If you want, draw an illustration for. How to draw an illustration that attracts attention. How to draw a knight, a princess - step-by-step illustrations for a fairy tale

Digital design technology is amazing, but the best work is still created using traditional painting methods. In this article, Alina Chau, a professional illustrator of children's books, will share the secrets of creating illustrations using paints.

1. Necessary tools

To get the desired result when working with paints, you need to have the right tools. Of course, you don't have to buy expensive painting supplies, but I still don't recommend using bad watercolors or paper that isn't suitable for it.

Here's a list of the basic things you'll need to get your creative journey started:

• Brushes: my favorite ones are with faux sable. They have a reasonable price and are in no way inferior in quality. You may need brushes of different sizes. I advise you to buy round brushes number 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12, as well as one or two large ones, so that you have plenty to choose from.
• Palette: Choose a palette that has enough space to place and mix colors together.
• Paints: My favorite is Winsor & Newton, but there are many other good brands. If you don't want to pay a lot, remember that manufacturers often create two types of paints - for beginners and for professionals. The Cotman series from Winsor & Newton is for beginners, and the Artist is for professionals. Even though the beginner series are cheaper, they are still of high quality. If you want to save money, but still get acceptable quality, buy Russian “White Nights” paints.

• Water cans: I usually have at least two - one for my dirty brushes, the other for mixing colors.
• Paper: Choose between semi-smooth (cold pressing) and smooth texture (hot pressing). Hot pressed paper has a smoother surface and the ink adheres to it differently. I use semi-smooth because I like the hard texture and I think watercolor looks interesting on it.
• White gouache: White watercolors are usually too transparent and barely noticeable. I prefer to do the final strokes and highlights with white gouache.

2. Start with a sketch

Regardless of whether you come up with the drawing yourself or copy it, I advise you to always start with a sketch. I like to draw with a ballpoint pen on newsprint—the stiff texture allows ideas to flow freely, and I don't worry too much about mistakes.

Above I've attached a few examples from my children's book, Pickle: The Little Bird Who Doesn't Tweet! To begin, I make a rough sketch in blue pencil. I draw the same line several times, trying to find the right forms that complement the plot.

If there are too many lines and it becomes difficult to make out them, then I simply move to another page. As soon as I like one of the sketches, I outline everything with a black ballpoint pen.

3. Sketch in color

I often create studies in color before I start working on the actual painting. To choose the right colors, the sketch must be drawn on watercolor paper. Let it be small, for example 10x15 cm or less.

The sketch doesn't have to be perfect. Instead, take note of how colors attract attention and how you can add interest to a painting using light and shadow. The purpose of the sketch is to understand what impression the final picture should make.

Even though Pickle is an e-book, I really wanted it to retain the feel of a classic children's picture book like Peter Rabbit, but also be modern and funny.

To achieve this, I added subtle, subtle lines and textures to the paintings. And in order for “Pickle” to also look current, I used not only modern visual references, but also a brighter and more saturated color scheme than those in classic illustrations.

4. Preparing paint and paper

There is a common misconception that for the final painting you must use the same range that you selected for the sketch. Of course, then the painting will look exactly like the sketch, but it's still better to start with clean drawing supplies and a clean palette. This will prevent the paint from looking dull and uncontrollable.

And don’t forget to regularly wash all accessories as soon as they become too dirty. This will help keep the colors clean and rich.

You don't have to worry about keeping the paper from shrinking if you're drawing in a sketchbook, but be sure to secure the paper of the final painting. You can either stretch it yourself, or buy a watercolor block that is already stretched.

Thin line with pencil

After all this, you can finally make a sketch. Draw very thin lines so that you can paint over them later. Unless, of course, you have plans to make them noticeable.

People often ask if I use any techniques to transfer the sketch onto the paper of the final painting. Actually, I just redraw it by hand. That's when I usually finalize it and add the finishing touches.

5. Watercolor is a multifaceted medium.

There is a common misconception that painting with watercolor means constantly worrying about how much water is on your brush. Many people think that if they use more water, the paint will behave as it should.

In reality, everything is not like that. It is better to pay attention to how quickly water evaporates from the paper. You must consider the weather and humidity when painting. And also, of course, the characteristics of the paper itself, how strong its absorbency is.

If you paint on a dry, sunny day, use more water. And if you are painting, for example, near a waterfall, then too much water on your brushes can create a risk of color bleeding. And in general, it is better to add new layers of paint in a timely manner, taking into account the moisture level of the paper.

One of the interesting things about watercolor is that you can paint with little or no water to create a dry effect or to capture the look of an oil painting. Watercolor really can do a lot.

6. Where to start

You can find many watercolor painting techniques and tutorials on websites and in books. But I would like to tell you how to perceive the big picture. There are many theories about where to start with watercolor painting. One of the most popular methods is from light to dark. Although I don’t think you should be constrained by any rules - I’ve seen artists create amazing paintings by starting from the darkest to the lightest.

