Although I don’t usually worry about coloring my artwork I do, on occasion, enjoy splashing around the old virtual paintbrush and have, again on occasion, tried to look up a new technique or tip from a tutorial. I find it entertaining that much like the old ‘how to draw’ instruction booklets from my childhood, these new online photoshop tutorials are pretty useless if you’re not capable of doing most of the work already. I remember having a ‘How to draw dinosaurs’ booklet as a kid and it was all: Step 1: Draw a circle, Step 2: draw a smaller circle, Step 3: connect the two circles with an oval, Step 4: draw a Brontosaurus. (Ask me to draw a brontosaurus one day. I’m really good.)

Anyway, despite all this I somehow managed to learn how to draw, paint, sculpt, count and fly. So to show my process of doing a little photoshop dabbling I figured I’d make my own cliche photoshop tutorial.

Step 1: Start with a drawing, doodle, or scribble. But really, a drawing would be best, because this is the most important part, you want to establish your basic composition and tone. In fact if you start with a crappy doodle or scribble don’t bother. Stop after step 1, Congratulations you’re done!

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Step 2: Build off of your drawing by slapping on some color. This is the most important step, you are establishing your color palette. For this piece my inspiration was Lady Elaine Fairchilde from Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood (in fact that’s pretty much been the inspiration behind everything I’ve ever done). Usually building color up from the background first is the best method. Building front to back (like I did with the elephant below) is the advanced difficulty method, sometimes called the ’stupid’ method. If you like unfinished looking work you may stop now, Congratulations your masterpiece is complete!

Step 3: Finish up by smoothing rough areas and clarifying your piece. Pay attention to detail because this is the most important step, the final product! At this stage you might consider changing up your composition or playing with your color palette as it suits your rapidly changing mood. Add flair and SFX as necessary. Also don’t forget to drown out all the subtlety you put in by massively saturating the piece before you send it anywhere, because as we all know, nothing ever ends up looking like it did in Photoshop. OK, Congratulations, you’re finished!

Categories: Cyborg Elephants, Nadir Balan, Photoshop Tutorial, painting, robot, sketch