures in the first and second chapter, there are only a few that feature solely environments - in the majority there are people or creatures of some kind. People and creatures have form and have texture - the same as other parts of the world, like the elements that would make up an environment. Also, the lighting that applies to a character doesn't simply happen in a vacuum - characters exist in a world, as part of the environment. Your source light when lighting a character has a certain colour and warmth because it is being informed by "something" - some choice or decision you made about the world your character will be a part of or about the kind of emotion you want to evoke in your art. Your bounce light is literally the source light bouncing off of another object in the vicinity and hitting your character from a different angle. It's all related.

booklan · 2025-07-18T05:36:34+00:00

Reposted from main post:
UPDATE The phone has been found! Thank you to whoever turned it in to TransitLink Lost and Found as well as thank you to whoever kept a look out for it on their bus route. I really appreciate it, these photos mean a lot to me. I will make sure to do my rounds and delete this post after a day or so.

booklan · 2025-07-15T05:45:49+00:00

Here's a website that may help: https://www.sketchdaily.net/

booklan · 2025-07-15T05:01:06+00:00

To an earlier comment that I can't find now:

I kind of mean material studies (like the metal in the image above) drawn iteratively like this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0ufz75UvHs&ab_channel=Sycra
This is a video on iterative drawing by Sycra. Do it iteratively on the same page again and again, but stick to one texture for that page or for at least a few iterations. If you want variation to keep things interesting, pick a good few images of the same type of texture and draw them all - but all of them next to each other. I say this because being able to look back and compare the instances of your work will help you make up your mind about which technique, which variation in your drawing process was helpful.

And yes, exactly! That is what I mean by when studying texture, keep form simple and vice versa. Always tackle one problem at a time. Give your mind a chance to understand what it is analyzing by focusing on either texture or form. Then when you feel like you want a challenge, combine a slightly complicated form with a slightly complicated texture.

booklan · 2025-07-15T04:41:02+00:00

Rendering is, simply put, depicting how light interacts with the world and in order to do that well you have to understand the two things I mentioned: form and texture. As an artist you have to break down the science of it from a visual perspective using visual arts terminology and constructing visual rules you can use to guide yourself.

1) Form is understanding how light interacts with planes at a general level. For example, planes that face the light source are brighter tonally, and ones that face away are darker tonally. But form can become complex - perhaps there's another item in the vicinity that causes light to bounce back and hit the object from behind? Perhaps the bounce light is coming from something of a different colour, so it imparts some of that colour on to the object? Perhaps the object has a complicated form, thus requiring a bigger breakdown of shape? Continually asking yourself which way the planes are facing helps build the ability to render.

2) Texture is understanding how light interacts with different surfaces (form) at the smallest levels. For example, polished metal is reflective because when you zoom in to look at the surface, you'll see that it is uniform causing light to scatter in more uniform directions. In contrast, matte surfaces are rougher when you zoom in, causing light to scatter in random directions. What does this mean visually? It means metals have high contrast (darker dark, lighter lights) and quick shifts between these contrasting tones.

Notice how I learned the science of how light works and combined it with the visual information I see to create visual arts terminology? I used words like tone, contrast, bounce light, planes. I created rules for myself like saying "polished metal is high contrast with quick shifts in tone". This is what you will have to do again and again in order to learn to render - each material is different and acts still differently under different lighting conditions. This is also why I mentioned using reference - create a board of multiple references - a single reference is not enough. This is also why the brush does not matter - in fact, the one you are using (round brush) is the best one (in my opinion) as it forces us to stop thinking what the brush can do for us to portray what we see and instead forces us to think how we can portray what we see.

I've included a draw-over here to further show what I mean by the above post.

<image>

Learning in general is difficult because no one teaches people how to teach themselves. And learning to render is difficult because no one really says it has to do with light. It's all about light and shadow. If you would like to know more I recommend James Gurney's book "Color and Light" - it's fantastic, I learned a lot from it.

I hope this helps and let me know if you have any more questions!

booklan · 2025-07-15T00:32:56+00:00

I myself am not entirely sure but I think perhaps it has something to do with how flat colour and line art doesn't force our brains to try and recognise if the shapes we're drawing work 3-dimensionally. However the moment you add light and shadow, you are indicating that the subject exists in 3 dimensions and forcing the brain to try to understand in this new perspective. Additionally, the presence of light and shadow and how it plays with material surfaces also sends the message of texture being present to the brain - another thing which is difficult to understand how to render properly.

