Haloquine - Thanks for help - Offline For a While

[Haloquine]

Hi,
I've been practising making art in various media for quite a while. But what I haven't yet gotten my head round is computer based art-work.

I'm basically looking for someone to help me with learning the basics and then improving my skills.

If people have line-art I can practice colouring, that would also be gratefully recieved.

I have examples of my forays into various media here; Haloquin on DA

But nothing done purely on a computer (although I have played with editing traditional works.)

The program I have is G.I.M.P., so someone who knows how to use this specifically would be ideal, but I'm willing to adapt.

Look forward to meeting you!  

[swizzkitten]

I really like your style! smile I don't have GIMP, but I do have PSP7 and they may be similar. I can help with the basics if you have any specific questions. Oh and if you want to post a sketch here I will do the line art for you so you can practice with the coloring. mrgreen  

[sadaoakimichi]

I feel your pain...

I'd be happy to offer some line art for you to practice with, if you like. ^_^ I've got plenty of it.  

[Haloquine]

Thank you both!

I've found lineart here; Kitton on DA - Lineart
which I've been using to practice colouring, which is taking forever!!! I'll post some here as I get them coloured. (but thanks Sam - hopefully I'll be better at my own by the time I've finished colouring these in!)

I've just learnt how to make smooth lines using paths with the pen-tool. I will be putting this into practise soon!

I may well take you up on the line-art making Swizzkitten, and tips are gratefully recieved. Is PSP7 a version of Photoshop? The tutorials I've looked at for photoshop seem to show a fair amount of similarity between GIMP and PS.

 

[Haloquine]

First Colouring Practice




(Using This Tutorial)

Things I don't like;
The shading on the legs is too harsh.
Her face looks sunburnt... how do I shade her face better???
And the highlights on the hair, they look nice but don't quite look like highlights.

Thoughts and comments? Preferably constructive of course!

 

[swizzkitten]

Haloquine

Thank you both!

I've found lineart here; Kitton on DA - Lineart
which I've been using to practice colouring, which is taking forever!!! I'll post some here as I get them coloured. (but thanks Sam - hopefully I'll be better at my own by the time I've finished colouring these in!)

I've just learnt how to make smooth lines using paths with the pen-tool. I will be putting this into practise soon!

I may well take you up on the line-art making Swizzkitten, and tips are gratefully recieved. Is PSP7 a version of Photoshop? The tutorials I've looked at for photoshop seem to show a fair amount of similarity between GIMP and PS.

Sure, glad to help. No, PSP is Paint Shop Pro, similar to photoshop I've heard but much less expensive...  

[swizzkitten]

Haloquine

First Colouring Practice




(Using This Tutorial)

Things I don't like;
The shading on the legs is too harsh.
Her face looks sunburnt... how do I shade her face better???
And the highlights on the hair, they look nice but don't quite look like highlights.

Thoughts and comments? Preferably constructive of
course!

I'm just learning to color myself, but as for her face I start with a very light tan, then shadow with just a shade darker and highlight with a lighter shade. I'm not sure how GIMP works, but if you can, when shadowing, set your brush to 3 opacity and 50 hardness..it's much easier to control. Hope this helps. 4laugh  

[Griffonage]

I use the GIMP, and it takes a lot of practice to figure out. Let me know if you want any tutorials on anything, and I'll see what I can find/make.

As for your art I would suggest toning down the colors because they are far too vibrant. You might want to take colors for skin from photographs until you learn how to determine more natural shades for skin color. For your first time coloring this is very good! I like how you colored the fabric, but once again the colors should be little bit more muted.  

[Haloquine]

Thanks for tips so far!

swizzkitten

I'm just learning to color myself, but as for her face I start with a very light tan, then shadow with just a shade darker and highlight with a lighter shade. I'm not sure how GIMP works, but if you can, when shadowing, set your brush to 3 opacity and 50 hardness..it's much easier to control. Hope this helps.

Tan. Gotcha. I can do opacity, but I'm not sure about hardness. What would that change in terms of how the brush works?

Pomato Soup

I use the GIMP, and it takes a lot of practice to figure out. Let me know if you want any tutorials on anything, and I'll see what I can find/make.

Thank you! I may well take you up on that when I find specifics that I can ask about directly.

Quote:

As for your art I would suggest toning down the colors because they are far too vibrant. You might want to take colors for skin from photographs until you learn how to determine more natural shades for skin color. For your first time coloring this is very good! I like how you colored the fabric, but once again the colors should be little bit more muted.

Thank you. I quite like using vibrant colours but will try muting them. Can I ask in what way you think they are too vibrant? Is it that it looks unreal, or that its just overall too loud?

