Now
I'm sure that at least some of you have seen an anime, those
very cool Japanese
cartoons
that
have an equally cool art style. Well if you've noticed,
anime doesn't use fading colors to blend in a shadow, they
use well placed blocks of color across their characters
to define shadows. This form of coloring is commonly referred
to as "Two-Tone" coloring, as you're using your
colors sparingly. This tutorial will walk you through coloring
your favorite black and white drawing in the classic anime
style. If you're reading this tutorial, I expect you to
be fairly aquainted with Photoshop, as in knowing the names
of the tools and what they do. If you are a beginner then
you are welcome to run through this tutorial as well, but
you may find yourself lost at times.
Step
1: Scan it in
I
assume you know how to operate your scanner, so we'll move
on to what you need to do immediately after you scan. Your
image will need to be cleaned up a bit (getting all that
gray gunky stuff out of the image, sharpening lines, etc)
Cleaning
up a scan is relatively easy, simply go to:
Image
- Adjust - Brightness/Contrast
First
off, up your brightness until most (not all) of your gray
gunk is off the image, now close the box and open it again,
this time, up your contrast until your image has a nice
set of smoothe black lines and a perfectly white background.
The image should look something like this one.
(note:
on a very clean, thick lined image, Adobe Streamline would
be the best way to clean it up)
<<====<<
Step
2: Removing the white
To
accurately color your image, you'll need to get rid of the
pesky white so you can take advantage of Photoshop's amazing
abilities. Follow these keystrokes to the T, then delete
the initial background layer (note: make sure your image
mode is RGB, if it isn't go to Image - Mode - RGB)
Windows:
Crtl - Alt - 1
Crtl
- Shift - I
Crtl
- J
Macintosh:
Cmnd - Alt - 1
Cmnd
- Shift - I
Cmnd
- J
If
you've done this correctly, all of the black lines on your
image should have been selected and transported to their
new layer. If the lines did not show up then once again,
make sure your mode is RGB and make sure that you hit the
right keys. Delete your initial bg layer (you don't need
it anymore) You should have something like this
<<====<<
Step
3: Darken up your lines
Ick!
How sketchy! I can barely see those lines, let alone color
them! To fix this, simply select the lines layer, name it
"lines" (makes it easier later), and press the
"/" key on your keyboard. Pressing the "/"
key sets your layer to Preserve Transparency mode, this
means that if a spot on your layer hasn't already been drawn
on, then it can't be now (to undo this mode, simply press
the "/" key again). Now, select your paintbrush
and set your foreground color to black, in the paintbrush
"brushes" pallete, click on the little black arrow
pointing to the right and select "New Brush" this,
as it says, will make you a new brush. To make this go quickly
simply drag the "size" meter up to 999 that makes
you a *HUGE* new paintbrush. Hit okay and then select your
new paintbrush, with your lines layer selected, simply click
and hold on the image for a couple of seconds, you'll notice
a difference right away.
See?
You darkened all the lines to a much more visible, easier
to color state. Now, you don't have to do this, but I find
that it helps. Create a new layer and drag it beneath the
lines layer, fill this layer with white, this'll help make
the image a bit more flat and easier to see while keeping
the black & white seperate.
Step
4: Layered base colors
Now
it's time to work some of those great Photoshop angles that
make this sort of coloring so
much easier than doing it by hand. With your white layer
selected, make a new layer (so it's below the lines layer)
choose your polygonal lasso tool (
)
and select each spot of the image that you want a certain
color. This will take a while, but this ensures that the
only thing that'll be colored is the thing you want to be
colored. Select a color you want for the area and press
Crtl - F5 (Cmnd F5 on Macs) to open up the fill box. If
your fill box is at the default settings (it probably is)
just hit okay and your color will fill on the new layer.
Do this with each color you want on the image, and make
sure that each color has it's own layer. Also, labelling
your layers as you go will make it much easier to go back
and edit each one later.
A
note about colors:
When
coloring humans, please remember, humans are never a pure
color (blood red, royal blue, evergreen, etc...) we're a
blend. For example, if you're white then you aren't a flat
pink color, you're a light blend of orange and pink. Also,
unless you want your hair to be utterly cartoony, stray
from using a pure color (aside from black). Example: (note
the girl's hair, it's not pure red or brown, it's a dark
combo of both). If you don't feel like mixing your own colors,
then I suggest you find some colored art you like and simply
use the eye dropper tool to select the color right off of
it
Step
5: The actual shading
Okay,
that probably took forever, but now you get to do the good
part. The shading! Shading is really rather easy, for each
layer you have a color on, just highlight it and click Crtl
- J 
(again,
Mac users should use Cmnd - J) to send a copy to it's own
layer. This is the layer you'll be doing your shading on,
this way, if you mess up you can just delete the tarnished
layer and make another copy of the original. Now, on each
of your layer copies, make sure to press the "/"
key to start up the Preserve Transparency mode on the copies,
this will ensure that you can't accidentally shade outside
of the lines. Now for the actual shading instructions!
All
Shading:
preparation
notes: Pick a light source and make sure you stay
with it, if you need to, reference a photograph with a similar
figure in a similar position. You can find many photographs
like this at corbisimages.com
1.)
Select the polygonal lasso ()
and carefully select the portion of the image you'd like
to have shaded (note: on clothes you should make these selections
mildly jagged to simulate the folds in the clothing)
2.)
Go to Image --- Adjust --- Brightness/Contrast.. On the
bar that says Brightness, slide the arrow to the right if
you'd like to add a highlight, or slide it to the left if
you'd like to shade. Below is a list of highlight/shade
values I use on an image, you're free to use it as a reference:
Skin/Clothing
highlights: +10 - +15
Skin/Clothing
shades: -20
Hair:
(light base colors) +10 - +20, (dark base colors) +40 -
+70
Notes
on shading hair:
Hair
requires a lot of jagged and curvy edges, keep this in mind
as you make your selection,
also think of the "flow" of the hair, how it moves
from one place to another, try to stretch your shade to
the general direction while keeping in mind the hair's flow
and your image's light source. Have a look at the example
to the right. (picture of the coloring image minus the lines)
Step
6: Congrats! You're done!
It
does take a while to master, and a while to actually do,
but the finishing product is always rewarding ^^ Have a
look at how our young couple turned out:
<<======<<
*finishing
notes*
This
type of coloring can not only be used to give your image
depth and contrast, but it can also be used to accentuate
the image itself. Sometimes the shading can be used in place
of a black line to give the impression of a tense muscle,
or as in this pic, a pair of baggy jeans. Simply play with
the technique if you wish to accomplish this.
While
this type of coloring does help convey a cartoony aura around
your characters, it's not perfect for everything. All serious
natured images would do well to follow another coloring
technique.
