hansooyung's coloring tutorial & ctiys: alma time! 🍒
hello everyone! though i've been meaning to for a while, i've finally gotten around to making my first manga coloring tutorial! i'll be going over cleaning panels and screentones, choosing base colors, and finally shading and lighting.
this will also be a color this in your style challenge, so if you're willing, feel free to post your colored panel and tag me in it!! i'd love to see all the results :)
find details under the cut! 🦋
DISCLAIMERS:
this is just how i personally color! i know for a fact that some of my other friends follow other methods and have such beautiful colorings <33
for colors specifically, i play around a LOT. if you don't like your color scheme for the time being, mess around with it! i don't use psds since i like to mess around by hand with color palettes, but maybe i'll look into it for the future.
i explain a lot just bear with me gang 🙏
TECHNICAL STUFF:
software: ibis paint x (on iphone). i use ibis since it is FREE for all phones and it worked on my chromebook as well.
while this tutorial is made for ibis paint x, everything works on other softwares except the brushes, which i've provided alternatives for below.
brushes: i will be using dip pen (hard) which is automatically included with ibis, and two other brushes i made myself which you can find here and here. for more brushes, @/bkdkdh was incredibly helpful and posted her awesome set here!
for other softwares, you can use similar brushes. dip pen (hard) can just be the default brush, while wet edges is just the default brush on lowered opacity (and more of a rectangle/marker shape?). watercolor pencil is a watercolor brush in the rectangle/marker shape as well. if you can't get the shape, you can always smudge your lines into shape as well, so don't fret too much! a bunch of people only use one brush for coloring everything (which is insane to me, personally, they are so talented!)
fun fact: the first brush listed that i made was originally called "aki tao watercolor smooth" 👍
ok here we go guys!!
STEP ONE: CLEANING THE PANEL
i think of this part as setting up the panel for coloring! usually it's pretty exhausting cuz it's all b&w but it's all worth it i swear. the panel i'll be coloring is this beautiful one of alma from chapter 2:
imgur link here (x)
a lot of people redraw their lines to avoid screentones, which is extremely helpful. however, i work on a phone and my fingers are not steady even with the stabilizer turned all the way up T~T. i do it this way, but a different (possibly easier) way may work for you!!!
your first step will be to remove all the white, giving us a transparent background to work with. THIS IS THE NUMBER ONE REASON WHY I USE IBIS PAINT X.
when you upload the image to ibis, a popup comes asking if you would like to "extract line drawing". this creates a lineart of your image. click yes, and your work is like 90% done.
if you're not on ibis, you can redraw your panel, put lineart layer on screen, etc. or you can just extract line drawing from ibis and upload to software of your choice
for those of you not on ibis, i've included the line drawing here (x) if it looks black, don't worry and set your background to white.
omg i was not kidding when i said i explained a lot. ok now onto the three main steps of cleaning the panel:
cleaning background
removing screentones
repainting black lines
for cleaning the background, we're going to clear off all the extraneous stuff. this includes the text in the speech bubble, the gradient screentones behind alma, and the panel line on the left side. just use your eraser tool and go crazy! (i forgot to save the panel at this point of the coloring OTL)
for removing screentones, we're going to remove all those "dots" that mangakas use for shading. these are used to show value for b&w art, but since we're coloring we don't need them—a lot of people have really cool ways of incorporating screentones in their colorings though, and it looks amazing! i used it on nana's hand in my bnha coloring.
remove the screentones from alma's hair and jacket with your eraser tool. this will take time, but it's worth it in the end!
for portions with a bunch of lines, you can create A NEW LAYER and redraw some of the lines. that way, you can erase indiscriminately from the original layer but the lines you drew are still there. again, like i said, my hand is really shaky so i don't do it a lot, but it's extremely helpful for smaller parts where i have control! i used this on alma's jacket, and here's a screenshot of the process:
(i made his jacket purple so i could distinguish between layers easily).
it should look like this when you're done:
for the final step of cleaning, i like to erase all the things colored black (the collar and strings of the jacket, along with the back part of his hair). that way, i can color them in with dark colors and it adds to the whole look of the coloring.
i've circled the parts i'm going to erase below:
and it should look like this when you're done!
ok everyone cheer we're ready to color now!!!!
