Today I’m going to teach you how I digitally painted, Sophie, my first “Twin-up of the Month.” I’ve written this tutorial to include my entire process, so read the entire tutorial first before attempting, because I also include the errors and corrections I’ve made for your learning benefit.
Final Image Preview
About This Tutorial
- Technique: Digital Painting
- Level of Difficulty: Intermediate
- Estimated Completion Time: (so damn long..lol) or approx. 20 hrs.
[ Project Tools]
- Graphics Program: Photoshop CS3
- Additional Tools: Pen Tablet, and Pencil on Paper Sketch
Step 1: Understanding the Initial Sketch
Once I realized how I wanted to compose my sketch, a Twitter pinup looking out a window, I drew it roughly on regular printer paper. Early on I had to be resourceful because my scanner is currently down–so I took a regular digital camera and snapped a picture of it.
Copy and paste the sketch’s picture into a New Project using the Clipboard Preset, adjusting the resolution to 300 pixels/inch. I also personally like to make sure that all of my projects open with the Background Contents set to Transparent.
Once the sketch is pasted into Photoshop it’s important to understand the lighting. I made a separate sketch just for this tutorial to show you how I wanted to light the composition. I picture this painting during a kind of morning time, with the main light source in the far left corner. Because of the position of the open window, the light bounces around creating shadows in various places.
We’ll keep this in mind for the rest of the painting…
Step 2: Outlining the Sketch in Photoshop
Add a group [name: DP (Digital Painting)] above the initial sketch layer, this group will hold all the contents for the painting so we can frequently look back to the original sketch. Under the DP Group add a New Transparent Layer, Fill the Background with White–this will be the “White BG” to make an outline of the sketch on top.
Add a New Transparent Layer above the White BG Layer and begin to make a rough outline of your intial sketch using an ordinary pen tablet. With the rough outline done, add another New Transparent Layer above your rough outline to make a cleaner outline. Use the pen tool to create straight lines for the window and to understand the subject better.
At this point you can turn off the Layer Visibility for your initial paper sketch.
Step 3. Painting the Base Colors
[As you can see, I work in a lot of layers...] Add a New Transparent Layer [name:Painting] underneath both the rough and clean outlines, setting the Clean Outline to 100% Opacity, and the Rough Outline to about 16% Opacity.
You can add another New Transparency Layer above both outlines as a temporary layer to play with some color swatches–I scribble some fun colors on the layer to figure out what will work for the entire composition.
When you have the color scheme you want, begin to paint in the base colors on the transparent layer you added beneath the outlines [Painting layer] with your tablet. Pick a circular brush with 100% hardness, 100% Opacity, and 100% Flow. If you don’t set them like this then the opacity changes will bleed into each other. Paint all the base colors in for the entire painting, so we have something flat to work with.
Step 4. Painting the Main Shadows
I always like to first start painting in the shadows. For a particular section of the painting, click the color picker, source the flat base color, and bring the picker down slightly to create a shadow within color range. During my digital painting projects, my brush is usually set to about 30% in hardness, between 5-20% in opacity, and 100% flow. Always play with these ranges and colors for your desired effect because digital painting is a multicolored project.
Gradually add more shadows on top of each other and begin to shape the pinup subject and curtain to create the appropriate depth.
Notice how the shadows move upward and back to the right? Since the light source is low, the darkest shadows of the curtain will be above the subject and behind the top portion of the window. The curtain’s shadows will be the darkest in the “lines” of the curtain’s folds. The shadows will favor the right side of the subject, whose body position will also have an effect on the shadow dispersement.
Turn off layer visibility for the Clean Outline Layer to work better with the sense of depth and overall detail. Working with minimal lines helps when painting details overlapped by the lines while understanding depth perception.
Step 5. Adding the “Twin-ups” Highlights
Paint in the highlights for the pinup by color picking a lighter blue (nearly white) and painting where the light would hit based on our earlier assessment. The objects closer to the light (i.e. boobs) will have more light as it should dissipate into the shadow. Always be conscious of the depth perception to optimize on your technique for this project.
I added additional structural details to the pinup’s negligee to enhance her body figure with some light shadowing over the highlights, we will go back later to add final highlights to the negligee.
Step 6. Taking a Moment For Details
While Finishing up the highlights for the pinup, I went back to clean up some extra details. For instance, underneath her negligee there would be a shadow upon her legs. Add some extra highlights to other places like her shoulders for where the light my bounce and highlight slightly. I also started to create texture to her hair which we’ll get to next..
Step 7. Hair and Makeup
It wasn’t until I was thoroughly into the shading of her hair that I realized the hair style was all wrong. Since her head is tilted down slightly, the beginning of the fingerwaves look like they are defined by a part. After about 1 hour and 30 minutes of study and fingerwave picture references, I finally corrected the style of her hair.
