I know this is such a weird question but how do you draw shoulders šš that feels so weird to say because people don't normally struggle with shoulders šš
its not that weird! its something i used to struggle w/ and still sometimes do, anatomy is weird,, idk that i have much in the way of tips for it though. shoulders tend to slope down rather than straight across from the neck:
there also tends to be enough space on either side of the head to fit another head (so 3 heads across in total) but in anime/with stylization the head tends to be bigger which means this rule doesnt really apply, especially for extreme stylizations like chibis where the shoulders tend to be smaller than the head and almost directly attached to the head
if one shoulder goes up, it helps to have the other one go down to make the pose a little more natural and add to the line of action
contrapposto posing can also help a character who is just standing there seem more relaxed/natural. for the shoulders this means that they are juxtaposed with the line of the hips (u can google and see more classical examples of this to get a better idea of it)
thatās about all i have, im no expert on anatomy but i hope it helps a little!
Hi! I had a question regarding online storefronts and was wondering if you had any tips/suggestions on how to figure out exactly what permits and/or licenses you need? I'm planning on selling things such as charms/stickers but can't find much on what is required when selling those! (If you prefer I could message you off anon, but I wasn't sure of this was something you could help with!) Thanks a bunch for your time anyways! š
ahh, i think it would depend on your state if youāre from the US. different states have different tax laws and such and its still something im learning the ropes w/ bc the govt really doesnt make it easy to figure out ^^;
id say if youāre just starting out, you dont *really* need any kind of permit or licenses?? i mean, take what i say with a grain of salt and definitely research the laws in your state, but especially if youāre just testing the waters or doing it as a hobby and arent planning to make a significant amount of income off it at first then thereās not much to report.
if you want to start as a business right off the bat though, register for an EIN and look up requirements for reporting state and income tax in your state. you can register yourself as a sole proprietorship and get a business license that way, but i personally dont think its worth the trouble in the beginning. i think states usually have laws regarding selling things as a hobby and they either wont collect taxes under a certain amount of income or only require you to pay sales tax, which you should be able to do online through your stateās specific site.
for cons, you are required to pay sales tax on the income you make to that state, and you can register for a temporary sales tax license or a permanent one if your frequent that state for conventions. though with the pandemic that probably wont be a concern until later this year, if at all
i want to stress that im by no means an expert at this, this is just what ive learned through personal experience, and i highly advise talking to a tax expert if youāre planning on starting an actual business. taxes are so confusing and like i said, im still trying to sort out how to report and keep track of everything year to year as i grow ^^;
If I start drawing on a big canvas and then make it smaller while still drawing does it affect quality? :0 thank u for always sharing tips, they are very helpful!
yep, changing the size of your drawing in any way while youre drawing will affect the quality!! its definitely better to size something smaller than sizing it bigger though! sizing smthing smaller will compress the drawing into using less pixels and therefore it may get a little bit grainy (depending on how small youāre making it) but shouldnt be too bad! making something bigger is trying to fill more pixels than what you originally drew on so itāll definitely be blurry and lower quality! if you have to resize, sizing down is better but iād try to wait till youre done to make a canvas smaller since you can also save a bigger version just in case.
if you mean transforming bits of your drawing though then i think thatās fine as long as you donāt transform it too many times! I use the transform tool to adjust things all the time and it does make it a little bit more pixely but if youre drawing on a big enough canvas and youāre not making things too much bigger or transforming them too many times it doesnt make much of a difference! you can also always transform smthing and then trace over/reline it to get crisper lines!
