Using photographic reference as a basis for animation background designs

"Farine" background sketch

When coming up with a design for a fantasy environment, it is very important that you respect the fundamental qualities like perspective of the scene.

Of course you can draw stuff in perspective in different ways, most traditionally by drawing perspective lines, and creating the environment as primitive shapes first along those lines. Another way to do it that's gaining popularity is to make a rough 3D version of the background in 3D software, and paint on that as a basis in Photoshop. That way you can also already put some textures and lighting in the scene, which can be helpful. You can then just pick values from the rough render in order to paint.
The way I like to do it, is by using photographs. It's a good idea anyway when you are a visual artist, to travel a lot and take a lot of photographs. In the instance of the sketch in this post, I based the perspective and composition on a photograph taken by my wife in Matera, in South Italy.

Matera, photo by Chung-Chun Hsiao

You may know Matera from Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ", as well as other movies. It's a very interesting town, and no house is on the same level heigh-wise. There are almost no streets, only stairs. When we were there, there was not much else to do besides build up a huge library of reference images (there were also a lot of amazing textures of walls and such). The "Farine" environment is partly based on Matera, mixed with Ghent, Belgium for the style of the houses, amongst other things. I find this a fun, easy and quick way to work that doesn't require any setting up of perspective lines or 3D primitives.

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