Night Park Scene Cohesion [WIP] [C+C]

[JoeCreates]

I'm looking for advice on this WIP game scene. Due to translucent layers there are way too many colors in this, but I'm just trying to get things to work together and look part of the same scene. I think its probably the colors that I'm least happy with. Maybe I need to reduce brightness on background layer stuff? Any advice on how to get things working together a bit better would be much appreciated!

[astraldata]

EDIT: Figured I'd show what I'm talking about with a quick edit ^^

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The biggest issue is the highlights of your trees reflecting a yellow sun in a moonlit scene. The highlights on the bench and rightmost bush too. The tree in the distance on the right side looks great. You'll have to tone down the yellow on the clocktower / Big Ben thingy when you shift the hue of your foreground trees toward blue (or at least a little more towards purple).

Other than mostly a few hueshifts, you've got it well enough to work value-wise. Looks cool.

The only thing I'd consider changing a bit value-wise is the deep blue in your shadows -- brightening it up a little so that it can be perceived a bit more easily. In such a dark scene with such a bright moon, you should at least get to see a glimmer of the moonlight in the shadows there to indicate form in the distant shapes before the clouds. It may just be my screen, but I'm having a hard time seeing the forms on that layer.

Since we're on the topic of that layer before the clouds, you could consider shifting that dark blue highlight more toward green a bit to give the subconscious an easier time understanding it's greenery you're describing and not just clouds in heavy shadow. It should be clear enough that it's not the latter, but it's still difficult to know for sure that it's the former (assuming it *is* indeed greenery you're describing there).

Hope that helps!

[Kosvid]

I can`t disagree with astraldata on the issue of coloring, but for some reason I like the original version more. It`s more.. cozy, I guess. At the moment I have no idea how to make this (the first) palette reasonable (without making the Moon cheesy ), anyway, I just want to say that I`d choose other way than shifting the palette to the blue.
P. S. The background trees really look like clouds now.
P. P. S. What can be the alternative light source backlighting the Moon on the right? This also looks kinda strange (disregarding other style decisions, of course). It looks like if the Moon was lit by.. another moon.

[Fizzick]

I have to disagree on the highlights. It seems like the objects are being lit up by the street lamp. I recommend making the lamp more obviously emit light and shift it towards a warmer hue. You could use the warm yellow on the clock tower, too.

[Decroded]

if this is game art then the most standout issue (excuse the pun) is with visual priority.
somehow u have MORE contrast and saturation in the background than in the foreground.
generally u should go (heavily) for the opposite.

reducing contrast and saturation of background also appears more realistic as it simulates atmospheric perspective.
even in cartoony art its important to at least understand and be able to apply these rules correctly before breaking them.

i also cant understand how sunlight is hitting those trees.
yellow shouldn't be present at night and the green itself should be reduced to a thin band imo in favour for some unnatural street light and desaturated blue ambient light for example.

the clock is another example of way too much contrast, making it appear more as something interactive that the player should concern themselves with.

i think a simple dithery cloud inference and corona around moon could work for the sky rather than the straight-line-dither gradient thingy.

pure logic question u might not need to concern urself with...but...what is source of the backlight on the moon?

[Lux]

I don't have a problem with the warm colored highlights, as street lamps often cast an orange hue on things at night. I think making the light from the lamp more orange would help in portraying this.

As others have said, the visual hierarchy does seem a little unbalanced. You actually don't have that much detail in the background, so I think shifting the background elements to a much more limited palette would really improve the readability. Something like this:

[HezaKey]

Didn't mess with your colors so much as your values.  Throw the original and this under grayscale and you'll really see what I mean.
Kind of messed around with the people's shirts, cause you have a cold color on a slightly warm green, they just don't pop out that much.  Red might look better, but I'll let you decide on that.

[dpixel]

Cool scene.  Played with the colors a bit.  Pulled the saturation way down for most colors and got the count down to 67. As already mentioned this is about layering.  I tried to give the focus to the sidewalk and messed with the bush to the left. 
The amount of greens are a tough thing to consider in a scene like this.  More realism? How much would really be visible in the foreground. Sometimes one color representing background trees in the distance is enough.