Walltip: "Let Sleeping Wolves Lie" Walkthrough

Today's walltip is a quick walkthrough of "Let Sleeping Wolves Lie".
Step 1: Vector trace
This is a pretty straight forward step. You go into a vector program and you trace your images. I started with Amaterasu of course, and then built the rest of the scene around her. I traced varying elements of the waterfall image and placed them in appropriate places. By tracing, I can make sure all the elements match and are consistent with each other. You'd never know there was supposed to be a shrine in the image now!

Step 2: Mix with original image to get colors
A vector can't capture everything about an image. In this case, there was a lot of great texture in the rock face and island that would not have been feasible to trace, so I matched up those elements of the waterfall image to the trace. I also added some general texture and did a color tint towards yellow, since in the end I want the image to have an aged feeling.

Step 3: Blend colors
A lot of the colors have sharp transitions (from the vector trace) or are messy (aligning the waterfall image with the vector) so I went and used the blender brush in Painter to meld things together. This is prepwork for the watercolor clone stage, as we'll want more gradual color transitions in the watercolor.

Step 4: Watercolor clone
The image was repainted with Painter's watercolor brush. The outlines are on a separate layer so they remain nice and crisp. There's not much to this step but a lot of work, since I limited myself to a max brush size of 10px (it takes a long time to cover 3840x2880 worth of canvas!) The key to the watercolor is to match the direction of the brush strokes with the color transitions/gradations. At this point I also added in the flowers of the island that I blended out in the previous step.

Step 5: Texture and color corrections
I have a bunch of paper textures in Photoshop from old wallpapers, so I just reused them here. Adding the texture increases the yellow tint (since I am basically adding yellow-colored texture) and this made the water and sky too green, so I did some quick color correction to make them blueish again.

And there you have it. 5 easy steps to a great wall... or is it?

Making Katamari in the Snow

Here's a quick rundown on how I watercolored "Katamari in the Snow".
First, I started with the vector trace (Illustrator 9):

Then I moved on to Painter 9 and the watercolor tool:

This is similar to how I've watercolored previous works (such as Mountain's Red Leaves.

A run down of Painter IX's brushes (Part I)

This is an exploration of Painter IX's default brush set. Painter has a ton of brush sets mimicking natural media, and is best utilized with a tablet to gain pressure sensitivity. There are so many types of brushes, that it's hard to know which brush has what effects.

This is based off of Painter IX's brush set. Brush sets in other versions of Painter will vary. Painter arranages its brushes by categories, which are fairly broad collections of brushes with similar settings. They tend to vary by effect, brush size, brush tip shape, and pressure sensitivity.

What the chart means

• Wet/Dry: Painter has two types of brushes: Wet and Dry. Wet brushes must be used on a "wet" layer, and cannot interact with Dry brushes unless the wet layer is dried. There is also a hybrid "digital wet" brush that combines some aspects of both wet and dry brushes (they combine the characteristics of wet brushes, but can be used on dry layers directly.) Some categories contain brushes for both sets (there are both wet erasers and dry erasers, for example.)
• Blending: Some brushes pick up the color of other paints around them. Some do not.
• Opacity: Some brushes have a greater dynamic range in opacity than others.
• Brush tip: The general brush tip shape
• Paper Grain: Denotes whether a brush picks up the texture of the paper's grain.
  
  Left: Where to change your paper's grain | Right What grain means for a Painter brush
• Buildup: Some brushes build up color as you pass the brush over the same area multiple times.
  
  Above: Two brushes with different buildup characteristics.

And now, on to the brushes!

Acrylics [general info]

• Sample brushes: thick acrylic bristle, thick opaque acrylic, wet acrylic
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: Varies. "Wet" or "soft" acrylics tend to pick up more colors than other acrylics.
• Opacity: Generally opaque. Slight opacity on brush edges.
• Brush tip: Varies. Distinct brush fibers or flat tips.
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: None

Airbrushes [general info]

• Sample brushes: coarse spray, soft airbrush, variable splatter
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Varies from entirely opaque to almost entirely transparent. "Soft" airs are the most transparent.
• Brush tip: Round, with either soft or hard edges. Most brushes have a spatter radius.
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: None

Artist Oils

• Sample brushes: dry bristle, impasto oil, tapered oils
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: High
• Opacity: Mostly opaque
• Brush tip: Generally square, tapers quickly.
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: None

