Finally getting it!

Just realised tonight what drawing and painting have in common. With drawing you layer up your lights and then into your darks (on white paper). You have to build up your values with pencil so its like you have to envision what the end value will be. You then work to that point. If its too dark, then you rub out the led and work lighter.

With painting, you have to build up from a base layer and continue to build up. Painting a bright value over a dark area will cripple the illusion of an object shape if not placed properly. Even a value that is only half a step above your base value will change the form. Continuously building upon each subsequent layer is how painting relates to drawing. It is continuously building and mixing colour. Your lights and darks only come right at the end to top off the piece. The mid tone is so important. Though its more particular with this piece because of the particles in the water bringing the lights and darks to a middle tone.

It feels like I've always known this information for so long but its like I never appreciated building up values as much before until now. Painting this hippo was such a pleasure to do and everything felt so intuitive once things finally clicked.

I'll keep it as a loose study since its time for bed.

Could be a lot lighter though, but didn't want to apply layer effects since I don't want to patch up mistakes with photoshop shortcuts. At least not for now anyway ;)

2 hours - Photoshop CS5.5

http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/2_sbiyM7UIQ/maxresdefault.jpg