This Will Change How You Paint

foreign what's up guys this is Hardy from digital painting studio and today I have a technique and a mindset that I want to share with you guys I think a lot of artists will find this genuinely transformative this was one of those just game changers in my whole approach to art that I think can really help a lot of artists also hang with me until the end of this one because I'm going to close with an announcement of something we're doing in the weeks ahead that I am extremely excited about let's kick things off with

a giveaway I get asked about my brushes pretty regularly so I wanted to make those freely available to to anybody we've got a freebies channel that we just started in the DPS Discord server which you can join with the link invitation in the description totally free and the ABR file for the DPS brush pack is available there to download it's it's kind of pinned to that channel I hope you enjoy them okay so I made a very bold statement with the title of this video Let's see if I can deliver on that and I'm going

to come at this with two main ideas one is more of a philosophy and a mindset and the other will be a concrete technique like a a tutorial it's this cool little layer trick that I suddenly use on like every painting and it has me seeing value in an entirely new way I think you'll find both incredibly useful and eye-opening so let's jump in item number one is changing how you paint by knowing who you are painting for it's kind of a weird question to ask yourself right like who are you painting that for right

now and for much of my life as an artist I don't think I really had an answer for that most of the time if somebody asked me that who are you painting that for the honest answer would have been I don't know you know I guess whoever ends up seeing it I'm I'm always just trying to make it cool and hope that somebody out there likes it maybe right seems seems reasonable and it wasn't until years later that I started really thinking about this critically thinking about my viewer when I started to paint something it

was actually in medical illustration school every project we were assigned would have target audience in the specifications and for a medical illustration project it was usually something like is this for a doctor is it for a medical student or a patient or a medical journal cover and each target audience would have different special considerations you would need to tailor your approach to a project in order to make it effective on the intended viewer and we always got drilled on this it kind of really planted that question in my mind it's something I try to ask

myself every time I start a project who am I painting this for so that's the question I want to leave with you guys today now medical illustration is kind of a weird example because it's this small hyper-focused corner of art but this idea is still hugely useful for all artists concept artists illustrators fine artists everyone really and it can help you make really good decisions early in your project so I've thought of a few of the main audiences who I think we all usually paint for whether we're really conscious of it or not and I'm

hoping that shining a light on this will help you see it and give you more control over what you choose to emphasize in your artwork and be more conscious of why you are doing that so know who you are painting for every time thank you the first one is simply yourself you are painting for you either just to express yourself or for practice so that you can improve or just because you you feel like making something cool today and that's awesome art is such a personal individual thing that we all need to just kind of

make that time to paint for ourselves you need those long stretches of solo introspection to really build that visual library that inner world that we all rely on as creative professionals so when you're painting for yourself when you know that you and you alone are the target audience you get some special privileges that you should try to really be aware of first of all paint any damn thing that you want if you think it is cool don't worry about what anyone else in the world might think if it's too weird or too dark or too

cute to anything don't worry about it it's just for you you know go nuts express yourself you're not doing this to please anyone else there's no invisible viewer over your shoulder approving or disapproving you are the boss the other thing about art that is just for you is that it can be ugly a lot of time when we're practicing art we end up wasting so much time trying to make our throwaway practice work into something polished and beautiful why do we do that like who is that for practice work can be ugly the only goal

with practice is for you to have learned something to have gained some new skill and that should really be your only concern if you fill up canvases with embarrassingly Messy gesture sketches or something that just look like scribbled crap but it made your line work a little stronger it helped you understand human anatomy or balance weight distribution movement you know whatever then that canvas full of scribbles was incredibly valuable incredibly successful so paint for you sometimes use that freedom like a gift and remember that no one else in the world has to see this it's

just for you you have permission to be weird and to make some ugly art it's how we grow foreign for our next audience let's put on our professional face let's talk about painting for the client now in a lot of ways this one is sort of the opposite of painting for yourself you have to put a lot of your preferences to the side and focus entirely on what your client really wants what their project needs and this is tough right I think that sentence might really be the definition of that elusive artistic professionalism that we

all aspire to putting the client's needs ahead of your own artistic wants it takes some effort it takes some maturity for sure and it's not like you have to totally obliterate your creative identity every time someone hires you and remember they hired you for your work your style your creativity your unique skills but when you're painting for a client always try to see the project through their eyes think of how they are going to be using your artwork who is Their audience do we want this artwork to get people excited to attract investors or customers

to tell a story really try to know that really try to tailor your approach to suit the purpose that you're being hired for we can't just paint what we feel like painting any given day we have to really Target it to hit that project's goal and if you can do that if you can kind of switch gears in that way your clients will love you and look even if you are not yet working is an artist this is still hugely relevant for aspiring professionals because the portfolio that you build needs to look like client work

in this way and I think that's one of the main factors that leads to one skilled artist getting hired and another skilled artist to be passed over it's exactly this does your portfolio look like it's full of work created for clients or were created for yourself even if that portfolio is full of gorgeous work that the artist created for themselves it ends up leaving that prospective employer wondering whether the artist can really solve those professional problems can advance a project so when building a professional portfolio definitely think like a client put yourself in that mindset

