Digital Texturing and Painting
Authors: Owen Demers
Venue:  (2001)

From the Book:IntroductionWhat Is Texture? Texture: WAY IN which the threads of a fabric or constituent elements of a substance are arranged and put together; sensation produced by this upon the sense of touch. -The Universal Dictionary of the English Language, Wordsworth Editions Ltd., 1989. A Handkerchief In Bed Can't Be Found A coin, sleeve-button or a collar-button in a bedroom will hide itself and be hard to find. A handkerchief in bed can't be found. -Mark Twain, notebook, 1935. (The International Thesaurus of Quotations, Harper and Row, 1970.) It is true that a linen handkerchief can't be found on a linen bedspread-at first glance. So, if we were to re-create this scene in the computer, and if it is necessary for the scene to differentiate between the spread and the handkerchief, then we, as texture artists, would do so through our skills at looking, seeing, and painting. The differentiation will emerge when we discern the subtleties of shadow and light by determining their colors while carefully maintaining the material's integral texture and nature, linen in this case. Essentially, how to differentiate between surfaces and how to execute the making of these materials and textures digitally for a project is what you will learn from this book. Texture artists begin by asking questions such as, "What helps me differentiate between one particular texture and another?" "How can I articulate this texture or surface on the computer?" We, as texture artists, are given the wireframe models of a project and it is up to us to apply what we have learned through the questions we ask to make these wireframes live and breathe with detail and color. I love textures. Not a day goes by that I do not stop and look at some rusted piece of metal laying on the road and try to figure out how to mimic it on the computer-or marvel at how humidity in the air creates such beautiful atmospheric depth and muted colors. This is why I do what I do in the CG field. I want to create vivid scenes and beautiful surfaces no matter how rusted and decrepit (see Figure I.1). I come to each digital project in the same way as a painter steps up to a blank canvas. As a painter, I approach the canvas-on an easel, or a computer screen; we still put brush to canvas even if it is digital-with an understanding of what needs to be done. As a painter poses a model in a luxurious costume, or sets up a still life to paint, I collect reference material-a practice I learned in art school. Reference material exists to assist you in illustrating a particular material or surface, whether the reference is a real piece of material or a photographic representation of the material. It assists you in the visualization of what the material you want to mimic looks like and how it changes under different conditions such as light, weather, or age (see Figures 1.2 and I.3). With your reference material you need to create a library called a morgue (more on this in Chapter 2), so that you may have a variety of samples of materials and textures from which to draw information and inspiration. I hope that you have come to this book because you have a fascination or a love of textures, painting, surfaces, or computers. Maybe, all of the above. Or maybe you have a curiosity about what a texture artist doesyou want to see if it is for you. Your digital textural design education starts with this book.You will begin with the discovery of your external world; looking, studying, and describing materials and their textures in the real world, collecting real or photographic samples, and going to the masters of painting to witness their technique and artistry around the subject of expressing texture and materials. The whole concept of looking at real materials for reference, I mean really looking, is an age-old tradition in art. This is how Rembrandt (a 17th-century artist) and Michelangelo (a 166h-century artist) learned their skills, which allowed them to articulate textures and mood. It became second nature to these painters to be able to illustrate the differences between these materials by using different brushstrokes and thicknesses of paint. The expression of light on a metal goblet for instance, is the swipe of a brush along the hp with white paint (see Figure I.4). They were taught basic concepts and rules and techniques in art from their mentors; people who, their whole lives, dedicated themselves to the pursuit of an artistic expression, and handed down these skills to the next generation. In turn, the next generation learned these skills and made them their own, creating their own expertise and then handed these skills, improved upon or revised perhaps, to the next generation. Included in this book are examples of paintings with my observations of the painter's color choice, how they achieved the expression of texture, and what we can learn from each example. This book is an attempt to reconnect texture artists with this legacy. When learning to express your craft, you must simply remember that the seduction of technology and the ease with which you acquire it cannot take the place of the learned instruction from the masters. What you learn from them can help you deepen your understanding of what you do and how you do it. Texture artists and what they create are vital components of any CG project. Textures and light create the mood of a piece, make the characters live, and depending on your style and the style you choose to express yourself in (this will be touched on later in Chapter 5), set your finished project apart from anybody else's. In art there are no absolute right or wrong answers. As a texture artist, your responsibility is to achieve a vision that is a combination of yours and the project leader's vision. There are different art directors and art patrons (influencing the direction of art), who will challenge your talent and convictions, hopefully. What You Can Expect fromThis Book This book is written with the intention of giving you two