cap56_portrait.pdf

Tutorial Paint a digital portrait

SECTION TWO: PROJECT 1

Paint a digital portrait

Painter offers all the natural media tools you need to create

traditional paintings. We show you how to use them…

hen working with a program as

vast and nebulous as Painter,

it’s often tempting to try and

use as many different tools

and effects as you can. Painter

provides a plethora of stunning natural

media simulation tools, and the key to using

them wisely is learning a little bit about

restraint. For a natural media painting to look

convincing, you should obey the rules of

traditional painting.

For this image, we researched what the

most common tools were for traditional

paintings of this nature. Oil paints have been

a favourite for hundreds of years; the fact

that they remain wet and pliable for so long

makes them ideal for any type of painting that

involves blending, such as skin. Acrylics are

another skin-tone favourite, although they

tend to dry much quicker. Such real world

limitations are lifted in Painter .

Layers are an indispensable tool for this

sort of work and the logic of using layers will

reveal itself to you soon enough as you work

through the tutorial. You’ll see how flexibility

is preserved via careful use of layers and

groups. But most importantly, you’ll see how

intelligent use of a few carefully selected

Derek Lea is a professional illustrator

based in Toronto, Canada. His work

draws upon disciplines as diverse as 3D

modelling, traditional painting, vector

illustration, image manipulation and

original photography. Derek regularly

contributes editorial content to Digital

Camera magazine as well as Computer

Arts . You can view a diverse cross-section

of his work at [w] www.dereklea.com

Part 1: Getting started

Create a pencil sketch to use as a guide, by tracing a scanned photo of your subject…

Locking layers

When working in an application

such as Painter, it's easy to get

lost in the creative side of the

process and end up painting on

the wrong layer accidentally. To

remedy this mistake before it

happens, it's a good idea to get

into the habit of locking layers

that aren’t currently in use. To

lock a layer, click in the empty

space to the right just under

the layers icon in the Layers

palette. A lock icon will appear to

indicate that it’s locked. Click on

the lock icon to unlock it.

The first thing you’ll need to do is launch

Painter and open the file face.jpg from the

cover CD. We’re going to make him face the other

way so choose Effects>Orientation>Flip Horizontal

from the menu. In the bottom of the Layers palette,

create a new layer by clicking on the New Layer

button at the bottom.

By default, the primary colour is black and the

secondary colour is white. Click on the colour

swap icon in the toolbox to switch them. With white

as your primary colour, select the Paint Bucket tool

and click on your new layer to fill it. Reduce the

opacity of the layer in the Layers palette to about

55 per cent.

This layer of white is here to soften the effect

of the underlying image. You only need to

use the photo for tracing purposes at this point.

Softening it helps you to see the sketch lines better.

To begin creating the sketch lines, select Pencils as

the Brush Category in the Brush Selector bar.

Naming layers

During this project you’ll build

up a lot of layers within your

document. This is a good thing

because it preserves many

aspects of your painting and

makes them editable at any

point. The caveat when working

this way is that the Layers palette

can become quite cluttered and

confusing. Getting into the habit

of naming your layers and layer

groups will help you recognise

your desired layers instantly

within the palette. To name a

layer or group, double-click

the icon in the Layers palette.

A layer attributes box will open

with a field that enables you to

type in a name.

Select 2B Pencil from the Brush Variant menu

in the Brush Selector bar, although it doesn’t

really matter which variant you choose

because the sketch is only used for a guide. In the

Properties bar, set the size to 3 pixels, and set the

opacity and the grain to 2 per cent.

Click on the colour swap icon in the toolbox

or the Colours palette to make black the

primary colour again. Now use the Zoom tool to

come in closer on the face. With your new layer

selected in the Layers palette, take your time and

do a thorough job of tracing the outlines of the

facial features.

Be sure to draw some lines that differentiate

areas of highlight and shadow. Also, feel free to

switch the white layer off or reduce the opacity

of it when it obstructs your view of certain areas.

Choose a lighter grey from the Saturation/Value

triangle in the Colours palette, and use it to slightly

darken shaded areas on your sketch layer.

Tutorial Paint a digital portrait

Tutorial Paint a digital portrait

Part 2: Preparing paint

Get ready to paint the skin by carefully mixing a series of different colours in the Mixer palette…

Colour

management

Painter 8 provides you with a

quick and easy way to manage

colour for a number of individual

devices such as press output,

printers, monitors and scanners.

The Colour Management window

can be found at the bottom of

the Canvas window. This is an

unlikely place as most users will

probably look for it under the

Preferences options. Anyway, in

the Colour Management window,

each device has a pull-down

menu that lists preset profiles, or

you can import a custom profile

of your own. It would be nice

if the monitor section had the

flexibility of Photoshop’s colour

settings, but it still works well.

