Post Halloween exhaustion! Candy crash! A new portfolio piece! Again, this one's pencil and digital. My confidence with this process is really growing. I've said it before but I have to say it again, this process really helps me do the exact kind of pictures I want. I've always wanted to be able to produce work that shows my drawing prominently but is richly coloured. I couldn't fully pull this off using ink and watercolour or pencil and watercolour because the paint would inevitably hide much of my linework. This has been driving me crazy for years. So, this is closer to what I've had in my head.
What I do is; take these very finished pencil drawings and scan them in. I rework them extensively on the Cintiq using Photoshop (CS4). Reworking the black and white drawing. Mainly I lighten it up with white lines. Part of my preferred technique has always been to go too dark in the initial drawing and then recover the highlights. In the past I've white ink, gouache or acrylic to achieve this. It's much easier using the Cintiq and very easy to correct. I also play with curves quite a bit to get the exposure just right.
I than duplicate the background drawing in another layer and set the blending option to multiply (I think... ) All the colour work is sandwiched between the two layers. This method keeps the colour beneath the linework, so that nothing gets lost beneath the colouring. It's like having two layers of clear paper and the line drawing is sitting on top of the colours, if that makes sense. (I use a lot more than two layers but you get the idea) Each layer of colour is set to a different opacity, I'm going for a slightly washed out look, not overly intense but with moments of richness. This process is just an extension of my traditional work so the learning curve has been pretty gentle.
And if you're wondering this is a bit of an homage to Maurice Sendak.
