Painting the Interdimensional Traveler - ZBrush Creature Design: Creating Dynamic Concept Imagery for Film and Games - page 240

Table 5-2 shows some of the most common blending modes and their function. These are the blending
modes I use on a regular basis. The verbal description of blending modes can be tricky to grasp. I recom-
mend checking the example images as well as experimenting on your own. Blending modes are powerful in
their ability to help you create “happy accidents” in your work. Their impact will always be a little different
depending on the contents of the layers you are working with. This element of randomness and unpredict-
ability makes experimenting with layers a lot of fun. While understanding the various modes will give you
a technical understanding of what each one can accomplish, I often find I get surprises that lead my painting
into new directions as I experiment with blending modes in my painting. Also, don't be afraid to hue shift or
change the values of your layers to alter the way the blending mode affects them. Experimentation will bring
interesting results. See the video for this chapter to see several instances where blending modes Overlay and
Soft Light are used to influence the impact of a texture on the image ( Figure 5-8 ).