How do I achieve this style of digital painting in photoshop ?

[digital_answer_seeker]

Hello,

I have been using photoshop CC (2017) for colouring drawings. I am trying to get a look similar to a traditional ink airbrush.

How can I recreate the look/effect of the attached photo?

many thanks in advance for any help

[c.pfaffenbichler]

I would recommend Vector Masks on Groups and filling the Groups with Solid Colour Layers with the appropriate Layer Masks (or plain Layers) .

[davescm]

Hi

I would do that with shapes.

Create the shapes with the pen tool.

Add a layer above each shape and clip it to the shape (Alt-Click on border between the two layers in the layers panel so a down arrow appears). This prevents the paint from going outside the shape borders.

Paint the shading

Use a mask on the outer shape and paint lightly wth a soft black brush to make it semi transparent

Add some highlights with a soft brush

Dave

[PECourtejoie]

Excellent answer and tips. I'd also add some noise, or dithering.

[davescm]

Good point on the noise PECourtejoie .

digital_answer_seeker Make the image in 16 bit mode and that way you can add the noise for effect (rather than to cover up banding which you will get with smooth gradients in 8 bit)

Dave

[digital_answer_seeker]

That's great. really useful. thanks guys!

one more question : what brush do you use? (there's so many options!). and

what about brush settings such as shape dynamics, dual brush, noise,

texture, etc...?? what boxes should i tick / adjust in order to get the

desired brush marks in the image? I want it have the grain of a traditional

paint airbrush

[davescm]

Hi

I just used a soft round brush in my example above.

You can add texture as part of brush settings or add noise and grain later using filter add noise or with the camera raw filter

Try out different brushes - if you are using the latest release of CC you can also download Kyle Webster brushes (in the Brushes panel go to options at the top right and click on "get more brushes".

Dave

[Trevor.Dennis]

This is not strictly speaking a duplicate thread, because the other on was on a different forum.  That being Photoshop Gurus

How do I achieve this style of digital painting in photoshop? | Photoshop Gurus Forum

[cmgap]

Clear how-to Dave. Thank you!