Mermaid on the Rocks: Process
Added 2015-07-15 11:08:34 +0000 UTCStep 1: A simple sketch. Just getting the basic layout and poses.
Step 2: Pencil all the details. Also adjust the sizes so the mermaid is nice and big on the page. I adjusted the pose of the tail so I could make the mermaid larger without going off the edge of the page.
Step 3: Vector inking in Manga Studio. Constant line width for inanimate objects. Variable line width for characters.
Step 4: Basic color blocking. I sampled a lot of character from photos. It's good to put in a general background color at this point so that you can see how the colors look on that background.
Step 5: Simple shading. New layers for shading different parts, set to multiply or color burn, depending on the part. Since this scene is out in bright sunlight, I kept the shading very limited and mostly on just the side opposite the sun. I used a very soft brush with opacity controlled by pen pressure.
Step 6: Highlight. To emphasis the bright sunlight, I drew in very strong highlighting on the sides facing the sun. I used a hard brush and then went back with an eraser to soften up some, but not all, of the edges.
Step 7: Cast shadows. With only the sun for a light source, I made the cast shadows hard-edged, taking care to follow the curvature of the surfaces, which helps to emphasize the shapes of those surfaces.
Step 8: Make the tail shiny! I wanted a really shiny look, like leather or latex, but I really haven't done that before so I tried doxy's Shiny Things tutorial. I think it worked but I need more practice to really get a smoother look.
Step 9: Draw the ocean. This was a loooong step that made my hand hurt. I hadn't drawn an ocean before so I followed Jesus Conde's Ocean Water tutorial.
Step 10: Draw the clouds. For clouds, I like to use the technique from Crimsonjassic's Simple Clouds tutorial.
Step 11: Finishing touches. I added the joke ad banner. I also applied a color balance adjustment, pushing the shadows heavily toward blue, to bring the color composition together a bit more. It works well in such a heavily blue setting.
Comments
Thank you so much, Hina! The water took a lot of time to draw but the technique from that tutorial was amazingly easy to follow. The splash and wake weren't covered by the tutorial but the wake was fairly easy to adapt. For the splash, I just drew some of the waves near the rock and then I used a simple tiny round brush with a lot of variation in opacity, size, and scatter, then I smudged it to create directionality. The clouds were actually super-easy. You just blob it on there and then smudge it up and, poof, free clouds! It also helps to look at photos of real clouds for reference when you're blobbing them on there.
Dov Sherman
2015-07-16 03:56:14 +0000 UTCYou know what else I like about your pics is? It's the amazing creativity that your drawings are made of :) almost all of your drawings, are always so unique and original, and it's always what makes me come back for more :) :) :) The scene in general is quite brilliant and once again tells a fantastic story without even so much as a word :) I particularly like how you made the drawing resemble something you would see on an advert or flyer, it definitely adds a whole ton to the pic :) The way his tormentors joyfully abandon the (presumably a-hole) guy to his fate and the way the guy desperately tries to call them back is just such a brilliant scene :) and don't even get me started on the fantastic outfit, the lovely little mermaid is trapped in :) It's exactly what I imagine a fetish themed mermaid outfit to look like and I really like the way you can still see his feet at the tail :) combined with his two gigantic obviously fake breasts and rather prominent bulge, he will certainly have a lot of explaining to do, to his eventual saviors :) :) :) Now to get down to the totally awesome details of this pic :) The way the buckles of his mermaid tail shine is the first thing that grabs my attention and that also equally leads me to the equal amount of amazing shine of the rest of his outfit :) you instantly get the impression of the material he's trapped in and adds so incredibly much to the drawing :) The water and clouds are probably the most amazing things though (from an artistic point of view) the way you drew the little splash of water as it hits the rocks and the way the boat carves through the water It left me in total awe of the amount of simply amazing detail that you put in :) and then you combine it with the amazing sun glare in the background and the puffy white clouds that could definitely be real and Gah just soooooooooo much awesome crammed into one pic :) :) :) All in all so far the best money I've ever spent :) I can hardly wait to see what you come up with next :) :) :)
Hina Yui
2015-07-16 03:35:53 +0000 UTC
