 Hello there, it's Sandy Alnok, and I just launched a camping scenes class It's a mini Copic class on five different camping scenes and while I was working on it I was putting in these campfires and I realized there was something that felt wrong about them and After I got all the filming done before I did the voiceovers I went started researching how to do fires because there's a couple of these that have campfires in them And I was doing them backwards. I've done them backwards my whole life, and we're gonna talk about that in this video When I said I had things I would be doing and learning during the peace love and art challenge Which you can get more information on in the doobly-doo down below When I said I was gonna be learning to I meant it and this video is one of those examples I'm gonna show you kind of not quite the right way that I have been making flames For years and years and years there's tons of videos out of here on YouTube that'll show you exactly this Which is to take a yellow marker make a flame and then add some Red to the base of it a little bit of orange to blend it and turn that into a candle and Countless tutorials on the internet will say that's how you do it They just make it nice and easy and for most things that is perfectly fine But I had just a nagging sense that this was not really what a flame Looks like because I've lit enough candles to know that the flame is kind of white so You know, I just wanted to do some research So here's how I normally would do campfires Basically a whole bunch of those same flames Put some red and some orange at the base of them and blend it and it's a campfire like your eyeballs See those and they say that's fire Your brain tells you it's a birthday candle and a campfire put a little wood under that sucker and you're totally sure It's a campfire as opposed to I Don't know this the states in the west of my country that are on fire right now because there's just wildfires everywhere And let me take a moment to make this a PSA if you are going to go out and go camping or anything Do check and see if it's safe to have fires anywhere Make one on paper if you can't have one in real life because we don't want anybody to Start a forest fire while you're out there camping So there's the very simple way to make fire and if you make fire like this don't feel bad I'm not saying this is totally wrong. I'm just saying it's not Scientifically correct So let's begin by looking at a single candle flame Because one flame is going to be easier than a whole bunch of flames in a campfire And so this will get us through some of the basics of fire This picture shows you a candle flame against a tan background If you see a candle against a white background, you basically don't see anything because it's white It's a white flame. We all know this intuitively. We just think of Flames and just say yellow. It's just our brains just do that But if you're looking at a picture and trying to replicate it a white flame on a white background It's not going to look like very much So if you're making a picture of a candle on a white background I say just go for it make the whole dang thing yellow and don't worry about trying to be realistic There is a little bluish purple color around the base Which there's a whole lot of reasons for different colors in fire it has to do with the materials that are burning and The temperature that it's burning which part of the flame is hottest and everything but nonetheless Let's look at another candle flame and this one is on a dark background because now we can see a lot more When you're trying to make a candle look realistic It's going to be easier if you can give it some kind of surrounding in the darker the better because you have a big Bold contrast with the white flame against the dark background So I've got my candle in here, and I'm going to just start to look at that base of the wick right where the wick Joins the flame and lights on fire There's blue down there Like I said, there's there's blue at the base of this I'm not going to get into the whole science of why you can look up all kinds of videos about it If you're interested, but then it turns into a golden orange yellow color But there is a dark area and basically that is where the blue shows through to the background So flames are transparent and there are times when certain parts of it You're going to see the background behind it, and that's what that bottom part is And then starting to work up the sides of the candle flame It turns red at one part. There's an area around the top and Sides of it that start to go red because red is cooler the reds and the oranges are going to be cooler than the whites and the blues So we need to change those colors and make those transitions really soft But it's a little tough to get there. There's a lot of hard blending that goes on with this So again, this is not for the faint of heart But adding the black in is going to start to give me something that can work again So just filling that whole black background in Gives some contrast and then I can start going in with like a number eight marker So it's a dark dark gray and go over some of the red because the red is not a pure red That's on the outside of that flame. It's kind of a dullish sort of color So I can go back in and play around with it. I'm gonna carve into Farther into the flame with a gray marker with more of the red with some of the yellows so that I can have that glow outside of the flame and give it that sort of a Glowy feeling, but the flame is basically white and then a few final details and The flame is roughly done. I mean, this is a quick sketch, but I just wanted to give you an idea of When you're doing flame. It's helpful to look at pictures I always say go Google something before you try to draw it and this is a perfect example Now let's look at some campfires and apply some of those same kinds of things This is a stamp from Lawn Fawn and I'm gonna color red around the outside and then work an orange in to start to bring those colors into the inside a Medium yellow and then a light yellow and then a little bit of blue at the base just because now I'm obsessed with putting blue in my flames and This is how some people do them But most of us do the red in the middle and then work toward yellow on the outside. I've done that for years But here I'm going to be Doing it a little differently. I'm using a no-line ink And I'm gonna use the same colors as the progression from the outside to the inside But when I wiped off the ink from the center portion as well as used a lighter color ink