Sketchbook: Elemental Vitality - Color

Digital Painting

I've wanted to work with color for a long time. I've always loved the bold statement of black lines and vibrant colors, but my attempts with traditional media never came close to emulating the artists I admired. By the beginning of 2007, I had colored a couple of pieces in Photoshop, but I realized I was getting ahead of myself. Until I really became happy with my penciling and inking, I wasn't going to be able to get what I wanted from color art.

Fast forward two years. My penciling has life and fluidity, and I've learned how to darken the lines in Photoshop to resemble inking. Since I prefer Sketch N' Wash for the atmospheric look of the comic, I hadn't been thinking about color much...until a colleague sold me his Wacom tablet cheap.

For those few of you not in the know, a Wacom tablet allows you draw with a pen stylus in place of a mouse, on a digital drawing pad. Let me stress: I LOVE THIS THING. I would never have attempted this tricky kind of color blend with a mouse or with physical paints, but because I was already comfortable with how digital color works, all it took was some practice time, getting used to the feel of the pen. And all those years spent framing developed my eye for color. This is only the second digital painting I've completed (the first was a very personal gift for some friends, so I didn't put it on the website).

I figure this artwork should get Seth's website to stand out from the multitudes of massage therapists in Boulder.

Back to current Sketchbook