and don't just include everything that you find cool and beautiful with client work the best way you can understand your clients needs is just communicating exhaustively really read those project briefs get invested in them try to get fired up really see what your client sees in this tap into that spark that got them excited about the project and ask questions in my experience most art directors are incredibly cool and are really excited to talk about their project and their Vision especially if it's an indie company that project is often their baby it's something they really

love and they'll they'll answer questions all day so when you're painting for the client try to be professional be your creative awesome artist self but put their needs first and really focus your artistic choices on what will best serve their project [Music] the last audience we'll discuss is probably the biggest Minefield and that is social media sometimes we are all just painting for likes and look it is easy and fashionable to tear that down is something shallow but look everyone needs validation I think artists may need it more than most right that's that drug that

artists are chasing ever since we first got praised by a parent or a kindergarten teacher for painting a pretty picture we have all been hooked on that validation and social media can provide that also art is such a subjective thing that we need that external confirmation to know if we're doing good work or not sometimes every artist who has ever arted his head days where they're just like do I just suck is this any good at all or am I just completely wasting my time in a post that gets slightly above average likes can make

those doubts just evaporate and that's a nice feeling right I mean undeniably but and you just knew there was going to be a downside painting for social media four likes for an algorithm can be dangerous for an artist sometimes a truly excellent piece of art will just tank on social media and who knows why maybe just the algorithm hates me today maybe most of my usual viewers were asleep when I posted it you know when those likes just don't come even if that piece of art is awesome it can magnify those artistic self-doubts hugely and

it can really destroy an artist's confidence that's why I want to caution you to kind of be really aware of that especially if you are creating specifically to try and build that social media following so know that sometimes even great work just won't get any traction out there that's just part of it we're all trying to paint that painting that will just break the internet but if that doesn't happen it's okay you still made something of lasting Beauty hopefully you learned something new and your mom probably still loves your art like she did when you

were in kindergarten the other danger here is that when you aren't painting for yourself or for a client but just to sort of offer something up shiny to the masses you kind of start to Lose Yourself that very question who am I painting this for it starts to just lose all meaning when the answer becomes everyone so this one is definitely tricky and again I'm not at all tearing down art made specifically for social media in fact I would say that this very image that you are watching me paint is in this category building a

following is definitely part of an artist's business strategy in many cases but it's important to stay anchored to their own artistic identity not to be an imitation of some other artist or some mix of everything at once on the internet just try to be your genuine awesome artist self hope you find these eye-opening guys the next time you pick up that stylist just remember know who you are painting for and make those choices to suit the purpose you intended foreign [Music] let's switch gears to the other side of this I promised you guys a painting

technique and I have a really cool one to share and it all has to do with value now I'm betting that you all have a pretty firm grasp on the basics of value how light and dark help us describe forms and create the illusion of three dimensions it's how I'm making this Dragon seem round and three-dimensional it's how I'm implying all of these cool muscles and tendons and overlapping scales value is awesome for describing forms but and this is the thing it can do so much more than that and here's where the technique comes in

make a new layer select your main figure silhouette and just fill a new layer in with a solid color and I usually use a cool gray but really this works with practically any color set that new layer to multiply now it's like it instantly puts the entire Dragon into Shadow it's like we've Turned the Lights Out but now we add a layer mask and I start to slowly hide the shadow layer and check out the instant drama that this starts to create it's like he's emerging from the shadows and with a layer mask you have

total control over this you can make cast Shadows you can make really soft gradients from light to dark but here's the main point use light as if you were shining a spotlight on a stage create drama you know lead your viewers eye show us where to pay attention and it always leads to work that ends up feeling more Moody and nuanced just a little more finished and once you discover this it's like no painting really feels complete without it I hope it works for you and definitely let me know in the comments if you have

tried this or some variation of this before but I just can't get enough of it always makes these dramatic paintings seem a little more dramatic it's like we're we're capturing this moment when this Dragon kind of leans Out of the Shadows like he's about to leap off of this pillar to take flight all because of a little trick of the light that we played here imagining yourself is the director the the one who's deciding where we should look instead of just using light and dark to make things look round let's also tell a story with

it let's be dramatic let's give it as much cool Factor as we possibly can try this out you'll love it [Music] thank you okay let's finish this one with an announcement and this is something I am really excited about next month on the evening of August 8th mark your calendars we're going to do a YouTube live event with a truly awesome guest I talk a lot about what art directors want to see in portfolios well let's see if I'm right let's ask a real art director about portfolios which artists get picked what do art directors

look for in those portfolios and why our guest will be Mike valencourt he is the art director at Magic the Gathering in charge of their packaging and product department and he's a really great guy I've worked with him a few times in the past he is an incredibly accomplished artist himself and obviously an art director of a very iconic brand now so for any aspiring professionals who are in the process of building a portfolio Mike's opinions and advice will be gold so mark your calendars set a reminder you know subscribe again just to be safe

and I'll see you here on August 8th 6 p.m Pacific awesome that's it for now guys in the meantime good luck with your artwork paint something cool today [Music] foreign