New painting done in watercolor and gouache! I feel like I'm learning a little more about traditional media every time and slowly getting a handle on it. :)
If you like my latest mermay picture [cw for mild gore], lemme tell you how easy it was to do the coloring for it. I used 3 layers to make it from black and white to full color, using a correction layer called a Gradient Map. This will be for the program Clip Studio Paint, but there's equivalent functions across programs, you just gotta do some research about where your gradient map options are hiding
In CSP, you go to Layer > New Correction Layer > Gradient Map
and this is what a gradient map does when placed above a black and white drawing;
It's a process that sounds complicated but is actually super easy to learn and exploit; gradient maps take a specific value (black to white and all the greys in the middle) and assign it a color. By adjusting where those lil ^ arrows sit on the gradient, you change which value is assigned that color, thus changing what part of your drawing is that color.
all the gradient maps I used are community made presets I downloaded for free using the CSP community asset portal
now pair that with layer masks, and you can isolate where on the picture the gradient map is in effect. Below is the gradient map that's Just the red for the couch, a few character accents, and the tail;
above in the orange is the layer mask button as well as where it is displayed on your layer (in CSP) once you apply it. When you want to change your layer mask, you click that second square on your layer; with that selected, you now can control what part of that layer is being shown without actually changing whats on that layer.
With the layer mask selected, you can erase whats there, then go over it with a brush or a selection tool and add it back as if it was never erased at all. The positive parts (what is visible on the picture) are displayed in white, the negative parts (what's been erased) are displayed in black. Obviously you Have to make sure you're interacting with the layer mask and not the layer itself (the layer itself is selected in the screen cap above, that's why it has that in-program white outline) or you really will just erase shit you can only get back by hitting 'undo'.
then you can add more gradient maps above or below the first one, depending on what looks best;
this is the bottom most gradient map layer arranged in my folder of gradient maps, because I wanted this orange as the foundation of the pic, the rest building off it.
the last gradient map layer is smushed between the red and the orange, and this is how I got those blue shadows and tail accents.
there is a Single value assigned that blue, but the gradient aspect allows it to be more versatile, and the browns making up the majority of the gradient help it feel like an extension of the orange layer. It's important to make sure your gradients harmonize like that otherwise it becomes more obvious they are two separate gradients interacting rather than the illusion of a more complex, selective color palette. While you can get a lot of depth out of a single gradient map, when you layer them, you're able to easily add shading, quickly change the color of a specific part of the picture and overall just cheat your way to a very cohesive, intricately colored picture with WAY less effort and color picking on your part.
taking this;
and turning it into this;
with 3 layers 8'>
And everyone say thank you for @spooky-beanz for inspiring this tutorial!
[ID: An illustration of a pale-skinned person being vivisected by someone outside of frame except for their hands. The subject is drawn in muted blue colors except for their organs which are bright pink. The subject is wearing a white tank top (shoved up to their neck) and jeans with a belt. They have mastectomy scars and gauges in their ears. They have two tattoos on their arms: a ring of barbed wire and a heart labelled “dyke”, and hold a cigarette to their smiling lips with painted nails. The person opening the subject up has darker skin and painted nails and wears spiked bracelets and skull-shaped rings. Faded white text over the piece reads “is this it? Is this all?”]
Emmrich card I've made some time ago for our Dragon Age Stamp Rally done together with the awesome @ vrak_czlovieka and @ lildisgustingart 🔥 You will be able to get them AGAIN at Magnificon in Kraków, I'm preparing some other small Dragon Age merch for that event too!
Some time ago, I designed a dryad for every platycerium/staghorn fern species I have or have had (my grande died, but the rest lives). They are sorted here in the following order:
p. ridleyi
p. bifurcatum
p. superbum (+ grande)
p. elephantotis
p. veitchii lemoinei
p. cabbage
p. madagascar alcicorne
p. quadridichotomum
p. stemaria
p. coronarium
My collection has grown with two p. madagascariense and a p. mt. kitshakood since I made these, so I suppose I’ll do two more at some point. The line art, ink layers, my design thoughts and some plant talk is publicly posted on my Patreon.
theartofmadeline
yousharknotpass
jacobvanloon
pixelskylines
vaporwave
titsay
izzy806
areudirty
