Drawing fire, what technicques work for you?

[Afrofairy96]

I wanted to practice more with fire having created a character that is suppose to be able to control fire. This is the closest I've got so far. I managed it with just different brush types and honestly I'm pretty satisfied with it. I definitely think you can tell it's fire. But I hear some ppl use different layers, effects, and all that fancy stuff. I'm still new to digital art so how do you guys make fire? What works for you? I'm open to hearing different methods.

[DiegoPalacios]

I edited the title to say drawing fire instead of creating fire, to avoid confusing potential firebenders.

about the technique i use. I add a bit of transparency, but never thought on that glow effect. How do you do it?

[vothnthorvaldson]

At this point, my technique to draw fire is to draw a fireplace and trust that my readers will understand that the orange blob inside stands for fire
Good thing I don't have a fire mage

[Afrofairy96]

I used the dropper to pick up the color at the center of the flame, used the airbrush tool and decreased opacity to about 5% then put some of it around the flame and them increased it to 10% and put the color where I thought the light might touch his skin then used a really bright almost white blue to go along the edges of that. Glad you like it!

[Iris-Grimoire]

I try to keep smudge use to a minimum and only at the tips or places the wind is blowing through. It's working on this picture, but should you change the background or make it move and it starts feeling unrealistic and more like colored smoke.

For me, the shape is key, so making something really swooshy and dynamic, and going from the most proeminent color of the flame to the lightest and making sure it's not just the same color in different levels - regular fire is dark red(but don't overuse it), to vermillion, to orange, to yellow, then white and some fire sources will also have some blue to represent hotter fire.

While looking at photos is a good reference as usual, with fire you also need to study other artists' pictures because the real thing doesn't "look" real, to put it on few terms. Tons of people use textured brushes to imitate cinders, or use glow set to Hard Light behind the fire to show how warm and vibrant it is, and many other techniques.

[rajillustration]

Sometimes to boost fire I use a screen layer or an overlay layer. Using a really soft brush can also help it get more of a glow feel to it.

*edit -- just realized I wrote "opacity/screen" when I meant to write "overlay/screen" lol you knew what I meant.

[ryoko]

I actually make a new layer for fire and use the lasso sub tool in Clip Studio and fill the area with the colour I want, then I'll use one of the markers and use the clear colour choice and essentially erase edges of the colour to make it look more flame like. Depending on how prominent I want the flame, I'll play with the opacity of the fire layer, too.

Ex:

[irene_addler]

@Afrofairy96 erm, I don't know if it's a stupid suggestion and you may/probably already know this , but you can use the blending layer, Add (Glow), and it will give the colors on the add (glow) layer a really bright glow, but I find you have to tone down the opacity quite a bit or risk it being too bright. Don't know if that helps any!

[tchotchkeco]

Here’s a quick fire I did. I can go into step by step details if anyone’s interested. Though it’s mostly the line art of the fire is orange. The fire itself is yellow. We then add a Luminosity yellow layer as well as a “night/dark” color layer BEHIND the luminosity. That what gives it the pop glow.

[IndigoShirtProd]

When it came to making a fire for this poster idea I had, I looked at a couple of tutorials and references of fires, which should be your starting point.
For orange or red flames, the first layer at the bottom would be a dark red. On top of that would be a layer with gradient in the shape of the flame from yellow at the bottom to red at the top of the flame. I continue using that gradient in the shape of a flame by duplicating the layer, playing with blanding effects, and erasing parts of the shape. Once I'm pleased with the shape and colors of the flame, I start highlighting with a pale yellow. From there, I add particle effects with the closest thing to a particle brush to simulate burning ashes floating up from the flame. These particles are usually the same color as the highlight, but it can be other colors too.
Making fire effects can be time consuming and can take a lot of layers, so be mindful where you need them. Here's an example of a fire I drew:

[Eightfish]

For me it's not just the fire, it's the brightness reflecting off everything else that makes it look real.

I think it would make your fire look brighter if you put some harsh lighting on the inside of his hand and arm, too.

[silverraven0]

I just draw some red fire base and smudge it, then use orange and smudge it, then use yellow and smudge it, then use white and smudge it...

On a new layer, the layer is changed to ADD and use very very light yellow with airbrush to make the shine.

I do use smudge a lot here. Still need to find a better way.

[beta1042]

If you have CSP you can always try the plethora of flame brush assets for it. Then play with different layers.

[faisalhussein394]

For me, I just mess it around until it looks like a fire, places orange glow from behind.

[Iris-Grimoire]

I went looking around for some tutorials, that might help people who are struggling with making their fire look consistent and nice!

Happy Holidays, everyone! Thank you all for... - The...

DeviantArt

Of course, not every one fits every style, but it might help figure something that was missing from your technique. Also the last one only has part of it displaying fully on this post, not sure why.

[Chita]

Oh, I love drawing fire! For me I usually create a new layer and put it to "add" mode (I think it's called like that) then I draw the silohuette of the fire with a very very low correction to give it that rough look. Then I fill it with different hues of red, yellow and blue until I'm sastified. Also sometimes it looks better if you blur the edges a bit.
Examples:

[mappypaint]

I painted "true fire" on several items using an airbrush and a mix of opaque and candy paints to get the fire effect. But if i'm going to do it digitally, I would be using many layers to get the effect I want. I did try it on Colors!3D on the 3DS long ago. I still found the file and you can watch a playback of it on how I did made it. http://colorslive.com/details/682820

[JRHoch]

I've never had to draw fire. Now I'm looking for something to burn!