This is my finished illustration.

 

Artist profile: ⑪ (Toichi)

I mainly draw book illustrations and character designs. I enjoy drawing not only people but also backgrounds, and I often go traveling to collect materials.

 

[1] Preparing the workspace

Since I want to use a large canvas, I hide the windows that I don’t use frequently.

Also, so that I don’t have to move my hand to the left and right of the screen when switching tools, I move the [Tool] palette to the right side.

 

Hint:

< Toggling Palette Visibility >

Select the [Window] menu at the top of the screen to display the list of palettes. You can toggle the visibility of palettes here. Turn a palette on by clicking the name to display a check mark.

 

< Moving Palettes >

You can move palettes by dragging them. You can place individual palettes anywhere you like, or move them around within the palette docks on the bottom, left, and right of the screen.

 

[2] Shortcuts & auto action settings

I go to [File] > [Shortcut Settings] to assign shortcuts to my frequently used actions.

 

I didn’t use shortcuts when I first started drawing digitally, but as I learned which tools I use most for illustrations, I started to find it annoying to go to the menu and select it each time. I decided to try using shortcuts, and I was really impressed by how much quicker and more convenient it was, so now I use a lot of shortcuts.

 

The number of my shortcuts increased over the years as I tried out different useful functions in the painting software.

 

My shortcut key customization is as follows.

 

・ Edit Menu

[Fill]: Shift + F5

[Tonal Correction] > [Level Correction]: Ctrl + L

[Tonal Correction] > [Tone Curve]: Ctrl + M

 

・ Layer Menu

[New Correction Layer] > [Hue/Saturation/Luminosity]: Ctrl + /

[New Correction Layer] > [Level Correction]: Ctrl + [

[New Correction Layer] > [Tone Curve]: Ctrl + ]

[New Correction Layer] > [Color balance]: Ctrl + .

[Layer Settings] > [Clip at Layer Below]: Ctrl + G

 

・ View Menu

[Rotate/Invert] > [Flip Horizontal]: Ctrl + Shift + 1

[Rotate/Invert] > [Flip Vertical]: Ctrl + Alt + 0

[Zoom In]: Ctrl + Q

[Zoom Out]: Ctrl + W

 

· Tool shortcuts

 

· Auto action shortcuts

Note: [Making a clipping folder] is an auto action that makes a new layer that clips to the selected layer so that you cannot paint outside of its drawing area.

 

In this illustration, the only auto actions I’ll use are the default actions [Making a clipping folder] and [Expand the selection by 1 px and fill], but I sometimes register new auto actions as well to increase my efficiency.

 

Note: An auto action is a function that can record multiple operations and perform them automatically. For more information, refer to the following article.

 

[3] Making layers/How I draw

I try to make my image data easy to adjust, easy to understand, and easy to see.

 

I used to edit images created by other people, and I was always grateful when the data was divided for each part and well-organized. I learned from this and try to make image data that is easy for other people to understand.

 

Having a well-organized file also makes it much easier for me if I need to make quick adjustments at later stages.

 

 

 

■ Fill & layer masks

 

When creating illustrations of people, I basically paint using layers filled with a single color and set with layer masks.

I draw on the masks rather than the layers.

 

Note: Read the following article to learn more about layer masks.

 

I work using the following process. My shortcuts make this process faster.

 

(1) Select the [Layer] menu > [New Raster Layer] to create a new layer.

(2) Fill the entire layer with a color.

(3) Click the “Create layer mask” icon at the top of the layer palette.

 

(4) While selecting the layer mask thumbnail on the [Layer] palette, I go to the [Edit] menu and choose [Clear]. This makes the color I filled in step (2) disappear and the layer appears as if nothing is drawn on it.

(5) When using a brush on the layer mask, the mask disappears and the fill color is visible again.

(6) When necessary, I adjust the colors using [Edit] menu > [Tonal Correction] > [Hue/Saturation/Luminosity] or [Color balance].

 

Hint:

Using this method, I can only draw one color on each layer, so I build up multiple layers to create depth of color when painting.

It takes some time to repeat the above procedure each time I make a layer, so I duplicate my “fill & layer mask" layer several times.

 

You can do something similar on the [Layer] menu > [New Layer] > [Fill], but I don’t use this method because fill layers cannot be adjusted with the [Edit] menu > [Tonal Correction].

 

Note: Read the following TIPS article to learn more about using layer masks with fill layers.

 

I originally used this painting method of masking fill layers in Photoshop, but I use the same method to paint other art in other software too.

 

This method of building up layers is related to creating an easy-to-manage image file.

 

If I paint intuitively with lots of colors on a single layer, it’s difficult to change the placement or color of elements. Instead, I try to create an effect of the rich colors of a thick painting style while keeping the layers easy to manage. (I used to have a thick painting style, which has influenced my style now.)

 

This method has the following benefits.

· Layers of “color + mask" = easy to see, easy to adjust later

· Many layers = Can create rich colors like thick painting

 

However, this method ends up with a huge number of folders and layers and it takes a while to build up color gradients, so I’m not sure whether other people would find it easy to manage. The downside of this method is that the file data becomes very large.

 

With this method, my layers for painting the skin look like this.

Note: I’ll explain how I paint the skin in part 6.

 

In the next part, I’ll show you how I make the rough draft.