User:Mauran Axestripe/Mauran's How-to-draw

Hello, I am Mauran Axestripe, a young artist in the making! (I hope.) I am here to teach you some of the basics for drawing Redwall characters. Here you can view all my Redwall work and more. Now, lets go! *zooms away*

Part One: Using Paint

Yes, if you are Windows user and are stuck with the rather basic Paint, follow these instructions.

1.Decide what sort of pose you want your beast to be in. An all time favourite is the half-side sort of pose.

2.Using a darkish colour (black is best) outline your beast, its features and all weapons. If the lines are going everywhere, then use the line and curve tools.

3.Now rub out all the parts where lines are overlapping, as any animal is solid.

4.Start colouring with the bucket tool. If the colour you want is not there, then click on Colours, then Create Custom Colours, and select your colour of choice. BE SURE TO COLOUR IN EVERYTHING, EVEN PARTS WHERE YOU'RE GOING TO SHADE!

5.Now pick a colour of a place you'll be shading. Then click on Colours, then Create Custom Colours, and drag the little triangle/arrow down until you're satisfied.

6.Now draw a line with the shading colour, then fill it in. Do steps 5 and 6 as often as you need to.

7.Now outline the background, and do the colouring steps all over. (Or draw all of the outlines first and colour them in one.) If you are drawing the sun, do not outline. Just colour it in yellow or orange or red.

Part Two: Using Photoshop

If you are lucky enough to have Photoshop 5.5 (as I have, it's pretty old now) or better, these instructions are for you. They might work on Elements as well. If you are not drawing a background, skip to step 6 except don't make a new layer.

1.Think about your BACKGROUND carefully. Be sure to choose whether you are going to draw a background or not, because if you decide not to do a background and you change your mind, there isn't much you can do (as I have learnt from bitter experience). If you definitely don't want to do a background (at least you can delete the background if you wanted to) skip to step 6, except don't create a new layer.

2.Get rid of the opacity tick, as well as wet edges and color (all on the Paintbrush Options tab), they're not good.

3.Outline your background in black or some dark colour using the pen tool. If the lines are going everywhere, you have to use the path tool, which is (in my opinion) harder to use than Paint curves and lines. Once you have gotten your path, go to the Path tab, which is next to the Layers tab. Find the right button and stroke it with your outline colour.

4.OR, you can use the Cloud Filter (this will use your two coloursof choice), which is in Filter, then Render. If you used blue and white, for example, this would make a cloudy sky. You can now outline the rest of the background.

5.Now, if you are doing a sun, go to Filter, then Render, then Lens Flare. Place the Lens Flare where you want it, then colour over any out-of-place lights.

6.Now, create a new layer for your character. Outline every part of the character, including all clothes, weapons etc.

7.You can now colour your background (make sure you have selected your background layer). Colour in EVERYTHING, unless there is no background at all. If there is no background, ignore this step.

8.Now colour your second layer (the character). Again, colour everything.

9.Now do your shading. Make sure you are colouring on the right layer. For instructions for shading, see steps 5 and 6 for Paint, except that you just click on the colours (on your side-toolbar), and instead of bringing the triangle down, move the colour circle down.

10.Once you are happy with your image, MAKE SURE YOU FLATTEN IT or the wiki won't let it in because it's either going to be saved as a bitmap or psd, and neither are allowed. To flatten the image, click Layer, then Flatten Image. This will squash it down to one layer.

11.HOW TO SAVE A PHOTOSHOPED IMAGE;IMPORTANT! Do the usual Save As thing, except save it as a JPEG, PNG or GIF, preferably a JPEG. For the JPEG settings, turn the Matte off, and make the quality 9.