The Shading Lesson That Made My Art Career Possible

[@cmango5865]

It's genuinely astounding how many insanely useful art tips, pointers, and fundamental breakdowns Marco has provided on his youtube channel FOR FREE! Amazing as always.

[@RealmsOfThePossible]

Exactly! I have learnt so much from him especially mixing colour.

[@LolaBeM3]

100% Facts

[@dadimunteanu]

Yep

[@dadimunteanu]

I mean, his channel is a whole school

[@pezvonpez]

ai generated comment

[@milehighslacker4196]

As a beginner, I was taught that "your darkest light is lighter than your lightest dark and vice versa (your lightest dark is darker than your darkest light)." I think that concept is part of this video explanation. Thanks!

[@Emil_m]

I think remembering the “rules” is more difficult (for me anyway) than understanding what’s happening. So for me, the guiding principle is: the place where the light hits the object is going to be the brightest. I used to put that same brightness in other places and it looked wrong, because this is not possible in nature. 1) figure out where the light is hitting the object - save that “color” to be used only for this, cannot use it anywhere else. 2) figure out where the light has hardest time reaching - save that color to be used only for this, nothing can be darker than this. It may be possible to go lighter and darker, but then it will create confusion because then it’ll look like these new places are darker/brighter. Unless you actually make that decision of course. For me, this used to be the mistake I made frequently. I’d just pick something brighter without realizing and then adjust things to match, I would lose the impact I was going for and the whole paining would have weak overall contrast. For your brightest color, you should be able to use highlights on top of it. And even the highlights which is the absolute brightest for your object, doesn’t need to be Maximum bright. Just need to maintain the relationship. For example you can load up a photo and reduce brightness slider. You can see everything is getting darker, but you can still recognize where the highlights are at. The more diffused the light source, the less pronounced the highlights will be. The highlights is what’s telling you how strong the light source is. For the darkest color you choose, it also doesn’t need to be absolute black possible. As long as there’s nothing darker, it will be perceived properly. So once you make these two choices you just have to stick with them.

[@wordforger]

The tricks I've learned over time basically come down to this: 1) light on the side the light is coming from, dark on the opposit side. 2) Certain objects/colors will reflect light on the other side. 3) If light comes from different directions so will shadows. 4) The brighter the light, the harsher the shadow. 5) If an object is being hit by two lights at once, the brighter light wins out when it comes to the light side. 6) Colored light leaves shadows of a complementary tone.

[@Emil_m]

@@wordforger yup, #4 is very important for authentic look, both of those pieces of visual information make it feel believable. #6 makes it even more realistic

[@Andybowbandy]

That’s what have I been missing! Half tones are not actually halftones, and they are apart of the light family. I wish this video existed a decade ago my renderings wouldn’t have had to suffer and my time. Thank you so much I finally now understand!

[@Andybowbandy]

I took halftones to literally 😅

[@Silustrations]

we can't blame ourselves - the person who named them is at fault :D!@@Andybowbandy

[@Andybowbandy]

@@Silustrations Your right! He or she should have known art people can take things too literally like me self

[@pat4005]

You could have found it for free in many art instruction books in the public library. Books created by traditional artists. And/Or, you could have simply done life drawings of simple objects in order to study how light hits dimensional objects during different times of the day and under different lighting conditions. It's all good, AND, as always, practice makes perfect! Rendering is also the best way to describe what is being done (as opposed to the term "shading". Shade is what is found under trees. 🙃

[@Call-me-Al]

​@@pat4005 Unfortunately not everywhere has libraries, which is an outrage as they are a very important part of local communities. They've been increasingly defunded the past half century in many areas.

[@allanredhill8682]

youre without a doubt the best free artistic learning recource on youtube. The fact that youre not only a knowledgable artist but also a great teacher and are putting out this content for free is insane. Wouldnt be half as far along my art journey as iam right now without your content for real

[@MaxDev]

He’s great and all buuuuuutttt *proko*

[@allanredhill8682]

@@MaxDev I would take 5 vids from marco over 20 from proko at any time. He just explains thing in such a concise and cohesive way that even a non artist would understand the principles hes talking about. Maybe thats just the way I learn but Marcos content is top tier. His 10 minutes to better painting series is literally all you need in theory to understand how art works

[@summero-my5in]

I like him and sinix

[@Art_Inexperiente]

@@summero-my5in Sinix is great!

[@MaxDev]

@@allanredhill8682 fair, we learn differently and i’d do the same with proko videos

[@sumicmusic]

Thanks for this tutorial on edging! I found it really easy to edge after watching this!

[@heckYEAHman.]

