Colors and layers.. need some tips

[bjornarg]

Hi, this is my first post here.

I just got myself a Wacom tablet and Artrage and yesterday I was experimenting with my first digital drawing, some stoneage guy. I found the "Blend modes" tutorial to be very useful, but I have some problems finding the right colors to put on the "color mode" layers. I think it's mainly because my basic pencil drawing usually contains a lot of white areas and if I understand it correctly "color mode" adds color to shaded areas only?

Are there any other methods I could use to put colors on my basic pencil drawings and is there somewhere I can find a thorough explanation of all the different layer modes? For instance should I use a separate layer for shadows?

Thanks in advance if someone can give me some hints.

[2xKnight]

I tend to use separate layers for just about everything. If I screw something up it's by itself and I don't wind up erasing things around or under it.

Shadows and highlights work well on layers by themselves. For opacity alone it's worth it. If you want to change the opacity on the shadows, you can. I fiddle with that quite a bit...


As far as tutorials go. I don't know of any ArtRage specific ones, but any good beginer tutorial on layers should work. Even photoshop / paintshop pro tutorials might help you understand 'em.


Asking about it here will help too, there are a lot of people better at this than I am around here.

[Lee]

Dear Bjornarg, Are you kidding? your cave man character drawing is great and i'll give you 3 and a half days to figure out the rest! can't wait to see what you do next. Love ArtRage, get to see such talant and put in my two cents worth. Learn as i go along. just now am figureing out the layer thingy after months! but the layering tool is very useful for a oldie like me. just started using it and it took me time to know when to add and take away and blend the layers but it is very useful. best way to learn the other tools is to do a lot of scribbling with the settings, Have fun!

[pai]

hi bjornarg,

welcome to the forum. your first piece is already that great. i really like this stoneage character especially his facial expression. can't wait to see the finish one. :D

[Rising Sun]

This is very good! The entire 'chalk' feel makes it actually seem as if it has been sketched onto a cave by a caveman themselves, which helps the overall aura of the piece.

I think this is very good and you should do something futuristic to go with it, as in 'From past to future' :P

Anyway onto the helping bit, I don't use seperate layers for shading and it turns out fine... heck, your's looks superb as it is now! Although, I think you may want an extra layer if you don't want to smudge in the colour of the original a little.

Carry on practicing and it will be *perfect*

Rising Sun™