BTS: Gojo Post-Workout (Patreon)

This is more for those who are interested in the technical part of the art, the Behind-the-Scene kind of stuff. Every artist has their own way of working. Mine usually has distinctive steps since I'm more of an artist who relies heavily on lineart versus digital painters.

Slide #1: The ROUGHEST and UGLIEST step of the process xD. Just mostly sharp shapes and building blocks. This is where I find placement of the anatomy.

#2: This is where I refine the sketch, smoothing out the building shapes and finding the more organic curves. I fix anatomy mostly in this part where I spend FOREVER fixing proportions. This part is the LONGEST part of my process. I flip the canvas back and forth to make sure things look okay. I step away a day or two and then come back with a new pair of fresh eyes to look at proportions again. It is the most annoying part of the process but rewarding at the end.

#3: Lineart. This part of the process is just a lot of confident strokes and balancing various line weights all over. In addition to the lineart, you'll notice that I almost never use black for lineart. I find it a bit too strong for my liking. Changing colors help set a mood and unite all the colors. In this Gojo piece, I just opted for a dark, warm, reddish brown.

#4: Base colors. I have a weird base for skin color, but it always works out at the end for me if I know how to play with the shadows and shading colors. For blacks, I never use a straight black. I always go for a darker and less saturated shade of a color. I never use straight white either, just a lighter and less saturated shade of a color.

#5: Shading. I enjoy this part too. This is the part that makes the biggest difference. I like to use warm colors. I personally don't like straight grays. I like to hop over to a gray that has a light tint of another color in. The grays in this piece has a bit of a red for warmth. For shading the skin, I avoid browns to avoid a muddy look. It's important to play with other tones. I think you've probably noticed how often I use warm, flesh,  heated, flushed-looking skintones xD.

#6: After finding a light source in the shading step, I throw highlights to emphasize that light source in this step. I select a very light color, set the blending mode to "Glow Dodge" and use a soft brush.

#7: You'll probably have to zoom in on this one, but I always overlay a texture layer to give the piece some depth and emphasize the skin rendering.

Okay, yeah that's about it xD. Sorry this is SO LONG. I hope it serves as a little something.