Crazy that a 14 minute video was all it took to make me start edging for 5 hours straight. Art videos are SO GOOD man

[@rayquandia]

💀

[@Ferodra]

For those struggling with bounce/indirect light: What helped me most in painting it is to imagine *every* lit part of a surface as somewhat emissive. As long as you take into account distance and light intensity (+ the inverse square law), it helps a ton to make a full piece feel coherent. I did tend to make my pieces way too dark before randomly realizing this while working in 3D

[@trixonic6934]

I’ve been watching you for years and after years of aimless practice I have finally made it into the world of product design. If you saw how bad I was when I started to where I am now you would never know the countless hours I put in just drawing from observation everyday and kept it all to myself. It feels great

[@whatiamdoinghere1788]

you made it sound so so easy that it feels so obvious and even silly, but applying this to drawing makes everything so so much easier to understand and draw, wow!! Thank you!

[@velvetbees]

This is a far better presentation than I received in my university art classes. One thing you explained is how the dark cloth did not create the halo effect from the indirect lighting, but a colored base does. That's because black absorbs light. Thank you for that reminder.

[@honkhonk5000]

How to amaze a non artist with four shades of white. I understand what’s happening but it’s just so amazing to see a circle with three colors become a sphere with the addition of the reflective light. It just came alive for me. Absolutely awesome

[@NATA5II]

I’ve told my non art friends and beginner artists that really the magic just comes from light and shadow. You can use blue or purple, doesn’t matter but if you get the light and shadow right, the realism absolutely pops.

[@shadowstar1286]

Hey Marco last year at Light Box Expo I stopped by your booth and told you how blown away I was by the quality of education and editing you have in your videos. You told me that you spend a lot of time editing. I haven't watched in a while but I'm happy to say your work is just as impressive as ever. I won't be going to LBX this year so I figured I'd drop a comment here.

[@LabradorPeninsula]

Every time I see a new video from Marco I get this incredibly strong urge to draw more, you can just see by the way he paints how much he is enjoying it

[@Mr.McWatson]

This is one of the best breakdowns I've heard for shading. The light family explanation really drove it home.

[@PabloEdvardo]

I'm almost 38 and now considering trying painting for the first time in my life. I honestly never knew that art was so technical in a way that leads to creativity rather than restricting it.

[@LunaticOnPixiv]

i cant describe in words just how useful this was. it cleared out all my missconceptions and question thanks marco

[@hoangoan9529]

Thank you for videos you make, you really make my art journey easier without college

[@utubewillyman]

I love the way you approach this as a problem to be solved with analytical thinking instead of some feel-good platitudes about painting with your heart, etc.

[@grahamothy424]

You’ve got talent in your paintings but you also have talent in your passion for teaching art. The way you explain and order and generalize things is so helpful. I rewind once or twice and I just permanently retain these core concepts. Thank you for putting forth so much effort into making your videos. I’ll forever be a fan

[@thecompl33tnoob]

Excellent video! I have my own tip to throw in for beginners, which seems to be implied but not stated outright: In design school, for rendering, our teachers taught us that "cast shadows are always as sharp as possible," and that "rounded/form shadows are always as smooth of a gradient as possible." Obviously this isn't always true in real life (you can even see at @2:07, the cast shadow from his hand is quite fuzzy due to his hand being so close to the light source), but it was a very handy place to begin. Most of the things we were rendering were artificial manmade objects and products and with bright artificial lighting, so this worked fine. Again, it's not always strictly true, but adhering to those two rules to begin will really help your art look realistic as a baseline, then you can go in and refine/fuzz some of those cast shadows or sharpen some of those rounded shadows as needed. Hope this helps someone!

[@bloxycola9109]

Marco, you have just single-handedly taught me how to shade correctly after I've been doing this all wrong for so many years. My shading always looked sloppy and muddy, so thank you for making this.

[@fenston]

Marco, you're a bright light in the long darkness of my art learning process.

[@RealDuendeNoFake]

I really enjoyed this, it honestly makes me want to pick up my tablet again after not drawing/painting for half a year.

[@97scuoch]

Everytime I come back to one of your videos I learn something new even if I think I have already got eveything out of it. The more you know the more you can learn and with your channel I'm always learning. Thanks.

[@gubbothehuggo2771]

"Reflected light is always darker than the light family." I had never heard of this until now and yet it's one of the most important rendering tips I have EVER been told. Thank you.

[@johnsantanaguio5056]

Man I love you, nothing more to say. You are the best teacher period. I've never seen this quality of digital content not even on really good universities, I imagine if all my classes were like this on school and university everything would be probably different.