It's easier to get rid of those lines and look how much more on fire it looks like when there's white in the center So I'm gonna make this a little fancier at this time. I'm gonna add some yellow highlight onto the wood and Then just kind of bring the brown up. So there's just a tiny highlight where the flame would shine onto the wood and Then I'm gonna do a few other things to it I'm gonna take a black marker and create a shadow underneath one log So it looks rounded and looks like it's laying on top of the other and then start to put some shadows in terms of lines like the texture of the wood along each of these logs and That looks a little more realistic. Well, let's do something else Let's add some color underneath that the flames would shine onto the ground so yellow in the center and then orange and then red as it gets to the outside and Since we know that cool glow on the birthday candle worked great I'm gonna put a glow around the fire too and Now I've got a gray a dark gray color that I'm gonna go over all that red with remember the dark gray in the previous example dulled down all that stuff on the outside so I'm dulling all that down just kind of covering it up it still has that flavor of being red and Then I can start to add in darker and darker colors and work the darker colors toward that center So I get a slow transition of color when I add the black all the way around that fire starts to seriously Glow, I mean it looks like it's on fire now as opposed to the one to the left Which just kind of looks like a nice little happy fire if you're looking to make something look realistic This is one way to do it So just for kicks and grins, I'm gonna draw a realistic campfire so instead of a cartoony this is going to be an Actual campfire with real flames looking around the campfire and I'm gonna make it a I think they call it a tent Format for building a fire when all the boards stand up in a TP type shape around the center flame where it's going to burn and I'm gonna begin by Drawing around the white area. This is that negative drawing that so many people hate but I'm trying to keep the white areas white and Coloring around the outside is at least gonna give me a place to begin I'm gonna carve in from that so I'm leaving more white than I need and Copic marker You can totally get away with that and I decided to jump in and work more on this bottom section instead of working on the whole thing at once So I'm gonna add the red down there and then the black coming in and I'll shift around with a couple different grays to build some transition Going into those logs as they pile up from the ground, but it's gonna be very dark just like in the picture to the left and Going over some of these colors with a medium gray so that they start to dull out as they move away from the fire Is there kind of distant from those central flames? But the boards as they get toward the center of the fire center of the fire, they don't stay brown It's one of the things that in the cartoony version that board just stays nice and straight and nothing interrupts it Well fire is going to interrupt the boards in reality. That's what you're gonna actually see so making those boards Interruptible is a challenge. It's like I've Been trying to figure this whole thing out as I've been practicing making flames If you want to see more of all the flame stuff then follow my social media this week because I'll have all kinds of campfires and things on my socials So now I'm gonna go back in I've got the whole black background in and I'm gonna start to carve in from the outside because I want To keep that white in the middle, but the outside edges need to be Red and then it's gonna move to orange and then dark yellow and then lighter yellow as it moves inward Because the whole thing is not gonna be white Because that would be just like way too much white But I'm gonna also have to have those dull reds on the outside where those start to fade out Around the outside edges. So I'm just gonna keep adding colors and shaving off more of this white area and leaving that white center really really white hot and and Building up the color transitions and then knocking them back So I'm gonna start going in with some grays and start to dull those areas so that they end up being less prominent And I've got sparks flying all over the place You can go back in and add sparks with a white pen or something if you want to do that but just getting that center part to feel like it is Like really white hot and on fire adding a little bit of blue Totally made this for me. I was so excited. I was just tickle pink My dad used to put copper in the fireplace at at home when we would have fires and I would just get so tickled I just thought that was so much fun to see all the pretty colors So don't forget as you start to do this you're going to have some dark areas in and among all these crazy flames So it's a little challenging to figure out where to put them go find some pictures on the Internet of some fires Tons of campfire pictures out there for examples that can help you but here I'm dulling down and shrinking up some of those sparks and There you can see my finished little sketch of a campfire. I Hope you learned as much about flames as I learned about flames by doing this research and doing a lot of practicing And maybe you'll get a chance to practice some Yourself you might decide to take the camping scenes class You'll see this video in the free pre-class lesson because I want to make sure everybody who takes that Gets to learn what a real flame looks like However, that flame in that picture right there looks fine to me Even if it's backwards my brain still tells me it's a campfire So do not feel like you have to change the way you color your flames. It'll be fine on Friday, I'll be back with a watercolor campfire Which is really hard to paint, but I had a lot of fun I learned a lot from it as soon as I get that edited it will be scheduled for Friday here on YouTube and Then on my blog I have a collection of a gajillion different summer ideas and you'll get to see some more flames There's like tiki torches and campfires and other things Summer related that are there since summer is on the way if it is not already arrived at your house and Those who are involved in peace love and art. I am so excited that you are Part of this challenge that I'm hosting Link in the doobly-doo if you've not heard about that yet You want to join in never too late to join in a challenge that lasts until August I will see you guys on Friday and all week long on socials. Bye. Bye now You