Stealing skin colours from photos is a brilliant idea. I've had some trouble working out how to get the tone right! (as you can see). I guess when the skin tones are more realistic the clothes will just look wrong that bright!

 

[Chaotic Mana]

Hardness changes the edge of the brush so when you stroke it looks softer around the edges as compared to a solid colour change. It's kind of like feathering or blurring the edges of the brush.  

[Danaidae]

Various skin tone palates are available online if you need.

Also, in regards to shading, try avoiding colors that are too heavily saturated and most people generally blend in a number of colors for shadows. Studying the objects put under different colored lights will help a a lot as well. :]  

[Haloquine]

Chaotic Mana

Hardness changes the edge of the brush so when you stroke it looks softer around the edges as compared to a solid colour change. It's kind of like feathering or blurring the edges of the brush.

Thank you, that was what I thought but wanted to make sure I wasn't confused. I know I can use a paintbrush, which has a softer edge, or a pencil, with a harder edge, and then 2 options of (sets of 10 different sized) fuzzy or defined shapes to paint with. But I can't find a setting on GIMP for setting specific hardness.

I'll try using the softer brushes, rather than the pencils with blurring, which is what I did above.

Danaidae

Various skin tone palates are available online if you need.

Also, in regards to shading, try avoiding colors that are too heavily saturated and most people generally blend in a number of colors for shadows. Studying the objects put under different colored lights will help a a lot as well. :]

Thank you. I'll have a search for palettes, I've just found a pic with lots of faces which I'm picking colours from but a palette would be easier.

I'll try using different colours for the shadows and see what happens.

I was wondering if anyone knows how to 'group' layers in GIMP? The tutorial above said that if you group a layer in photoshop with the layer below it, you can only colour on non-transparent pixels... if that makes sense... so i was wondering how to do that as it does sound like it would make things easier. Pomato Soup?

 

[Griffonage]

Haloquine

Thank you, that was what I thought but wanted to make sure I wasn't confused. I know I can use a paintbrush, which has a softer edge, or a pencil, with a harder edge, and then 2 options of (sets of 10 different sized) fuzzy or defined shapes to paint with. But I can't find a setting on GIMP for setting specific hardness.

To change hardness you have to create a custom brush.

Basically what you do is look at the bottom of the brush tab (where the row of buttons is, yes?) and then click new brush. What I did was make one custom brush that I change the size and hardness of as I work on a piece (easier for me than making a bunch of new ones... augh).

By the way, I figured I'd give a little plug to my favorite GIMP brush creator, iceytina. If you browse her dA gallery you can find some amazing stuff including snow, crayons, watercolors, moons, and more! Browsing dA with Resources: Application Resources: GIMP Brushes: Popular: All Time will let you find some amazing stuff (even those leaf brushes that lazy Photoshop users use to make trees! yay!).

Haloquine

I was wondering if anyone knows how to 'group' layers in GIMP? The tutorial above said that if you group a layer in photoshop with the layer below it, you can only colour on non-transparent pixels... if that makes sense... so i was wondering how to do that as it does sound like it would make things easier. Pomato Soup?

I haven't heard of this at all, actually. I think coloring the flat colors then locking the transparency works just fine.  

[Haloquine]

Pomato Soup

To change hardness you have to create a custom brush.

By the way, I figured I'd give a little plug to my favorite GIMP brush creator, iceytina.

Brilliant, thank you. I didn't know you could make custom brushes *blushes* And I'm sure the link will be useful when I get a bit more confident with things smile

Pomato Soup

Haloquine

I was wondering if anyone knows how to 'group' layers in GIMP? The tutorial above said that if you group a layer in photoshop with the layer below it, you can only colour on non-transparent pixels... if that makes sense... so i was wondering how to do that as it does sound like it would make things easier. Pomato Soup?

I haven't heard of this at all, actually. I think coloring the flat colors then locking the transparency works just fine.

That does, but then you can only do the shading on that layer, which means if anything goes wrong its harder to fix. The grouping thing apparently makes it so in the new layer painting only works on the coloured pixels of the layer it is grouped to. I guess GIMP doesn't do it.  

[Haloquine]

Colour Practice 2
Ok. I struggled massively with the hair, I think its ok but I'm not sure.



I will probably do more work on this, but I'd like some feedback please!

I used skin colours taken from a photograph (couldn't find online palettes, anyone have a link to one they can share?) and tried to use softer colours generally.

First attempt at using paths to draw

I think this is quite cute... even though the ears are kinked. I'll fix that asap. Any thoughts?

I'm not sure whats causing the blur around the edges here, its not on the actual picture.