Environment Value Sketching

[@munchler8716]

I want to say thank you for your videos! I only draw as a hobby, for my mental health. When I draw, I can be in the moment and be creative. Your calm manner helps me a lot. Thank you very much and good luck!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks so much for this! Drawing purely for calmness and joy is a beautiful thing.

[@hohoho-q4h]

I just realized that i didn’t really plan things out. I was just so focused on getting the picture done fastly. Thats why i struggled so much in the process

[@jessicalacour]

That first part of the series, already unlock something in my process and efficiency! I've been working has a level artist in the game industry, for the past 10 years. My dream was to be concept artist as first, but felt to insecure and scare to lose the passion for drawing doing it as a career. Recently i got the opportunity to do more concepts art, in pre-prod, and I was quite stressed out about giving multiples iteration for a same subject so early. I tried your technique and it felt so comfortable ♥ Finding your channel was a blessing for my self-confidence and efficiency! Thank for sharing your way. I also really like your aesthetic and choice of music :)

[@gradyfrederickart]

That's amazing! Thanks for sharing. I'm glad this method clicked for you, as I felt the same way when I started thinking this way :D

[@pilotmccluskey7691]

I have to say, I've watched a LOT of videos about environment painting. I would get inspired and go and try it myself and it would come out horrible - granted I'm mainly a character artist - but I would get discouraged. This video and the part before have both had stuff in it I've never heard before from any other painter. Perhaps it was obvious to other people but your advice about where to place your values is literally revolutionary to me. I would go into my paintings with ideas about atmospheric perspective and making sure my foreground was dark and my background light or vice versa. But your advice about placing the light thoughtfully and strategically to create interesting shapes rather than just lumping different forms together with a single value makes SO much sense. It's really the same with painting characters. I feel like you've totally rewired my brain when it comes to thinking about landscapes, and I'm hyped to try this method out in my next sesh. The stuff you're sharing is so valuable and it's awesome to watch you make art. Seriously keep up the good work!

[@gradyfrederickart]

I'm sorry I missed this comment! Thanks so much for this, it really made my day :D It's really amazing how sometimes it takes just a few words to unblock us as artists. I'm really glad you found this stuff helpful, and thankyou for sharing this with me. It means alot more than you know :)

[@adnansamivlogs7789]

I love the calmness of your talking. Really helps to soothe my mind as I draw. Thanks for making these videos!

[@gradyfrederickart]

@@adnansamivlogs7789 thanks so much :)

[@anik4921]

This is as good as it can get ! Really looking forward to the colored finish and THANK YOU again for putting out thousands of hours of hard worked knowledge to us Grady !

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks for always watching, Anik!

[@johncox5939]

I am really enjoying these environment uploads so different to how I approach them. I now start with these as a warm up for half an hour or so and it’s amazing how they are turning out. As it happens I am not under any pressure I just draw for fun and really hope you take this on to the final outcome. JC

[@gradyfrederickart]

That's great! I'm glad you like this approach :) Thanks for watching

[@P4MI]

Really enjoying this series Grady, it's helpful to see a breakdown like this into distinct steps

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks!

[@xiliuv]

Thank you again for these videos, I know they take a lot of work and time. Also, the editing is really good, I like the background music! I'll definitely need to rewatch this video to fully process what you do here.

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thank you very much! I'm really trying to get better/faster with editing so it's nice to hear you like it.

[@bigmanfry]

What is the background music?

[@RichardK_art]

Thank you so much for your videos! I recently found out for my self, as you said, that it very important the process itself. I came back from grayscale to colours sketches. Now I just do colours first. It's really helps a lot when I hear from a such skilled professional, that just chill and find your own process. Thank you!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thankyou so much :D

[@piergiacomomacri492]

thank you to explain the inside emotions and feelings as well as the techical parts...

[@bocage_art]

Just stopping by once again to say thanks, tremendous content, I'll definitely rewatch it again! I'm hoping for a possible part about coloring tools!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks so much! Yes I've decided to make a part for color tools for one of these sketches :D

[@superpyrrhocorax]

your advice is always SO helpful, thank you so much for these videos!!