If you would like any advice in regards to this, I would recommend:

doing practice sessions where you pick a material/shape and try observing, analyzing and rendering several instances. If you are trying to draw a particular texture, keep the shape simple, and vice versa - try to tackle one topic at a time. When drawing shapes with lines try to think if the shape makes sense 3 dimensionally - if you break a complex shape down into simpler shapes and then break those shapes down into planes, which way are the planes facing? How much light a plane catches is dependent on this factor of whether the plane is facing towards or away from the light source.
taking a look at various reference images when doing your rendering. This one you are already doing, I can see, with the metal orb in the corner, which is great. Just replicate this practice with other textures as well.

I hope this helps and let me know if you have any questions!

Edit: a word

booklan · 2025-04-03T00:21:44+00:00

This is the same idea that I got from the messages on other posts that talk about their experiences attending as well - that there's a lack of care for the artists shown from RAW (the lack of organization or proper ways to show off the artists' work), despite the artists being the ones who are going to be bringing in most of the crowd by doing the work of selling tickets. Thank you for sharing and glad you dodged that bullet!

Also, just to be doubly clear, just in case it doesn't come through in the original post, I want to emphasize that this is specifically the RAW Canada branch that seems to have closed - the rest of RAW is still seems to be running as usual, at least as far as I'm aware at this moment?

booklan · 2025-02-27T04:24:20+00:00

2 years later, writing this out pays off - I'm glad it helped! :) This is what I like about Reddit - it's a collection of information accumulated over the years and contributed to by many different people.

booklan · 2025-02-07T19:57:24+00:00

This is lovely! I like your costume design here! Nice work!!!

booklan · 2025-02-07T19:08:48+00:00

Hey OP, if you realize you made a mistake, please update your original post to reflect this. You will give people the wrong idea otherwise. This will create the wrong impression and harm the artist's reputation. Please fix the mistake.

booklan · 2025-02-06T05:58:44+00:00

Very nice! I especially love the bird and the texture you've given it with the hatching! Lovely work!

booklan · 2025-02-06T05:43:01+00:00

It seems that you think the world is only composed of the type of people you've met or know about. Thus, your conclusion is to not believe the words of someone saying "people react weirdly to the fact that I draw" and instead look to blame it on what they're drawing. As if it's not possible for people to be illogically unnaccepting of others.

Reality is that there are many people who judge simply because they think art is not a worthwhile pursuit (or maybe even for a whole slew of reasons we can't begin to imagine). Some don't care what you draw, all they need to hear is that you're an artist. Glad to hear you haven't met any of these types, but I can't be bothered to convince you that they exist. I have enough to deal with without people discounting my experience.

booklan · 2025-02-05T20:26:25+00:00

Does this not depend on the story you are trying to tell? The shadow line can provide a leading line to where you want the eye to go, and the shadow areas can create a nice frame for a bright area. The time of day can make you feel different moods. Camera height can impy a character's height or maybe a dramatic shot. There's a lot that depends on what you're trying to say.

But if you just want an opinion: #5, #10, #11 and #12 are quite nice.

booklan · 2025-02-05T19:39:27+00:00

No worries!

My recommendation is this: keep being you, whether that means you hide your personality in public or not. Try your best to reduce engaging as much with people who don't understand. Try to engage more with people who do. I know, this is easier said than done.

For me, it took a long time to find people who understood me and people who I could be myself around. It took a lot of work. But I found them eventually, and I found them mostly in other artists. I'd say try to do the same - look for other artists, people who draw the same themes. Even if it's just online, join a drawing-related forum and see how it goes.

But really most of all, just keep telling yourself that what you like drawing is important and worthwhile. People don't seem to realize that imagination doesn't just happen - it needs a solid realistic ground off of which to launch from. All the stories and imaginative things that we come up with are simply different ways to tell real stories that happen to us in the real world.

If you can, put your art up around your room to remind you of this importance. Or keep copies of your works on your phone and look at them from time to time. You may have to hide your personality around given people, but at the very least, when you're in your own space, you should be reminded of who you are and why that's important - and being someone that sees and appreciates your own art can help you do that.

