Photoshop

Gillian Galang elevates a building well beyond its reference, using shapes, colour and composition tools to create a bright environment

Making a study of an environment, landscape or background is a great way to advance your painting skills. As a freelance artist, I’m constantly looking to improve my creative repertoire, so I regularly create studies to help expand my visual library of what I can draw.

If you’re new to environment art, painting an outdoor scene can be a daunting prospect. If there are many different elements in the scene, then you may find it tricky to make a start.

My goal here is to teach you that painting an environment isn’t scary, and it can become a fun project once you start to draw. In this workshop, I’ll walk you through the process of how I observe my reference before I start painting. I’ll explain how I break down my painting process by moving from big shapes to small shapes, use composition guides to give your painting a strong structure, how I choose my colours, and add my own ideas to make the artwork go beyond the source material.