Stained Glass Illustration

Durrell Odom · 3 Jun 2016, 05:44

@Marsha-Kay-Ottum-Owen Thanks! Much appreciated.

Durrell Odom · 6 Jun 2016, 01:26

A little update

Larissa Brown Marantz · 6 Jun 2016, 04:20

It's turning out beautifully. Nice job on the hands. I always have a hard time with the hands. Looking forward to the colored version.

Durrell Odom · 6 Jun 2016, 06:38

@Larissa-Brown-Marantz thank you. It'll probably be much more difficult to figure out. Lol

Sarah LuAnn · 6 Jun 2016, 16:57

Late to the party here, and I want to mention first that I think that you have an awesome start so far. It is beautifully designed and the values are looking really nice.

The one comment I have to make is one of those weird technical nitpicks that only some people would even care about--as someone who has actually done some stained glass (not much, just enough to know a bit about how it works), one of the first things I notice first is that some of the glass shapes you've drawn would not actually work as a real piece of glass--they would break very easily. Glass won't stay together if you have anything "hourglass" shaped--a shape that is wide, then very narrow, then wide again. It would split somewhere in the narrow area. Similarly, anything that cuts deeply into a shape before turning back out again would probably cause a split.

This is probably not something important enough to you to change your design at this point, but I thought I would mention it. I think that when you are trying to imitate one medium using another, it is useful and interesting to know how the medium you are imitating works, which is why I mention it. I'm looking forward to seeing the colored version of this!

Durrell Odom · 9 Jun 2016, 04:58

@Sarah-LuAnn Thanks for the insight! I learned a lot during this whole process and it seems I still have a ton to learn too. Wasn't easy, but it was fun enough. I focused on trying to keep this simple as possible because I had no knowledge of stained glass and also trying to replicate it through digital painting which is was not easy. Also thanks for complement. Here's the final b/w detail. Now onto color.

Christine Garner · 9 Jun 2016, 07:07

@Durrell-Odom Its looking great.

Durrell Odom · 14 Jun 2016, 05:35

Any thoughts on the color application?

Kevin Longueil · 14 Jun 2016, 06:13

@Durrell-Odom Hey Durrell this looks really good - i think i would try desaturating everything quite a bit except for the center area - there is a sponge tool in Photoshop where you can desaturate easily just the areas you want to - it works like a brush... you probably know this already - i tried desaturating in Procreate and i think it really helped to shift the focus onto the artist's face - right now the saturated colors around him really tug at my eye - anyways - really nice work - i think your client is going to be really impressed!

Durrell Odom · 14 Jun 2016, 07:01

@Kevin-Longueil Thanks for the tip. How about now?

Kevin Longueil · 14 Jun 2016, 07:16

@Durrell-Odom I think it looks great! - the artist seems to me to be the focal point now - my eye goes to the center first and then wanders around to discover the other panels of the Trefoil - but i end up eventually back in the center

Durrell Odom · 14 Jun 2016, 07:36

@Kevin-Longueil Thanks for your feedback. It was really helpful. Unfortunately my client wants some significant color changes but not too much though.

Durrell Odom · 14 Jun 2016, 08:27

@Kevin-Longueil Night version.

Kevin Longueil · 14 Jun 2016, 17:37

@Durrell-Odom This still looks good Durrell - i think the sky in the top left of the lamb is where i keep ending up now though - the high contrast you had between the artist and the orange background really helped make hime the focal point - maybe knocking back the saturation of the sky a bit in lamb panel will help the middle pop a bit - is it possible to put a bit more light on the side of the face with the highlights - i think even a very small amount of increased lighting would be worth looking at - i really like the lighting of the last version - maybe put that layer under this one and erase with a low opacity eraser to bring back some of that warmth you had in the shadows -
i do have to mention here that i think you are a much better painter than i am so take my opinions lightly - you could easily call this done and good!

Durrell Odom · 15 Jun 2016, 16:58

@Kevin-Longueil "Final" version. Depending on my client; tired of working on this. lol.