[@BlackKara]

Yeah I have gone back and watched this over and over again. Not because it isn't clear, but like. This is so good. I've been struggling with value a lot and this helps so much.

[@TheGirlBeDoodlin]

Amazing guidance🙌..just came across this channel and loved it!

[@P-rar]

You just did more for me than 15 years of doodling, bless you

[@ziltoidtheomniscient2398]

Reminds me of the first video I ever saw from you, many many years ago! Unfortunately I fell out of art, but I always loved the theory and craft of it. Thanks for this amazing update and all your educational content, Marco.

[@discoeur]

thank you marco bucci for being one of the best art teachers online :3

[@fiftyshades8706]

It’s amazing how much in depth info you compile into each of your vids all for the cost of a subscription like and comment! You’re truly a kind soul, and I genuinely wish you well in everything you do 🙏🏾 hope to one day share my works with you and the world very soon

[@fawwazanvilen6625]

omg 10:39 on it's so amazing how you refine it into such a beautiful result wow

[@AngelfromGenX]

I did that to draw my photos or screenshots I took on my phone. 1: filter it to black & white. 2: change the brightness 3: change contrast - to see the light & dark shapes.

[@LovinLnCottage]

What a great video! Thank you for making this foundational lesson so understandable for beginners. I am a retired teacher of both science and art, so I admire good teaching where ever I see it. Keep up the good work! 🙏☮️❤️🖖

[@lunarart502]

I think that‘s the „Klick“ i needed. I will immediately grap my sketchbook in the Morning to practise. Thank you VERY MUCH! I watched a ton of Videos about Light and shadow and colour But didnt understand the principle till now. You‘re explanations were really understandable to me. I hope that’s the piece of understanding besides watching a Reference I needed to go on on my journey.

[@DarkHarpuia]

Thinking of halftones as "the points at which the form is turning away from the light" is a REALLY helpful mental frame for this. Thanks!

[@cameronbartlett856]

I've not dabbled in art in over 10 years, but this... I will remember this if I ever get back into painting

[@deep6393]

I recently got back into art after like 10 years of a creative block and it's so good to be back!!! I hope you start painting again soon!!

[@bielxcorrea]

Man, you are just the absolute best. It’s like you purposefully set out to answer exactly the questions I had!

[@brinhildaink8067]

What an incredible video,thank you so much for your hard work! Your passion and kindness is infectious.

[@tkataby73]

I've watched endless lessons about shading spheres but you explain it in an awesome way! I finally saw it when you also applied it to the face. Thank you soooo so much!

[@NecroOver]

Structure of hilights can explain roughness when you see something. It's necessary for complete texture perception. Cool video. Thanks.

[@FattyKung]

as someone who enjoy drawing but have no fun or interest or talent in painting, you're my real life angle who make me step further into the world of painting more and more and make more good art🤗 Thank you so much sir!

[@MugenGlider82]

Thanks for taking these fundamental concepts and immediately applying them to a piece. A lot videos I find do the first half well enough but neglect the latter. More importantly, you make it simple enough to digest. Appreciate you, Marco!

[@menu.config]

This is one of my favorite educational videos on youtube so far

[@kaarlimakela3413]

Encouraging. I can translate just sketching and coloring over to something a little more, something new. Good point for confidence.

[@stephenkrus]

THE best Shading Tutorial... EVER! 💎✨👌

[@xaf15001]

As someone who's more focused towards pixel art, this similiarly mimics how I draw pixels. Pixel art limits what you could do, so using only 2 colors at first helps establish a base before adding in dampers between light and dark families, then adding strong accents that makes the pixels pop.

[@plushdragonteddy]

this is SO helpful !! shading is the one thing i’ve never 100% understood, and i’m realizing now that it’s because i didn’t consider the bounce! thank you for this :D

[@sugarpolecat4781]

After I discovered tha AI can make art similar to a pro in mere seconds, I completely gave up on just doing art as a hobby. Then I picked up these tutorials you create and sort of got back into drawing things. These tutorials are so well done and they just give such a great walkthrough about what should be happening, it made me want to try these myself with my own references and photos. So thank you.

[@PlushmayhemVT]

Thank you for this video. While I feel this is all stuff I knew, your demonstration has helped tie it all together and become a cohesive thing for me.

[@TheMiniatureDoctor]

This is incredible. I've read about this so many times, but I only understand it now! You're a genius

[@VLAD.....]