Hello! Do you have any tips on how do you make the hair so glossy and beautiful? Itās one of the things I adore most out of your style!
hello!! thank u so much! iām happy that you like it, ive struggled a lot (n still do) to make hair shading look nice ^^; i donāt know if i can give many tips but i can at least walk you through my general hair shading process under the cut! for a less wordy process, you can also check out the speedpaints on my yt!
starting with the base color, i try to pick a bright/light color bc with the way I shade the base color ends up becoming part of the highlight, if that makes sense! Itās a lot easier when Iām coloring white or black hair (see below) bc I just use straight up white for the white hair highlight or a shade of blue/purple for the black hair highlight, but w/ colored hair it tendās to be a little trickier to envision what color will look best against the shading! i can always paint over the highlights later but it does make the process easier if i pick a color that works well right off the bat!
i started w/ a bright pastel pink for this drawing despite the character having a more muted hair color bc i think the best highlights are vibrant n saturated! also i just like pastel colors!
i then airbrushed a gradient around where her highlight will be. i picked yellow bc i think it compliments the pink tone nicely, and it means the actual highlight will have a slight gradient n appear softer in the end, though i donāt always do this step ^^; as for where to put the highlights, it varies depending on the hairstyle but i put them around the middle of the bangs kind of like aĀ āhaloā or crown effect! i use the texture lines that are in the lineart to help me decide placement as well; the HL will go right above those lines! her hair is pretty short but i also airbrushed some yellow near the ends of her hair to act as highlights for the longer strands. the longer the characterās hair the more highlights iād add lower down
next i took a shade slightly darker than the base color and used it to shape the highlights into the basic form that i wanted them to be in! i think this is probably the most crucial step to achieving that glossy look. even though iāll be refining it more, the hair already looks shiny w/ just the color and rough shapes!Ā i usually go for roughĀ ātear dropā shapes for the shadows, originating from roots and tips of the hair. the highlight shape looks like?? maybe bat wings, but it kind of naturally forms bc of the teardrops. i canāt really explain why i choose this shape, and i do change it sometimes, but i think it achieves the shiny effect bc it mimics the way reflected light wraps around shiny objects! if you notice, i try to separate the shapes by sections of hair. the more i section it out in the lineart, the easier it is to make the shapes when shading ^^
not much to say here, i just took the base color and used the marker tool to clean up the shapes! at this point since iāve started blending colors, the eyedropper tool is my best friend
i then took a couple darker shades and used them around the roots as well as the actual shadows of the hair. iāve also put some right up against the bottom of the highlights, under the texture lines! putting darker shades against the lighter ones creates contrast and adds to the illusion of being reflective and glossy! the texture lines themselves also help bc they darken up those areas, but theyāre more of a stylistic choice :3
i added colors and cleaned up the shading a bit by blending it so itās not as messy! every object reflects the colors of things around it, and shiny surfaces like metal tend to reflect more noticeably, so adding colors that arent the same as the actual hair tone (in this case blue n purple) can make it look more reflective as well!Ā
i changed the lineart color to match which helps soften it up as whole as well as color picked her skin tone and her hoodie to airbrush at the tips of her hair. not a necessary step but i think it gives it a softer look ^^
lastly i made some color adjustments on an overlay layer, and added some final shiny details like small sparkles n lighter colored texture marks, as well as thinner hair strands!! i could have refined the shading more, but since this was a procrastination doodle, i didnāt want to spend too much time on it ^^;
n thatās basically my whole hair coloring process! iām sorry it was long winded, but since I havenāt done one of these in a while, I wanted to make sure it was thorough. no matter your shading style, i think the most important steps to achieving the glossy hair look are the colors you choose for the highlight vs shade/base and the shapes of the highlights! with those two things you can still achieve a shiny look in flat color pieces:
i often change the highlight shape to be more square or triangular as i see fit! i also find it easier to shape highlights in hair that is drawn with really clear sections, so if youāre having trouble it may help to use your lineart as a guide:
i hope that helps with your hair coloring endeavors a little bit and good luck w/ figuring out your own style of coloring!!final chiaki piece: X
tbh, i donāt really know if i have much to offer in terms of anatomy tips?? i get asked this a looot and i never know what to say bc its hard for me to explain, or know what would be helpful,, really all i can give advice on is honing your observational drawing skills and using references! i think drawing from life can be one of the most helpful/important skills for illustrative artists. that doesnt mean you have to sit still for hours drawing a still life or figure (though tbh figure/gesture drawings are a great option for learning anatomy) but making sure youāre referencing from real objects/people, or looking at how other artists stylize certain attributes can be a huge help!
