How To Paint ANY Material - Introduction to the Form Principle

In this video I go over all the basic aspects of the form principle as well as all the different attributes of materials when it comes to rendering. Obviously this is all keeping it pretty surface level and every material has it's own little quirks and unique qualities, but I sincerely think that thinking about these different elements when painting and studying materials makes it a million times easier to understand what you are painting. And it sure beats just aimlessly scribbling away until something sorta looks right.
As always, if there are any follow up questions or you guys want to see anymore content from me feel free to put it down in the comments, I try to see everyone's responses and answer whatever questions I can!
🎨 Links:
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0:00 Intro
1:37 Form Principle
10:57 Material Traits
14:41 Texture + Demo
Music Credit: Bensound, Pixabay

[@gustav0santos]

dude just summarized scott robertson's entire book, "how to render". i love this guy

[@ForrestImel]

I still haven't had a chance to read that haha. A lot of what I'm talking about here I learned from Dorian Iten's webinars.

[@gustav0santos]

​@@ForrestImel Dorian is such a great teacher. His articles are AMAZING. And Scott's book is great too. I'm not going to lie and say that I read every page of this book, because Scott can be too mathematical sometimes, but I know he talks a lot about the form principle, how to calculate the cast shadow - he really likes this one -, fresnel effect, atmospheric perspective, etc. He really goes deep into rendering.

[@piusdoe8984]

Summarized the entire book. Sounds like you've never read the book

[@gustav0santos]

@@piusdoe8984 It was a joke, honey. Scott's book "How to Draw" literally changed my life and at the time I also studied "How to Render", but my English was so bad and the book was so technical that I didn't really study it as well as I could have , but you can be sure that I studied it as best I could. But congratulations if you know every page of the book.

[@idkdude7662]

@gustav0santos Hii, i loved your art, Can I take a look at the channels you follow? 🥹 💕

[@sitkinator]

This feels like something that'd be in a course you have to pay for. But here it is, sitting on KZbin for absolutely free. I appreciate your teaching method, especially showing how the different layers of light, from the basic simple shading to the ambient lighting actually stack up and connect with each other. What I've begun to understand with drawing and art in general, is how every time you zoom into a piece of art whether digital or traditional, there's always some imperfection that casual viewers would never even glance at. It even applies to the wood artwork you made here!

[@TorchOG]

Deadass thought this was a blender tutorial cause of the thumbnail

[@grav3yardshawty]

so blown away by how much i learned that i don’t even know what to comment other than thank you

[@sugarplums885]

Forrest please make a color thumbnail video for illustration ( splash in particular )

[@ForrestImel]

Added to the list!

[@raul.ciobanu]

I found your channel while you were inactive on YT, and I can't tell you how glad I am to see you back! Great video, thank you!

[@beaver_eater2447]

Watching all this knowledge for free feel like a steal, thank you so much for making this.

[@juniorkageO]

Man I am glad you came back to yt. I like your style and how you explain things. Thank you a lot.

[@DigitalRyuii]

Ive been struggling on my material study for 3 months from now, and you just explain it in a minute. I've watched tons of yt vids and didn't extracted any. Thank you very much for this

[@plakjeham118]

I frikkin love your videos man. You're my favorite artist out there. Especially when it comes to your tutorials. They helped me so much. Would love a video on how to render in color especially with the value technique you're using.

[@adacskipper]

Holy smokes, this is exactly what I've been looking for. Lately I've been feeling very frustrated with my lighting and colour; realizing that its missing something but never being quite sure what. You've really opened my eyes; just goes to show that there's always more to learn!!

[@sethlynchart]

Hell yea man! I've listened to you talk about this countless times on stream but something about this video really made it click for me!

[@mwtinternet7136]

Thanks alot Forrest! I finally understand how to tackle these challenges in study. Your videos are extremely helpful. I hope you do more of these videos!

[@tony355367]

Thank you for your teachings, these let me understand the principles of roughness and reflection, not just textures

[@Alienhirn]

To answer your question at the end. Yes, it was indeed a super informative video. Thank you very much for posting it. 👍🏻

[@aikaterinhtsiklh7411]

informative and very entertaining! one of the best art youtubers out there

[@DukePaints]

Your video style reminds me of Ethen Becker, but like, you dont make me feel bad (:

[@Iris-fp9vo]

You make him feel bad 😂

[@97scuoch]

Absolutely loved it. If I see a video like this on applying the form principle to any organic object from imagination I'll subscribe

[@ivanginfrol9870]

12:40 In a 3D editor of the type (blender). These parameters are called Specular (roughness), and Glass (Metalness) in another way. In PBR material

[@elijahbanks1947]

I like your teaching style. I them in the background while im warming up. Subscribed.