I usually start with what I like the most, like Pickle the bird, and then move on to the side characters. And after all this I add the background color using a large brush.

I advise you not to worry if the paint does not lay down as you want, or goes over the edges. On the contrary, you should perceive this as one of the most interesting aspects of painting with watercolors. You can achieve cool and unexpected effects at any time.

Usually, after I apply the background colors, the paper becomes damp, so I let it dry before worrying about the details. And this time I really have control over how the paint flows.

I almost always leave room for decorative details empty until the very end, because I use them to enhance the composition or direct the reader's attention to a specific place. That's why I don't want to accidentally highlight them too much.

In my children's book, the characters spend most of their time outdoors, so I usually save leaves, plants and flowers for last, even though they are an important part of the composition. I want them to highlight the art as much as the storyline itself.

7. Experiment

There are no rules, there are only tools! As with any other art form, there are many techniques in painting. Experiment and learn new techniques that will complement your drawing style. You can use white, you can scrape the surface of the paper, you can apply a lot of paint. Most importantly, have fun!

If you're interested in my painting process, you can watch a quick-motion video of how I painted the picture below from start to finish. The video is three minutes long, but in real time it took me seven hours:

Schoolgirl drawing in mixed media. Watercolor + colored pencils. Video

French artist Xavier Collet explains how to make the painting process more efficient using his work with a dark fairy surrounded by a forest.

I think the following drawing rules can help you develop your skills, but sometimes it can feel like they are trying to limit you. When trying to satisfy a wide range of artistic criteria - such as character design, thoughtful compositions and effective color schemes - you can slow down, but fast work is not always good, remember that.

I believe that the best way to the top is to learn to feel, to do things instinctively. With practice, seeing the things that are in the image and identifying those elements that still need work becomes second nature, filling the subconscious as you work.

With practice, it becomes second nature to see things that need improvement.

The only thing I did before I started drawing was to step away from everyone and the photos in my head so that my subconscious could start generating ideas. After that, I completely immersed myself in the drawing process.

Initial sketches

I don't know how far I'll go with this illustration. What I do know is that I want the main character to be a queen of sorts—someone who makes you feel afraid and anxious when you look into her eyes.

So I'll start with a rough sketch to get an idea of ​​what the composition will be like. She walks in the forest and watches you. Well, let's start drawing someone who will make you feel real fear and mesmerizing horror.

Fifty Shades of Gray

It is important to take into account the depth of the image and decide on the planes: a background with two or three levels of depth; your character's main plane and foreground.

I start in mono - it's faster and it will be easier to change something. I chose a palette of many shades of gray and by adding horns and a full length dress to the character, I began to define her character.

A starting point

We all have our little weaknesses. Mine is that I can't resist drawing the character's face in the early stages. It is often said that detailing elements in isolation is not a good practice because you end up missing the big picture.

Helpful advice, no doubt, but I can't stand the fact that there will be only a few details on the face, I'm terribly itching to add them. So I took some time to draw the face, crown, horns and hair.

Sometimes it is very difficult to determine what colors the illustration will be in. So here's a little advice for you. Take an old drawing or even a photograph, it doesn't matter. Duplicate the image layer and apply the Gaussian Blur effect to the duplicate. Then change Blending Options – Blend Mode – Overlay. And see if this color scheme inspires you for your work illustration.

Search for a color theme

After that, I adjusted the Hue/Saturation and painted with the brush in color mode. Another tip is to apply Auto Levels or Auto Contrast and then play around with the layer blending modes. Sometimes happy accidents will inspire you and help you overcome the wall of “uncreativity.”

Add details

I start drawing out the details of the character, starting with the head and bust, before moving on to designing the clothing.

I'm not doing any ideas for the dress, as I said, I'm just flipping through a large selection of different images to get my creative juices flowing so I can come up with an unusual design for the dress.

Contrast

It's good if there is contrast in the drawing. More specifically: the contrast of shapes, brightness and color. My choice for this illustration is a bluish light which will indicate magical power and control over all living beings in this illustration.

More details

Now that I'm happy with the colors I've chosen, I can finalize her costume by adding details like jewelry, and introduce a range of materials like fur, leather, metal, and glitter that all add up to make the design more interesting.

Plastic surgery is your friend

Remember the benefits of digital graphics programs. Photoshop's Plastic filter is a powerful editorial option. Here in my illustration I use it to touch up the fairy's face since I decided it was too long.

Let's finish with her

Time to complete the final details of the character. I added the finishing touches to her corset, painted a skull on her staff, added a blue glow to her costume, etc.

Now it's time to spice up the background with some light and some noise. The speckled brushes in the Foundation Lightening mode are perfect for me.

