Jungle Spooks

I am a lover of trees and forests and I am always floored when an artist can paint them with such a sense of magic and the kind of dark beauty these lush places contain.

This is a stunning piece, it feels very deep and magical and I love every bit of it from the gorgeous greens you used to the soft light in the background coming through the trees and the various textures like the fuzziness of the moss and twisting bark of the trees.

I really like the "creeps" peeking at me through the plant life, they are very fun and give it such an eerie mystical feeling.

As far as critique goes I have been working more heavily on my backgrounds the last year or so particularly with plant life and forest scenes so while I feel I am not good enough to critique it from a "teaching" standpoint, I will tell you a bit of my own observation in hopes that it helps you out as it has helped me (when I remember to pay attention.)

One thing I notice is that forest (and jungle) floors are terribly complex. They are an entire mini world all their own of pebbles and dead leaves, left behind bones, feathers, mushrooms and moss, acorns and pawprints.
Study the floors and begin to find their rhythm and pattern and that can help bring a lot of life to empty spaces. Adding a few rocks peeking from between leaves or a few extra long stocks of grass does wonders for adding interest I find.

Forests and heavily plant filled areas can be quite time consuming to paint so I suppose patience is one of the best skills one can have when drawing them but if you absolutely cannot find the time then doing a speed paint with as much speedy details, even if it is just blurry leaves all around can really help and I think another big key is to really learn your lighting because that can make even sketchy speed paints most believable.

Okay, enough of my probably rather useless tips. I think you did an amazing job and honestly I see very little "wrong" with this. I might like to see a few extra little plants (curling vines, leaves, etc) here and there and on your gorgeous rocky formations it might help if you added a few tiny flowers or some different types of lichens mixed in but otherwise, well done!!<img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/r/r…" width="15" height="18" alt="" title="Black Rose"/>