I modeled Sophie the Twin-up after the style of Jessica Rabbit with an old Hollywood figure and style. Shading on her hair reflects the style of fingerwaves, the shadow is where the wave curls in and the highlight is where the curl comes forward at the viewer.
I kept her makeup sexy and feminine. Using a very tiny brush (probably 1 or 2 in size) I gave her bold liner for her eyes, winged out her eye lashes, and placed three dashes for her lower lashes for added sexiness. Notice the small traditional highlight under her brow, and the light smokey shadow of her lids with a touch of pink. Using a low opacity brush, I added the same pink on her cheek bones for added feminity.
Her beak lips are given some dimension by following the lighting for the composition with a highlight on the left and shadowing on the right. And keep in mind what hair over her eye does to the shadow, for there needs to be shading directly underneath her hair.
Step 8. Finishing the Body & Background
It’s probably a good choice by now to give her some hands..lol. At this point you’re going to have to redraw her limbs, so take the erase tool and erase some the sketch from the Rough Outline Layer. Go back to your Painting Layer to finish sculpting her arms and appropriate shadows/highlights.
The lines from the Rough Outline Layer appear a little harsh with the shading that’s been done, so take the blur tool around 80% strength, and begin to blur the lines on the curtain. Take the erase tool to completely erase areas that are no longer dependent on the rough outline like the hair, around the face, etc. However, I have kept some of the Rough Outline Layer to show through for the face, fingers, breast, and negligee.
Color pick a darker purple to finalize the shading on the curtains, go back with a soft opacity brush of a light purple to put lower highlights for where the light will hit the curtains “peaks.”
I rarely use the blur tool for my paintings (I like them to be textural), but I did take a blur brush with a low strength (20-30%) and slightly blurred parts of the curtain to smooth out the color.
Step 9. Coloring the Negligee
Add a New Transparent Layer above your Painting Layer; you can name this the Negligee Layer. Take the brush tool and with 100% hardness, 90% opacity and 100% flow, paint the negligee white. Set the Negligee Layer to “Soft Light,” and right-click the layer to select Blending Options.
In the Blending Options window, check the Color Overlay option, selecting the color “ff00a2.” Keep the opacity of this option at 100 while you set the blend mode to “Linear Burn.”
Now Sophie looks like she has a sexy hot pink negligee on while keeping all the original shading and highlights.
Step 10. Lighting & Cleaning Up the Edges
Next, select the Rough Outline Layer and with the erase tool at 100% opacity, erase all the details of the window and siding only. I still used the other parts of the outline for the curtains, and details of the pinup, so be to sure to not erase that.
Turn on the Visibility Layer for the Clean Outline Layer. Use the pen tools to fill in the areas of the window and siding where you want shading and colors. Because the window is open and the frame shows through the glass of the window, add extra detail by coloring the borders a tinted green.
I originally planned on having a flower box under the window (as seen in sketch) but I decided to keep it as a ledge for text since it’s also integrated into my Twitter background. Color the different levels of gray for the shadow and highlight affected by the light source. Once there are straight, clean shadows for the window, turn off the visibility layer for the Clean Outline Layer
Step 11. Final Highlights & Coloring
Yes, add a New Transparent Layer above the Negligee Layer [name: highlights]. Color pick a very light pink color to add more highlights on the negligee. Define some extra sexy details like the nipples and edges of the negligee.
Use this same layer to color the room behind the curtain and the pinup. Take a brush with 20% hardness and 10% opacity and layer on a bright yellow color onto the edge of the pinup’s hair, body, negligee, and curtain. This is just an extra, kind of “real life” detail that happens with light behind you is reflected upon your skin. Add a dark gray shadow for the pinup’s shadow over the ledge as well as the shadow for the left window.
Step 12. Adding the Text
Finally, add the text. Using the text tool, add a text layer on the front of the window’s ledge. Place the text (@SexiDesign) on the layer in the color white in a “Forte” font. Select “sex” and set the color picker at [f13ea7]. Right click the text layer, select blending options, and select a Drop Shadow with 40% opacity, a -122 degrees angle, 6px distance, 0% spread, and 0px size.
Create a new text layer for the site url, www.sexidesign.com and with the same font/color center the lower case text underneath the @SexiDesign text layer. Right click the url’s text layer, select blending options, and checkmark the stroke for a 3px size, 53% opacity, and [888989] gray fill color.
Whew! and that’s it….
Final Image
And of course, my final twin-up has a twitter themed, 140 character limited caption underneath for added pizazz… 
What You’ve Learned…
- The importance of understanding your light source…
- Color your painting in layers of shadow and highlight for depth…
- Correct any mistakes with references or study…
- Taking your time to analyze your composition results in a better painting…
- Don’t be afraid to add some sexy, naughty details
… - Have fun learning your own style of digital painting!
Download the .PSD Project File
After changing around the .psd file to optimize the file size, I decided to include it for any additional learning benefits…Enjoy! 
Click to Download .PSD Project File (Compressed Zip Folder)
12:36 AM
great job! I like this style