Digital shading?

[DualDragons]

Hey, does anyone have some advice for digital shading? I'm relatively new to digital art and i'm wondering what works well for shading (and isn't too ambitious).

Thanks in advance!

[forg]

Hello, I can provide visual examples later if needed.

But some basic advice for simple shading is

-Use a multiply layer to apply shadows

-Consider where the lighting source is, this will help you place shadows.

-Do not shade with grey/black, if you are just starting out, I definitely don't recommend this. It gives a dull, muddy look.

-In choosing colours: play with hues instead of the tones of the colour (slide along the colour wheel instead of exploring the square part of it)

-colours next to each other on the colour wheel generally work pretty well as shadows (green-shade with bluish green, red-shade with purple, etc.)

Good luck!

[Jenny-Toons]

For whatever digital art program you get (I'm bias towards Clip Studio Paint), I suggest playing with the modes and pairing them with certain colors. These modes in CSP look like this:

Most people use some shade of purple or blue with the Multiply mode for shading, and I sometimes do that. But often times, I use a slight hot, slight dark redish pink for my shading, especially with skin. I switch between multiply and Linear burn, depending on what I need. Here are some examples:

With a redish color, it works a little bit better with the skin and doesn't feel all that muddled.

[darthmongoose]

Creating a new layer over your colours on "multiply" blending mode and masking it to the layer with your colours (in photoshop, put the layer directly above your flat colours, select the shadow layer, hold Alt and click the layer with your flats) and then painting them in in something like a purple or blue is usually a quick and easy approach that's pretty reliable.

For Errant, I only shade light things like white and skintones (I have specific shadow colours for each skintone) and I instead use edge highlights Same technique of masking to the flat colours, but the layer is on Add Glow mode and it's usually a bright blue, orange or similar.

[nathanKmcwilliams]

I should probably try out the various ways described above... I usually shade with darker & lighter shades of each color. It takes a lot of time, switching back and forth between each color. (Though I like the way it looks.)

[Kiweevil]

What I do is duplicate the colors layer, fiddle around with the hue and saturation to fit the lighting of the setting, and then erase where I don't want the shadows. It may be unconventional to some but it's how I did these:

Just like traditional artists, digital artists develop different methods that best fit their art style. With experience you'll get real real good at it ^w^ you can do it

[DualDragons]

Thanks for all your advice! While i am a bit familiar with which colours to use for shading (e.g. green and darker blue and purple shading) i was kinda struggling on how to shade and avoid the so-called pillow shading.

(Sorry for the late reply, i made this thread before i went to bed )

[snackbagstudios]

I am soon going to make a toturial on how I do it.

But basically you want all of your local colors to be affected by the same light, and the same shadow color.