I've been going through Dorian Iten's Light guide and this is a very great video that helps me understand those lessons even better

[@chukukaogude5894]

In 2020 watching videos like yours and others really helped me get my art skills up. I feel bad that I haven't posted anything on YT for a while lol. My skills got pretty good. Your channel taught me and made me aware of color, edges and the values. I'd like to say thank you. EDIT: Oh and painting shapes. That changed my whole thought process. Not having to draw until the very end of the painting was liberating.

[@joaovitora.pelegrini2000]

I think whis the best video about shadows and rendering i've ever seen

[@LovelyTrendyCoolGirl]

Thank you, this lesson was much needed recently as I was trying to wrap my brain around the different types of values in terms of light and shadows 🙏

[@riaayo5321]

I have never had lighting in terms of these family groupings explained this way before, and I really appreciate the insight. I had not considered grouping halftone into the light itself and often defined light/shadow and then blended that edge to get the halftone. I'll clearly be going into it with a different perspective now.

[@byzoemay]

Thank you so much Marco, this information is priceless! You're helping so many artists who can't afford classes/art college. You break this down so well, it's really helping me to understand!

[@blue_shiner]

Love you Marco. I would not have been able to understand these concepts as easily had you not explained them. The simple is profound!

[@nikivaszi]

You are the one of the best art teacher on the internet landscape! 🤗

[@QuietLumina]

Your ability to teach is just incredible. I have been watching the facial places course from your website and have learned so much. It makes me feel excited to practice because I actually understand what I’m trying to do.

[@octonolite_0]

Marco, thanks as always for taking these concepts and breaking them down scientifically and yet somehow making the information so digestible.

[@Myname2663-w2z]

I have tried to learn this for years and it hurt my brain. This is the best explanation ever. Thanks so much

[@bookshelfhoney]

Same! I get so confused trying to understand this before, but this is very helpful

[@LoganE]

Watching you work on the example painting is incredible

[@LilChuunosuke]

This is an AWESOME, high quality, easy to understand tutorial! I've been working on leveling up my drawing lately and this showed up in my recommended at the perfect time. The way you describe things is so clear and easy to understand. I really appreciate you sharing this with the art community for free its going to help a LOT of artists.

[@rhysbrewer69]

Hey amazing video just learned this at my current school but don't forget that the bounce light on your sphere is effected by your cast shadow so where your cast shadow is there wont be any light bouncing back from that area

[@MiauxCatterie]

you just made light and shadow make so much sense to me. thank you. im subscribing for sure.

[@PedroLopes-xe8ux]

Very well structured and fundamental lesson, loved the way you teach! The lesson was very insightful and resourceful. A little tip I'd give is at that moment in 11:16 you could use static images and a quick dirty cut or slide in for the first image to keep it quick but not hard for the eye as the rolling animation. Keep up the good work! :)

[@DarwinRoger893]

Marco you are a gem! Never change pls!

[@shawna444]

Subscribed within a microsecond! Can't wait to binge watch...thank you so much!

[@0pride809]

That was the single best explaination I've ever heard of halftones. I always look at greyscale drawings and the light and shadows seem apparent or more obvious, but when a pro adds the greyish/halftones I get lost because I'm like "what exactly are you looking at?". My initial theory was just to always have them hug a darker shadow but I see now with this theory it is not always the case as some areas arent "elevated" enough to cast a darck shadow. Much appreciated

[@nunorodrigues2987]

I would love to see this translated into color. I have a hard time with the right place for the right saturation in each are. Awesome explanation! Saved!

[@totallycarbon2106]

If you are working digitally maybe try colour selection using a perceptual colour space like OKlab? As you pick your hue and saturation you don't want your resulting perceptual values to shift from the greyscale value study.

[@transition.medias-kr1pz]

Thank you for this I recently decided to pursue being a game dev and I love this video

[@CaviteTechnology]

Everything thought here is the same way how I light in a studio setting with photography, great points!

[@cynloh2302]

Thank you so much for this! I'm going to be teaching a class on light and shadow in a few months, you inspire me so much!

[@thomasawl]

Love the tram in the background!

[@WankiTank]

Man this is so helpful. I'm super into very simplistic cell shade and my shadows never seem to work out when I tried to give it just a little more variety. you actively have to merge different types of lighting and shadow with one another, even across families sometimes, e.g. drawing ambient light as unshaded. aaah my brain. it's actually more complicated (if you want to make it just a little fancy) to draw like that than to include the half tones in the first place. I never knew

[@phdgraphitti969]

This won you my subscription. A proper explaintion👊🏻

[@TheChameleon2008]

Wow, 2nd time i watched this video and its indeed one of the better one's i have seen all year.

