Colored Images (Several different subjects)

[Wintermute]

Alálà has had a couple threads going recently showcasing some rather exceptional concept drawings of various Naruto characters. I've colored several of them, and I thought they might be of interest to people here. (Those of you who have read the Akatsuki Leader (http://forums.narutofan.com/showthread.php?t=129159) thread may have seen some of these before.

EDIT: Posted coloring tutorial below.

Akatsuki Leader:
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/akatsukileader.jpg

Nidaime Hokage (I don't really like my coloring of the background on this one, but the figure is decent.):
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/Nidaime-colored.jpg

And two reditions of his Naruto

Naruto (standard lighting):
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/naruto2normalLight.jpg

Naruto (the jutsu he is doing provides a significant light source):
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/naruto2jutsuLight.jpg

Once again, for those who didn't pay attention the first time, this is not my line work, I only did the coloring.

[az0r]

There awesome the akastsuki leader looks great!

[Astronaut]

ah, the coloured ones look amazing. :D
nice job.

[Wintermute]

After I colored his Akatsuki Leader linework, Alálà asked me to do a tutorial on how to color using Photoshop, well here goes nothing.

Coloring Tutorial (Photoshop):

Starting with the the lineart as your first layer in Photoshop(thanks Alálà), the first thing you want to do is make a copy that will stay on top of everything, so you can tell what you are doing. The easiest way to do this is to use the Multiply option for layer blending. This means that the color value of the top layer is multiplied with the colors below (standard is addition).

First make a copy of the lineart layer (Drag your lineart layer onto the New Layer Icon on the Layers Palette). So we don't get confused, you should also kill the visibility of the original lineart for now (click the eye next to it in the Layer Palette).
Then, in order to avoid some really weird artifacts from the Multiply blending option, we need to ensure that the lineart is grayscale, so we apply a filter to the new layer. Go to the Filters button in the Layers Palette (the circle, half dark/ half light) and select the Hue/Saturation filter and kill the saturation. Make sure this filter is above the new lineart layer (before it in the list of layers). Filters are generally applied to all layers below them. Your lineart should now lack any color.
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/graylinework.jpg
We only want the lineart to be colorless, however, and the filter would kill any other color you put below it. We need to make sure the filter only applies to the one layer, we can do this by merging two layers. Right click on the Filter layer and select the option Merge Down. This will merge the selected layer with the layer below.
Finally select the Multiply blending option for the Linework layer (top left drop box in the Layer Palette). Now we are ready to start coloring the flats.

Now that we have the linework in a form that's easy to work with, put a new layer below the lineart layer (click the New Layer button and drag the new layer to the right place in the orderand start coloring with the mid-tone color you want for each region. I use a different layer of each region because it's much easier. Remember, only the topmost layer on each color boundary needs to be clean, if fact, overlap on the lower layers is a good thing, especially if you intend to eliminate the linework at the end. Overlap will eliminate any white spaces under the linework. Here is the result after two colors (the skin color layer is below the cloak base color)
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/messylayers.jpg

Continue with this until you have all the flat colors in (after 11 layers)
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/flats.jpg

Now we add the shading. There are innumerable ways to do this, but the way I chose is by using Hue/Saturation filters. To add shadows using this method, add a Hue/Saturation filter layer on top of the flats (below the linework). Increase the saturation and decrease the brightness until the flat colors look like you want the deepest shadows to look.
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/theshadow.jpg

Filter layers come with a layer mask (a grayscale layer which determines where the filter will be applied). By default the entire mask is white; click on the mask and fill it completely with black. Now by drawing in white on this layer, you can add shadows by selectively applying the shadow filter. The more opaque the white, the darker the shadow, down to the level you applied with the filter (opacity is a brush property, you can set it up by the brush size selector, or you can control it and/or a number of other things using a pen tablet, settings are under the Brushes tab in the upper right). After applying shadows
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/deeps.jpg

(Continued in next post, too many images)

[Wintermute]

The same process is done to add highlights (new filter, decreasing saturation and increasing brightness to the brightest highlight level you want). Applied to everthing
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/thelight.jpg

After the same process used to select shadows
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/lights.jpg

Now, 14 layers later, you're done.

With linework:
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/lights.jpg

Without linework:
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/ALTutorial/noline.jpg

[Wintermute]

Oh, and thanks for the compliments. :)

[Wintermute]

Another take of the jutsu-lit version of Naruto
http://www.nd.edu/~astrathm/Personal/naruto2jutsuLightredux.jpg

This incorporates a little more of the light bloom (overexposure) effect I was going for in the coloring.

[Dirty Harry]

Wow, they look amazing, especially the AL cg. The way you colored those makes them look so realistic. I'm definately using that tutorial if you don't mind. Great job!

[Wintermute]

Wow, they look amazing, especially the AL cg. The way you colored those makes them look so realistic. I'm definately using that tutorial if you don't mind. Great job!
Thank you. Feel free to use the tutorial, that's why I posted it. :)

[Mojim]

These are all awesome coloring :knk :spaz
Good job :thumbs

[KenshinBlade]

kingdom hearts style pics looks so good. Also very good coloring keep it up:thumbs

[Mansewerz]

damnnnnnnnnnnnnn, the Nidaime one is soo pimp!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Lovewitches]

nicely done coloring :D

You have improved :amuse

[Sogeking]

geez. Great job coloring the pictures.

[Wintermute]

kingdom hearts style pics looks so good. Also very good coloring keep it up:thumbs
Is this what Kingdom Hearts looks like? I've never seen anything from it.

nicely done coloring :D

You have improved
Thank you, but I don't know how I can be said to have improved, these are the first ones that I've done. :amuse

[KenshinBlade]

big feets and hands reminds me KH thats all

[Kamioto Furin]

wow!!! You have really great coloring skills!!! :thumbs These are so great! Especially the Nidaime pic! And yeah, you're style makes it realistic! Keep it up! :knk

[Kyūbi Naruto]

Dude! Love the Naruto! Awesome! I love the outfit!! It kicks ass!! Great Job Both of you! :thumbs :thumbs 2 thumbs for each of you! :thumbs :thumbs

[Luap]

wow this is amazing im gonna try it!
Thanks a bunch.
hope it turns out as good as yours

[Lord James]

Nice! I like your style. It's very unique! :Gaipose

[neko-sennin]

Cool work, Wintermute! And thanks for the tutorial. I've never done colorations of line art, but I'm sure I can figure out ways to adapt those layering techniques to other projects. Again, thanks.

[nefer_sbedjieb]

nice job!
you really rock in both painting and drawing

[pearl_master]

wow they are really good, what program do you use? is it photoshop? the line line art is also very good give Alálà a congrates from me, ill rep him when i find him. but for now reps for you :P

[Miyruru-chan]

Really like what you've done!
I love people who have unique styles.
:kthumb