Shiny verses satin finishes

This was such a great study in my sketching class that I thought I would share it with you. It is painting shiny, reflective surfaces verses satin finishes. With Christmas just around the corner and while you are decorating you tree, take a minute and try this challenge. Get both a shiny and satin ornament and lets get painting.

 We will start with shiny:
 1. When painting a reflective surface remember that the reflection will take on the shape of the reflecting object and skew it. So with the example of our ornament, the image wraps around the round shape of our ornament. It is often hard to paint these weird, skewed images since our brain doesn't get it at first, but be persistent, it will all come together.
2. You also need to make sure you have good values. Lots of lights and darks make it look reflective! 3. Reflections have lots of hard edges, sharp, mirror edges, keep them crisp and strong.

Satin finishes:
 1. Satin finishes are almost the opposite of reflective images since they do not reflect an image but just the light.
 2. When painting your satin ornament make sure you keep all your edges blended and soft, no hard edges.
 3. No strong lights and darks, everything is soft but there is still value changes, just gradual.

 Okay, its your turn, let me see what you have! Give it a go, this is a great seasonal lesson just begging to be sketched and painted.