with anatomy specifically, its good to actually understand how the human body is put together, and how muscles/bone structure affect the outside shape of the body. You can break down the body into simple shapes, sure, and thatās a great start! but for the more detailed curves and bumps, if you donāt know *why* they exist, its hard to draw them correctly! if that makes any sense?? for example, i see a lot of beginners draw bumps on the sides of the wrist when drawing hands, but sometimes it may look awkwardly placed or wrong because theyāre only mimicking what theyāve seen other artists do, and not thinking about the actual wrist bone that causes that bump. same for the collar bone, lots of people learn to stylize it as a line but have you looked at the actual shape of one before? do you know why we draw it curved in or how high in the chest it is?
that being said, its not like i consciously think about that every time i draw, and iām no expert on muscular or skeletal anatomy by any means slfdlmfs,, this may all seem obvious to some, but i think in general its important to consider and understand how the body is put together, even just on a subconscious level! you donāt have to learn all the muscles in the human body and a lot of this stuff is picked up from just drawing or observing real people, which again is probably the best form of practice. donāt be afraid to use references, especially of yourself if you can! I am constantly referencing my own body, by taking pictures of myself in the mirror or of my hands and then stitching those together to form the pose i want to make. using online models can help too, you just donāt want to rely too heavily on referencing them as a lot of times their features can be kinda wonky lol
im sorry this advice basically boils down toĀ āpractice more and draw from lifeā! i could try giving specific tips but im not great at making tutorials or explaining my process, and iām more of a visual/kinetic learner myself, so actually drawing and studying other artistsā works is what helps me best! if you donāt care to draw from life, thatās perfectly fine and understandable, thereās no one right way to do art and its okay to find observational drawing tedious and boring! you can still use observational skills on already stylized art and reference how other artists stylize things to learn, just be careful about heavily referencing and such ^^; i hope i helped a little bit and good luck w/ your art!
hey!!! I was watching your despair expressions vid and saw that when you selected Mikan's hair, it was outside the lineart!! but when you colored it, none of it was outside the lines!!! I was wondering how you did that!!
oh, sure!! itās actually a pretty simple process! iāll put it under the cut~
Iām gonna be explaining using saiās features, but if youāre familiar with a different program iām sure you can figure how saiās functions would translate over!in order to get to the point where i can color without having to worry about the lines too much, i first have to create a base! i do this by selecting outside the entire lineart layer. however, if youāre like me and pretty much just use a cleaner sketch for lines you might have a lot of holes in your lineart. in this case i just take the selection brush and cover those holes up!
once all the holes are filled, iām able to select around the full lineart using the magic wand tool:
make sure your magic wand is on the right settings! it should be on Transparency (Strict) for the crispest selection! You can also play around with the bar on the bottom, it really depends on how clean your lines are, but it basically just controls the sensitivity of the selection (whether it picks up as many holes in your lines or not).
if you do your lines on separate layers, its helpful to put them into a layer group so you can select around them all at once:Ā
i then go to the selection settings and invert the whole thing!
that leaves me with the entirety of the inside lines selected! you can also just straight up select inside the lines, but i find this is the cleanest way for me since i have a lot of overlapping and fine lines that would disrupt the selection otherwise.
