That’s really so kind of you to say, I appreciate it~ (*^▽^*)
My colorings aren’t that much of a mess anymore I guess (well, as long as I use adjustment layers I’m used to); With neutral scenes (Like scenes taking place in the day), I tend to use around three selective color layers, with the first one toning down the blacks in the majority of the colors, while the magenta section will look like this most of the time:
The second layer will most likely be me repeating “toning down the darker colors” while the third layer is up to you. I use any selective color layers after the second one to fix up any colors that I don’t like in a scene.
Hint: Make sure not to tone down the darker colors too much or the scene will turn out too light! This happens to me too frequently, so starting a few months ago, I began familiarizing myself with layers that help the colors in a scene pop up more like hue and saturation. I like to place these layers either right at the beginning of the coloring or place them in between layers. I do use the same settings on hue and saturation as a lot of other pastel colors, which looks like this:
I also play with every other color that fall under master (every one), BUT these have no definite settings, I mess with them until I like how my gif looks. Oh, and I never use more than one hue and saturation layer.
I also like to use at least one curve layer if possible and it will most likely look like this:
Not too bright, but if you want, go ahead and raise it some more.
Recently I’ve been relying on gradient maps more than curves and these gradient maps are composed of pastel colors usually in the pink, purple, and blue range. I don’t like to use more than two but sometimes a scene requires more of them. If a curve layer doesn’t help me out as much as I thought, then I will use a gradient map that is composed of black and white and I will play with the opacity of these gradients if it is too bright (I like leaving the opacity between 50 through 75 percent but you might have different preferences).
These are the layers I rely on the most when coloring gifs, but feel free to experiment with other layers!
And if you’re interested, here are some blogs that have really nice pastel colorings:
@animeps, @animemangaps, @resourceanime
I’m still a little unorganized when it comes to coloring my gifs, but I hope I helped you out some~ If you need any help on the adjustment layers, feel free to send me a message!
