Why References are important

All art is drawn from something that exists so that we may create what doesn't exist, that which lives within our imaginations. In this video, we discuss why using references makes you a better artist and how to effectively use and find them.
Timestamps
0:00 Introduction
1:31 Where to find references?
4:30 How to find references?
5:34 Your Visual Library
7:28 Conclusion
8:40 Outro
9:11 After credits joke
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[@ShockArcl1te]

Imo, references are huge for bases, particularly natural bases. Different colors of mud, swamps, moss on brick, it's all incredibly important to making a base feel right. The cool part is that this is works in reverse too. I had more appreciation for the beauty of nature in my environment after I devoted a lot of time to noticing details for reference.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

You know what you're not... You're not wrong ha ha It is the details that count and that make a thing feel real. My current Stargrave bases are 'Low effort' in that their isn't a lot of painting involved using more the Geek Gaming Scenic method of using more materials and I am just so happy with them. It's all about know the scene and know what you can use - Cal

[@artistpoet5253]

It's difficult for some 'artists' to accept they should use a reference. I read too many times on Reddit boards about this or that artist complaining that what they see in their imaginations won't make it to the final work. Which are immediately followed up by the usual, 'practice your fundamentals, take a class, don't punish yourself' which is fine. What never gets mentioned is the advice you provide in this video.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Yeah our imagination is sometimes our enemy in the same way the perfect is the enemy of good - Cal

[@salientrogue3117]

Having references makes it so much easier to bring it vision to reality on the model

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

💯 - Cal

[@Eulogy10]

​@@WhatareyouPaintingnow it's so obvious yet so overlooked and underrated lol

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

@@Eulogy10 yep a lot of what this series is about - Cal

[@MrFiremagnet]

Another hood classic coming right up!

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Thanks - Cal

[@Cpl-K]

Thanks for more great videos cal and sunny, really appreciate all these breakdowns answering all the why's and how's for us not in the know! hope you are feeling better now too! Cheers, Kez.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Thanks Kez, I hope you got a lot out of this. And yes we are feeling so much better! Thank you - Cal

[@thysduque]

Awesome video as always! Thank you!

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Glad you enjoyed it! 😊 - Cal

[@dallonrobbins5078]

Funny, since a particular reference ended up inspiring s whole custom chapter I created

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

What reference was it? - Cal

[@Virtu953]

How did yall learn how to write the scripts for these videos? I love it. It's so fun, energetic, and information dense. Yet you keep light by repeating key information.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Thank you very much so for this one we have a conversation before hand and talk about what we want to hit. Then we right dot points and the start our record. Pause after we run out of breath and remove the gaps and that's how we do it 😊 - Cal

[@Nallenbot]

Loving your work!

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Much appreciated! - Cal

[@MrTrenttness]

🔥🎸🔥

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

🌜🌚🌛 thankyou - Cal

[@MrFiremagnet]

As always, amazing video. Here's my two cents: My chapter is Blood Ravens. When I only started, I just looked at tone of different painting tutorials and basically copied parts of them and integrates into my recipe. The end result was just all over the place: green visors, yellow lights, blue lenses, dark red armor, but closer to cherry red, bone shoulder pads, black trim, golden Aquilla and so on. I basically had every primary and secondary color, and my space marines ended up looking too cartoony without the intention of making them cartoony. Not to mention power swords being sometimes green and sometimes blue. After that I played some Dark Crusade with Firestorm over Kronus mod. And it had some of the best space marine models (they even put models of some of the modern officially licensed games to shame), but what really grabbed my attention, is what choices did I have in the heavily modified army painter and how only 4 primary colors were used to create each and every detail color. Than I understood, that LESS IS MORE. I started looking for more designer advice and methods, and came to a conclusion, that my primary goal is creating a contrast, and it can be achieved by contrast of color, contrast of saturation and contrast of texture. And I used my existing marines to make a new contrasting color scheme recipe. I wanted to make them desaturated and streamlined, in a way, but also with more texture contrast and more eye-catching elite and character models. I used Firestorm Over Kronus army painter screenshots as a reference, looked up recipes with a concept in mind and other painters works with similar sensibilities as a reference. And I *developed* a certain set of rules of what details and what parts can I use. Every lense, every power weapon - only in a certain way. I ended up using both blue and yellow, but I used very particular shades and for very particular details. Armor became darker, but extreme highlights became more dramatic, bone became into a stone-ish bone, not a yellow one. No golden parts throughout the army at all, every usual golden part turned into a dark shade of boltgun metallic, but yellow made a comeback with a lot of hazard stripes. The end result turned out to be quite far away from the Blood Ravens from both the game, official material and the FoK mod. But I loved them ten times more. So I think every person should go through this journey at least once. Figuring it out and making your take on already established army is extremely satisfying, and helps to understand the ropes of creating a balanced color scheme, making you into a better, more intentional painter.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

