Drawing Process (Pixiv Fanbox)

(This is not for educational purpose, please only watch as one of the references of how I draw. Poor English, bad anatomy warning)

Arkwork: https://www.pixiv.net/artworks/91384124

1) Rough sketch

I made an idea of drawing couples of playing outside, and here's the rough sketch of it.

I prefer drawing with pencil brush because it's quite familiar to drawing with real pencil and easy to detail control.

2) Main sketch

I know many people draw main sketch with hard brush or pen brush, but I rather use the pencil brush (same one used for rough sketch) because it's really hard to keep atmosphere from rough sketch to main sketch only with hard brush.

(it's more like pencil drawing, rather than line art)

↓

One of the most important part in character is face, and comparing rough and main sketch frequently can help keep the atmosphere of face easily.

completed

3) Color Masking

Mask silhouette

-> separate by color

-> adjust colors by background temperature

-> set the main light roughly

↑ (This is how I usually sort colors.)

filling color is easy, but setting colors with harmony isn't easy.

I recommend referring to great photos or illustrations (doesn't mean using spoid every color with no brain)

(in my case I referred to this picture.)

and the main light source is flash spreading from camera (first person view), so I drew light parts in the middle of the mass.

completed

4) Coloring

I divided colors by two parts: light and shade

and we have to mix into natural one part.

I use pen pressure-opacity brush (maybe one of the default brush)

and smoothen boundaries like this: covering boundaries with low pen pressure(=low opacity) and spoid and repeat..

The main rule when coloring is

1. dark part which made by object in front -> clear boundary & big contrast

2. dark part by its form(like sphere) -> unclear boundary & small contrast

Sometime you may feel like the colors are muddy, washed out, or too saturated, but don't worry.

This process is for portraying light and shade, not the colors. We can adjust colors or add tones later.

completed

5. Adding tones & Details

The details I usually add are back light, light reflection, eyelids..etc.

back light is usually on the character's silhouete at the opposite side from the main light.

Light reflection is on the smooth surface like skin or hair.

(Too much light reflection can make a drawing weird)

Tones

I use 3 ways of adding tones:

Overlay, Hard Light, and Color-Dodge

I use overlay for overall tone of characters: warm or cool + bright or dark

Make a tone layer with blening mode to Overlay at the very front

and paint warm & cool colors with air brush tool.

I use color-dodge mode when adding tone with stronger light like hair.

unlike overlay mode, it starts with black layer.

(black in color dodge mode = no change)

Hard Light mode is for blush but you can use overlay or other modes.

6. Background & fix

I'm not good at landscape painting, so I drew roughly and blurred.

and then adjusted the tone dark with overlay layer mode.

fixed some body structure and then finished!

Every drawing follows this process.

For detailed settings, please check the PSD files.

Please message me if you need more details.

Thank you!