[@TamilVolk]

I don't even care for learning. I just want to see your intros. It's the best.

[@Chiwey]

Please keep these coming because you have a great way of explaining things in a very beginner friendly manner! Even as an artist with some experience in the field already I sometimes have a hard time understanding concepts unless they are explained in a clear logical way and so far I think your videos are some of the most accessible I've encountered in a while :) If you are open to suggestions I would love a video about rendering tricks you often use to quickly showcase materials for example (like maybe using photo textures together with layer modes and painting over them) or similar topics. Looking forward to more videos!

[@nivlaccc2175]

Once again, this is somethingg incredibley useful that I will be coming back to! Thank you so much!!

[@biggestmonkefanofalltime9710]

That was actually very informative and helpful. Thank you a lot!

[@BlakeRas]

Appreciate you making these videos man

[@pent6841]

Amazing as usual, keep it up!

[@viktorpavlovych]

Thank you so much for for the super high quality explanation! It hard to make complex thing to appear simple to do, you explained it really efficiently step by step. It helps a lot, thank you again

[@SuperFlyGhost]

Really great break down of all the fundamental principles and thier interaction with each other. ❤

[@DjeauxSheaux]

Thank you for making this very informative, useful guide.

[@sonicfan73887]

This video is actually too good to be free thank you :)

[@galaktikstudio]

Entertaining and informative! Thank you for sharing your knowledge, wisdom, and insights!

[@J3ss4u]

Excellent video! I didn't know that about "texture". Great to know.

[@KnightHunterTheresa]

This is one of the most helpfull painting tutorials out there.

[@ramongomez8389]

Thank you so much, you are a great teacher!!

[@XtraTycoon]

That was a really helpful breakdown! Thank you :D

[@AlexandruMarasescu-gr4cz]

When is the full course due? haha. Thank you for making these videos!

[@NoHealNeeded]

i love these intros and outros

[@dimplebup]

awsome video dude, pretty funny intro too

[@inconnuinconnu3105]

very clear, thank you very much !

[@yustinniga1586]

Great video 🦾

[@Saphiresurf]

Wow this is incredible, this made a lot of things click thank you

[@cdewx5749]

Can you do a short tutorial on hair/fur with this thought process in mind? btw I started note-taking in a big PSD file like you did and it's been so well to just jot down and reinforce what I'm learning.

[@kilutica3D]

Great content!

[@TamilVolk]

Also is that a SHAMAN KING POSTER????? I never noticed before. It was HUGE in Russia when I was growing up, but nobody in US ever heard of that anime. I am so happy someone knows about it. Great tutorial. Hello from Kuya Streams!

[@ForrestImel]

Thanks! I actually just finished reading all of the manga, love the series and the art in it :)

[@TamilVolk]

@@ForrestImelSo cool! I am trying to catch up on the manga. I was a huge fan of the OG tv show from 2000's, but I heard they changed a lot of things later.

[@neryerick]

Great video, you earned a new subscriber.

[@EwokOverlord]

awesome!

[@danielmoreno5330]

What brush settings are you using or do you recommend when painting? Great video btw, it really helped me better my work!

[@jakkdlaw]

The way you draw such straight lines is amazing to me. I practice that a lot and still struggle with it. How many years did it take to reach this level?

[@ALTARTIST00]

Loved it. I found this channel after watching your art journey video. And, ever since I've subscribed because it was inspiring. I really needed to understand surface material much more and this video helped a lot. Would there be any books you recommend to get better at understanding specular and diffused surfaces?

[@ForrestImel]

I've heard good things about Scott Robertson's book on how to render, otherwise I don't know many books or tutorials that cover this type of stuff unfortunately.

[@Haruyuki_Art]

Thank you😀

[@Iad83]

I've been using the lasso tool more and more the past year but I still feel like I'm sleeping on it. It wouldn't have occurred to me to section off areas as you did when adding the larger areas of the wood, but seemed very useful to lay out those larger shapes quickly.

[@ForrestImel]

I think my next video will go over how I use the lasso tool to paint because it is really quick and efficient.

[@juanchinpanchin]

Really Usefull 👍 😊

[@tornandfrail]

Thanks so much for this

[@hanzflackshnack1158]

Good stuff. People probably shouldn't be learning simplifications before detailed structure. I'm aware this goes against what most artists teach. That doesn't make it less true that learning anatomical simplifications before having a thorough grasp on perspective or trying to draw texture without understanding the intricate behaviors of light just doesn't work (I know because for the first few years, I tried to skip practicing the intricacies of mechanical form building). It's awesome people on YT are seeing there's no merit to the "DRAW PERFECT HANDS NOW!" videos and are creating legitimately useful instruction.