Artists

• Sample brushes: Impressionist, Seurat, Van Gogh
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Generally opaque
• Brush tip: Variable. Each brush is unique, mimicking a different artist's style.
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: None

Blenders

• Sample brushes: Grainy blender on Pens, Oily blender on Oils, Soft blender on Pastels
• Wet/Dry: Dry. Watercolor and Digital Watercolor blenders are contained in their respective categories.
• Blending: Blenders are used to blend paints that have already been laid down on the canvas.
• Opacity: N/A
• Brush tip: Variable, but generally round
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: N/A

Calligraphy [general info]

• Sample brushes: calligraphy brush, thin grainy pen
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Fully opaque
• Brush tip: Thin and at an angle
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: None

Chalk [general info]

• Sample brushes: blunt chalk, square chalk, variable width chalk
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Mostly opaque
• Brush tip: Round or square
• Paper Grain: Yes, generally strong
• Buildup: None

Charcoal [general info]

• Sample brushes: dull charcoal pencil, soft charcoal, soft vine charcoal
• Wet/Dry: Dry.
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Mostly opaque
• Brush tip: Round or square
• Paper Grain: Yes, generally mild
• Buildup: None

Cloner

• Sample brushes: camel oil cloner, furry cloner, smeary flat cloner, all using same base pattern
• Wet/Dry: Wet and Dry
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Varies.
• Brush tip: Varies
• Paper Grain: Varies
• Buildup: Varies

Colored Pencils [general info]

• Sample brushes: colored pencil, oily colored pencil, variable colored pencil
• Wet/Dry: Dry
• Blending: Some
• Opacity: Partially transparent
• Brush tip: Round and small
• Paper Grain: Yes, generally mild
• Buildup: Yes, generally mild

Conte [general info]

• Sample brushes: dull conte, square conte, tapered conte
• Wet/Dry: Dry
• Blending: None
• Opacity: Mostly opaque
• Brush tip: Round or square, dense bristles
• Paper Grain: None
• Buildup: None

Ramblings on Mushishi: Mata Itsuka

NOTE: I just found this half-finished entry in my "potential blog topics" Google Notebook when I was doing some testing during work, so I decided to finish and post it, no matter how late it is.

One of the motivations behind turning my recent Mushishi wall, Mata Itsuka, from a vector-only wall (like Oyako) to a painted wall was to gain more familiarity with Corel Painter 9. I've had Painter for years (although only upgraded to 9 last year) but have only used it extensively for a few wallpapers. Frankly, having no experience in natural media aside from pencil/pen and paper, the number of options overwhelms me, and I have no basis for understanding how the oil-based brushes are supposed to work compared to, say, oil pastels. Still, a painting-based wall was just the excuse necessary to get more practice!
The last wall I used Painter on was the Okama Hunter in the Grass wall where I used the digital watercolor brushes to create a textured background. I went back to the digital watercolor tools (not to be confused with Painter's watercolor tools which is an entirely different palette) because I liked how they maintained the paper texture, and because I like the watercolor look in general.
One of the first things I discovered was Painter's custom brush maker. This thing is about 25x more complicated than Photoshop's custom brush maker and about 50x as fun, because you can actively preview the brush while you're making it but before committing to the changes. Very slick. I wasted probably several hours just messing around with controls, although in the end I created a new digital watercolor brush quite similar to the presets but with more control over the brush size based on tablet pressure and a fixed opacity (the presets were switched in pressure control on size/opacity).
Basically, I began by painting the base color for Ginko's face, then adding successive layers of shadow and highlights. I painted way outside of the outlines as I planned to mask the final color layers in Photoshop. After several frustrating attempts to figure out how to use the digital watercolor blenders, I gave up and decided to use the regular set of blenders. However, in Painter, you have to 'dry' any liquid ink layer (such as digital watercolor) before you can use the "dry" brushes (which include blenders, oils, etc.) Afterwards, though, the regular blenders were most intuitive to use and everything went from a sorta cel-style shading to a much softer gradient-style shading.
I like Painter's blenders a lot, and plan to use them in many more painty walls.

Tutorial: Painting "Mountain's Red Leaves"

Here is the tutorial segment of my Hakkenden "Mountain's Red Leaves" Paint-o-rama contest entry. It describes how I created the wallpaper, step by step. Click on each image thumbnail for the full screenshot.

