#hydro rambles

Picking colours (and some other tips)

> Experimenting is good!

> There’s blood beneath skin and it’s going to show through at different intensities based on what your lighting is doing. I’m assuming Chiss blood is red, so I usually make any blush on my Chiss purple. (Red + blue = purple. Basic colour mixing thingz, you know?)

> The fairer the Chiss’ skin is, the more vibrant you can be with that purple blush in my opinion.

> Temperature, colour, and intensity of light determines what the skin looks like. 

> Having black shadows on a coloured artwork is a good way to flatten the whole piece; when I paint shadows on a Chiss face, I go for a dark blue or purple and blend it with what’s already on the canvas. Playing with layers and their opacity function is also good.

> Laying down a base blue before starting with the rest of the colours is good. You can see that I did that in the speedpaint I’ve attached to the end of this post.

> This website about colour zones will help.

> This website about colour blocking will also help.

References

> I find a face reference of an actor I want to Chiss-ify. Then I have my blue skin reference, which is usually one of the Na’vi from Avatar.  

> I use the Na’vi because there’s a lot of images available with variation with temperature of light and quality of light to observe. 

> Make note of the colours that appear in their flesh as light interacts with it. 

> Warm light will have pink that transitions to purple, then to blue as shadow starts to come back in. I’ve put Ar’alani next to the reference I took inspiration from (link here) for comparison.

> You want to go and paint your reference as it is, except blue. When you get to adding highlights and shadows, look at the Na’vi image and see what colours appear in that light. 

I think that’s pretty much all I do when I paint Chiss. Here’s a speedpaint of Thrawn with Lee Pace as a face claim if that helps somewhat :3

(Ignore how I erased his uniform; I could NOT be bothered with that sorry).

Also, Here are some artworks that helped me when I was figuring this out. I’ve done a bit of analysis that might or might not be helpful. Take what you like from it.

Magali Villeneuve

In my opinion, Villeneuve’s Thrawn portraits are the best official artworks of him that we have right now. They’re my main go-to for inspiration. The lighting plays across the skin in a way that gives it a fleshy, warm, alive feel. Even the colour zones are present, which gives it that extra bit of depth. If you can’t see them, that’s fine; it takes a bit of time to get used to looking for them.

Rod Reis

The first of Reis’ Alliances cover is also up there with good official Thrawn art we’ve had fairly recently, imo. His style is different to Villeneuve’s, but he follows the same processes with the colour zones and how the skin interacts with the environment around it. The shadows aren’t flat or black; they have colour to them that adds more dimension to the portrait. There’s also that hint of purple-blue blush around his cheeks with more yellowy-blue tones on his forehead and more blue tones around his jaw and chin (again, colour zones are present :3). The light is cooler than Villeneuve’s in the Chaos Rising Portrait, which you can see in the lighter teal hue on the right side of his face. Cool light usually brings out the lighter blue tones in the skin (that’s just what I’ve noticed, though).

Dr Stratt is halfway to Dr Grace's desk when he finally asks his question. "When was the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change established?" "Nineteen eighty-eight," Dr Stratt answers swiftly, then drops the beanbag into his hand. "If I see another one of those in my classroom, you're not getting it back." Maya listens to the click of her heels as she walks away. Dr Grace fidgets with the beanbag as he watches her with a wide grin on his face. "Did you guys know Dr Stratt worked for the European Space Agency for a bit?" he asks, attention back on them all now. "What?" is the collective, surprised response. "Yeah!" he answers cheerfully. "Anyway, climate change. Not good. Let's see why, then break down how it works, shall we?"