[Hippie]

Does anyone know of a good resource, or can explain atmospheric perspective to me?

I want to have rolling hills or large mountains in the distance of my paintings. But when I try this it looks like clumps of dirt. I have tried darker values and less detail, but that only looks muddy and underworked.

Maybe I just don't understand what I'm looking for.

Anywho, if someone could try to explain I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks in advance.

[Hippie]

waylon: thanks for the info and the image.

It helped with what you are talking about but does the same apply for a darker sky?

Here is a image I just started so you can see my problem.

Anyone have any more comments or suggestions?

thanks again waylon, and one more thing, how about highlights?

[smothered]

Hey hippie, I remember reading some type of exerpt from leonardos notebooks regarding this. He says that all the bg's should fade to the same tone of blue. The reasoning being the same for the sky being blue. Water particles collect, and obscure the view. Basically, what I think this boils down to is...
-keep the bg one basic color, and just adjust the brightness of each layer, getting lighter as you go back, but keeping them very close in value. Decreasing the saturation level will help no doubt as well.
-as the objects get closer and closer to horizon, (further and further away from viewer) make the outlines of the mountains, valleys, whatever closer together.

For a reference, I'd look at the bg's of leo himself. the annunciation, and mona lisa have a wonderful effect to them, misty, ambient, simply beautiful. I haven't had too much sucess in this either, I think it's cuz I spend too much time with the naked ladies
-k

[Hippie]

hahahaha smothered, I know what you mean. But since I'm trying to move past just doing character work I'm trying to learn backgrounds as well.

Thanks for the tips I will go look at some of the old masters works now.

[ June 21, 2001: Message edited by: Hippie ]

[Rinaldo]

Yes it works the same for a dark sky. the sky itself should be lighter near the horizon and darker up the top of the picture btw. the mountians would only need be a slightly darker blue than the bit of the sky near the horizon. if it's a night scene I would note that things would be more monotonal over all.
everything becomes more nutral as you go into the distance. the values come closer together (things get lighter as well), the colours become more grey.

I's say http://www.vigilante.net/~loki/
and www.goodbrush.com
have some good examples of this kinda thing.
http://www.seraphseven.com/rinaldo/art/mush.jpg
this pic of mine has some mountians in it.

[c2design]

One thing that helps me is to look at real things in relation to the background. For example trees in comparision to far away hills. One thing you should notice right away is the difference in saturation. Things up close are more saturated in colour and the further they are away, the more grey the get. Other things to keep in mind are that details are non-existant far away, dark shadows should not be used in the background unless it is night, and blacks should be chromatic to avoid flat, uninteresting spaces.

[quaternius]

Great responses and tips. Here's one more - this is fantastic and helpful site.
http://www2.evansville.edu/studiochalkboard/ap-aerial.html

[waylon]

It's pretty simple, really. The farther away an object is, the closer it gets to the color of the sky at the horizon (which is usually whitish.) The foggier the day is, the more pronounced the effect. On a perfectly clear day, you'll see this a lot less. But it's always there.

So how to actually apply atmospheric perspective? Well, like I said, as objects recede, they get closer to the color of the sky at the horizon. Dark values, such as shadows under trees, will become more white/bluish. Super light values, like fresh snow, will be toned down a little, and made a little bluer.
http://fear.incarnate.net/~vlad/cgi-bin/loader.cgi?i119&9

Here's a picture that demonstrates reasonably well what I'm talking about. Notice how the buildings in the distance are all fairly blue, and the values are pretty dull. (the darkest dark isn't all that dark.) But in the foreground, colors are a lot sharper, darks are a lot darker, and lights are... well, not THAT much lighter, but they are a little bit.

Hope this helps.

[Hippie]

Rinaldo: thanks for the info and the sites.
Very helpful for me. Yes I know the sky should get lighter towards the horizon normally, but I was going for a break of dawn type scene, now I'm thinking I will go with a night time atmosphere.

c2design: thanks, saturation and value are things I'm still working on. One question though without details in the background then should I just try to make it a silluhette?(ugh I can't spell that)

quaternius: thanks for the link I haven't visited that site in forever. I didn't even know that it had a section on atmospheric perspective.

Thanks everyone for all the tips, I will be posting this image in the WIP section soon and would appreciate comments there as I work on it.

You have all been a ton of help.
If anyone alse has more to add please do.