Always do THIS before shading

Hey! In this Short video, I'm gonna share with you a tip on what to do before you start the shading process on your illustration. Hope you like it and that it is useful for you also.

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My name is Lucas Peinador, I’m a concept artist and illustrator. I am originally from Costa Rica, now living in Slovenia.
I love painting and teaching about painting. This channel is dedicated to art and creativity, to share the mindset, technique, and tools of an artist working in the Entertainment Industry.
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[NotAppIicabIe]

Going in with a solid color first like that instead of the lasso tool is so handy I want to try it. When I used to try digital art it was just hard for me to use the lasso.

[atari]

Yess I cant work without everything being on a clipping/mask layer, , every colour must be separate and in order or I will snap my pen into a billion little pieces

[vi_pravi]

For me personally, working using only one layer is more fun and exciting. It also makes process more chaotic, and I'm a big fan of that.

[thomasfenn]

meanwhile Medibang users: My project takes 3 minutes to save if i use more than 10 layers

[Uvlugiak]

When I first really started to dig into digital art, I fell into this technique intuitively, until I realized how needlessly complicated, time consuming, and controlling it really is. Not to mention how quickly it drives up the file size, especially if you apply this method to separate highlight and shadow layers for each individual base layer as well. This can easily and ironically get out of control if you continue to create even more layers for secondary details/textures, since those can also affect how let’s say, a shadow will appear overall. Because then you gotta go back and meticulously edit the shadow layer and so on.

But then again, this method seems to be a rite of passage for digital artists. And maybe it was just me who let it get so out of hand. My take: digital art provides endless tantalizing methods for increased control over your art, with the ability to separate it into editable layers as one of the main means. While this does grant an immediate boost in control, it ultimately becomes a crutch you rely on to avoid developing your digital toolkit. Because the further you get into this method and the more time you spend dividing your piece into layers within layers within layers…the less you’ll want to “start over” trying something new. And trust me, there’s plenty other more efficient methods out there for achieving the same effect.

Again, maybe it’s just me who went too far with it. I’m sure there exists a balanced and enjoyable workflow with this method, and if that works for you, great! Nothing against it in that respect. I’d just like to caution budding digital artists against getting too stuck into a single “correct” way to create art. Because again, there’s virtually endless ways available to make it happen. I encourage people to approach their art with a bit more dimensionality and fluidity.

[alctalks]

For a beginner artist this might be a useful thing to try out, but it's far from necessary. It might help some people, but to me it just takes extra space and effort. If I'd layer everything seperately I spend too much time trying to find the right layer 💀. I also feel it's less flexible, especially for lineless art. I don't think it works if the art has many different components either. But I encourage beginners to try this out to see if it works for them.

[ccherry.berryy]

Oh keeping the same textures in the same layer is smart too

[rikuje]

For so long I'm so scared to to paint on grayscale then color layer but your work makes me wanna do it.. Maybe it is that time of the year to get out of my comfort zone

[aitakemi]

This is why I still use Sai for its auto selection/wand feature. If you have clean lines, you can just separate these things in just one clean instead of using lasso tool.

[Caca-yqdi]

I used to do that before I started to get an art degree. After learning academic art I found it absolutely irritating to work on separate layers, getting used to working with paint on paper all that xD

[agnozythehearthead]

I came to this trick myself, a lifechanger it is! I do hybrid style, with painterly render but thicker "pencil" lineart and it looks so gorgeous

[kurikuraconkuritas]

I find using save selection more useful

[confettiveda]

I like doing this! I can blend with confidence knowing that I'm not going to keep getting skin color mixed into the hair lol

It also helps my scattered brain focus on a "list" of elements that need to be shaded and make sure everything gets shaded.

[igosduikana]

everybody talks about this as if its the simplest thing but it takes ME forever still :(

[poppytempest]

Thats exactly what I do!😊 I keep seeing people do digital art in a chaotic way and whenever I tried copying them, it never really worked for me! 😅

[Bobo-Nose]

Artist: I like to put my elements in separate layers.

👃🏿🎨Me too, though I had to tone it down a bit because I ended up using so many layers.🎨👃🏿

[MatashiYuhei]

I think I'm having a hard time understanding this. So you have your Base Color(A) and then you have a layer for each colored element(B i.e. hair/eyebrows, cloak, eyes, etc.) Then you lock the layer and shade over everything ? I feel like I'm missing something or missing a step and would greatly appreciate some assistance 😅

[ple]

I honestly struggle so much with having everything on the same layer. It just makes me really nervous for some reason. I feel much more comfortable with most pieces being separate. All pieces on a drawing are on multiple different layer, so when I'm messing around with color combination or with shading, I feel confident, that I won't color over something else by accident (which happens A LOT when I have to different pieces too close together).

I'm trying to get hand over just painting on same layer, but it's not going to well so far. It's hard to get out of my comfort zone, if I always use 20+ layers, but I guess I just need to learn to not stress too much about messing up and just play around like I used to when I started out with drawing :0.

[Limner_Liora]

This is really smart- i divide my colors, too, but i haven't tried butting down base shades that are monochrome- definitely going to start!
Thank you!

Also that person you drew is ABSOLUTELY PERFECT ✨✨✨✨✨

[teath_]

I use csp- this is my method of doing this: instead of using the brush tool to make a selection i (personally) just select the flat entirely (shift click the layer) and either
A) make a mask layer with that selected shape and invert(so the flat shape becomes the positive space/"white")
B) just go straight in on another layer while the selection is still going.

When youre satisifed, merge each layer with its corresponding mask/shade layer. Make sure to keep copies of the flats in a seperate folder incase you want to experiment more.

If im SUPER lazy i clip the shade layer to the flats but that makes the workspace confusing. Too many indented layers that you accidentally unclip and then have to reclip when fixing/adding layers. I used to do this religiously when i was using medibang as a kiddo. Not very efficient for detailed pieces.