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Saturday, December 16, 2017

How I Color - Part One


Faeries! It's time. It's the time of the week where I put out the post you've been waiting for all week!* XD 

I've been pretty busy lately with art-I-cannot-post-yet-because-siblings-read-my-posts... And, well, if I posted the art I'm giving to them that would be just totally ruining the surprise. And we wouldn't want that, now would we? XD

I did a step-by-step post earlier, like almost two months ago. And I felt like doing something like that again. :)

Except. There is a twist. I'm not showing you how I drew the art. I'm going to show you how I colored it. :D Today, though, I won't show how I colored the whole thing. I'm just going to show you how I colored the person on my picture. :3

*I have no I idea if you've been looking forward to my post that much. :P


Here's the picture before I colored it. :) I don't normally draw a chibi person with a background, but I felt like giving it a go. I also wanted to draw a chibi girl that didn't have a normal skin tone. :P So I drew a water sprite or water elf or something.* That way she could have blue skin. XD

About the background... When I draw trees by myself they look really deformed. >.< I looked up "simple cherry tree" or something on Google images and used one of the pictures as a base. :P Same with the mountains. XD So if you just can't seem to get something to look right, don't be afraid to use Google images! They are so helpful.

*I have no hot clue to what she exactly is. I first thought she was a water sprite but I looked it up (not the best idea :/ there are some scaryyyyyyy water sprites out there) and she does not really look like those. And then I looked up water elf and she isn't quite like that either. But I think I'll just call her a water sprite because that's what I intended her to be. XD Sorry, that was a bit long winded.


It doesn't really matter what you color first in your drawing, just as long as you start coloring! XD For this particular drawing, I went with the sprite's skin. I wanted everything else to match with her blue skin tone. 

What helps me find the perfect shade of color is blending two or more colored pencils together on a scrape piece of paper and then using the colors I liked best on my drawing. For coloring her skin, I started with a really pale, icy blue and then I went faintly over that with a light sky blue colored pencil. :) I'm not sure if you can tell, but on the picture above, I had already started with the second layer of color. But I'd only done the legs. :P


Now on to the hair! :D I used only one colored pencil for her hair. There really isn't much to say about how I colored it... Because it was so straight forward. :P Just color it. And boom. You're done. :P

I will mention, however, if you do color outside the lines with colored pencils, you can use a eraser to erase it. I use a pink eraser... But I'm not sure if that's the best idea. What is the best eraser for that type of thing? Hmm... Now I gotta look up which is the best color of eraser is for erasing colors.* :P

*types in search bar on Google "what color of eraser is best for erasing colored pencils*

*I'm not even sure it matters what the color is! XD



Um. What the ham and eggs is a kneaded eraser?! *clicks on the article* *skims it* Well, okay, by the looks of it... *reads more of the article* It's a eraser that is kinda like silly putty because you can make it into different shapes and stuff...? It's kind of weird but kind of cool... XD

Well, I'm still not sure what the best eraser for colored pencils is. But my pink eraser works just fine for me. :P

Anyway! Back to coloring!


I colored her dress next. Thanks to Tracey, who gave me the idea, I drew the water sprite wearing a lily pad inspired dress. So I colored it... Green! XD I used just one colored pencil again.


To make it more lily pad ish, I colored the flower on the sprite's dress pink. I used two different pinks for it to make it more realistic. :P



Next, I colored her eyes. I colored with two browns so the bottom of her eyes would be more noticeably lighter and the top darker. 


Shading is next for me. :D The key thing to remember about shading is where the light source is coming from in your drawing. I made mine coming from the top left. I kinda just guess and go a little willy-nilly with my shading, so mine may not be completely correct. :P 

In the picture, I used a darker shade of sky blue for shading her skin. And for the water sprite's hair, I used a much darker blue. You might not notice a lot but I even shaded the whites of the sprite's eyes. I like using a light gray for that. ^.^ 


This is the last step I'm showing you today. 

Earlier this year, a good friend of mine told me that manga/anime artists often use black for shading lots of their drawings. I was rather shocked when I heard that. I mean, wouldn't black totally ruin a color by making it totally black?* It turns out that using a black colored pencil doesn't do that. It really just darkens the base color you're shading. I've used black waaaaaay more now that I know it shades so nicely. I do my shading with a black colored pencil lightly, so it doesn't make it look too dark. 

I used my black colored pencil on the water sprite's dress. 

*On a side note, I was also a really inexperienced artist back then... So I didn't know much about art and coloring and other artsy things at are important. :P

- - -

And that's it I have for you faeries today. I think I'll do a step-by-step next Saturday about how I colored the background. :3 I hope you enjoyed the post! See you guys later! Merry Christmas!!!

How do YOU color your drawing? Did you enjoy reading about how I color things? Have you been busy getting ready for Christmas? I'd love to hear what you do for your Christmas traditions! 

8 comments:

  1. AHHHH GREAT POST MUCH AWESOME MUCH FUN MUCH ART MUCH AMAZING. XDDDD

    Yes I enjoy reading about how you color!
    Yes I have been getting ready for Christmas. XD
    Annnnd you know what we do for traditions. XD

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    1. XDDD You’re comment made laugh so hard. Especially the first part. XD

      Yay! I was hoping someone would enjoy it! ;) :P
      XD Really??? I did not know that. :P
      Haha! Yes, I Do know what we do for traditions. ^.^

      Thank you so much for commenting! It means so much to me! <3

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  2. That drawing is so cute!!! :o I think I have heard of a kneaded eraser..idk XD
    I don't have the first clue about where to shade
    so
    yeah XDD Awesome post! :D
    And kinda busy kinda not, I got all my Christmas shopping done in November because of black friday XD And for Christmas traditions we always watch Christmas Story XD

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    1. Aww! Thank you!! Really? You heard of one of those kneaded erasers before? Wow! Sounds like you know more about erasers than I do!!! XDDD

      Good for you! I would ask you what you bought for Christmas gifts but then someone might read your comment and your present would get spoiled. :( XD Oh cool! Watching a movie sounds like a fun Christmas tradition. C: My family always has apple scones for our Christmas breakfast tradition. XD

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    2. XDDDD

      I got a gift for Bunnygirl(My little sis of course XDD) A doll that she liked :P
      Yeah it is :D
      Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo those sound so gooooood XDD

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    3. Aww! That’s sweet of you to give that to your younger sister. :) I bet she’ll love it!

      The scones ARE really good! XDDD *sends a apple scone through the Blogger Portal so Sarah can one for Christmas* XD

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  3. So pwetty! I love the contrast between her dark blue hair and light blue skin. (And thanks for the shoutout! <3)

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    1. Tank u! XD Aww, thanks! I had a lot of fun coloring the sprite! :D (You’re welcome, sweetums! <3 ;) )

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