Next Steps

Today I've shown Jordan my block model of how I'm going to layout my composition, he aprroved of it and has shown me techniques on how to make everything more realistic: soft selection for making a more realistic terrain, alpha maps as a simpler way to make the fogginess of this dream, also how to merge the path and field using grass.

Example of alpha maps being used for grass,
found at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/vwbA6

It's important to always be looking at references and professionals, when it comes to the grass merging bit I found this example showing progression helped.

Found at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/8ZeBQ

Found at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/8ZeBQ

Another example: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/Ra84X

Then I was shown different ways to use lighting, ie area, point and directional - I will be rendering in mental ray. Below are some test shots of lighting.

Now I'm going to work on my matte painting by working into Monet's painting even more using mixer brush tool to make it look more painted as Cornell collages art work rather than painting his own to collage. New techniques: Mixer brush, clone tool, hue jitter and taking an oil painting texture and using a blending mode to add a layer of effect. Braid Game is an example of the sky.

Diagram of compositioning layers