Select the white layer and return its opacity

to 100 per cent in the Layers palette. Hold

down the Shift key and click on the sketch

layer to select them both. Select Group from the

Layers palette menu to group them. With the layers

grouped you can enable or disable their visibility

together, as well as change the opacity of them

together.

Switch off the visibility of your sketch group in

the Layers palette for the moment and select

the Eyedropper tool from the toolbox. Use it

to sample a skin colour from the image and make it

the primary colour by clicking on it. Select the Apply

Colour tool in the Mixer palette and add the current

colour to the mixer.

Go back to the image and sample another

colour and add it to the mixer using the same

technique. Repeat this until you've filled the mixer

with a nice cross section of skin-tones in varying

hues and values. It’s okay if your colours touch. If

you find that you're running out of room, use the

Pan tool to move around within the mixer.

Brush tracking

When you start using Painter,

one of the first things you should

do is set up the brush tracking.

The Brush Tracking dialog is

found under the preferences

sub-menu. You will be presented

with a scratch pad on which

to draw a brush stroke. Using

typical pressure and speed,

draw a single stroke. Painter

interprets the stroke and

creates a blueprint for how the

application will respond to the

way you paint when using the

natural media tools.

In the Mixer palette, select the Mix Colour tool

and use it to push neighbouring colours into

each other within the mixer. By blending colours

in this manner you’ll be able to create a stunning

amount of skin-tones that would have been a lot

more work to create in the Colours palette.

You don’t have to limit yourself to the available

colours in the reference image, so enable the

visibility of the sketch group in the Layers

palette

to hide the reference image underneath. Once

you’ve achieved a nice representation of skin-tones,

use the Colours palette to create an unrealistic

Pan in the mixer to a clear area and add this

new colour to it. In the Colours palette, create

an unrealistic red and add it to the mixer. Repeat

this process to add a bluish black and a slight olive

green. Having a few unconventional colours to use

in various places will help to make your painting

anything but mundane.

Part 3: Painting skin

Oils, the traditional artist’s choice for skin, are combined with water to create a convincing effect…

Create a new layer in the Layers palette and

set the Composite Method to Default. Select

the Brush tool from the toolbox. Select Oils

from the Brush Properties bar. Because we’re going

to block in large areas of colour, choose the Smeary

Round brush variant. This preset provides good

coverage and a convincing bristle.

Based on the underlying reference image,

select a mid-tone skin colour from the mixer

using its sample colour tool. Make sure that

the ‘Pick Up Underlying Colour’ option for your

new layer is not enabled. Roughly begin to paint the

colour you’ve chosen into the appropriate areas, but

stay away from the eyes and the lips for now.

Continue to sample some lighter colours from

the Mixer palette and use the current brush

to paint them in the appropriate areas on the

current layer. Continue consulting the reference

image often by switching off the sketch group and

paint layers to see it. Then switch them back on and

add more paint.

Mixer contents

The Mixer palette is probably

one of Painter’s most important

recent advancements. One thing

that makes this better than any

traditional paint-mixing palette is

that the paint never dries and you

can save the contents to use later

once you’ve cleared the mixer.

Choose Save Mixer Colours from

the Mixer palette menu to create

a preset file for your current

contents. Choose Load Mixer

Colours from the palette menu

and navigate to your preset file to

reload them at any point.

You’ll notice that colours begin to blend

together nicely as you use different paints on

top of each other with repeated strokes. Go

ahead and blend a little, but your priority here is to

get the proper ranges of colour into the proper areas

of the face. Select a darker colour from the mixer

and add it on to the current layer.

Continue painting with some darker colours.

The smeary round oil brush is ideal for skin

because it drags underlying pixels more than

it applies new paint. Each stroke that overlaps

another blends realistically and provides all of the

advantages of working with traditional oil paint,

which has always been ideal for painting faces.

To get more of the paint and less underlying

pixels, reduce the bleed slider in the Properties

bar, which is currently set at 100. This will help if

you simply want to block in basic colour quickly, but

the trade-off is a less than genuine effect. Only do

this for blocking in simple colour, and when finished,

return the bleed amount to a higher value.

Custom palettes

Another great interface feature

is the ability to create custom

palettes containing just the

brushes you use frequently. To

create a custom palette, simply

click on a Brush Category

icon and drag it out into the

workspace away from the Brush

Selector bar and release it. A

floating palette will be created.

You can add additional brushes

to it by dragging them over from

the Brush Selector bar.

