STRUZAN REBALANCING PART 8

For this study, I wanted to focus on Struzan treats hair. There was something distinct about it that I wanted to dig into.

In the example below, we see the original photography and Struzan’s drawing. My conclusions were:
• Struzan keeps strands feeling individual - the highlights don’t group together, you can see shadows between bright hairs
• Most importantly, Struzan brightens up the strands in the shadows that add shape to the hair. This flattens out the image a little, but adds a sense of fantasy and contour maximalism.

This fits with Stuzan’s general approach to hair - the contours of hair are to be emphasized:

We can see similar techniques at work below in the Struzan’s work of Luke. The original photography has dark pockets of shadow where the specularity of the strands is lost at the root. Struzan fills in most other the shadow.

In compositions where there is NOT a wide range of darks, mids, brights, Struzan still makes sure to fill in the shadow pockets of the hair with contours.

Exceptions include the work below where Stuzan does see some of the darks mostly in place for the Courtship of Princess Leia piece.