PS tutorial - Part 1 (Base Prep) [most singular...]

HAPPY CHRISTMAS, ALL!

This is my Christmas Gift...
which is also my New Year's Gift because this is incomplete. -_-""

corbeaun requested this so uhhh. I know I'm late -__-"

MANGA COLORING: PS/CS2 TUTORIAL

1. Preparing Your Base
2. Coloring & Basic Adjustment Layers
3. Making it look pretty

This tutorial is about coloring black and white images / manga, preparations and what you can do to make it look more polished. For the complete Photoshop Newbie, I suggest reading #1 first. For the slightly experienced colorist, you can go directly to #2.

This tutorial does not contain any recipies, textures drama and *cough* complications. You can apply the principles here to all your coloring needs. The guide on Adjustment Layers does not contain any values since it aims to make you learn the principles behind manipulating these layers.

Click on the links above to take you, um, there.

Note: I'm not an artist. I have not taken any formal art training. If you see any boo boos, you're welcome to correct me. Suggestions are welcome, too.

TO MAKE IT LESS PAINFUL

The coloring activities are mostly focused on these four Windows: Layers, Brushes, Swatches, History.You'll be using a lot of these, so make it less painful, let's put them on the same box like this:

If you can't see these windows, go to Window (Menu) and just click on the missing windows. Usually, these four will be on separate windows, so what I do is I click and drag these four so that they will be in one window.

This part of the tutorial is mostly Base Preparations without Layer Adjustments.

PREPARING YOUR BASE

1. FRAMING / CLEANING

Grab your base, resize it. To resize, just to go Menu >> Image >> Image Size. Frame it on your icon, or whatever. After framing, lock it so it will not move.

Now, let's go back to our this window. Under the Layer type, you'll see Lock. Click on the ...four direction arrow (-__-)''. Now you can't move it. But you can still do stuff with it.

Start cleaning. Use a brush and Paint away the unnecessary details. DO NOT ERASE. Erasing is dangerous when you're erasing near the lines you need.

When Painting-Cleaning, use different brush tips/types to efficiently clean. Change the Brush Properties by clicking on Brush Tip Shape, just below Brush Presets.

At this point, you don't have to worry how blurry or how weird the lines look. We'll take care of that.

2. TO BLUR OR TO SHARPEN?

Blurry lines, sharpen it. Too strongish bold lines, Blur it.

When Blurring or Sharpening, DO NOT SHARPEN THE ORIGINAL BASE. What you do is:

1. Duplicate the original

2. Put the duplicate on top of the original.Set your Blurred/Sharpened Duplicate to Normal/Soft Light/Overlay/Whatever you think is best. Usually I have it on Soft Light.

3. Blur/Sharpen the Duplicate.

Go to Filter >> Sharpen
Go to Filter >>Gaussian Blur . There are other kinds of Blur. You can even use Blur (-_-""), but with Gaussian you have control over the degree of Blurring. A 1.2 or less Gaussian Blur will do. It will depend on your base.

4. Adjust the Duplicate's Opacity, as needed. Merge the Duplicate and the Original. If you do not merge, the coloring will be a little wacky/tricky.

If you're undecided whether you need a romantic blur or if you want clean lines, you can just leave your base and do it after coloring.

But, what if you need to only Blur or Sharpen certain parts of your base. Go to Tools on the left. Below the Eraser Tool is the Blur, Sharpen and Smudge Tool Trio.

Next part: Coloring

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Tutorial 8D. I want to see it complete ~

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T_t I wanna see it complete too. xDDD

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Merry Christmas! =D And thanks for the tutorial (I really suck at PS -_-)

lol. Nah, I suck too. We just need practice. I'm writing an ultimate be-all end-all guide for the PS noob. -_-""" What can I say, I'm nuts. I'm not too good at writing tuts... >.>"""

But your graphics are always sooo pretty (I just steal icons/layouts XD)

I'm definitely interested in that guide =D

don't worry, danly, it's ALMOST complete. I already wrote er...40% of it. It's ALMOST COMPLETE. ALMOST.... @_@""""

This is an excellent tutorial, I've had a few people ask me for tips and was debating on whether or not to make one myself... XD I might just send them your way instead.

Here are some methods that I use on almost every icon and color.

1. before I do anything with a manga capture, I take my eye dropper and select part of the background that I want white, then I go to replace color and move the lightness bar over. What that does is makes any unwanted grey into a nice white. Keep an eye on the shading that you do want to keep though because that will be altered.

2. I never clean with erasers (yuck) I do what you do and when I work around lines that I want to keep I will use the dodge tool on a high setting (midtones) and use that. This acts like an eraser but wont nick the lines.

3.I always chose my colors from a picture or texture that I like and never from the pallet itself. I have it set to websafe and that limits what I can select. Using the dropper gives me exactly what I want.

4. I hate using black lines so I will usually throw a colored layer over my lined layer and set it to "color" "overlay" or "screen" or whatever else I think looks good (and I rarely keep it at 100%)

5. I've never really messed with blurring before aside from making my shading smoother. I like using the smudge tool instead because it gets the sharpness out of the lines. I especially like it for hair because it makes the hair look shinier (but I think that softness from blurring is part of what makes your icons so appealing to me so I'll have to mess around with it XD)

After all that, I flatten the image, multiply it, and throw my colors underneath it. Then I layer and layer textures until I'm happy ^___^

Oh, and a nice way to check and see if you have stray "dust" is to go to "curves..." and move the bottom line all the way to the right (or top and to the left depending on your setting, you'll know) anything not white white will turn black. I do this before I change my black lines.

Its late here and the later it gets the more I ramble so I hope that it made sense and was useful. ^^'

Since you sent me these, I'm going to include it in the tutorial, yes? Oh darn, I already included the curves thing on the second part... Crediting you of course. xDDD

Sorry for such a late response ^^' Of course you can include them :op So long as you find the information useful.

thank you! :DDD

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