Handpainted Props - Crate

I've always found that creating a wood texture with that painterly vibe to be a challenge. So it's no coincidence that a lot of the props I'll be creating for this project will require me to tackle that challenge head on (again and again!). And so I begin with a good old fashioned wooden crate; feeling that it will be a good start to honing my handpainted abilities.

WIP - Handpainted Crate from kizz on Sketchfab.

I started out by blocking out the key shapes of the crate, namely the formation of the planks and the wood grain (for which I used a photo reference). I also quickly painted in some highlights and shadows.

Next I started cleaning up the highlights and shadows, making sure that everything blended well together.

And with the tones worked out I could make my move into colour. I applied a simple overlay channel with the desired colour.

Then it was just a case of painting. I tried to add in some subtle colour variation on the planks as well as re-tweaking some of the highlights and shadows. I gave some additional form to the planks by scruffing up the ends.

After those four planks were completed the next four were pretty straight forward. With everything in place it was just a case of changing some of the colour values (with hue/saturation and brightness/contrast layers) to get the colour I wanted. Then I just added in a few details were I thought they were needed.

I've learnt a fair bit working on this humble box. The main thing that stuck out to me was that I spent too much time focusing on the smaller details of the texture rather than the bigger picture resulting in some muddy or just plain noisy areas in the final texture. With that noted I think that I'll spend less time zoomed in on my canvas so I can pay attention to the larger forms. I'm also aware that my workflow is a little longwinded but that is something that will remedy itself as I continue to work. So with all that in mind it's time to move onto the next prop!

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