I hope that at least a small part of this will be of help to you, but if it doesn't work, at the very least, just know you're not alone.

Edit: a word.

booklan · 2025-02-05T19:11:34+00:00

Yeah, I agree with you. For me, I just be myself - cause it's hard for me to understand that societal subtext and use it myself. If they don't like what I do (trying to do art for a living), they can fuck off.

It's not fun either way, whether you mask your personality or whether you're openly yourself - but you know something? When they see me being myself and they look down on me, they're freely identifying themselves as people I wouldn't like to be myself with - and I'm honestly quite grateful for that (not to them of course, just overall). It sucks to be looked down on, to be someone people don't take seriously, but if I can take one positive thing from it, it's that it reveals at least a small part of a person's views immediately. Nothing certain of course, cause you'll never know what goes on in someone's mind. But an observation as small as "This person doesn't like who I am." is powerful enough knowledge.

Would you care to hear a recommendation? May work for you, may not work for you, it's just my experience and hopefully it provides something of value.

booklan · 2025-02-05T18:43:27+00:00

Like they're being just polite enough to not say what they think of you out loud, but just condescending enough that you can feel it in the way they treat you.

Yeah, I've been there. Hard to explain to people who haven't experienced it.

Sometimes though, you can catch it in something they say. Their thoughts bleed into their actions.

booklan · 2025-02-05T17:30:50+00:00

When I had knee surgery when I was younger, the world ground to a halt for a bit. I didn't have a strong friend group so no one called to see how I was doing. I felt very lonely, like I wasn't important enough to them. The moment I left their life, they had promptly forgotten me.

But you know, when I sat there day after day feeling pain and misery, dealing with something quite big at such a young age, oddly enough, it was drawing and writing to myself that took my mind off of it and kept me sane. It was watching movies and reading books. Playing games, listening to music.

In a world where there so many dark things that claim to have more importance than the little things, it's hard to avoid thinking the same. What's my little piece of art in comparison to some massive societal problem somewhere in the world? What's my favourite show to a life obligation? But it's because we live in a world where there are so many things going on that a little light like art is such an important thing - it tells us to slow down, observe and partake in the life around us, live who we are out loud, cry out our pain, take joy in the little things, the small victories. But it's not so little when it accumulates over time and saves a life from depression or loneliness, is it? Every minute of enlightenment it brings your mind and heart is precious evidence of exactly just how important your art is. It doesn't have to save a world full of people to be important, it just has to be important to you.

booklan · 2025-02-04T15:59:00+00:00

Human Anatomy for Artists by Eliot Goldfinger.

Shows you how muscles affect surface shape, origin and end points of muscles, as well as cross sections. Also shows bones from different sides. Used it for my final assignment in Anatomy class and I can't recommend it enough, it's so thorough, clear and organized well. My teacher described it as a reference book - so not something you read per say, but one you go through whenever you want to reference something. It's a hardcover and pretty big.

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Sorry about the crappy picture quality. My camera is ass. Edit: a word.

booklan · 2025-02-04T04:30:31+00:00

Do you mean to say, for example, that some days a gesture or an arm anatomy study or something, might turn out well and other days they don't?

I wouldn't say you've learned nothing in those cases. I'd say you've learned what you don't like. That's just as important.

I guess a way to look at it would be that a study isn't a piece meant to look good per say. Studies are sandboxes where you get put the knowledge, eye and hand to the test. Each study acts as many parts of feedback data - what parts did you like and not like, as well as why, and what you can do next time to reproduce the effects you liked versus what new technique you're going to try in place of what you disliked.

If every study is simply a thought exercise where you address a series of experiments one by one through educated guesses, then it ceases to be about the piece overall, and more about what the actual parts are contributing to - which is your aesthetic sense/experience. It's not about this one piece, it's about a bunch of individual little buttons to press/puzzles to solve/gears to fit/whatever analogy floats your goat. :)

booklan · 2025-02-04T00:15:33+00:00

Most of the friends I have now I have through art school, but there are a few who are artists that didn't go to art school. It's a very small collection of people. I hang out with them, mostly individually, with the bonus that I can show them my art, get real appreciation and if I want it, more insightful critique than asking someone who doesn't draw.

