If that's the case you may have to compensate for the lack of white by using dark tones (?). Will need softer pencils for that, though, and frankly graphite is just not suitable to create dark tones.

I quite like the idea of a sleeping, half-complete cyborg girl. It'll make quite an interesting image, if completed.

@ Adam

It depends entirely on the resolution of the painting. If the eyes are going to be the focus, then it's fine to draw them in strand by strand

BUT, even then, the results may still look unrealistic, especially if you are not careful with the placement and direction of each eyelash.

And simply by making the edge of the upper eyelid a thick, dark line, you can already give the illusion of thicker lashes.

An example, from here: http://www.pocketmole.com/tutorials/eye/



You can see that even without drawing in all the lashes strand by strand, the eye looks pretty good, and at a distance (aka if the portrait is a bust/waist-up or full body work), the lack of exact rendering doesn't matter.

Which is a long winded way of saying that, in the end, sometimes it's better to keep things simple, and to hint at details rather than fuss over them. Sometimes, time and practical constraints prevent you from painting every pore, or drawing every single strand of hair, or every leaf in a tree. The image as a WHOLE needs to work, and if it doesn't, working on the nitty gritty details will never make it any better.

@ H4X

Oh, that's VERY nice. I see you've improved since the last I saw you.

Amusing myself with drawing nonsense...

Actual work this time still a work-in-progress

@ Inachi

Reference. Her face really does look like that, lol. I'm not painting this to create a beauty portrait

Work work work work work work work...



Should have asked model to smile earlier. She looks great when smiling.

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Jan 30 2012, 10:58 PM

Custom speckled brush in photoshop.

@ mclelun

I agree with agito. It's nice, but too fast. They move like they'd eaten several Brazillian plantations' worth of coffee. Donkeys and all. LOL

Character #1 complete:



Working on Character #2 now:

@ Sai

It IS Commander Shepard, actually Or one player's version of her, anyway (this is for an art trade. I make her a set of paintings, she makes me a pair of earrings)

Also, update on the second:



This post has been edited by DragonReine: Feb 5 2012, 10:37 PM

Thank you! <3

Uh, around 6-7 hours so far for the second painting? Haven't done the hair and the leather choker yet, and that's going to be a b***h to paint, so there will be another >5 hours for that.

Thankfully I have the next two days off, so I can finish this series by Tuesday, and I can get my earrings (image below) mailed over, yay!

@ Adam

My way of getting clean lineart/sketches. Which may or may not be the most optimal way of doing things, but it works for me:

Firstly, you'd need to get a much better image of that scan than what you've taken. Right now it's rather obvious that the area on the left side of the image is somewhat darker than the right, and you can see the table at the top of the image, and there's an obvious colour cast (I'm guessing you photographed this under incandescent light), which may cause noise issues.

You'll need to get it as evenly illuminated as possible, otherwise you'll get an image that has patches of gray which will be hard to remove unless you're willing to spend time hand-painting it away.

Ideally, you should get this scanned using a scanner. Otherwise, you need to get a really clean photograph with no shadows. Suggest reading these to get the optimal image: http://emptyeasel.com/2007/01/19/how-to-ph...r-the-internet/ and http://emptyeasel.com/2009/09/17/camera-ti...rk-for-the-web/

Once you get your clean photo/scan, it's ready for processing in Photoshop. This is what I'd do in Photoshop CS5:

(Steps 1 and 2 are actually optional, but I use them if the image has a colour cast, so I can get a clean grayscale sketch)

1) Layers -> New Adjustment Layer -> Channel Mixer.

2) Select option of channel mixing that produces the cleanest image, i.e. the least noise. There are various preset "B&W with X filter" options, you'd have to test for yourself to see which preset produces the cleanest grayscale image.

3) Layers -> New Adjustment Layer -> Levels

4) Push the white slider towards the left to get pure whites. You will probably have push the gray and/or black slider towards the right to compensate for "blowout" or loss of colour.

A more obvious tutorial (with helpful images) can be found here: http://www.jmort.com/tutorials/scanning.html#levels

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Feb 6 2012, 07:19 AM

Ah, you merged it with your previous avatar, didn't you? Clever. Although the purples don't quite match, LOL

Looks fine, as long as one doesn't look too closely. I'm just the kepoh type that likes to inspect every pixel of people's avaters

(joking, but I tend to notice colour shifts, it's hard to ignore)

Portrait #2 complete:



Now working on portrait #3

A snap of what Reine does while painting:



A friend of mine asked how do I lay down colours without losing the underlying sketch, and this was my visual response Zoom REALLY far out and keep the image size small-ish.


This post has been edited by DragonReine: Feb 9 2012, 10:05 PM

Here's several sets of custom brushes for Photoshop, with PDF files on the settings, how to use them, and how to create similar brush effects in Painter (if applicable).

Custom Brushes for Basic Painting, Skin and Hair

Custom Brushes for Fabric and Costume Detailing

Custom Brushes for Natural Backgrounds (Sky and Earth)

Custom Brushes for Elemental Effects (Water, Ice and a bit of Fire)

All created by Marta Dahlig.

I've also attached a PDF file sourced from ImagineFX magazine that details how to create your own custom brushes and brush libraries in Photoshop.

EDIT: Or not, since it seems that Lowyat won't let me attach files >_> So here's a link to a set of tutorials that show you how to make brushes using various methods: Tutorial Search on deviantArt

This post has been edited by DragonReine: Feb 10 2012, 07:12 PM

@ Sai

You're welcome!

Frankly, ImagineFX.com provides LOTS of free workshops, most of which deal with digital painting. Of course, the quality/usefulness varies depending on your needs/skill level/how clear the instructor is, but most of them are very, very good. I suggest taking the time to read them, when you can