Digital Matte Painting | Exercises

21.4.2025 - 6.7.2025 || Week 1 - Week 11
Yong Zhen Xing || 0359473
Digital Matte Painting || Bachelor of Design (Honours) in Creative Media / Taylor's University
Exercises

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Contents

1. Lectures

2. Instructions

3. Exercises

    Final Outcome

4. Reflection

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Lectures

Week 1 

On the first week, Mr.Kannan introduced us to what is to be expected in the entire duration of Digital Matte Painting Module.

Week 2
In this week, Mr.Kannan asks us to look into cinematic title for project 1 as well as attempt the sky replacement exercise first.

Week 3

This week, Mr. Kannan shared tips on making sky replacement look more realistic. This was also our introduction to virtual plein air. Mr.Kannan also shared some tips on how to draw it. Lastly, he also drew some examples on what is to be expected in project 1.

fig 1.1, Lecture & Demo (8/5/2025)

Week 4

In week 4, Mr. Kannan lecture us on camera angles and how important perspective is when it comes to cinematic shots. Principles we learn such as rules of third was also emphasized here as it could be used to make a shot more interesting.

fig 1.2, Lecture & Demo (15/5/2025)

Week 6

In week 6, Mr.Kannan elaborates on composition and give us some tips when doing our project 1, more specifically on how to make everything blend with each other.

fig 1.3, Lecture & Demo (29/5/2025)

Week 6 - 15
From week 6 onwards, we had consultation every class where we slowly progressed on project 1 up to our final.

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Instructions

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Exercises

In exercises, we are to do a series of exercises to better understand what digital matte painting is all that is about.  

The first exercise we did was sky replacement which is exactly what it sounds like. While it was mostly using the one specific tool in Photoshop. There were still adjustments to be made to make it feel more more realistic. The compilation below is my first attempt on doing sky replacement.

fig 2.1, Sky Replacement - First Attempt (8/5/2025)

I then received feedback on some part I could fix to make it more realistic. The compilation below is the updated sky replacement. Changes made to each settings include adding highlights, shadows and playing with hue around parts of the composition.

fig 2.2, Sky Replacement [Updated] (23/5/2025)

Next exercise was virtual plein air. This was the hardest exercise compared to the rest. I struggled with this a lot and and it took up to about 12+ hours for me to finish just one. While we had to do 3, I unfortunately ran out of time and only managed to do one. This exercise absolutely drained me.

fig 3.1 & 3.2, Original Image and Base Sketch (23/5/2025)

fig 3.3, Virtual Plein Air - First Attempt (19/6/2025)

fig 3.4, Comparison with Original Image (19/6/2025)

After getting feedback, I needed to tweak quite a few things. Mainly the colour compared to original image was way off. I didn't realized this until I compared the images side by side but the reason my colour is off was because of the different in contrast between my tablet and laptop display. As I used laptop's screen to compare while drawing, the colour looked off. After realizing this, I readjusted it. It certainly looked better.

fig 3.5, Virtual Plein Air - Second Attempt (4/7/2025)

fig 3.6, Comparison with Original Image (4/7/2025)

Basic perspectives studies were also needed as part of the exercise which can be seen below.

fig 4.1, 1-Point Perspective Study (19/5/2025)

fig 4.2, 2-Point Perspective Study (19/5/2025)

fig 4.3, 3-Point Perspective Study (19/5/2025)

Afterwards, we also needed to do some simple composition. I found this exercise really fun to do! I loved experimenting with different compositions.

fig 5.1, Composition 1 (4/7/2025)

fig 5.2, Composition 2 (5/7/2025)

fig 5.3, Composition 3 (5/7/2025)

Lastly, was to do value study for shapes such as sphere, cylinder and sphere. This made me really think about how lighting plays when light shines in a certain direction. Sphere was certainly the most difficult to do as the shadows blending into the light are in ellipses. 

fig 6.1, Cube Value Study (2/6/2025)

fig 6.2, Cylinder Value Study (2/6/2025)

fig 6.3, Sphere Value Study (1/6/2025)

As for the invisible set extension, it has been taken from project 1, therefore the explanation would be in project 1's post.

Final Outcome

fig 7.1, Final Exercises (5/7/2025)

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Reflection

These exercises in this module has definitely helped me improved in my drawing skills overall. It was definitely more on the technical side but I have learned a lot. The value studies and sky replacement especially was great exercises to help me understand lighting better. The virtual plein air was another good exercise to train my observation skills even if it was really difficult.

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My Other Digital Matte Painting Work :

Exercises (Current)

Project 1 : Invisible Set Extension 1 (Pre-Production)

Project 2 : Invisible Set Extension 2

Final Project : Thematic Matte Painting (VFX)