Making professional signatures.

Well, i wanna learn how to make sigs like the pro's (Alt,Draucia, KIABIN, Kovan) All of em, but they all-in-all have a different style then me, what i do is find a render and make my own background and such, but the way you guys work is you find a whole stock and work with it, but the reason i fail at that is i cant get effects behind the focal unless i render it out, is that what all of you do? What am i missing? Should i not be puttting effects (C4d's, smudging) behind the focal at all? I wanna learn how to be a good artist and make an amazing signature out of a stock but i seem to just not have the hang of it?

Lets take this stock for example : http://lookbook.nu/look/723705-Bloodbuzz-Ohio

I have no idea how to work with that? Should i be rendering out the girl to start then go from there? Because if thats true you all must be frigging amazing render-ers.


I guess what I'm asking here is how do you work with stocks like that? Looking at that image i can see it could be an awesome sig but im just not used to working with it, how could i learn this kinda thing? Because it seems every tutorial i look at is done the way i do things.

If anyone can help i think most of you have my msn but if not [email protected] but im not on much so just pm me.


Thanks,


Lukef555

 

i would use the whole stock and not render it at all. the stock is beautiful.
for this type of image i'd prolly chuck in a c4d behind the girl, put some orbs in the grass, add a few fractals, then some adjustment layers and lighting.
i wouln't do any dramatic changes like smudging or chucking stuff over her becuase it might ruin the quality.
goodluck with this piece

 

You say though your "chuck" a c4d behind the girl, how would you do that without rendering her into her own layer?

 

use a pre-rendered c4d put it on top of the stock and just erase bits of the c4d covering her. it may look uber choppy at first but when u blend all the layers it usually fits in.

 

that's how i do it .. +a millions of other things xD,,

Luke, it's all about creativity.. you know why my sigs catch peoples attention, it's because i always try to do stuff I've never seen done before
you have no idea how much i experiment on photoshop, i don't even know what I'm doing at some times, i just try out everything on photoshop.. don't stick to your routine, go crazy ..


and basically how i work with stocks, is always different.
I sometimes render it, or work my way around the render ( cutting off c4d and stuff )
or i use other parts of the stock and copy and paste it somewhere else, to cover something up.. or i just flip it horizontally and put it on lighten, darken etc. etc.. that's how you can also cover stuff up

I really don't have anything else to say, I've told you everything about this subject .. if you need help with anything at all, just PM me man .. I'll help you out

Good luck

 

Thanks guys. ALOT

Im taking all your tips into mind and trying to learn stock sigs, and all around improve my gfx.

 

haha cool, hope to see some nice work from ya.