I create a base layer underneath the lineart layers like so:
after that, i just Ctrl + F (or paint bucket tool) to fill in the space and then clear the selection w/ Ctrl + D and our base is finished!!
i make a layer folder above my base layer and clip it to the base by making it a clipping group. there are plenty of tutorials out there about how a clipping layer works so i wonāt go into it too much, but basically when a layer is clipped it allows you to color anywhere on the layer below it. so any layers that i make in this clipping group will act as if they are clipped to the base layer without me having to individually clip all of them.
now i can color as i please without having to worry about going outside the lines!
any new color layer i make will be inside this folder:
though this helps make it so you donāt have to worry about messiness outside the drawing, within the drawing colors can still overlap! what i do to color the rest of the image (since the skin is usually my bottom most layer) is select around the edges of the area iām coloring first! remember those holes in my lines from the beginning? this is to cover those up so the selection doesnt leave the inside of the drawing, but i donāt need to be as precise about it because ive already ensured that the color will stay clipped to the base layer:
i then select inside the area that i want to color (in this case the hair) with the magic wand tool, but i have to be cleaner about this to ensure that it doesnt go outside the lines of the hair:
and that last part was basically what you were seeing me do with mikan in the speedpaint! if i go into her file and unclip her colors from her base layer you can see that its actually a mess under there lol:
i hope that helps you out a little anon, it seems a bit convoluted when its typed out like this but once you get the hang of it, it comes as a natural next step when laying down base colors! good luck with your art!!and for anyone wondering, here is the speedpaint in question!
Ibbles, do you have any advice or videos you could share for a beginner digatal artist when it comes to colouring? I know to practice a ton but I need some sorta direction, ya know? Btw I ā”ā”ā”ā”ā”ā”ā” you're art!!! Ā°Ā°Ā°ā¢āŖļøāĀ°ā¢ā¢āāŖļøāāĀ°ā¢ā¢āāŖļøā¢Ā°āŖļøĀ°
thank you sm! hmmm, i think any advice i could give depends on what direction you want to take you coloring style! youāre right when you say practice cause i think a lot of developing any kind of style is about experimenting and seeing what feels comfortable. what helps me when im trying to figure out a new coloring style or upgrade my main one is looking at artists i admire and trying to mimic parts of their shading, or figure out how they create certain effects.
for my own coloring style i originally started out wanting a mix between cell shade and soft shade and gradually (like over the course of a few years) moved towards a more painterly style just bc i realized i most admired a more rendered look. and im still developing that! but recently ive wanted to have a secondary more simple style closer to cell shading, so ive been trying to examine how artists who mainly cell shade utilize bigger and more basic blocks of shadow. in general if youāre trying to go for a more simplistic style, maybe focus on color picking and really learning how to choose colors that compliment each other, and if you want a more detailed style, focus on depth and how you can incorporate both subtle color shifts between shades, as well as well placed darker colors for depth. i still struggle w/ using dark colors to make light areas pop ^^;
if you specifically want aĀ ātutorialā on how i color, i do have one here...kinda! its specific to shading hair, but the main process is basically how i shade everything else too. im not sure that really helps too much but good luck figuring out your art!!
Hello! Do you have any advice for someone who wants to sell merch but lives outside of US? I am especially concerned about the shipping prices.
I think it kinda depends on where you live, but building a basis in the country you live in is gonna be your best bet! Like, if youāre from the UK, or Canada, Australia, France, or Spain I know thereās definitely great local anime communities in all those places as Iāve received many orders from those locations and follow lots of artist based all around the world! And Iām sure there are many others in non-Eurocentric countries as well! Going to cons in person if there are any where you live definitely helps, and I think before this pandemic thatās how a lot of merch artist made the majority of their income. Knowing your customer base is definitely important.
If you want to ship internationally though, iād recommend starting off w/ light items, like prints, stickers, buttons etc, as they will cost less to ship. Look into shipping programs like those offered through Shopify and Paypal as they often give you small discounts on shipping prices and you can print the labels at home which saves time! I canāt really give advice on foreign mail systems as Iām not familiar with them, but your government run postal system is probably going to offer the cheapest prices, as compared to privately run corporations, unless youāre shipping out very heavy items.Ā
You could also look into a drop shipping system like Redbubble or Teespring to ship your merch for you, so you wonāt have to worry about shipping at all! These services ofc come with certain restrictions, but theyāre not bad to start off selling w/!
I hope that helps a little and good luck w/ selling your art!!Ā
