Help with Fire

[Degare]

 

So - this is my first time "painting fire".

It's not bad, but it's not good either... Advice for how to do it better next time?

 

 

PS. I know that this figure is supposed to be a water creature, but I "made it work" to be a fire elemental lady who's an "ash mage" of sorts or whatever...

 

 

[Glitterwolf]

It's certainly not bad.

 

 

I think what could improve....

 

You got the right idea of Fire Seering white hot ( light) inside and darker outside.

 

 

But this accounts for all the flames.

 

What can be improved IMHO is the placement of the darker spots.

 

So for example looking at the tail there are no darker spots.

 

Maybe paint some dark tips there..

[althai]

Looks really good to me. The only suggestion I can make from this picture is maybe some smoke at the ends of her hair, similar to how you did the smoke tendrils.

 

However, the picture's a bit small, making it hard to pick out the details. If you post a bigger pic I can try to offer some better critiques.

[kitchen_wolf]

I think that your contrasts are probably too sharp.  A yellow-orange glaze would probably tie it back together.  Real flames don't seem to go all the way white while they've still got orange bits:

 

 

 

[ced1106]

Eh, skip the black stuff for now. You can practice on q-tip cotton to make torches.

 

You have the white -> yellow part, now work on yellow -> orange.

 

Hot Lead tutorial: http://hot-lead.org/advance/fire_theory.htm

 

 

If you have any flamethrowers, you can go crazygonuts, not worry about accuracy, and get the white -> yellow -> orange -> red down. 

Note how the yellow, orange, and red can mix together because flames don't stand still.

 

Edited June 23, 2016 by ced1106

[Doug's Workshop]

http://www.hot-lead.org/advance/fire_prac.htm

 

The thing I would say is a variation on what kitchen_wolf said.  The contrast is too much.

 

You need way more mid-tone and only a little bit of white. 

 

For my own painting, I will usually add a dark gray glaze on the tips of the flames to represent some smoke.  Lots of smoke only really forms under certain conditions, and I never really think of elementals as having those conditions.  I like a little bit of black/grey because it implies smoke without me having to actually try to paint smoke (the little bit of gray would be lost among the oranges).

[Keianna]

This is now my favorite reference pictures for painting fire:

 

It is a still from a video of someone who made a fire tornado with box fans. Video is on YouTube if you are interested. I know the colors are a bit backwards, but the shape of the flames is really fantastic. Look at the pattern of the colors, then you can shift the colors to get the effect you want. I painted purple flames with the same patterns.

 

Edit to add link to the post I got it from: http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/65873-flame-reference/?hl=%2Bfire+%2Btornado

Edited June 23, 2016 by Keianna