Looking Up
The face in this image was inspired by a photo of a sculpture I found online. I added all the other image elements from imagination. I painted the image in SketchBook Pro, edited it in iColorama for tone and color, and repainted it in Metabrush for a wet look.
I found a photo of a sculpture online that was my Inspiration for this piece. I imported the photo into Autodesk SketchBook Pro and quickly put together this study for a possible painting.
I imported the study into SketchBook Pro and used it to guide the location of key image elements. I will turn off visibility for this layer as soon as I place enough image elements that I am confident continuing without the photo. All of the images I show from here on are with the image layer visibility turned off.
I filled the bottom layer with a warm orange/yellow color, which is the complement of the blue I plan to use for her shirt. Then on a new layer, I painted a solid blue for her shirt.
A cool feature of SketchBook Pro is the ability to paint with a range of colors without having to keep going back to the color picker to change colors. I tried that here on a new layer above the solid blue shirt layer, using the tattoo inker to paint lots of separate strokes (you have to lift your stylus from the tablet for the color to change). You activate this feature by going into the color picker, choosing a color, and hitting the “randomize” button that looks like two crossed arrows. Then, you can use the HSL sliders to control the allowable range for the randomization. I chose a color range that stayed in the blues and greens (which is a low setting of the Hue slider). This link tells you how to do it.
I felt that the result of using the tattoo inker was too rough, so on another new layer above the tattoo inker layer, I used a soft pastel to paint with the same color range. Then I Adjust the layer opacities so that you could still see the effect of the tattoo inker layer blended with the other layers.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used an airbrush to paint the highlights on her face. This is an instance where I made use of the photo layer, turning on visibility and lowering the layer opacity so I could use the low opacity photo as a guide to where there should be highlights on her face.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used an airbrush to paint the dark areas of her face and neck.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used the randomize color feature to paint over the dark areas with a variety of colors. I reduced the opacity of this layer, and I used a colorless brush to smooth the layer a bit. Then on a new layer above the previous layers, I used the airbrush to pant deeper shadows on her neck and at the edges of her face.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used a black pen to draw outlines of her shirt.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used the airbrush to paint highlights on her shirt, and I used a marker to paint her buttons. Then on a new layer just above the orange background layer, I used an airbrush to lighter areas at the top of the background, and darker areas at the bottom of the background, since the light source is at the top of the image.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used a black pen to paint an outline of her head and neck.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used an airbrush to paint a brown area to form the background for her hair. (The edges of this brown area look a bit ragged because later I had to erase some around the edges because I had airbrushed too big of an area.) This brown area will serve as a fill for any gaps there may be in the hair I will paint on higher layers.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used a black pen to draw outlines for her hair. Then, on another new layer above the other layers, I again used the “randomize color” feature to start painting color onto her hair.
On a new layer just below the hair outlines layer, I painted with a variety of colors for her hair, using a marker and a separate layer for each color.
Now I went back to the “randomize color “ layer and continued painting randomized color for her hair. I adjusted the layer opacity and tried a few different blending modes.
Now, on new layers above all the other layers, I started painting her features. I painted her nostrils on one layer and her mouth on another layer. For her mouth, I used a marker to apply base color, and an airbrush for highlights and shadows.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used a black pen to draw outlines of her features, as well as her eyelashes.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used an airbrush to paint deeper shadows at the edges of her face where it meets her hair, and also under her brows. I also created a layer to make shadows under her collar and buttons. I decided that the part of her face shadow on her right cheek was too dark, so on another new layer above the other layers, I used an airbrush to paint a light color over that area at low opacity. I also went back to my previous face shadow layer and used a colorless brush to soften the edges of the face shadow around the chin and left cheek.
On another new layer above the other layers, I used an airbrush to paint glowing highlights on the top of her head where light would be hitting it. I adjusted the layer blending mode for best effect. I exported the image to my camera roll.
I opened the image in iColorama. I used Adjust/Tonelab and Adjust/EQ at low opacity, trying several different presets, to enhance color and contrast. Then I used Texture/Vintage with an inverted brush mask to add a pattern to her shirt, at low opacity. I saved the image to my camera roll. I was happy with this image, but I decided to try reworking it in MetaBrush to see if I could get a better result.
I opened the image in MetaBrush. On a duplicate layer, I used Wets/Wet and the default brush to paint over her, varying the brush size as needed. I painted at medium opacity. I did change the brush settings, making a small but non-zero spacing and zero edge and structure, for a smoother result.
I duplicated the layer. On her hair I used Brushes/Tex 1 and Tex 3 at medium opacity and with a relatively small brush.
I duplicated the layer, and I used Brushes/Art 3 on her hair. In addition to painting over her hair, I pulled color from her hair to make tendrils at the edges. I saved the image to my camera roll.
I opened the image in iColorama. I used Adjust/Tonelab preset 3 at medium opacity to enhance the color.
