we're going to be talking about lighting and shadows I love teaching about lighting and shadows
there's a lot of theory that goes along with it there's a few things that we want to keep in mind
number one is your color because shadows are not just shadows when we're thinking of them in color
we want to think of what color is your light so your light color will determine your shadow color
that's something that not everybody talks about right so if we have yellow light then our shadow
color is going to be blue light color determines shadow color based on the color of the light the
shadow would be the complement this is based on the RGB color wheel for those who don't know there
are a bunch of different color wheels RGB is the one that deals with light that's your additive
color so in the RGB color wheel your primary colors are now Red Green and Blue say if we had
a yellow object adding on our shadows on top if we use that kind of bluish shadow then yes the shadow
does kind of look almost brownish it kind of goes into a dull yellowish down here which is you know
that's just because of the way that the colors interact however if the light itself is yellow the
shadow will be blue let me give you an example of that this shadow right here is like a bluish color
the light color is yellow that comes from it it's like this color right this shadow is yellowish
it's almost greeny and that's because the color of the light is like a purple right that's from the
neon light So based on the color of the light that starts from the shadow will be the complement so
that's something you want to kind of think about number two is your intensity how bright are your
lights determines how objects are affected so this is light concentration how much of the surrounding
area is affected right so how bright are your lights not every single light that is produced
will create a shadow not every single light will create bounce light either depends how bright this
light is if we are talking about the sun the sun is obviously gonna cast shadows because the sun is
the brightest thing ever so the sun is a very very intense light it's going to cause light everywhere
it's going to cause shadows everywhere it's going to affect everything that it touches say if you've
got a glowing button that glowing button might not light up things in the room right you might just
have a little spotlight in the corner right so how intense this light is will affect A how you draw
it B it will affect how much it affects so if you have like just a tiny a little light it probably
won't create a cast shadow probably won't create too much bounce light if any so you got to be
careful about where your lights are coming from and how much they will actually affect number
three proximity how close is your light to object slash how close are your objects to one another
so this determines shadow concentration size AOE stands for area of effect but envision with me
take a flashlight turn that on right if you move your hand closer to the flashlight less of the
light is going to peek out through the hand and that shadow that's going to be against the wall is
gonna get bigger because you're covering up more of that light source the edges of your shadow are
also going to get fuzzier because your objects are farther apart from one another think of the
sun and think of a cloud passing over the sun you notice when that shadow comes around it's very
gradual it just slowly gets darker say if we have our hand and it gets closer to the wall the closer
that our hand gets to the wall makes the shadow on the wall a lot more concentrated because those two
objects are closer together now to the two when two objects are closer together the area of effect
of your shadow becomes a lot more concentrated but if you're closer to your light source that
shadow becomes yellow or dispersed and farther away proximity is also important for shadows
that are not caused by light sources when you are illustrating something not every single shadow
that you create is because of a light source sometimes it is literally only due to proximity
say if you've got like the creases and you like your fabric because the two edges of the fabric
are close to each other it's going to create a shadow no matter what if you clasp your hands
together for me real quick you kind of just give yourself a handshake or something you notice that
in between your fingers where palms are touching all that fun jazz there's automatically going to
be a shadow there because the two sides of those two objects are so close together that no light's
going to enter their angle so light sources don't matter with those types of shadows that's called
ambient occlusion ambient occlusion is a very digital artist term but those kinds of shadows
are the ones that are quote unquote baked in to your objects your light source does not matter in
that case okay so I didn't write any of that down um it's one of those things that like eventually
it'll make sense as you continue with it so number four light placements where's your light source
you'd think that this one would be first but it's not this determines cast shadow direction
We've got a little sphere here our light source is coming from up here where's our shadow gonna be
what direction bottom right yes so our shadow's gonna be over here on the sphere if our light
source is down here where's our shadow gonna be kind of around the top area right up that's
literally it light placement that's where the shadow's gonna go if your light is on one side
shadow's gonna be on the opposite side how that light is placed down is going to change depending
on the type of shape it is a sphere is gonna have you know a very gradual shadow right if you start
from one side because all of the edges and sides are very very rounded the shadow's gonna be very
gradual it's gonna be very different if it's a cube right a cube we have our hard sharp edges
so if we have a light source here the top of the cube might be slightly lighter this side might
be slightly darker the other side is going to be completely dark the shadow's gonna be coming
from back here so a cube is very hard edged number five what's blocking the white so like placement
is what direction the shadows are going to be what's blocking the light will determine what
actually creates them not every little edge that you draw will create a shadow a lot of
things that I see with younger artists like when they draw robots I have little bits of plating
on the robot that plating is not enough to cast a shadow it's not enough to cast a really big shadow