[@YassineCherifi]

I really love your shape design and the atmosphere is just amazing and for me I DO feel a sense of lonliness mixed with happiness lol and I too wanna reach a level where I can evoke a feeling with my art it would be the best feeling (not anytime soon as am a complete beginner). Thank you so much and am ready for part 3 best of luck Grady 🙏❤

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks so much for this :)

[@windintheears]

I would like to be there like that walker! Good video and talk Grady.

[@HalfWarrior]

Thank you Grady!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks to YOU as always :D

[@Shvyalt]

Genuinely I'm so thankful for your videos I also love drawing environments and you have a similar method as me these really help me improve so thank u❤

[@olgaosipovaart4484]

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge, tips and tricks, your philosophy 🙏🤗 I very much appreciate it!!! This video and the one before are amazing! They gave m a lot!!! Will definitely try your technique!!! Thank you so much 🤗

[@gradyfrederickart]

Glad it was helpful! Thanks:D

[@thorkhen9915]

Thank you for the great tutorial! Amazing pieces as always :)

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thankyou!

[@CowboyBoomBoomSlim]

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with us, such a valuable video!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks for watching :)

[@victorart-]

Always so great. Thank you for sharing.

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thankyou :)

[@kueename]

im starting to watch all you videos, they are very informative! i love the chill vibes! can you put all you videos in order on a playlist?

[@gradyfrederickart]

Done! Thanks for the suggestion and for watching :D

[@nikolailockertsen]

Lovely sketches!!!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thank-you man!!

[@Katja-z5v]

I really want to learn how to paint enviroments like you but I am a complete beginner with landscape painting. How did you learn how to paint like this? Do you have any advice how someone can reach a level like you? What should one focus on while learning? Sorry if thatˋs too many questions.. l´m really motivated but donˋt have access on Education and have no idea how to reach my goals. Great Video btw you inspire me a lot!

[@gradyfrederickart]

Thanks for the kind words. This is a very broad question which has a ton of possible answers haha, but I would recommend starting by just drawing ALOT. Draw from life, from photo references, practice drawing shapes in perspective, and study frames from movies/tv. I can suggest a couple of books like "How to draw" by Scott Robertson, "Framed ink" by Marcos Mateu-Mestre, and "Alla Prima" by Richard Schmid(though this one is very pricey). These will offer ways to practice fundamentals like perspective, light and shadow, and composition and just generally have a ton of great info for any level :)

[@Katja-z5v]

@@gradyfrederickart Thank you so much for answering! I will check these books out for sure :) Sometimes i get really demotivated with practicing bc i have so many cool enviroments in my head but i don't have the skill to paint it .. or when i see people that are way better then me and my goals seems out of reach. But i think everything comes with practice so drawing a lot makes sense.

[@Simon-et4hu]

@@Katja-z5v Welcome to landscape painting! :D sorry I had to lol ^.^ I wish you the best!

[@al_2222]

Your videos actually inspired me to start looking into landscape art, I primarily did portraits before and just happen to stumble across this channel. Your art style is arguably one of the most magical i’ve ever seen! I was just wondering how you approach using references, I can’t seem to use one without replicating it completely. Do you use multiple? Or is everything original? Thank you for your time!

[@gradyfrederickart]

That is awesome! Thanks so much. I use alot of references, but it's mostly for inspiration or to understand how something is made/looks in reality. It all depends on your goal. Obviously if you are trying to study and focus on painting skills, then trying to paint a reference directly can be very helpful to understand colors, values, perspective etc. but if you are creating concept art and designing, then the reference should serve as a jumping off point. Create your own designs but use reference strengthen them. For example, if you were designing a spaceship you might look at real space shuttles and equipment for interesting details, and you might look at cool vehicles to inspire the kind of shapes you want, or you might take a more out of the box approach and use something like insects to inspire a more alien/organic design. It's a broad topic, so it's hard to give a catch-all answer, because every situation requires different use of reference. I'll try to show more specifically how I use them in a future video. Thanks :D

[@al_2222]

Thank you so much!!

