Graphic/digital art/sketch/whatever-you-call-it tutorial

As I promised in my last post, this is a tutorial of my most recent graphic. I'll try to keep it short and simple. If you have any questions, you are always welcome to ask.

What you need:
- A drawing/editing program. I use Gimp for most of my graphics, but I used Pixlr (Editor) for this one. It's online and free, so you don't have to install anything.
- A tablet. I don't know if you can do it without, it will be really difficult.


1. Idea/reference

You need to know what exactly you are going to draw, or at least have some sort of idea or inspiration. It could be a photo like the one above - I was originally going for the romantic/gothic theme like on the picture but changed my mind later. It was very useful to get the anatomy right, though.
You can use a photo as a reference if you don't want to draw the outline yourself.
If you don't have a photo you could make a quick sketch of what you want to draw - but this is optional.




2. Really quick sketch

Open a new, empty page in your chosen editing program, add a transparent layer and make a quick, rough sketch of what you are going to draw. The ugly thing above took me no more than 30 seconds.
This step is not necessary, but it helps me a lot when drawing the outline because then you are already fixing the mistakes and not starting something completely new.
This is not necessary if you are using a reference image or if you are a professional drawing genius (I'm not, that's why I need a layer for practice first).

3. Outline

Add a new (transparent) layer, use the first sketch to help you start a better one. You can delete the quick sketch when you are done with this, because you're not going to use it. Look at the inspiration/reference, in the mirror or anywhere else you can get help for getting the anatomy right.
This step is probably the most difficult. It has taken me about 9528374106 hours to complete this step - and that's if you don't count the time spent on growling in frustration, running out to the kitchen to get some chocolate and listening to music to calm down and not start throwing random stuff around the room in rage.
It was also at this step that I changed the clothes from a romantic dress to a more causal top. I just tried it out to see how a tank top would look and liked the result.

4. Even fatter outline :3

This is optional, but I like chunky outlines. Remember that it shouldn't be fat all over, just at the places where the shadows fall and in corners. This is also a good time to add small details, but I have only done that after the next step.

5. Colour (and in my case details)

There is not much to explain here. You add a new layer underneath the previous, and colour everything. I also added a tattoo, an earring and a Deathly Hallows necklace. And some black eyeshadow, of course.

6. Shading

It probably annoys you that the lips have magically become red, right? :D Another thing I changed afterwards.

When I said that step 3 was the hardest, I lied. 3:) At least for me, shading has always been a very tricky thing. I used (almost) my usual technique: two layers of highlight (two for the hair, one on 8% and the other on 13% opacity; and two for the skin, at 30% and 25%) and two layers of shading (13% and 18%). As explained in my previous tutorial, I used the common technique, the lasso tool to select the areas that should be shaded.

The different thing about my two last graphics is that I didn't use black for the shading. I used a colour darker than the original, but not black. For the yellow top it was dark green and for the skin I used dark brown.

On Pixlr there is a very useful option when picking a colour:

Right now I have selected the colour of the top, neon yellow. But right below it you can click to make it a few shades darker or lighter. For the shading I clicked two times on the one on the left. This is the good thing about using Pixlr, although I'm sure some other programs have it too.

7. Credits

Always write your name or username on your work, but don't cover it up (at least not important parts of it). This way it won't be possible for someone to show your work uncredited or claim it as their own. They could crop out your name of course, but then it's called stealing and excuses like "I didn't steal it, I just forgot to credit you" won't work. I don't think my work is even good enough to be stolen, but you never know.

8. Background

You normally add credits in the end, but I forgot about an important part - the shadow and background! 

The shadow is easy enough. You add a layer at around 25% opacity below all the others, draw the shadow around or slightly below the person/item. Then blur it with the 'blur' tool or a fuzzy paintbrush.

If you want any advice on choosing a background, ask someone else. That's all I can say because sadly, I fail at backgrounds. I am going to work more on this in the future, but for this graphic I have just used a few blobs of different colors with a paintbrush, then tools like 'blur', 'sponge', 'smudge' and a lot of other stuff that I never use. The result is actually better than I expected.

When you are done, save the graphic in two versions: one with layers in a format like .xcf or .pxd if you are using Pixlr, but you can't upload these on Blogger so you also need one in .png or .jpg.

I hope this helped/inspired you in some ways :)

Maria