Don't Draw BACKGROUNDS Like This!

In this short art lesson, instructor Jessie explains helpful do's and don'ts she wishes she knew earlier for rendering backgrounds. Jessie takes us through various art tips which focus on making the background subtle, creating depth, and shading distant elements. Did any of these help you? Let us know in the comments below! 🤓

🕓 Timestamps:
0:00 - Introduction
0:22 - 3 ways to make a background not overpower the focus
2:24 - How to add depth to a background
3:17 - How to shade background plants

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Winged Canvas is an online art school based in Canada specializing in virtual art programs. We are known for our Art Mentorship program and quirky art nerd culture. Our instructors are professional artists and designers with a passion for teaching and nurturing creativity, sharing our artistic skill sets and industry experience with others.

Music credits:

Artist software used:
Clip Studio Paint

[allanredhill]

Ok here are my dos and donts:
DO
- use reference
- make thumbnail sketches
- plan the background in conjunction with your character
- color the background first to achieve more cohesive and believable colors and lighting
- always check your values and keep the higher level of detail in your foreground
- keep in mind your perspective grid, dont just eyeball objects

DONT
- overrender, especially on objects that sit farthest from the camera
- just slap in a makeshift background you didnt plan in the original composition (srly, people can tell and at this points its often better to just leave things blank imo)
- put in more effort then necessary, work smarter not harder

[Lyricbead]

Finally in 6 hours I’ll know everything I ever did wrong in life- I mean backgrounds…

[val_kart]

You know the deal everyone.

Watch the video, check your entire file of art with backgrounds and despise it like we always do

[ashlea]

I swear to God this channel needs more acknowledgment. These tips have helped me so much. ❤

[thedoodletoon]

i love the phrase "that's it. that's enough information." because art really is telling a story! very helpful

[hellspawnstudios]

What I tend to do when drawing backgrounds is, instead of having no lineart at all, I'll have the lineart be a darker shade of whatever the main color of a given background piece is, and put it in with a textured brush, as I usually draw my characters with black lineart using a round brush. Then I use correction layers to lower the contrast of the background, and then add blur. The end result is that the lineart kind of blends into the colors while still giving the background enough definition that I and whoever else looks at the piece can tell what we're looking at.

[dizzylimme]

This reminds me of drawing crowds of people. The people in front are detailed, but towards the back the people’s eyes are just dots and they become as complex as stick figures. Lack of detail in the back really does add depth. I just didn’t realize how to exactly do it but this video has helped!

[natyoboi]

omg i cannot stress enough how i'm grateful for this advice
i'm always afraid to draw backgrounds because of the details so hearing this gives me a HUGE sigh of relief. thank you

[SailorSketches]

you make my life as a self taught artist livable 😭😭✨✨

[kennedyscustomscreations]

All the traditional artist watching this: 👁👄👁

[bigdadbeefsticks]

Right after I clicked this video I got a Reese's ad that said "No one likes to be told what to do." 😂

[TheStarGod]

I've got a nice suggestion for you! Maybe you could explain how to draw antlers better or at least more anatomically correct. Especially since it's getting around the holidays and people are drawing reindeer. If you could that would be amazing, thanks ❤️

[hegotleggy]

I've found it's really useful to paint your focal points first, while the motivation for detail is still pretty high and work toward the least focused points. By the time I get to the last ones, the amount of work I'm willing to put into the detail is just the amount of detail the area actually needs.

[featherlinnea]

As someone that has avoided drawing backgrounds for a long time, I find this all insanely helpful.
Good video and now... I am going back to actually drawing backgrounds haha

[rofidel]

I'm someone who hates drawing backgrounds but I must do them to avoid my drawings of being too boring, great video btw!

[JoeAndBo]

I really liked the tip about zooming out and focusing on the bigger picture because I tend to get caught up with adding too much detail. I also draw very fast, so my art ends up looking crusty and unnatural. I think this will help me not suck so much at backgrounds in the future

[lunondisposable]

You can tell when a tutorial is good when it explains the reasoning behind something I thought was obvious but see a lot of others struggle with. I could never put it into words as well as you did in just a few minutes!

[Cynikari]

This is way more helpful than what my actual art teacher taught when i used to go to school lol.
They would always teach us stuff like drawing detailed patterns in backgrounds and nothing that really helped me.

[artbymiwsher]

I cannot overstate how elegantly simple but useful the advice in this video for backgrounds is. One of the rules of thumb that I've learned to follow is to imagine your piece from the perspective of your viewer, and try to draw/ paint at that level of zoom. So, in other words, if the main focus of your piece is a character in the foreground, your background should serve to augment but never distract from that focus. Drawing zoomed out also helped simplify—trees become large geometric shapes rather than worrying about the composition of those shapes. Were the viewer standing closer.

[MACKYBOY-]

The whole keeping a consistent zoom when drawing those little details back makes a lot of sense. Thanks for the video.