I think when it comes to journey's such as this I am not sure as much it should be something everyone should do, because I think it was the fact that it obviously meant so much to you is why learnt so much. I think everyone needs a hobby journey like it where they have struggles and learn but as for that specific one I think treasure that is was your own - Cal

[@MrFiremagnet]

@@WhatareyouPaintingnow well, it's true that every person gotta have his/her own path, but it really gave me the tools to not only understand how to make better and more consistent color schemes, but also jumpstarted my understanding of color theory and design in general. That first you gotta have an idea in mind and than use tools to convey that idea. To me it was making my dudes more bleak, dark and somewhat uniformed, as in "elite sci-fi troops of the totalitarian regeme" trope, without falling into the "drimdark" cliche. And I would argue that, no matter which path does person choose to gain that understanding, it is on of the essential skills for everyone who works with color. Professionals probably already know that and spend their time developing that skill as a part of their training, but to me, as a hobbyist, it was like an epiphany. Before I got this understanding, I was doings random crap and was consistently frustrated about the results most of the time.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

So which video was most helpful when it came to this epiphany? Was it the hyper realism one? I am guessing that's the case but we want to try to try and learn from our successes as much as our failures - Cal

[@MrFiremagnet]

@@WhatareyouPaintingnow well I got that epiphany, like, ten years ago or so after painting a whole company worth of marines (i repainted same dudes from the marine battleforce+5th edition starter set twice). But your videos could have helped me to gain that understanding much quicker, and they also solidify what I came to by trail and error, and give me more information for future projects.

[@kamilorowski6852]

I would love to learn how to paint miniatures. I'm trying to do it since few mouths, but I have aphantasia. My "Visual Library" is empty. I try to go with placing colors by logic, but I can't visualize result before painting over the mini. So I repeat and fix many time, putting lots of layers, making mini lose details. But the biggest problem is, that I don't know how the mini should look "finished". How should I know, that the mini I'm painting is going in a good direction? Could I ask You for any suggestion, how should I grasp this problem? Do You have any idea, in which direction should I go, to see improvements?

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

First of all this is a different question. I want to be able to give solid advice but I can only give the advice I think will work and unfortunately it will be time intensive. That answer is literally copy another painter blow for blow through the whole process til you have built that process memory and muscle memory. So find an artist who shows their literal whole process. Which may mean have to sub to a Pateron. That is the only solution I can think of but I am getting Sunny to look at this right after - Cal

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Cal is right on the money, however he was going off instinct with his explanation let me explain why that is a good way to go. In art class or art school, we start by learning some basic techniques like shading and highlighting, still life drawings which is recreating a live reference right in front of us, then we move on to recreating artworks from the masters all this is to help the artist better understand how a piece of work is achieved once we have done this enough times we will now have the knowledge to mix and match styles and create something of our own because we have gathered enough data from copying. So do not feel afraid to recreate paint jobs at the start all artists do this once you gain an understanding you should be able to create works of your own -Sunny

[@kamilorowski6852]

​@@WhatareyouPaintingnow Thank You both for an amazing idea. I never thought about recreating someone's work step by step, but after hearing it from You it sounds so obvious. Thank You one more time. It means a lot to me.

[@Carstig]

and then comes the hard part where you visualise something in your mind but search for references and they do not match. *sigh* ok, back to the B+W shot of the model and using something that vaguely matches.

[@WhatareyouPaintingnow]

Well I hope our tips helped with at least finding some of those vaguely matching references - Cal