[@BuckshotBill118]

This is a bit of review for me but I've never heard it explained so succinctly. Thank you. One thing I'm struggling with is subsurface scattering and translucency. I struggle with understanding exactly how much of the form should be painted from the other side of the object. If you have any advice regarding that, it would be appreciated. Loving the content so far.

[@ForrestImel]

Yeah translucency is definitely a tricky one to get accustomed to. I think what has helped me a lot is looking at objects like gems or crystals. A lot of the time you can see that what is happening is light is entering the object, bouncing around on the inside, and scattering light around. So what will happen is sometimes your shadow side might appear brighter in value than your light side, or at least a similar brightness. This doesn't necessarily mean there isn't a divide between light and shadow still, just that the shadow is being washed out in a way because of the light within the object. You'll also usually see the light bouncing around the object as a higher saturation because it is acting more like reflected light from the object itself, meaning the object's own local color is adding into itself so it might make like a red object appear even more red on the inside as opposed to how the outer object is appearing.

[@piusdoe8984]

Nice vid

[@NotSoMax]

I feel like this is another reason for 2D artists to at least have a basic understanding of 3D programs because you can do little rendered spheres and primitives of your desired material and use that as your basis for a quick study to later incorporate into your piece! At least that’s what I try to do being a primarily 3D artist who attempts 2D art

[@Kagane1001]

Really helpful video, especially the demonstration at the end! I'm definitely doing the same study later. To separate material study from texture study: Let's say I'm painting a stone carving of that exact wood ball. How would that change the rendering? Simply sharper highlights? I feel i have trouble wrapping my head around the word specularity, if i translate that to my native language its says the same as glossy... if it means reflective, is there any other marterial other than metal thats high specularity? Thank you to any answeres😅

[@ForrestImel]

Sometimes some objects have similar levels of specularity and glossiness, but what helps them stand apart is the texture. So for instance you can sometimes find sculptures people have made of something that is meant to resemble wood, but made from stone, and because it mimics the texture, it looks very convincing because they have a similar level of specularity and glossiness. But there is a wide variety of options, "wood" and "stone" are just simple terms/categories, but there is a whole range of different types that offer different traits and will show things like highlights and reflected light differently. as for any other specular objects, I think that metal is the most common, but plenty of objects have it to an extent. Looking around my desk I can see different types of plastics or even some clean, finished wood that is reflecting back nearby light sources, even if it isn't crisp/glossy.

[@kayfoxii]

Thank you so much for this! I've been struggling and feeling like there's something off with my rendering for a while now. I'm going to try and keep this more structured approach in mind for future pieces, and hopefully it helps make things a bit simpler! :D If you don't mind taking the time to answer: when painting in grayscale, do you end up adding more light effects with blending modes on top of that? Or do you stick mostly to painting *all* light and shadow in the grayscale version of the piece? I think this may be another reason as I don't always know where to *stop* adding D: No worries if you can't! But I really appreciate your videos regardless- informative, genuine, and easy to understand. Keep up the amazing work!

[@ForrestImel]

Sometimes I'll use additional blend modes, I tend to not talk about specific photoshop techniques though because what primarily matters is the end result. So if I'm trying to show an object in sunlight for instance, what matters is knowing how intense the sun is and how much that sun will light the object (this normally makes the value go up anywhere from 20-40%). It's not an exact science and can be manipulated in ways that suit the image you want to make, but if what matters is just having enough contrast to make lighting look a certain way, that can be achieved by tons of different techniques. One I might commonly use is a color dodge layer filled with black and then painting white on to it to give it a nice glow. But usually that's done after I have a good base for the material. Not sure if that totally answers your question, let me know if that makes sense haha

[@C4ManMike]

Are you ever gona release the soecs of ur comp and monitors?

[@karstafarius]

Really good video

[@luciethart]

Thanks Forrest 🤓

[@TomBigosinskiArt]

I remember you were describing the same thing to me some years ago, and for a few years I was sure it's "determinator", as it determines the light direction xD

[@J3ss4u]

You should make a video on edges too 😊

[@tami2093]

Thank you so much for this video. It really opened my eyes to a concept that I hadn’t come across with respect to form, light and materials. But I am I bit confused on one aspect. I understand that the roughness/smoothness is what impacts glossiness, but don’t understand what quality of the material impacts specularity. Also, why does the sphere lose colour as specularity increases? I would be very grateful if you (or anyone that could) please help clarify this. Thank you in advance

[@ForrestImel]

This starts to get away from some of what I understand about materials and where I would need to do more research to be certain. But the way I perceive it is that as an object becomes more specular it begins to reflect back light within a certain range/intensity. Something to study that is interesting is seeing what objects get reflected back to a perfectly smooth chrome sphere and what doesn't get reflected back. If a chrome sphere's reflection has an object that is in shadow it usually isn't seen as clearly as objects that are receiving light. That's kind of how I handle those kinds of materials, but that is more of going off of perception of a material and not the actual science behind it.