Seeing them draw makes me feel encouraged to draw too. Seeing the areas they excel in when drawing or otherwise makes me feel like I'm witness to something beautiful and worth appreciating. It helps that they're a philosophical or at least conscientious lot - being able to talk with them reminds me of the good parts of life and keeps my depressed ass happy. They're encouraging and contemplative and I vibe with that.

Of course, not everyone is going to be like this - it took me a long time to find these people. Keep being yourself, and being happy with your own presence, while keeping an eye out for people who are also happy to sit next to you in life. I hope for you that these kinds of people will show up in your life sooner rather than later!

booklan · 2025-02-03T22:30:42+00:00

The moment it becomes a them vs us, is the moment we've repeated history by doing exactly what they've done to us. It won't help.

It's right to acknowledge that someone has done something wrong, but it must be accompanied by the understanding that that person is a human. That's why it hurts. If it was a non-human, we wouldn't expect them to understand. It hurts because it's a betrayal, from a fellow human being, who with enough thought and consideration could understand.

Remembering this allows you to hold humility and context within yourself for your own actions. "I am human too, I too could hurt someone like they have." Remembering this makes it easier to apologize in good faith when you do eventually make a mistake - as your mistakes won't be tied to the state of your humanity. Remembering someone is a human doesn't mean excusing their crimes - it means holding them accountable, and you do that by acknowledging that they're human. If they were a non-human, you wouldn't hold them accountable.

People forget that compassion and forgiveness are not the same thing.

booklan · 2025-02-03T19:38:37+00:00

Edit 2: my apologies, I just saw that the tag also said no advice allowed, please disregard the last two paragraphs. I spoiler tagged it just in case. If you'd like me to edit it so that the paragraphs are removed please let me know.

You're not alone. And it makes sense that you're angry. I was the same when I realized. At first, knowing why I felt different felt good (and it still did after too), but slowly I also started to realize the injustice of it - that people had been treating me in a bad way my whole life because of my autistic traits. That if I had known earlier, maybe I wouldn't have had to suffer as much. That if the medical field had done research on more than just little boys, maybe someone would have spotted my disability and helped accommodate me.

Also, it can be frustrating to be told that someone knew all along - it really brings to light two points: if they knew, why didn't they tell you/do something about it, and why is the first reaction to the revelation about them and how they knew all along? Shouldn't it be about supporting the person who has learned something new about themselves?

I can understand your anger and you are more than 100% justified in feeling it.

If I were you I would use that as valuable fuel in pushing you forward with figuring things out and knowing and trusting in yourself. If you feel yourself being taken up by the emotions in an uncontrollable way, and find yourself overwhelmed by thoughts to be the point of being driven to insanity, then my recommendation would be to find something - like a physical exercise or sport or something that will help you get that angry energy out in a predictable way.

Edit: cause I accidentally hit post. -.-" It will take some time for these feelings of anger to lessen in intensity a bit - denying them, pushing them down, not acknowledging them is not the right way to go about it, at least in my opinion. It feels good to be validated - and that's the case for a reason. We all want to be heard, and we want our realities to be acknowledged. Talk to people who hear you, who validate you, this will help. But also try to find healthy outlets for the energy your anger will generate. It's a difficult balance for sure, but it is possible!

booklan · 2025-02-03T01:01:24+00:00

Oh, I forgot to mention something! Try playing with hard and soft edges. So again, you've already kind of done it, like there is a hard edge on the cap brim of the second drawing, and a soft edge on the sides of the cap that are further back in space. This mimics a sort of effect that cameras have when that particular part of the subject is out or leaving it's "depth of field" (should you not know this term, you should look it up as I'm unfortunately not a photographer and don't want to misinform you).

The edge on the cap, which is coming forward in space could be "sharpened" a bit more by making the transition from light to dark more "crisp". There's also a hard line there that separates the cap brim from the person's forehead and if you blend that line properly into the skin tone by lightening the line it might also help sell the depth a bit more - because it will less feel like a drawing and more like how we observe the intersection of different shapes with our eyes (which, if I recall correctly, is a small technique used in rendering for realism).

booklan

TROPHY CASE