The Shading Course

Practice: AO Study 2 (3D)

Lesson by

783

Mark as Completed

Assignments 64Lesson NotesDownloads 1

Practice: AO Study 2 (3D)

Lesson by

Dorian Iten

in The Shading Course

783

Mark as Completed

Assignments 64Lesson NotesDownloads 1

Overview

Now it's time to take the Ambient Occlusion (AO) Study to the third dimension! In this project, you'll take an existing image and shade it again, using only soft ambient sky light.

Materials Needed

One of the project images (see downloads section) or a reference image of your choice.
You can do the occlusion study in any medium. Choose the medium you are most comfortable with.

Steps

Select an image you love or download the project image.
Either A) print the image or B) open it in your preferred digital painting application.
Create an "ambient occlusion pass". This means you shade the subject as if it were lit only with ambient light, like an overcast sky. Shade your subject as if it were made of white plaster.
Upload your study alongside the original image.

Duration

This project should take 1–3 hours to complete. Go for high quality.

Examples

Common Mistakes

1) Making Ambient Occlusion too small or too big

2) Making Ambient Occlusion too light or too dark

Tips: Ambient Light vs. Key Light vs. Fill Light

Aurora

•

@delia

•

@tonyhcf

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10d

@rfrimpong3

•

8mo

This is what I was able to do.

Martha Muniz

•

7mo

Looks pretty good! You got the occlusion shadows in all the key areas. I think you could still add some very soft shadows from the jaw to the cheek and for the skin folds around the shoulders, as this can continue to communicate the roundness and 3-dimensionality of the figure. But overall, nice work :)

@marq777

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8mo

It seems like there used to be more than one reference image in the downloads but for some odd reason all I could find was this fish image. So I just worked with that.

Martha Muniz

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7mo

Looks pretty good! I'd suggest easing the harsher dark crevice areas into the soft, lighter shadows, so it's more evenly distributed out. Also, in case you want to try this assignment out again, under the Assignments tab in the Examples section, you can find more images to use as reference, or you can use your own images -- sculptures, figurines, simple 3D models have worked well in my experience.

Vin

•

9mo

This is my second attempt, and this time I used digital tools. Shading AO in high quality is difficult for me. It looks rough, but I spent more time on it than it seems…

Martha Muniz

•

9mo

You're not alone! It can definitely be challenging and takes a bit more time than expected, but it seems like you're on the right track. You captured the fade as it transitions closer to the ground, without getting messy halftones. I do think it would help to further spread out the shadows a bit more, softening the outlines especially as you move further upwards. A softer spread can help bring in more of the roundness of the figure, similar to the model of the 3D sphere, showing more of its volume. I put an example here with the beard to hopefully help illustrate it better:

Vin

•

9mo

It's more difficult as I thought, and my drawing looks dirty ( just like Dorian pointed out in the lesson notes).

@kotka

•

10mo

I would have preferred to do this traditionally but I had no printer and my Photoshop subscription just ran out. While doing the assignment, I felt that I was finished a lot of times but decided to stick with it, trying to exaggerate and improve even more on the AO placements and characteristics. Trying to see what more I could "show". This is a very educational exercise regardless of which method.

Joshua Bederson

•

1yr

Derek Adams

•

1yr

Samuel Sanjaya

•

1yr

complex AO Study, A little bit hard to differentiate between ambient occlusion and form shadows. Any feedbacks will be greatly appreciated

Martha Muniz

•

1yr

Nice job on the fish, and you got down correctly all the key areas of occlusion for the monkey. When it comes to separating occlusion and form shadows, most of the darkness you see when an object is under direct light will be the form shadow, but there is a gradation as the occlusion fades out or a strengthening as it interacts with other planes, including the floor. Think of a soft, diffused light source coming from above. So in this monkey example, you will see some soft general shadows, underneath the face/cheek area and a soft shadow underneath the brow bone, similar to the gradation on the sides of the fish. Generally, the shadows will become darker the closer they are to the floor (or another plane, as in the case of tight crevices) and lighter the further away and more open they are.

@alcyonair

•

1yr

@alcyonair

•

1yr

I improved on the drawing because my lines were too heavy in the previous submission. I tried to focus more on the ambient occlusion itself

@cindygs

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2yr

Romain Decotte

•

2yr

My complex AO study - was loads more fun than anticipated :))!

Thieum

•

2yr

@biancaesteban

•

2yr

@biancaesteban

•

2yr

No idea if it’s entirely correct and the soles of feet I assumed would be in contact with the ground.

Karlo H.

•

2yr

I don't have a printer so I had to draw the monkey

Charles Litz

•

2yr

Here is my take on this exercise. I am not quite sure about the area around the fin or about how far the occlusion shadow should spread but I will get the hang of it with some time :)

Kwame Alexander

•

2yr

Complex AO study of my son's toy.

Bradley Forbush

•

2yr

It took me a while to get to this exercise so I did a couple of extra views. I thought the airplane would be fun to do, but the top view became more of a rendering exercise because of its flat silhouette. Anyway - it was tempting to add half tone to the plane sketches to bring out some form, but I pulled back (even erased) in hopes of concentrating on AO.

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About instructor

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Dorian Iten

Former program director at Barcelona Academy of Art. Passionate about teaching craft and exploring the inner game of art.