Step 0: Preparing the Image
I found the scan of Hakkenden from AnimePaper and decided to use it for my wallpaper. However, to make a wallpaper I had to extend the image horizontally to fit the widescreen format. This was achieved in Illustrator, using fairly simple paths to define the shape of the trees, and then applying several effects of roughen and twist at low levels to create the jaggy edges that defined the leaves. The image was then exported to Photoshop at 200% size where some texture was added.


Step 1: Base Layer
I created a new blank canvas in Painter, and then opened my prepped image, setting this as the clone source. With a very large watercolor brush I basically filled the canvas with color. At this stage it wasn't very important to get all the details right - just make sure the canvas is covered. This fills the large areas (like the orange sky and the darkest layer of trees) quickly and easily.
It's useful to have a copy of the original as the top layer in your file, set at a low transparency. Although you can use 'tracing paper' to see a semi-transparent version of your clone file, you don't have any control over it. Having it as a layer means you can show or hide at will, change the transparency levels, etc, so it's easy to see what you're cloning from.


Step 2: Start adding details
Using a smaller brush (half the size of the first brush) I began to more closely define the edges. I don't repaint the entire image, just the edges. Note that in using the watercolor option in Painter you get white halos around the brush. Be sure to have plenty of extra space at your edges, so you can easily remove them with a soft eraser when you are finished.


Step 3: Second verse, same as the first
Continue as before using yet a smaller brush. Also, be sure to lock your previous layers, as it will prevent you from painting over a finished layer.


Step 4: Small enough for details?
When you get down to 8px you can actually define all the details at the edges. In this step I used not only 8px brushes but also 4px and 2px for especially detailed areas (the area around the geisha, and the bridge, for the most part.)


Step 5: Blend it all together
After the watercolor portion is done, you'll want to erase those halos I mentioned earlier. I did that in Photoshop (because I could select the layer's transparency and use a feathered mask on the layer.) Afterwards all of the layers were merged. The canvas was also extended ~50px in all directions and the color cloned at the top. This is because when you use the blender tools in Painter, it pulls an average color of what is beneath your brush - and at the edges of the canvas, it pulls in white, giving you a bad frame effect.
Like before, use a large blender for expediency, and smaller blenders when you're painting around the edges. Below is a typical workflow:
Step 5a: (the before shot)
Here is the edge of a tree, before anything is done.


Step 5b: Blending the edges
First, using a small (6px) blender, define the edges of the tree. Since all the trees have scalloped edges, make sure your brush stroke is in the same type of semi-circle. Also, by going slightly beyond the edge of the tree, you'll pull in the lighter color behind it. This gives the edges a bit of glow and adds depth.


Step 5c: Filling the interior
Using a larger (12px) blender, fill in the rest of the tree. This technique could also be useful in painting clouds, as they have the same scallop edges and lighting emphasis.


After the blending step, there were some final post-production steps in Photoshop - cropping the extra pixels out from step 5, adding a hint of texture to emphasize the painting style, text (a haiku from Issa), and final colors and levels adjustment. Finally, add your signature and post it on your website!

Using the Smudge Tool

The Smudge Tool: How to add a painted effect to an existing image

This article discusses how I've used Photoshop's smudge tool (the one that's an index finger pointing downward) to create a painted effect on several wallpapers. It does not discuss how to create a digital painting from scratch. There are many tutorials on that subject by as many artists as there are styles.

The smudge tool works really well in conjunction with an art tablet because you can utilize the tablet's pressure sensitivity to manipulate the strength of the smudging. Also, if you are comfortable using your tablet to draw, write or doodle on the screen, smudging will feel fairly intuitive. I haven't tried smudging with the mouse, but considering how labor-intensive smudge-painting a 1920x1200 image is, I can't imagine it would be good for your wrist.

Before you start smudging, you have to prepare your image. Smudging works best on an image that has some texture, half-tone dots, noise, dirt, dust or speckles, because it drags around the colors under the cursor. If you're working on a flat color, there's nothing to see when you start to smudge. This makes smudging another technique to consider for image cleanup and re-CG. Also, you should keep a copy of the original image on a locked layer. If you mess up, or want to redo a region, you can just copy it from that layer and rework it. Sometimes you can't go back enough steps in the history and even reverting won't bring you back to the state you want. Also, it helps you keep track of what areas you've worked on and where you need to go, and in the end it's fun to compare the original to the smudge-painted version.

