Drawing with Tone

  After Bryony had spoken with tutors, and voiced that we were having a lot of trouble deciding on colours, and that we were getting really bogged down with it all, a new method was brought to our attention. In Brys animatic she had used a simple toning method, different greys to show tree, bush and background, and the tutors felt that she had lost that tonal quality when we were concentrating solely on colour, and that we needed to concentrate more on the tone and light of each background rather than the colours.
  Bry posted this video to me, which showed how painting with only a grey scale helped you to think only about the light and tone, which was what we needed to do, and then by applying layers of colour and erasing certain areas according to which basic colour we wanted, we'd be able to get a denser feel to the backgrounds, and would not spend hours fiddling around with colours. (31st Jan)

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adulBnHYI

  And so, I had a go on one of the scene's in the middle of the film, that is mostly dark, but does have an element of light.

Once again you can see that I've had a lot of trouble separating the lines cleanly, but this was my first attempt.

I then tried using one of the cleaner final background images uploaded on DropBox and this worked a lot better I feel. Although, I'd asked Bry how she wanted me to paint it and she showed me a way using the layer setting 'Multiply', but this way I couldn't paint on separate layers, which was a pain, and meant I couldn't add and change settings individually. 

A Purple version of the above image.

 A more saturated version, with some fern brush detail in there. After this I was definitely feeling more confident about the method, and was eager to get started on the final ones. 

This was an experiment for Bryony just as much as it was for me to, so many many versions of this scene I had churned out, to try and help her decide on what she wanted, colour wise. She wanted me to apply more light to the trees, but didn't know how the light would touch/ effect the trees, so I had to play around with that. Applying different layers of block colour and then changing the layer properties gave us many different looks. We also inserted the character into the shot to help us visualize. 

I started with a basic sheen. This is clearly not great and goes against the design of the trees, as they simply would not reflect the light in this way. 

Here I've applied a darker shadow, which I think works well, especially in the trees as I've gone with the roots in the trees design. This makes them look more lumpy and three dimensional. 

I then had a go at adding the midtones, just with a smooth round edged brush. It makes the scene look lighter, but it can be fixed using levels. However, the method that Bry showed me to colour will not allow me to separate layers to adjust, which irks me as all this painting is on one layer. The many layers of painting feels like a safety blanket. And is also a massive time saver as well as a sort of short cut.

And here I have added highlights, and smoothed them a little with the smudge tool. ( I have since been asked not to use the Smudge tool, but to utilize a low opacity brush, which is cool with me )

A green layer and a blue layer were added here, and the layer properties were set at  'Colour dodge'. This has a nice palette, which is wonderful as I'd never chosen these colours originally I think. The character has been inserted, to see how the background colours work with her. Bry has now recognised from my tests that she may have to alter the brightness of her character to fit the light of each scene. 

Here the blue and green layers were set to 'Overlay'. The colours are darker, but this gives it a more cartoony feel, and the blue and greens do not work too well together, although I liked the blue next to the characters colour.

An interesting effect was achieved with 'Pin Light', although there is too much green in this for what Bry wanted. I feel that this grey scale technique is awesome!

Here may be the most effective one, I feel that the colours work best when they are similar, and don't contrast too much. 

After Bry saw these she wanted me to make the tree at the back more detailed, and to introduce a texture to the light sections on the trees, so they don't look so glossy. She was pleased with the placing of the light however. And wanted the background and floor to be a little darker also.