STEP TWO: BASE COLORS
CROWD CHEERS ok lets go!
this part is the most important to me, because it sets the tone for the whole coloring. i like to use three-four main colors in my colorings, and it's usually background, skintone, hair, and the secret fourth color. the secret fourth color is usually whatever color fits the character's vibe, or if the character's color is the bg, it'll be an accent color.
for example, with my nagi coloring, i used white for the hair, i had my skintone, i had blue as the main coloring vibe (as nagi's color), and black as the accent color.
for alma, i chose his main color to be red! it's the color of his hair and his jacket, so i wanted it to be vibrant and stand out. since blue contrasts red, i went for a greyish-blue shade for the background. (i went for grey rather than solely blue because then it would clash rather than complement).
disclaimer please please please take your device off night mode warm mode f.lux whatever you have. this has screwed me over more times than you may think :(
i like to make my vibrant colors closer to the right end of the color square. for alma's hair, i chose this color:
i dragged it down from the corner a bit but kept the saturation since his hair is kind of dark. we can use vibrant colors to shade it though, so don't worry!
here's his hair and the background together:
now from here, play around with skintones until you find one that matches the hair!
i usually drag around the wheel to the orange-red intersection, and have it on the lighter, more saturated side. here's the color i chose for alma's skintone.
i thought his original skintone looked a bit too orange, so i pulled the saturation back a little bit (moved closer to the left side of the square).
after that, color in his jacket with a bit darker red than hair, choose a gold color for the accents on his jacket, and color in the black parts with a grey-ish color (we will change that later).
here's the base colors!
if it looks a bit bright, don't worry! we can change that with shading. or you might just have to. accept the light.
STEP THREE: SHADING AND LIGHTING
wooo we made it!!!!!!! ok now i lied, we have a bit more of base colors to go. on a layer above the skin, color in your teeth and tongue. for pieces that have a more red feel (like this one), i like to make the teeth and the shading a more vibrant blue color. (for blue pieces, i make it a purple!).
IMPORTANT NOTE: ALL SHADING AND ALL COLORS SHOULD BE DONE ON NEW, CLIPPED LAYER.
i'll then go in and do some light shading with my wet edges brush. i'll use a darker color for hard shadows and then a lighter, more vibrant color to accentuate it.
next up we have blush! a lot of people do this in very different ways but i like to do it directly under the eyes, in a vibrant red shade. make a new layer above the skin and clip it on. color pick alma's hair and drag it to the most saturated shade (red corner). then using the watercolor pencil brush, lower the opacity of the brush and drag a line under the eyes on both sides.
make sure to erase the portion of blush that goes above the eyeline. i also added some lips for alma as you can see, and then added a red line under the eyes! this was back to the regular dip pen (hard) brush on 100% opacity. it may take a few tries to get your blush to the way you want it, so don't worry too much.
now we can start our actual shading!
i break this part up into three steps: skin shading, blue shading, and light shading (highlights?)
for all of them, think about where the light is falling and how it will look on alma.
quick interlude about brushes: i use the watercolor pencil brush for softer, bouncy looks (like blush and noses) and i use the wet edges brush for more hard lines in shading.
again, make a new layer above the skin and clip it on. (i like to have it below the blush, so it doesn't cover it). for skin shading, i take the vibrant red and lower the opacity of the wet edges brush by a significant amount (specifics don't really matter, as long as you're happy with it). i'll trace his neck, from the shadow of his face, shadows of his hair falling on his face, ears, and nose. (for the nose i used the watercolor pencil brush for a softer look).
this is what i have once i'm done!
next we have skin shading part two, where we basically make a new layer on top of our first shading, lower the opacity further, and trace outside whatever we just did to blend it in more.