We create pets

I want my dark fairy to have... pets. The bottom of the composition is a bit loose, so it's the perfect place to draw the creatures that come to life with her dark magic.

I don't have a specific idea of ​​what I'm going to do, so I sketch it out with a dark brush and then use a brush in the Dodge mode to add details like eyes and mouths with wisps of magic coming out of them.

Menagerie of Monsters

So far I'm working instinctively and I'm quite happy with the design of my creature. Now I can add others. I use the same workflow: create a small sketch and then add details using the brush in the base dodge mode.

Blurred elements

I'm almost finished with this illustration and will now be applying some of the tricks I've learned over the years. I want my fairy to look at the observer - the spectator who is hiding in the forest.

So I'll finish off the branches with hard brush strokes. There is no need to draw them in detail. Then I added a Gaussian Blur effect to them and that's it - they're ready!

Grain adds texture

I love adding texture to my drawings. Sometimes it's just a paper texture created using a Layer Overlay. But now I will do something completely different.

I added a neutral gray layer (Saturation - 0, Brightness - 50) and applied Filter>Noise>Add Noise twice (set to maximum) and Filter>Blur>Blur three times. Then I set this layer to Overlay (Overlay) and clicked on the Layer Opacity, setting the settings to 5-6%

More magical life

I decided that the painting needed more life. My solution is to quickly finish the butterflies in the foreground, again giving the drawing more depth.

The final trick

Last tip. An easy way to add a little more variety to your art is to create a new layer and fill it with a soft cloud brush.

Set the base color to a light gray and use a soft cloud brush to create contrast. Then set this layer to Blend Mode.

I followed my own advice and finished the drawing!

Hello! My name is Hatice Bayramoglu, I am a 3D artist and illustrator from Turkey. In this lesson I will show you how to draw and color a hero - an illustration for a children's book. As the lesson progresses, I will explain my choice of certain tools and my thoughts on illustration. My tutorial shows how I create an illustration from initial sketch to full drawing. I believe that after reading this lesson you will find something useful for yourself. To create the work I will use Photoshop and a Wacom tablet.

This drawing will be created entirely in Photoshop CS2.

Step 1: Sketch
Start by creating a new document in Photoshop. Its dimensions should be about 800x778 pixels. I started by creating a quick sketch that captured my main idea. Here's a sketch of the main environment around the main character.

So, as you can see, this sketch shows the main character - a little girl standing next to an apple tree with an apple in her hands. She smiles because she is happy, and perhaps a little sad.

Step 2: Setting Up Brushes in Photoshop
Here is the one and only brush that I use to paint my heroine. For painting I will use standard brushes.

Before you start painting, you need to set up your brush. Start by choosing a tool Brush(Brush), then use the standard brush shown below.

(click on image to enlarge)

Step 3: Color Palette
You must decide on the colors you will use before you start painting. Here are my colors used in my work:

Step 4: Layers (Layers)
Create New Layer(New Layer) and name it Sketch. You can create this sketch in Photoshop or on paper. Once you have created the sketch layer, change it Blend Mode(Blending Mode) on Multiplication(Multiply) and always keep it on top of all layers so you can see what you are painting over.
Now look at my layers palette. Here are separate layers for each sketch object. Painting each detail on a new layer makes it easy to make adjustments as you paint. It's much easier to correct mistakes if the main elements of your illustration are located on separate layers. This step is really very important!

Step 5: Working on the Background Color
Here let me show you how I color the background. Choosing a tool Fill(Paint Bucket) (G). Once you fill the background it should look like this. Make sure the layers are arranged as shown in the image below.

Step 6: Coloring the Basic Shapes
Before we start coloring, let me show you the order of the layers again. I changed it because the sketch layer should be on top of all layers, and also set to Multiplication(Multiply). At this point we can start coloring the sketch and can identify the main shapes. Using the tool Brush(Brush) (B), start painting the main character and the tree on separate layers. Make sure that Rigidity(Hardness) of the brush is set to 100%. A brush with soft edges may result in a somewhat blurry result.

And in this step I would like to change the size of my file because I want to add more subtle details. So I open Image(Image) - Image Size(Image Size) and increase the file size to 1500x1495.

Step 7: Adding Details
Now I can start adding details. In this step, I started by painting the main character's face. Make sure you are working on the proper layer before painting.

And here I created a copy of the tree layer and added some details to it. I also hid the first layer with the tree.

Here's a screenshot to show you the details. I started adding even more details to my drawing, such as grass and small flowers. At this point I created a layer called Flowers.

I add even more color and fine detailed lines on the wood.

Now look at the details I just created. I continue to add details and, if necessary, create new layers.

