Queen of Hyenas

 

I made this painting for someone who loves hyenas.

It was definitely easier painting the dog, since I had real-life references. Even though the hyenas did not come out as I wanted, I am pretty happy with the little puppy at the bottom center.

In this painting I approached fur, which has a fun outline when backlit. 

The suffused airbrushing needed to be handle better through edge control, but somehow I love the disappearing edges.

The background and colors were roughed in after a thorough value study. I'll get better at coloring as I go.

Retreat! - Scifi Fantasy mixup

 

I really enjoyed working on this painting with a group of tribes from a fantasy world I am making. I was particularly happy with the guy in the center with his face almost completely in shadow. 

Jumping back into airbrushing techniques, and having fun with sculpting the shapes. The idea is quite simple: large airbrush = soft edge, small airbrush = hard edge. 

I have now made different brushes that help with speeding up the process, but at the time of this painting, I was still figuring out how to manage soft and hard edges. 

The color is slapped on top with color layers. But Vivid Light layers also really help, even though they change the values. 

I recommend using correction layers with Color Balance, and tint it into one or 2 colors before starting the coloring from greyscale. 

You can also use gradient maps to give it a base, but careful with those, they tend to take over the painting.