Newbie looking for advice

Artwork Traditional
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Without delving into my lifestory, I’m looking to learn Blender and digital painting. I’ve got the CG 2010 Blender Training Series and, of relevance to this forum, Chaos and Evolutions. Started both classes this morning.

Chaos and Evolutions I’m finding just a whee bit beyond me, but I’m happy the instructor takes the time to suggest other starting points for beginners and I was likewise happy to find the suggested Andrew Loomis books here. Threw those PDFs onto my iPad and am ready to start them soon.

But I guess what im looking for is some overall guidance. A path! What do you all recommend for learning digital painting? Should I study Loomis and then take the Chaos & Evolutions class? Should I do BOTH even though Deevad tends to leave me behind sometimes? I’m thinking once I complete C&E and CG Cookie’s class I’ll be ready to start Blend & Paint.

p.s. I’m an author by trade but am looking to develop other aspects of my artistic capability. Plus I think it’d be great to someday incorporate my own concept art, 3D models, etc into my intellectual properties. That’s a pipe dream at this point but I have the time and inclination to hopefully see it through sometime

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Welcome aboard here. 3d is an exciting field and like any other art, limited only by imagination.

When learning art, I found “Drawing from the Right Side of the Brain” quite helpful as the book assumes from the onset that you know next to nothing about “drawing”.

Would be interested in what books you have published.

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Thanks for the tip, I’m looking into acquiring that book as we speak. I started working through Loomis too, finding it hard to adjust to my Bamboo tablet. I realize I could just use pencil & paper but I want to practice on the tablet. Maybe I’ll throw up a ‘sketchpad’ thread around here in the near future to track my progress and get feedback! :smiley:

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http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/ This is one of the most comprehensive sites on color and painting, all broken up into bite sized chunks. At the same time remember that these things are general rules of thumb, don’t drown your own expressiveness in them.