things. The first is an understanding of how to decipher and describe what you are looking at. By exercising your eye-simply looking and getting into the practice of asking questions about what you are looking atyou will become more adept at translating what you are seeing into a satisfying and compelling digital re-creation of the surface you are trying to mimic. The second focuses on how to create these textures. Using both digital methods, such as scanning in real items or photo references of the materials and methods using traditional mediums such as oil paints, I will take you through the process of creating basic textures and then lead you to the creation of more complicated textures. I am not going to get into the math behind creating textures because the programs themselves do that well enough you do not have to think about it. I would prefer that you use your eyes.Your eyes are much more finely tuned instruments than any dedicated computer program. So, to go beyond the math, using your eyes as sensors of distance, scale, and receptors for light allows you to create much richer and more satis- fying textures. Simply looking at colors and asking questions such as: Is the color warm or cool? Do I need more black? More red? Less blue? What about yellow? Asking questions about surface quality: Is there a reflection? Is there refraction? Is it bumpy? Or questions about the light quality: Is the light absorbed? Brilliant or dull? Hot or cold? What is the color of the shadow? It is the combination of both light and shadow that helps you discern the essence of the texture of a particular surface. Observation and understanding the whole as well as the parts are significant when looking for such things as reflections, continuity, and color. Through this process, you will come away with a good base to begin your own discourse with your environment and everything in it. What You Should Know Of course before you begin, you must have a fundamental understanding of computers, computer graphics, painting software, and 3D software. I would like to show you how to achieve many different textural and artistic expressions by describing the techniques and steps I used to achieve the textures in the project section. I use all of my artistic training, from painting to graphic design, to using 3D software to achieve my goals. Any kind of artistic training that you may have had prior to this book will be an asset as well. If you have time to take a traditional photography course or a painting class, or have the initiative to start painting at home, this will also greatly enhance your learning process. In the computer world, we think in terms of color maps, bump maps, shaders, and so on.They are singled out in computer language to express these textural qualities in the computer which in turn enables us to understand what we are looking at in real life. The basics of looking can merge with our computer understanding by starting to describe shaders in terms of color, highlight, specularity, diffusion and so on, color maps in terms of color and pattern of the surface, and bump maps in terms of texture, light and shadow. An understanding of color theory and design through an introductory course or reading some of the many wonderful books on these subjects (many are listed in the reading list at the end of this book), will help you greatly in understanding these basics which I address. What's most important for you to know is this: All you need in order to be a successful texture artist is the desire to create, the curiosity to learn, and the spirit of adventure. This is the impetus behind the successful execution of the texture artist's task-to interpret your environment and translate it into a digital style that is expressive and complete. You, the artist, decide with the client, what is the best way to communicate the mood and artistry of the project. It is your vision and expertise that will guide the project to a successful conclusion. The computer is there to assist you. How much latitude you get from it and what breadth of expression the project has are totally up to you and your talent. The success of your project depends on how much you immerse yourself into your craft, and whether you understand the nature of the project and how to achieve it with the tools you have. WHat You Will Need The tools are brushes, paints, solvents, and the computer and its software (see Figure I.5). It is not the type or style of brush, nor is it the cost of the paint or canvas that make a good painting. It is the understanding of what you are about to paint, and how to use these tools to express what it is you are trying to convey that makes it a good painting. Whether you are painting a muted still life or a brooding portrait, your talent and your craft, not the tools alone, will determine your ability to convey what is needed. It is not the type of computer nor the software that makes you a good texture artist, but drive and talent, and the intrinsic knowledge of the materials of what you are re-creating in the computer, and the diligence to go and find out what you need to know in order to re-create it. Obviously, to get the greatest benefit from this book, you will need a computer and software that allow you to paint and manipulate images. You will also need to purchase a 3D software package in which you create shaders and lights to render your images. You may also want to experiment with some tools most digital art books ignore: Oil paints Acrylics Watercolors Charcoals, pencils When you get to the project portion in this book where I use these traditional mediums to create textures, roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty along with me.You will see the benefits and happy accidents that can create a whole library of wacky and wonderful scribblings that can then be transformed to make useful and interesting textures. As beginner digital painters, you should decide which software you want to use even if you have not purchased a computer as yet. Many 3D modeling and animation