DAEDRIC FUN TIP:
Mortal fiction is pathetic. Any mention of 'spoilers' will usher forth a cleansing flame.

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Uploader _Noxygen_,
Tags artist:Noxygen character:Katia_Managan Kvatch_arena_armor monochrome portrait smiling
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_Noxygen_: this is a W.I.P, also my first time actually trying to use the digital medium seriously. I don't know shite about coloring (especially with Krita) so any suggestions on doing so would be greatly appreciated!

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ADudeCalledLeo: Looks good so far!
I can't tell what that facial expression is supposed to be.

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_Noxygen_: I just used that shot of majin Vegeta doing that maniacal smile as reference. Now that I look at it again I should've done more planning with that in mind to make the facial expression more direct (and shrink that shredded neck lol), but hey I'm learning ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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AMKitsune: @_Noxygen_: I don't know what program you're using, but the vast majority of them allow you to draw/paint on different 'layers'. I'd suggest that it's important to keep your lineart and colours on separate layers, so if you make a mistake or change your mind on how you want it to look at any point, you can erase/change the part you want without affecting more than you need to.

Second thing. Whatever program you're using, it quite probably has 'blend modes'. These are options that can be applied to layers (or groups of layers if your program supports 'folders'(or groups, or whatever they're called)) that change how the contents of that layer is drawn over the layers beneath it.


In this example, I put some colours in a folder above your lineart and set the folder's blend mode to linear burn. There's no hard rule as to which mode you have to use. Play around with them to see what looks good to you.

I also darkened the lineart slightly to prevent the colours visibly butting up against each other over the faded lines.

Exactly how you choose to order your layers and what blend modes you use are entirely up to you. The important takeaways are that it's good to keep the various parts of your work separated into layers (for making cleaner changes and additions), and make use of layer/folder blend modes to merge the different parts of your image together.

Hope that's of some help.

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_Noxygen_: @AMKitsune: I just woke up and checked on this and Jesus Christ this post is awesome! I love the colored image example you made, hopefully I don't f*ck it up lol. I'll try my best to color when I finish my lines a bit more. Thank you for the help!

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_Noxygen_: Also I'm drawing it in mischief then converting it to krita for coloring and such.

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AMKitsune: @_Noxygen_: You're most welcome. I've just checked, and it looks like krita has all the functionality you'd want for this kind of thing. All that remains is for you to dive in and have fun with it. (that's the best, and most important part XD)

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Zargothrax: @_Noxygen_: I forgot to answer earlier, but I'm also working with Krita.

If you're just starting out, the basics are: sketch, but on a separate layer than the background, (and put the sketch of the clothes on an another layer if you are drawing full body) then turn the opacity of the sketch layer(s) down, and ink on an other layer, then turn off the sketch layer(s), and create a new layer BEHIND the ink layer, on which you paint the colors. This is the most basic workflow you can have.

An another way to color is with the "colorize mask editing tool" in Krita. It's a very powerful feature, I use it frequently for base coloring. I suggest you look it up.

The most straightforward way of shading is to make your color layer into a clipping group, by selecting it, then pressing ctrl+shift+G, and adding a new layer on top of it inside the group and setting the blending mode of it to multiply. If you then paint onto that layer with a gray color, that will cast a shadow onto whatever color you had there on the color layer.

If you want to see over-complicated ways to see how to shade, take a look at my previous post where I detailed my Krita workflow: >>7268, but in all seriousness, if you are just starting out with digital, for now, don't overburden yourself with these things.

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_Noxygen_: @Zargothrax: thanks! I just finished the flat tones, and was going to stop there because I couldn't figure out how to cell shade properly. until I saw this post, although I did kinda f*cked up by using the sketch as line art lol so I'm still on the fence about adding more with this one specifically. regardless, this is useful information for the future so thank you!