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STEP 4
Now I feel the need to work a bit on the lighting. The image starts to be cool, but my eyes still wander on the canvas, with no precise areas to focus on. For my taste this makes the image usually a bit weak. You want to indicate clearly where the light is coming from, guiding the eyes of the viewer from the brightest area of the image to all the other parts of the composition. In order to do so, I use a lens flare and some vignettin on the edges of the canvas.
Regarding the lens flare, create a new layer, fill it with black, select the screen blending mode, then go to Filter -> Render -> Lens flare and you have your nice flare. I usually blur it with a Gaussian or motion blur that you can find in Filter -> Blur, in order to get rid of his ugly perfection. Now I place it on the top left corner of the canvas, where the light is coming from. I usually change is hue more on the yellow, so that it feels more natural.
At this point, with a black airbrush, the same I used to indicate the clouds, I paint delicately with low opacity on the edges of the canvas, in order to make those areas darker.All this procedure is really important to make the image dramatic. As you can see from the image I placed the flare and the darkest areas along the diagonal of the frame. Now the lighting is following nicely the movement of the ships, which is the element I want to underline the most.
STEP 5
The main elements of the images are now established. It's time to start detailing out stuff. To paint quickly the ship I take the random image of a jet fighter. This is a great base to start with and the jet fighter has that dynamic shape I'm searching for. I place a couple of the same jet fighter in order to mimic the shape of the sketch.
STEP 6, 7, 8
I now start painting on top of the base with the same brush I used to rough out the ships at the beginning . Not be scared to cover completely with the painting the photographs, remember that these are just a helpful base, eventually you want to create something new and completely different from the initial jet fighters.
Keep painting, invent the new shape, and slowly make the pieces of the jet fighters disappearing.
The most important thing is defining the shape with light and shadows, harmonizing the lighting of the ship with the lighting of the scene.
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