on your object in that case you're gonna have to come up with the edge that it takes up right
so say if we have like a shoulder plate if it's got like a little divot here right I see a lot
of people do this if it's directly connected onto there it does not gonna create a shadow it's not
a big enough divot if you wanted to create a shadow you're gonna have to make it more
three-dimensional take it off of the edge of the arm and then it'll create a bit of a shadow not
a crazy amount but not where you can tell that it's you know a three-dimensional thing coming
off of the shoulder if it is directly connected there it's not going to create a shadow it's not
other things that you'll see write translucent things their shadows will look different compared
to something that's opaque think of a piece of jello let's look at the blue ones for circles
ones are a little bit better so if you take a look at those the shadows because it turns loosen the
shadows still have a bit of light peeking into them and that's just because the light is not
being completely blocked it is being dispersed so the light that is hitting the side because
you can see the light source is coming from here the light that is hitting the side of the jello
it's still like being blocked by the jello but not completely so there's still some light that peeks
through onto the shadow so what's blocking the light and how it's being blocked is something that
you have to keep in mind when you're doing your shadows because not everything will block shadows
the exact same last two number six primary light what is your brightest light all right so this
tends to be you need the sun or room light but not always so this determines majority your shadows
that's the light that will cause the majority of your shadows 99% of the time it's gonna be
a sun or a room light it is whatever is going to create the majority of the cast shadows on your
if they're shooting a film you don't have to have like like lights everywhere just to like make sure
the shadows are pointing in the correct direction that's what we're thinking of right what is your
primary light 99% of time it's gonna be the sun so that means 99% of the time your light source is
gonna be straight overhead straight overhead or to the side so yeah this determines the majority of
your shadows because your primary light is going to be your most powerful light so whatever your
primary light is that is what you'll be focusing on the most so your secondary slash your bounce
light what other light sources are affecting your object or subjects their reflections minor glows
this is the less powerful life there might be other light sources light sources aren't
necessarily there's like a little glowing things around you it could just be reflection if you're
in the water on like the beach or something the water is going to reflect the sun as well it's
going to create a bit of a blue bounce light that pops onto your character you might even get like
the water ripples on the skin of the character depending on where they are so that's considered
a secondary light minor glows though are also something so say if we have those buttons maybe
those buttons are more powerful maybe we have that lightsaber right the lightsaber is going to
be a secondary or bounce of secondary light most likely those will most likely pop up inside of
your shadows because it's another point of light your secondary lights are the ones that give more
energy to your piece mostly it's not a minor glow then it's going to be a reflection if you have
your hand down on the table or something you'll kind of see the reflections bouncing back up onto
your hand right and that creates this nice sense of realism so with this one you can kind of see
how I did it with the hair we have our big bright primary light source it's coming from the back
over here we have the reflections of the shirt that come back onto the kid right you can kind of
see it touching the edges of his hair you can see a bit of blue coming from the carpet that reflects
back onto the skin it reflects back onto the cast a little bit right without it it would look a
little bit more empty and this one you just get a lot of hard edge shadows you have one light source
that is coming from up here it's not very bright the one down here is also not extremely bright
but the one up here is still overpowering the blue one because the blue lights area of effect not as
intense it's just affecting this little area here right this orange light that's coming from above
is affecting absolutely everything with so we need to make sure that that one overpowers a little
bit more so your secondary or bounce light is your less powerful light so if we were to actually draw
this on a skin ball a ball of flesh real quick it's a weird it's a weird one but it is like a
flesh if you'd like to support the channel and the creation of free arts education become a member on
patreon so if we were to do that or let's say that the light color is yellow so let's go with
something more blue so if this is just our normal shadow I'm not going to blend in this one I'm just
going to kind of generally show you how this works so if I don't blend in any of this it's right here
light source right light source coming through this little section I'm doing skin in particular
because skin has a little is slightly translucent so we have some extra bits translucent stuff has
this thing called SSS subsurface scattering and what subsurface scattering does is it's like it's
a little bit of extra translucency that the skin has you get to see kind of it penetrates the first
layer of skin a bit you get to see a bit of like the flesh underneath the best way to describe it
is if you've ever had like a flashlight you put your hand over the flashlight you see the red
bits poking through your skin that's subsurface cover so anything translucent will do that this
shadow there's a couple names for it I think some people call it the core Shadow what I was told was
the Terminator that's not a joke so the terminal shadow or the Terminator it is the darkest part
of your shadow we kind of opened that sphere up again the Terminator or the core shadow is
this dark ring it is the darkest point on your sphere or anything that is round your Terminator
will be the darkest point this will just be your normal cast shadow so this is just a shadow that
is a result of the light source and then this one down here would be your bounce or second light so
if I had to put an order to it that is how we think join a virtual class to learn live from
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