programs are available, such as: Maya or Power Animator (Alias IWavefront) Softimage (Avid Technologies) 3ds max (Discreet, a division of Autodesk) Carrara (MetaCreations) STRATA 3D pro (Strata Software) Electric Image (Electric Image Inc.) LightWave (NewTek) Houdini (Side Effects Software) All these programs have different ways to solve your rendering and lighting needs, and express these in varying degrees of mathematical accuracy. Because most of the textures you create are 2D, you will need to explore the different 2D paint and illustration programs available, such as: Photoshop (Adobe) Painter (Corel) Combustion (Discreet, a division of Autodesk) Illustrator (Adobe) Ideally, you should get your hands on a few of these programs so you can explore what they have to offer. Try to get trial demos of software you are interested in or sign up for a beta program, if possible, and test the software before you invest in it. If your friends have a copy, then go to their house or studio and play with the software as much as you can. 3D paint packages allow you to paint a texture directly onto a 3D wireframe model. Some of these programs include: Painter 31) (Corel) Studio Paint (Alias I Wavefront) Amazon (Interactive Effects, Inc.) Deep Paint 3D (Right Hemisphere Ltd.) The main programs that I will be using throughout this book are Maya 3.0 (Alias I Wavefront) Photoshop 5.5 (Adobe) Illustrator 9 (Adobe) Painter 6 (Corel) Painter 3D 1.0 (Corel) Deep Paint 31) (Right Hemisphere Ltd.) The computer systems that I will use throughout this book are A Windows NT platform Pentium II (Intergraph TDZ2000 and an IBM Intellistation) 17 gigabytes of hard drive space High-end graphic cards 512MB RAM A 21-inch monitor A flatbed, or slide scanner A painting tablet If you are like most of us, your budget is probably the main issue in your choice of software and hardware.You may have to start out with less complicated 3D software or own only one paint program and not the fastest machine. Don't let this discourage you.You can create anything and learn, as you must and will, to your benefit. Creative solutions come from us, the artists, and not the computer.Work with what you have. Never limit yourself by what you think you could have had. If you can afford a little (or a lot) extra, then do so. Even though most of the work you will be doing is 2D in paint programs, some of these files can get rather large in size. In this case, RAM and processor speed should be taken advantage of and possibly 3D accelerator cards for tumbling around textured environments. One important consideration when buying a computer is to know what software runs on what platform. This is especially true if you can only afford one computer. It is really handy to know the various programs that the box runs. This way you can switch from a 2D program to a 31) program without switching from one computer to another in order to start or finish some part of a project. When I began my computer career, I started with a Macintosh LC computer. It came with a 12" monitor, a 40MB hard drive, and 8MB of RAM. I was able to produce many graphic design jobs on that little machine, most if not all of them using Adobe Photoshop to create some fairly large paintings. I eventually moved on to a Silicon Graphics (SG I) machine because my interests expanded into the higher-end 3D graphics field. At that time the SGI platform and other workstations such as SUN Microsystems were the only high-end platforms capable for such heavy computation. This is not the case today. Presently I am working on a Windows NT-based system, like many others in this industry. This is not to say that NT is the choice of champions, although its ratio of cost to efficiency is low, therefore quite attractive when considering platforms for this type of work. Having said that, as you are most likely aware, every month there seems to be some new advancement of some kind or other in computers that can put your most recent purchase to shame, so it is up to you, the consumer, to know your choices. Talk to people who use these systems, read magazine articles on hardware and software, and so on. Know your options. ABout This Book's Approach to Software Software developers come and go and software development is never in stasis, so to base this book on any one program and its features would be futile. The principles in this book are applicable to any of the platforms and software out there today. For the most part, this book will not dwell on some specialized plug-in or filter. It is more important that you develop your intuitive artistic eye first, then choose which available tools to use. As you develop your talent of looking, the software will articulate and reflect your developed sensibilities in this area, and therefore your choices will be more lucid and reflective of your needs as an artist. I like to think of this book as a tutor that will help you develop the software in your head. First, to help you develop the technique of "looking," and then to choose your software according to your needs. This book will also address the differences between the functions as well as terminology. Software seems to be growing toward a homogenous feel and in most cases software companies borrow from one another. Whatever software you do own or decide to buy, it is imperative that you read the manuals thoroughly. Familiarize yourself with the concepts and capabilities, and work through the tutorials as well. They are very informative. It is to your benefit, as well as your checkbook's to do so. It will help you stay off the product help lines in the midst of some crazy project's deadline. A Final Word With this book I hope to help you become first and foremost a better artist. I hope that you will no longer see just one way to create and paint textures for your projects and will realize just how much fun you can have furthering your exploration in the endless world of art-on and off the computer. Simply by increasing your acuity, the world around you will never look the same.