Step 8: Special attention to the main character
Now that I'm happy with the detailing of the decorations and wood, I'll add detail to the girl's outfit. At this stage I noticed that my character looked very plain and not very attractive, so I thought I should take the time to make some changes. I tried to give a slightly different look to the heroine and continued to add more details. Again, pay attention to the order of the layers. As you can see, in this step I have a few more new layers. All layers have their own names.

Now I'm starting to add little details to the heroine, adding more yellows and greens. By the way, don't forget that you don't have to detail everything in this step. At this stage I work on the main details and light until I get a nice contrast. Sometimes I change some colors. I'm almost finished painting her clothes and body. I also moved the sketch layer a little to one side so that you can see what the heroine looks like without the sketch base.

Step 9: Adding Highlights and Contrast
I used the tool Clarifier(Dodge) (O) to brighten areas. This is what the work looks like after all the adjustments made by the tools Clarifier(Dodge) (O) and Dimmer(Burn). I continue to add more detail to the tree using brushes of different sizes and colors. Once enough detail was added, I began to smooth it out using a soft edged brush. I also use tools Clarifier(Dodge) (O) and Dimmer(Burn) to give shade to branches.

I also add a few strokes with the tool Finger(Smudge). I use this because I want to add soft blurry areas to the clouds and background. At this stage I noticed that my clouds were not very detailed. So I created a new layer to paint the details to the cloud using two tools: Finger(Smudge) and Brush(Brush).

Step 10: Adding More Details
At this stage, I noticed that I needed to add more flowers to my drawing. So I create a new layer and, as you can see, I draw some cute and simple flowers. I continue to add more details. Adding some touches with a tool Clarifier(Dodge) (O), I'm doing this because I want to add some lightly lit areas of grass.

Now that the grass and background are complete, I can start adding more detail to the girl's hair and face. Selecting the brush mode Lightening Basics(Color Dodge) and add a few strokes to her face.

Now notice the details I added using just the brush in mode Lightening Basics(Color Dodge).

Step 11: Color Correction
The drawing is almost finished except for color correction. To start Drain(Merge) all layers. Now in Image(Image) - Corrections(Adjustments) - Brightness/Contrast(Brightness/Contrast) let's change the color a little. I want to give the illustration a more sunny effect.

Set the parameters that I set. This is what the illustration looks like - more sunny and joyful.

Finished illustration
Here is the finished illustration, I hope you found this tutorial interesting. Thanks for reading.

I still receive letters with the same consistency with questions: “I want to become an illustrator, where to start?”, “How can I learn to draw?”, “What should I do if I can’t draw, do I have a chance to become an illustrator?”

At first glance, the questions are quite strange. If you don’t know how to draw, you don’t want to start and try, you don’t even want to learn how to draw - what kind of illustrator are you? Why do you need it? But everything is not as simple as it seems at first glance.

I recently came across a higher private school in Hamburg online that trains illustrators only. On the very first pages of "About Me" they say that an illustrator is a designer who knows how to draw.

I felt funny because I am a graphic designer and, without false modesty, I received a good education. Over many years of training, we were constantly told that any designer must be able to draw, handle a camera, understand typography and understand art.

Along with such subjects as typography, we were taught drawing and photography - things that were reflected in my ideas about illustration. I devoted several sections to the influence of photography on illustration in my book “Profession - Illustrator. Learning to think creatively.”

The statement that an illustrator is a designer who knows how to draw seemed very strange to me. At first I decided that people simply did not know what modern designers were teaching. But then I seemed to understand what they were talking about. Namely, that the illustrator is a professional who has a wide variety of skills and image techniques, which can often be called more like design ones.

Indeed, a modern illustrator is no longer tied to traditional visual techniques: he does not have to work only with paints or pencils on paper. He doesn't even have to be able to draw very well. It is enough to be able to handle paper and scissors, wood and a chisel, fabrics and a sewing machine, to be able to draw only at the level of contours and sketches and at the same time be no less successful and a selling illustrator than colleagues working in traditional techniques.

Today I would like to draw your attention to the techniques of modern illustrations.

To questions like “Where should a future illustrator start?” I already answered, and below you can follow the link to my answer. And to the question whether someone will turn out to be an illustrator if he has not learned to draw traditionally, academically, I will say yes. Because if paper and chiaroscuro don’t work for you, it’s worth trying yourself in some unconventional technique if, despite everything, you want to do illustration professionally.

For inspiration, I will show you a beautiful book - a collection of works by illustrators and artists working in non-traditional illustration techniques.

Book on American Amazon:
Book on German Amazon: Illustration Play: Craving for the Extraordinary

The cover is made on very beautiful, textured paper with real stickers.

And this is what the content looks like - a list of featured illustrators.

Illustrations made using a burner. Author: Genevieve Dionne

Installation illustrations made from various materials. Posted by Stephanie Dotson

Illustrations-installations made of paper and wood. Author: Aj Fosik

Illustrations on old packaging, envelopes, etc. Posted by Melvin Galapon