so... college is interesting. been painting/drawing like mad.. but no anime.. not really.

i miss it and i don't at the same time. i look at it now.. and it doesnt seem hard to me anymore.. anime i mean. it seems so easy now :/ realism took the fun out of it i suppose... cause realism is so hard for me sometimes...

im thinking ill make a separate account and post all of my work that ive done over the past two years... so everyone can see what ive been up to at school..

im not sure.
ill think it through~

-AZN.. sudeki.. sudeki-butt...

uhm... yeah i didnt want that long ass journal on my page..

so this is my default .

yey.

FUCK tutorials. I will admit.. they are nice... But learning is through experience and vice versa.

But I'll be damned if I spend 8+ hours on a tutorial on how I color people. x_X.

So. I'm going to lecture.. if you will.

Listen if you dare.


I find that the issues most upcoming artists have involve hands, folds, and achieving a believable skin color. Anatomy is not hard to learn and imagine at all. One simply has to understand the skeleton, the porportions, and how skin and muscle and meat all achieve a three dimensional form. Trust me. Anatomy is NOT hard.

It's not. I'm sorry. I had to tell you. I didn't mean to break your heart. Drawing and re-drawing a person that someone else drew or from a photo is the easiest way to learn. The hardest way would be to draw from the imagination. But if you are the brave and ever so clever soul, you would draw your anime character, and compare it to a picture with an anatomy that you admire. For example, I am fucking in LOVE with 's anatomy. I still draw my own shit, but I learn from her pictures. It's how I taught myself.

Drawing realistic humans is another story.

Folds are probably the hardest thing to grasp, especially when drawing anime simply because you have to imagine the fabric falling over someone's body. After a while, you get the hang of it and you manage to make educated guesses.

But for some reason, even after achieving a decent anatomy in a figure, I find that several artists STRUGGLE DESPERATELY with skin color.
Once again, I'm going to burst your bubble.

Skin is not "brown" or "tan" or "white". It's never just ONE color. Unless you are an alien... or pale.
I won't chastise those who use brown to shade their human, because if that's your style.. hey.... so be it.

But those who are struggling.. I will let you in on a secret. Skin color is nothing but layers and layers of pigment. Pigment that is combined in such a way, that is produces the APPEARANCE of tan or white or pinkish. This is science.
So, instead of denying science, why not color the same way in say, Photoshop? Or when one paints using oils or acrylic?

The SECRET to achieving a believable skin color is through the use of layering colors and adjusting the opacity (in real life or in Photoshop. Either works the same).

By examining skin, you will find that for someone with a lighter skin color, there are pinks, pale purples, light browns, reflections of color from other objects, grays, whites, yellows, oranges. If the person is tan, there are oranges, browns, yellows, reds, and deeper purples and blacks.

Darker skinned people have a different pigment makeup. There are of course darker browns and blacks, but also (again) the purples and oranges so commonly seen in skin. Grays are typically evident in a darker person's skin. How on earth do I know the general color makeup of skin?

Take a look for yourself.

[link]

This man is not tan. Sorry ladies. As an artist, one must learn how to break down the colors you see. Practicing how to distinguish realistic colors from real people will train you GREATLY when practicing with Photoshop, whether you are merely doing an anime character, or a digitial portrait.

How about this one.

[link]

What colors can you pick out? Be careful though. She has beautiful olive skin, but even she has the purples. Her dominant color is a very pale yellow, with layers of dark brown and a dark, but pale purple that shadows her face. If I were to CG this photo, I would start with a 100% opaque layer of pale yellow. And when I mean pale, I mean pale. Most new artists make the mistake of using vibrant and bright colors to start out with skin. For beginners, using pale colors at first and learning how to layer them is the best way. Only until one masters that can they move on to the cheat sheet way.

[link]

To achieve radical skin colors like this, you are going to HAVE to start out with a bright, lively orange. Then you would add your light pinks, your browns, your brownish-greens, your whites, and of course, your blacks. You could add purples if you wanted to, but with this skin color, it wouldn't be necessary. Like I said.... pretty soon you can pick out colors and as you pick out colors, you'll learn how to patch together a plan on how in the HELL you are going to copy her skin color.

[link]

and

[link]

Coming back down to anime, even anime artists use the basics of skin. The first picture has a simple break down of a pale, off white color layered with pinks, reds, oranges, purples, and greys on top.

The second is almost exactly the same, only it uses much darker and richer colors. This artist must have used a high opacity for the colors in whatever program she (or he) used.

Then of course, there's the anime cel-style side.

[link]

Even though it's cel-looking, she still used rendition of purple. It doesn't look like it, but that's what it is. XD! It's a mixture between light brown and light purple.. and together.. you get brownurple. But of course, with anime, you can do anything. With anime, you can bend the rules of skin color.

Anyways.. back to reality.
This is the process I go through when painting, CGing, Graffiti-ing on Facebook-ing.
I think.. Hmm.. what skin color do i want? And what colors make up that skin color?

Then... I layer them accordingly.
[Hint: Layering is also not that difficult either. Playing with the opacity in the medium you use (oils, photoshop.. etc..) will have different effects and thus, different colors. Eventually.. you will learn what degree of opacity does what.. so fret not!]

After I'm done.. i think.. how do I make this more realistic? Is it missing a color or tint/shade of white or black? [Hint: Lightly opaque degrees of white and black will save your life. If you need the face to be lighter after you've already pretty much busted your ass shading... bring the opacity level down and get the white... and brush over the entire thing. Instant brightness. Same somewhat goes for darker. Both brown and black can used when regarding skin color]

This is my process. This is also how I learned. XD I'm sure there are easier ways... like replaying somethin on Graffiti... or downloading a video file for openCanvas..

But it's what my mental and artistic process is. Almost all artists do the same thing regarding all objects, not just skin color. Practice picking out colors in everyday objects. Then move onto harder shit like people and skin. Then move onto even harder things like metallic, reflective objects (... yes... it sucks).

.. and that's my advice. Take it or leave it bitches D:

mmmmm.

so .. college is awesome.

but.. im afraid it leaves me no time for the anime that i love?
im thinking i should just post the traditional shit i do cause obviously i do more of that than anything else XD...

havent drawn anime in forevers.


updated scraps section. some low quality pics of my sketchbook.. XD

D: as of now, im a graffiti fiend on facebook.. so come find me and make requests. :[

-asia matos ... aka sudekers

D:


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