[@terricon4]

Decent video, ok job explaining it, and no worries on copying others that copy others that copy others. New ones being made means newer artists have new tutorials recomended by the algorithms more easily. Simple alternative language, for those in 3d modeling/texturing. Glossiness here is basically roughness in a PBR (Physically based renderer) shader system. Older ones actually used glossiness as is, but not most modern setups. Though it would be inverted, high glossiness means low roughness, low gloss means high rough. So if you got older glossiness maps, invert those for the roughness ones, not perfect but its approximately right. Specular as mentioned here, is close to metalicness. Metalic is used to have objects that show the light that hit them, more than their own coloring, like a mirror. You will in 3d shaders also find Specular intensity/level, and specular color. These in older shader models were like what you see here, but in in PBR specular is basicly just the amount of light a surface bounces, at all... so a low specular is good for pure blacks, while a specular of 1 might just be most normal materials that still get lit up by the enviornment. Imagine a normal black piece of plastic, versus some vatte black stuff, ones still visible with a form in lighting if identifiably black, while the other would be just a void even with external lighting on it, you can't really see the form of it. Specular color, is the color any light it receives from the environment is biased towards. This is used on pearls or some car paints or other cool things to make certain effects where parts when lit up, turn to a unique color, that they didn't have before external light was more strongly applied. The idea of texture, is the normal map (or bump maps in older shaders). Roughness does somewhat relate to this, being representative of the micro textures... but for the larger macro textures like divets or protrusions like in his wood example, that's up to the normal map. The normal map basicly tells the renderer that when light hits this area, act as if that light was hitting something at this angle instead, as the normal map tells it. So a flat plane should reflect light evently, but a normal map says on this part, act like the plane is tilted this way, and so you get variations in how light behaves on a surface, as if there was say a divet there in the model, despite the model itself being flat becuase the normal map told it such. Parallax and other setups allow for a virtualized depth to also be added that means parts of your normal map that are lower, might be hidden by the higher parts, or high parts might hide other parts behind them, depending on the angel of view. This makes 3d forms pop not just in lighting but seemingly have some perspective as well. Then there's height, or displacement maps that actually deform or distort the model itself. This is much more expensive but can help. Say you have a flat plane that had a normal map for rocks on it, it looks fine from above, and with parralax even from horizontal angles. But if you lower your camera right above the ground... the rocks/bumps don't actually poke up from it, and then the illusion falls apart and you can see its flat, when viewing from the side perpendicular to the plane. Displacement can give actual geometry to those bumps or stuff, but require to generate polygons to do that, so again, a lot more expensive than just a lighting trick like a normal map.

[@laffy7204]

Wait, you tell us how to make an object appear glossiee, is there are a way to make the object look specular?

[@dynocraftLOL]

ayo i always wondered how many total hours of work you needed to draw these wide splash arts for smite and league of legends, did the time spent vary a lot between the different concepts? how many hours of work was the average?

[@doctorzoidberg1715]

Does anyone have the source of the grahp of Spectrality and Glossiness? As well as what materials fall where ? I know it will vary based on the art style but still.

[@kloa4219]

Any idea of how to render figures or creatures? I get really stumped rendering stuff more complex than a sphere lol

[@renealbrechtsen9743]

How about liquids though ?

[@ForrestImel]

A liquid can be treated like any other material, it's transluceny, glossiness, and specularity can still all vary depending on the type of liquid. Like water and maple syrup and lava are all technically liquids, but they definitely don't all look the same. So when it comes to painting a material to feel like liquid, all of this still applies.

[@housequay]

Man I'm watching too many art videos and doing too little art for any of it to make a difference

[@healxo]

Almost clicked off the video when you said idk how helpful this'll be. Glad i stayed, but i'd bet there's a less self-deprecating, more encouraging way to say that

[@f_mathias]

0:21 LMAO

[@cosmicworrierart]

W

[@Schmidtcreations]

I wood use texture brushes😂

[@melo9796]

How is this video free to watch

[@ArksideGames]

I swear I need to paint better skin for my dnd commissions 🥺🥺😫😫

[@MatrixOne500]

Thanks. Annoying intro but some decent information, so I guess I'm overall neutral and not gonna like or dislike. Not sure how this principle of shading the ridges in an object would apply to a smooth wooden surface such as a desk or chair, since that would be primarily - or exclusively - texture, with not many micro 3d spaces to allow for shading. Most modern or futuristic props emphasize smoothness.

[@boyu8_]

absolutely terrible video.. did not enjoy it (i enjoyed every second of it)

[@idkdude7662]

I think you should do 'How to render anything' too 🥲