Here’s another project in my self-taught journey to learn digital art and painting. I titled this character, Hiron: Manga Princess. I have no idea if “hiron” means anything but it sounded exotic-ish…so I went with it. I would call this a Manga style, but maybe mixed with a Bratz doll?
This started simple enough as a sketch shown in image #02 above. As I began to add the color, I found I was drawn to the details (flowers and such). I had a hard time giving the details a look that felt good to me so I ended up using the pen tool in Photoshop to help define the edges a bit more. I really liked the mixture of painterly and cartoon-like feel.
I worked only in Photoshop CS4 this time, a first for me. While I had mostly been learning to paint in Corel Painter, I had seen many other digital artists using Photoshop. I think I quickly got use to the change and will certainly be using Photoshop more.
If you’re just starting out as I am, I’d love to hear your comments and learn about your experiences in digital art.
–Kevin Harrison