[@jacktuffery9930]

I have a question that almost relates more to part one: when you paint the first two tone sketch, how do you have confidence knowing that you can make the lighting "make sense", as in the mountain is dark but the sky is bright etc? also, that advice on making yourself feel what it's like to be in the scene is great.

[@gradyfrederickart]

Reference plays a big part here. Knowing what kind of lighting you want and what's possible can help you make decisions during your 2 tone sketch. For example in this image, I want a dark and powerful mood, so very dark sky appeals to me. I can use that as an opportunity to create a focal point with light hitting the mountain, creating a light shape against the large dark shape of the sky. You can exaggerate things you see in your reference to improve their impact on your composition as well. For instance if a reference image is overall very bright and the foreground, midground, and background all have similar bright values, you can slightly compress or darken the background and foreground values to draw the eye to the brightest hotspot in the midground if that's where your focal point is. Even though it's not 100% accurate to your reference, you've made a conscious change which will improve the overall impact of the image :) Hope that makes sense! Thanks for watching 🍻

[@jacktuffery9930]

​@@gradyfrederickart That makes a lot of sense. For some reason, I had in my head that in the two-tone sketch you first draw the landscape shapes you want, then forget about the values of the reference completely and just ask yourself "where would I put the light and dark values to make the most interesting composition?"- which is sort of what you were getting at but not as extreme as I had in my head I think- still use the basic value layouts of the references to guide your decisions somewhat. Thanks for the detailed reply!

[@luizfernando3591]

Nice work process Mr. Frederick🗿. When you have a more defined idea to go from, do you think it’s helpful to incorporate, some early “concepts” of composition into the 2 tone sketch? I ask because out of all You showed, the one with the dark mountains, framing the center just caught my eyes immediately.

[@gradyfrederickart]

Yes, definitely. This method can work even if you have a very specific idea/brief in mind. It's just about taking things one step at a time. The thumbnail/line drawing is setting up some guidelines for you, then move on to the 2 tone sketch where all you have to think about is the dark/light shape distribution. Even if I hade a much more complicated design like a city or a crowd of people, I would still use this method to break that image down into very strong shapes overall at this step. Then slowly build the details within that foundation. I hope this helps haha I'm not sure if this answers your question. Let me know if I can make something more clear. Thanks so much :D

[@luizfernando3591]

@@gradyfrederickart thx, very helpful insight.

[@sketch2807]

Love the videos man, really motivational! a lot of what you say really resonates with me

[@gradyfrederickart]

Some I made myself, some are from many years of collecting haha I couldn't tell you where I got them, sorry :( Thanks for the kind words!!

[@sketch2807]

@@gradyfrederickart no worries thankyou for the reply!

[@Mr.McWatson]

Cool approach, can someone see how he's making his layer selections though? He uses the lasso and then what?

[@gradyfrederickart]

When I want to cut a flat image up into different layers, I usually lasso the element I want, then ctrl + J to duplicate that selection so it is on it's own layer :) Hope it helps!

[@Scarmanderg]

My biggest problem when it comes to digitally painting anything is trying to get the colours blend well. I struggle with this a lot. Does anyone have any tips

[@MatthiasLiutic]

Upload brushes you use 🙏🙏

[@renealbrechtsen9743]

I was just going to ask if you can use this method with characters, then you answer it at the end. Thanks :D

[@gradyfrederickart]

Absolutely! Thanks for watching :)

[@jamesgoodman5643]

My POS computer would probably catch on fire if I started transforming stuff like that. Lol

[@superpyrrhocorax]

tiny bit concerned that you seem to have disappeared? hope things are okay

[@gradyfrederickart]

Hello! No need for concern, work has just been really busy and I have just moved to a new house so things have been quite chaotic. I'll have new stuff soon! Thanks for looking out for me :D

[@davidruzicka8479]

Looking forward to part 3 of this series!

[@jamesgoodman5643]

I have no idea what’s happening here.