Also, reducing the Feature setting to a lower

value in the Properties bar will remove the

bristle appearance of the brush and enable you

to create basic strokes of colour. Again, this should

only be reduced to maximise your colour placement

and then be returned to a higher value to preserve

the excellent natural media simulation.

Create a new layer and enable the ‘Pick Up

Underlying Colour’ option. From the Brush

Selector bar, choose Blenders as the Brush

Category and Just Add Water as the Brush Variant.

Increase the size to about 56.6 in the Properties bar

and paint over your underlying oil paint on the new

layer using the Just Add Water blender.

This method of adding colour and then

blending it together is an essential basis for

creating convincing skin. When you’re happy with

your blending, select the skin and the blended skin

layer in the Layers palette and group them. Create a

new layer in the Layers palette and select Oils once

again from the Brush Selector bar.

Part 4: Detailed skin

The technique is the same, but smaller brushes and extra care is needed for the more detailed areas…

Select Smeary Round as your variant again

to pick up underlying paint when painting

over existing colour. Reduce the size to about 15.6

and reduce the feature to 2.9 in the Properties bar.

Carefully paint in some colour around the eyes

– take your time and don’t be afraid to blend the oil

paint more aggressively this time around.

Use this small brush to paint oil into many

other detailed areas, such as the nose. Use a

variety of colours from the mixer and also use

the Eyedropper to sample colours from the existing

skin. Feel free to reduce the size of the brush more

for sharper detail. Also, reduce the opacity of the

brush and use it to paint over and blend colours

slightly

Also, spend some extra time on the lips.

Getting them right is very important. Use

more reddish hues than you did for the skin.

Sample some new colours from the reference

image or create them in the mixer if necessary. And

don’t forget about the unconventional colours you

created earlier – add a few strokes of them here

Tutorial Paint a digital portrait

Tutorial Paint a digital portrait

Part 4: Detailed skin continued...

The hints of other unconventional colours will

help make sure that the face doesn’t appear

too monochromatic, which is often a risk when

painting skin. When you’ve finished with the fine

details, increase the size of the brush, select a dark

colour from the mixer or the canvas and paint some

sharp shadows in areas like his temple.

Create a new layer in the Layers palette. Ensure

that ‘Pick Up Underlying Colour’ is enabled.

Select blenders from the Brush Category pull-down

in the Brush Selector bar. Select Detail Blender 5.

Like the name suggests, this blender is designed to

be used with finer details like those we’ve created.

In the Properties bar, increase the size to

around 10. On your new layer, use the blender

to paint over the top of your new finer detailed

work and blend it into the rest of the skin. Increase

or decrease the size of the blender as needed. When

you’re finished, select this layer and the detail layer

in the Layers palette and group them.

Part 5: Glazing skin

Saturate selected areas of the skin-tones by using a translucent acrylic glaze…

Click on an area where you’d like colour

slightly more saturated (like the area on his

cheek between the highlight and shadow) to

sample it as the primary colour. Now choose

Window>Show Brush Creator from the menu.

Click on the General section at the left. Change

the sub-category to Soft Buildup from Grainy Soft

Buildup, for a softer effect.

Paint over the area where you sampled the

colour on the new layer. The build-up of the

glaze will saturate the paint on the underlying

layers. This effect can be easily overdone. If you

find the saturation is too great when you’re finished

painting your glaze, reduce the opacity of the layer

in the Layers palette until it becomes more subtle.

Create a new layer and select Acrylics from

the Brush Selector bar. Select Glazing Acrylic

10 as the Brush Variant. In the Properties bar,

increase the size to about 52 and be certain that the

opacity is set low, somewhere around 2 or 3. Hold

down the Option key to temporarily access the

Eyedropper.

Part 6: Adding sparkle to the eyes

Use acrylic brushes to provide your subject with a pair of striking eyes…

Create a new layer, leave the Brush Category

set to Acrylic but change the Brush Variant

to Opaque Detail Brush 5. Use the Colours

palette to create a grey colour and add it to an

empty area of the mixer. Create a number of greys,

cool and warm, and add them to the mixer. Use the

Mix Colour tool to blend them together.

Consult the reference image for highlights

and shadows and begin to use different greys

to paint in the whites of his eyes on the new

layer. Take your time and get the appropriate colour

values in the proper areas. You can reduce the

opacity of the brush in the Properties bar to achieve

a more subtle blending effect between highlights

and shadows.

Pan within the mixer back to your skin-tones.

Select some nice pink tones and paint in his

tear ducts. Then create a new layer with ‘Pick

Up Underlying Colour’ enabled and select Blenders

from the Brush Selector bar. The Detail Blender 5

variant should still be selected – choose it if it’s not.

Reduce the size to around 6 in the Properties bar.

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