The important thing to remember when smudging is that to get the painted effect, you need to smudge in the direction a paint brush would go. This may mean following the curves of a hand, or rolling in circles in the clouds. Use your judgement for which direction a brush's strokes would go, but there are also plenty of fine art galleries available online that you can use for reference.

Like many of Photoshop's tools, smudging makes use of Photoshop's brush engine. You can customize the brush in a large number of ways. However, for smuding you'll probably want a simple brush that changes size in response to pressure (if you have a tablet). The default round brushes with a soft edge work well, or you can use one of the media brushes if you want a slightly rougher effect.
Choose a brush size appropriate to the area you are working on. You'll want a small brush when working on the fine details on a face, but a large brush will make the job faster and smoother when working on a large area like a shirt. Remember, right-clicking will bring up the brush options box where you can change the size of the brush.
Make sure you're also at an appropriate zoom level. You want to see what you're doing up close if you're working on fine details. But be sure to pause every so often and look at the picture at 100% scale as well as looking at the entire image at once. That'll tell you if you're off in an area.
The other thing you can change with the smudge tool is its strength - how far is the color moved when you drag the cursor over it. This determines the "length" of the brush stroke, but I usually leave it around 50%. Too low (below 30%) and it takes forever to smudge, too high (aboe 70%) and it's hard to control.
If you need to smooth out a large area, try brushing first in the direction of the paint strokes, then perpendicular, then in the direction of the paint strokes again. That will help spread the colors around more quickly resulting in a smoother area. If you only smudge in one direction you'll see that you get lines - these are what create the brush stroke effect, but sometimes it's distracting.

Smudging will also create a picture that is slightly blurry. There are several ways to counter this issue. You can work on an image that is larger than what the final size will be (at least 50%-100% larger probably, but any larger may slow down your computer). You can softly overlay the original image over the smudged image - the outlines will usually come out the strongest, which is about the only part of the original you want to come through sharply anyway. A judicious use of sharpen filters may also help.

Enjoy experimenting with the smudge tool!

Vectorlicious + Painterlicious

My latest forays into Illustrator mavenry has been heavy utilization of the art brushes. I've use art brushes before, but mostly as accents to a greater picture; this brush-painted styled Mushishi wall uses a few art brush strokes, but mostly it's filled shapes with some tweak and roughen filters applied to them to give it the sketchy edging. There's also some calligraphic brushes in there because when you set the width to random it can mimic a varying stroke line without any work on your part - but it's unpredictable since it's the computer that decides how wide to make the outline.
However, after reading a tutorial on creating (and using) art brushes I've decided to give it more of a go. (Computer Arts magazine from the UK is really a wonderful resource. I only wish it didn't have to be shipped overseas because it makes it so expensive! Thankfully many of their articles and tutorials are reproduced on their website!) I've already done several tests and have been happy with the calligraphic style. Creating your own art brushes means you have total control over how the edges taper out or not, which is not something easily achievable with a calligraphic brush. I hope to use this technique to make several more Mushishi walls, since it's got such a rural, classic Japanese feel to it that a calligraphic brush-styled wall would complement. So far I have another Ginko wall (which will be very dark, so I may cheat on all the effects) as well as a Nui wall (which I'm thinking will be more brush-on-parchment styled, and should showcase this technique wonderfully.)
We'll see how it turns out. After all, vectorlicious and painterlicious shouldn't be mutually exclusive.

Vectorlicious vs Painterlicious

I haven't made a wallpaper without using Illustrator for some part of the wall in quite some time (since "Welcoming the Dragon" in June, to be precise.) No particular reason why except I really like playing around in Illustrator a lot more than playing around in Photoshop. Also, I've been into clean, crisp images with very few colors, and Illustrator pulls off that sort of wallpaper a lot more easily than Photoshop, and I've been choosing scans to that effect as well.
Looks like I'll finally be breaking that trend. The Mushishi scan I wanted to work with was in a very delicate watercolor style, and although I was initially tempted to try and use vectors to recreate the effect (and push Illustrator's natural brushes to their limit) I backed away from that idea because I think I've just been doing too many vectors lately. My other skills feel like they're getting rusty.
This wall will be done in a smudge-painterly style, with copious amounts of paper texture to maintain that watercolor feel. I don't do too many smudge-painterly styled walls, but it's rather relaxing to smooth out the details. In many ways it produces an image totally opposite from a vector's crisp outlines, but hey, variety is good.
I think this style will suit the Mushishi manga image much better as well.