[@tamaranesic4917]

Thank you million times! ❤

[@royalwumititu3934]

That was very clear, very clear, simple, precise, and that's valuable, thank you

[@ryanmcw7878]

Thank you Marco, you are such an incredible teacher and am always happy to see new videos from you!

[@smortonmedia]

Originally I thought this was going to be a video on shaders in 3D for vfx... and even though it wasn't, I'm not disappointed. Truly amazing tips here and it's incredible how these fundamentals on light, shadows, values, form, contrast, etc... all translate into other mediums. You gave a better explanation on bounce light and ambient occlusion than some other 3D artists. Great video and I'll be sure to come back to this one frequently

[@iluvpandas2755]

Same experience here. I am working with painterly affects in Blender so this is helpf.

[@zander7513]

As a non-artist(but avid gamer), I genuinely feel like I've never understood ambient occlusion better than when watching this video

[@hongyizhou1734]

such a great lesson! Learned more than in my college lighting course!

[@gillian4425]

Thank you, Marco! 🥳

[@whatiamdoinghere1788]

I am here yet again because I forgot how to and I am so glad I found this video again, ah, incredible, incredible, thank you. I am big fan of yours now

[@HardHitMag]

My brain basically exploded when you pointed out that form shadow and cast shadow have the same value.🤯 It's actually obvious but somehow I always neglected that until you pointed it out. Thanks for all your amazing drawing advice and videos.

[@trashqueeen]

Wow i finally understand ambient occlusion. 3d rendering guides always just say inner corners dark and leave it at that

[@elliejohnson2786]

I'm not even close to a good 2d artist (I work in other fields) but when I did do 2d art, I used pure black as my shadow in a different fill layer, and adjusted the opacity and set it to multiply mode. It automatically gives me those two shadow families while keeping the piece in block colours.

[@gloriouschoiceofausername6392]

Wonderful video! Thank you for this lesson 🥰

[@fredturd]

Ingenious. Now it only takes me three hours to do the shading on an upper lip.

[@WankiTank]

my head exploded when you said to keep the bounce light darker than the half tone 🤯

[@raspberryleaf258]

This explained everything I wanted to know so well!! Thank you so much :D !!!

[@cridow]

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU

[@deejdman9431]

I literally wasn't interested in doing art until the algorithm randomly fed me this video. Now I'm sitting here thinking about how I can dip my toe into it. I have a 5 year old that really loves drawing. He makes at least half a dozen little art pieces at home every day without being prompted in any way to do so. So thanks for this video, because now I think I have been inspired to not just foster his creativity with much more effort, but I now I feel a great spark of my own creativity that has been weak for a long time. I really wish that schools did more to foster creativity in kids. I lost almost all creative instinct by High School. The only exceptions were Photography class, and Wood Working. Two things I have not been able to do nearly as much as I had hoped to when I was that age. Creativity really is a thing that is easy to loose in life. I hope its not impossible to regain such a powerful life tool. Ill help myself to some of your other videos now, Thank you for everything you do.

[@sigh9610]

I noticed quite a few painters dont like the term blending, probably bc it makes us focus more on blending the colors rather than the overall picture. Edges for me works better too, reminds my brain to not get caught up in one detail.

[@annebennington]

this is the best art channel ever

[@holyhalloweenbatman]

What an outstanding tutorial. Instant subscribe.

[@dameanvil]

00:14 🌞 Understand the relationship between direct light, light family, and shadow family when working with shading. 00:27 🎯 Establish the separation between light and shadow families as the first crucial decision in shading. 00:41 🖌️ Simplify objects into one value per family for effective shading. 01:23 🎨 Revealing light and shadow families through adjustments in brightness and contrast. 02:17 🖊️ Simple shapes with clear curves and straights are key for effective shading. 03:25 🌅 Introduce halftones to add depth and three-dimensionality to your shading. 04:48 ✏️ Use blending techniques to soften edges between halftones and shadows. 05:16 🖍️ Apply halftones and ambient light values to create a more realistic rendering. 06:26 🌟 Pay attention to the quality of edges to enhance the form and realism in your artwork. 08:03 🔦 Understand ambient light and ambient occlusion for accurate rendering in shadowed areas. 10:06 🖌️ Practice non-committal adjustments in the early stages of your painting process for flexibility and experimentation. 11:27 🧠 Combine knowledge of human anatomy with shading techniques for realistic portrayal of features. 12:52 💭 Use highlights as a final touch to enhance form and add a finishing touch to your artwork.

[@tvsonicserbia5140]

Wow, this is shockingly good. A rare no nonsense art tutorial.

[@PencuryTimun]

Thank you for this turorial. This teach me a lot!!