Hello there! If you're having trouble painting shadows in general, the first thing I'd recommend is avoiding shadows that are almost the same value as the lit skin. When your shadow values are too light, they won't do much to describe the form, and everything will end up looking flat. Another very important thing is establishing the direction of the light. If you don't decide on a light source from the beginning, you'll often end up adding shadows everywhere, and the lighting will start to feel inconsistent. I set the light as if it were coming from the upper right at about a 3/4 angle. Notice how everything on the left side, any planes that aren't facing the light, falls into shadow. When you begin painting the shadows, I'd recommend starting with graphic shadow shapes (or shadow mapping). This gives you a solid foundation to build on before moving into softer transitions and rendering. Notice that in my example, I painted the shadow shapes with hard edges and without blending them. Even at that stage, you can already feel the volume of the character and the objects. Hope this helps! :) | Artwod Feedback