It's never rude to ask questions!
Banding is a mix of pillow shading and AA. Banding is mainly common in small clusters. As an artist, you are tempted to AA those lines, but having do it, it makes a separate color for that AA having it seem as a
shadow, in a sense. With that being said, it looks bad, just because it's literally one line of a dark color irrelevant to the shading (because you did that line to AA, correct?)
Let's set up an example. Say hi to Chris!
So Chris here is wanting to be shaded, so let's go ahead and do that!
So I shaded Chris, everything seems good, no banding. Now, let's add some AA.
Err, I think I AA'd just fine.
Chris: No you didn't you 'no-good color palette poor rigid nasty looking face' artist.
=[ Okay. So what did I do wrong?
Basically all these 'AA' made the image look double outline, jaggy, and also banding. Banding because it's the same length of the outline (for the left side of Chris).
So, let's fix him, although his attitude makes me wanna throw him away.
And there's ugly Chris for you! I added highlights for a purpose. Look at his big forehead. It looks like it's about to be banding right? (Highlight - midtone - shadow) Well, Nour, there are
some circumstances that banding can be allowed, usually when it's needed and it doesn't ruin the image. However, let's say I want to widen that highlight.
Then I would go like this. No banding, but there are AA. =o Why didn't I band? Because if I do, it'll become a habit, making me think banding is acceptable.
So keep in mind, that banding might be valid in certain circumstances, but simply think banding is bad bad bad and you must find an alternative to prevent banding.
Any who, here are some more links for you to read further into banding:
Click here!
Here too!
I don't think I showed you this link.
If you have any other questions, ask. Always ask questions. There are no stupid questions. (Unless it's irrelevant)