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Now, the principle, we want to be able to go back behind the ear, and show that that
ear is blocking our view, and I think you'll probably see that it looks like these are
getting darker, possibly, as they go right behind. And I can do that, but it-- you know,
this is an unusual situation, too, in that being a black man, his ear is quite dark.
It could very well be that a Caucasian or another lighter skinned person could have
that silhouetted ear against there, as well, but sometimes you find that you don't always
have the advantage of having the thing going behind being the darker. But you still want
to show that range and that direction, regardless of the value you're working in. And then do
those exceptions, like his ear is going to be quite a bit darker against this, and we'll
work on that. And I don't want to get so involved in using
this mid tone reference, that I forget and go too dark on him, making him just become
too dark and flat. So I really want to be able to be thinking about several of those
things all at once. Let's come across this. And you see how it's holding my textures.
In fact, they may be a little bit strong, but I can still modify those later, too. I
want this irregular edge up here. I don't want it to be just a clean edge to value,
so I've got to be careful and fade this away, and maybe every once in awhile come in there
and toss it up, so that I have a little bit of an irregular edge. I'm not talking about
a soft edge or an undefined edge. Regardless, it's still going to be a dimensional edge.
But-- let's come up here into the hair and not just make a line again, but try and find
things and parts of the hair that will go up underneath of that hat, so we just don't
have a noticeable-- you know, all the same, consistent width to the shadow. It'd be the
same thing as using a flash, if we're not careful. And even though we have all this
texture, and each one of these hairs is actually coming towards us, or is deeper, and so the
shadow's not going to be hitting on it the same all across here. So I want to make sure
I break it up, so it doesn't just become that static shadow. Let's come in here a little
bit here now, and see what we can do with adding a little value in that ear. Let's see;
how can we get this so you can see it and I can draw? Oh, I still see-- boy, these--
I don't know whether you can see them; they're little jags. That's the seam going behind
there. So I still want to go ahead and show that it's getting darker, and it comes to
an edge. Maybe I can accomplish that, even though it's a light hat and a dark skinned
person. But let's come in here now and add a little value.
Now, we have some darker in between the ears - I mean between the hairs - and so I'm going
to just noodle in some value in here, that I can just use as a base. And I can take hairs
out over it, or I can soften and subdue what I want in front, what I want in back, to give
it the depth, so not everything is in the same plane. Okay. I have to get this-- I see
quite a bit here that we can take advantage of, too. And maybe these are some of the things
that's going to help us develop a little more value on that side of the face, so that the
other one won't be quite-- won't appear-- the other side, the right side, as we're looking
at it, won't appear so dark. Remember I said I wanted to be able to bring come value in
here, but be very careful that I don't sacrifice my dimension and that drama. If I can hold
that drama, still tell the story - whatever that story is - it's going to be to my advantage.
Knocking back some of this, because we want dimension, and there's going to be probably
brighter hairs out here than there will be over here, so that's what I'm trying to accomplish
right now. Finding out where one hair goes underneath another one, so that I can bring
one to the top, maybe make it a little brighter, catching that secondary light.
And then, when we look at this-- I don't know whether you can see this or not, but this
right here, the absolute highlight, right on the edge of this part of the ear, is--
it has a little bit of a brighter highlight on the edge, so I'm going to bring this tone
out a little bit further, so it doesn't look like this is just a big, round piece. We have--
it very well could be somewhat rounded, but we still have that rim lighting on the ear.
The more that I can isolate that light on the edge, I think the more effective that's
going to be.