i used the watercolor pencil brush since it's more softer shading meant for blending! i also added it around the eyebrows for depth.
next up we have our blue shading! this is a technique that i learned from @/bkdkdh's colorings, but adding blue as a shadow really adds to the whole coloring. using the watercolor pencil brush, select a light-ish blue shade (a bit more saturated than background color) and use it to shadow a few more areas than your skin shading. i always make sure to hit the underside of the nose, cuz i think it adds depth!
finally, to wrap up our skin shading we have our lights. i use an orange-ish yellow color, which i set pretty light to not blend into the skin. using the watercolor pencil brush, i'll basically highlight any areas opposite to where the blue was, and highlight different parts. i always highlight one side of the nose as well.
i erased the line around the nose since we now have shading there, and added a darker shade to the teeth since i felt it wasn't shaded enough.
now onto the hair!!! (guys we're almost done bear with me, skin and hair are the two main things and then you can half-ass the clothes)
color pick alma's hair color, then drag the red a bit further down to get a darker yet still saturated color. here's mine:
then, using the wet edges brush, draw lines of shadow wherever clumps of his hair fall or overlap with each other. you can have the opacity set to whatever level you want, i just went with around 90. just try to follow the natural lines and patterns of the original line drawing, and everything should work out fine.
here's how mine looks! then, just like we did for skin shading, place a layer on top and lower the opacity to around 50%. place some more shading to blend it in. you can also shade more parts with this shade for some softer shading. i actually forgot to take a screenshot of this step but you'll see it in the next one!
for our (almost) last part of hair shading, take a layer and place it below both of your shading layers. this is going to be our highlight layer! you can see it below, labeled 49%.
remember how we set alma's hair a bit darker from the corner color? now select that corner color and draw highlights in the center of each hair clump.
lightly visible but it's there!
now here i skipped around a bit bc i was having fun and forgot i was doing a tutorial, but repeat the shading (not highlighting) steps with darker colors for alma's jacket. you should have your base layer, a dark shading, and a softer shading for blending.
we're almost there guys!!!
for the pretty much final step of shading, select a light blue color and do some blue shading with the watercolor pencil brush opposite to wherever your darker shading falls (just like we did on the face). make sure to do it to both your hair and your jacket! here's mine:
now for the black portions, we're going to color the whole thing in a dark blue color. just alpha lock your layer and make a big stroke of dark blue, almost black. for our black shading, we're actually going to go lighter.
select a lighter (but still dark) color and place highlights on the base layer, then take an even more vibrant, lighter blue and place it on the very outside for highlights. a better example of this would be nagi's legs in his blue lock uniform here. then, choose a shade to apply shading to the gold accents on alma's jacket and we're done!
CROWD CHEERS!!!!!
STEP FOUR: FINISHING TOUCHES
we made it guys!!!! for finishing touches, i'll usually do background effects or text or that kind of stuff.
step one is coloring your lines. you can add a new layer and clip it to your lineart, or simply alpha lock your lineart and color directly on top. for hair i like to add vibrant blue/purple lines, along with a few red ones. for skin lines i try to do dark brownish purples, but leaving some black is good too bc it adds flavor!
i colored in the text boxes and added shadows using the wet edge feature, then added some text. for the glitch effect, i duplicated the lineart, dragged the layer below all of my colors (including speech bubbles) and then used the glitch effect with height full from ibis. if you don't have ibis, you can look into features on your software, or you can also just drag your lineart layer a bit to either side and color it in. i also applied just the tiniest bit of noise on top of everything
and there we go!!!!! we made it to the end :)
if you've read all the way til here, thank you so much! if you decide to color this panel of alma (or any other panels!) don't be afraid to post them and tag me for a color this in your style type of thing! (you can also put it in my tracked tag, #user.roy) i'd love to see everyone's works :)
here's the full timelapse: (it stalls for a bit at some times but hey we can't have everything)
