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CGCookie — Coloring Technique Preview: Greyscale Step by Step
Published: 2014-01-10 19:54:23 +0000 UTC; Views: 55607; Favourites: 1604; Downloads: 1078
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Description
After being asked by Kent to sculpt a creature concept, went ahead and recorded the process, with no real tutorial in mind but led to the idea of doing a tutorial on coloring done with a greyscale technique.
Many artists work this way and build up their values before adding color! It's a great way to focus on lighting without worrying about color balance, harmony, saturation, etc.
Look forward to that happy accident sometime after the Cecelia course
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Comments: 48
Unfortunately the video for this video is not available. All that remains is the image of the technique applied. Sorry for the inconvenience. However we do have a similar tutorial located here using the zombie clown bust! cgcookie.com/archive/coloring-…
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sorry for asking but, what does the greyscale do before starting adding colors?
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working in greyscale helps understand values. A lot of painters tend to use greyscale first because it helps the eye determine if the composition and lighting look correct to the viewer. Some artists even tend to limit their range of values to help express individual style.
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Kinda reminds me of Scratch from Ice Age movies but as a reptile.
Very nice!
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Shared this on my blog today
www.noblevalerian.com/da-favou…
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He looks like hes giving the look Randall gives in Monsters Inc xD
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The colors sort of remind me of Spiderman's outfit. Really neat way of coloring!
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when is this tutorial coming?? i cant find it on cgcookie
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It's been put on the back burner while other tutorials and content are taking top priority unfortunately
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I cant wait for this tutorial! I really want to paint in this way
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A very well organized step by step tutorial! 
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I like to start out with a larger brush to lay out the values and then get smaller as I refine the details. This goes for the eraser tool as well. Hope this helps =]
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Great tutorial!
One quick question though; How do you "lose the lines"? Do you simply delete them,
or do you blend them into the grey scale?
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Whichever seems to work better for the scenario, I often draw over the lines but if the lines are on it's own layer, I would hide that layer.
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Oh ok! Thank you so much for the reply!
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Aww he lost his hair. heheh
This is actually one of my favorite ways to color, the grayscale technique. I'm curious as to the way you guys go about colorizing the grayscale though so I might have to check it out (if it's not too much).
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Great work!
Thanks for sharing
May I ask how did you add the colours?
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It will go more in depth through the tutorial, but basically you can first create a new layer and set the layer style to "color" or "hue" and then paint your colors over the greyscale image without losing the values already set!
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Thanks! Most tutorial uses overlay and for reason I just can't do that.
Thanks, I'll try the "color" or "Hue" next time.
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Great job, i like this Picture. Reminds me of the ice age squirrel.
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Ha now i see that as well. Good reference
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Yeah I always ask a lot of artists about that and almost all of them do greyscale first. I find it hard sometimes to add the color to the greyscale though. Cool!
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This always looks so comprehensive (to not use the word easy), but then when I try...
Nevertheless... this is great and I will take another look at it when I have delusions of grandeur once more.
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Keep practicing and I'm sure you'll get better in time!
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tis to bad that i dont do digital art, ive been sticking to traditional since its what i know and i dont think its possible to do gray scale first with out having it turn out weird looking
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This will be the tutorial for you then! It explains the process of working strictly greyscale and how to add color afterwards.
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I made a drawing recently that started with greyscale and it's probably because I don't master it but it felt like SUCH a waste of time!!
I'm a lot faster when I start colouring straight away and then simply add shades and light.
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I feel the same way. I almost always start in color and have fun exploring color harmony and expressing emotions through saturation and color combinations. But this is a technique that many artist use and may work for other artists.
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