Questions? Go ahead and ask me

[Sky]

Oh, I see now.  

As for your question:
The fish thing was Caustizer's idea. They were supposed to eat green food at the very beginning. But after reading his fanfic, it made more sense to me if they would eat fish also rather than green food only. But they can eat both. :^.^:

[Malte279]

Hi Sky,
I was wondering if you could give me any suggestions on how to create better shadowing in my photoshop images. Do you also use the burn tool to create your shadows or is there a more suitable tool? Do you first select the area that is to be shadowed or do you draw it free hand? Are there any guidelines by your experience as for which level of opacity is suitable in various light conditions (dawn, day, dusk, night etc.)?
I would really appreciate any help you might be able to offer
By the way, do you use MSN by any chance or (well, I don't want this to come across as pestering now though I must admit that there is a pestering quality to this question ) is there any chance that you might give it a try?

[Sky]

^ Wow, so many questions. I feel honored. Okay, let's see...
 
I don't use the burn tool to shade my pictures. I just use normal brushes with a darker tone of the color I want to shade. I have an extra file with various color palettes and I use a graphics tablet (so I draw free hand). I don't know if it's suitable than the burn tool... I guess you have to try it out.

Opacity... you mean the shades? Hmm... though question. I usually experiment until it fits to the rest of the picture. Not the best advice, huh?  

And yes, I have MSN. But I'm afraid to tell you that I use it rarely or not at all.  
But if you still want my adress, send me a PM.  

[Malte279]

I don't use the burn tool to shade my pictures. smile.gif  I just use normal brushes with a darker tone of the color I want to shade. I have an extra file with various color palettes and I use a graphics tablet (so I draw free hand). I don't know if it's suitable than the burn tool... I guess you have to try it out. smile.gif

Aye that's what I did (after some try and error with the burn tool when it comes to lighting characters where the colors are usually very clearly defined. I was not precise with my question. What in case of adding light and shadow effects to something that does not consist of clearly defined and bordered colors but many small spots of varying colors (e.g. tree tops where the leaves have been done with the leaf shaped brush)?

And yes, I have MSN. in-yes.gif But I'm afraid to tell you that I use it rarely or not at all. doh1.gif
But if you still want my adress, send me a PM. smile.gif

Aye, of course. I also don't want to drag you on MSN if you don't want to. My own MSN address is malte279@hotmail.com. If you don't mind a chat sometime I would be glad to be added (or to be sent your address in a mail or PM), but I won't continue pecking you about it if you don't want to risk the taking up of time which MSN may cause

[Sky]

What in case of adding light and shadow effects to something that does not consist of clearly defined and bordered colors but many small spots of varying colors (e.g. tree tops where the leaves have been done with the leaf shaped brush)?

For these kinds, I make my own brushes. I start off with a base color and shape and then start shading/lighting it as I would with bordered colors. Same goes with grass.
I used this tutorial for both, maybe it's useful: Tutorial
If you're unsure how to make a brush, this may help: Brush Creation or you can use one of these: Grass and Leaves/Vegetation.  

I hope I could help a little.

[Malte279]

Awesomeness! I never created an own brush before even though I have often sorely missed something as basic as a square or rectangular brush on photoshop (maybe they left such elementary stuff out to encourage people to get in touch with the option of creating once own brushes). Thanks a lot Sky

[Pangaea]

How large do you envision wingtails as being?

[Sky]

How large do you envision wingtails as being?

Compared to a human?
Let me see... about 2-3 heads larger to an avarage human (7-8 feet perhaps?).
I made a drawing once with Sky and me but it's an awfully drawn picture and not very accurate...

[Pangaea]

Let me see... about 2-3 heads larger to an avarage human (7-8 feet perhaps?).

WHOA! :blink: I imagined they would either be pretty small (3–4 feet tall), or around human-sized (6 feet, tops).

I generally think of the gang as being pretty small; maybe that has something to do with my low size expectations. About what sizes do you see the gang as being?

[Sky]

WHOA! :blink:   I imagined they would either be pretty small (3–4 feet tall), or around human-sized (6 feet, tops).

I looked up how large a Pteranodon was and they were (fully grown) about 6 feet tall (I also looked at Petrie's bio at the character list) and wingtails should be a bit larger.  
I think I've read somewhere here that Littlefoot was on eye level to an avarage human so having Sky being a young adult made me think of them to be much larger. Uhm, I think that answered your new question too.  

*sigh* But I guess Caustizer did a much better job at this than me...  :unsure:

[Pangaea]

Ah, don’t be hard on yourself. No one’s really sure how large the gang is supposed to be, and there are a lot of different interpretations. For a long time I thought of the gang as being REALLY small, with the largest members being only about three feet long! Nowadays I think of them as being larger, maybe around twice that size, give or take. Anyway, you can probably change your estimates as well.

Do wingtails have teeth? Or just beaks?

[Sky]

Hard question... I'm not quite sure myself actually.  :unsure:  Can birds even get teeth?  :blink:
Anyway, I drew them sometimes with teeth to strengthen their expression and emotions. So I would say, yes, they have teeth.  

[Pangaea]

Well, it’s been found that a mutation in chicken embryos can cause them to grow teeth, but they never survive long enough to hatch (Article here). It’s likely that birds still possess the genes for teeth, but they are inactive. I don’t know if it is possible for those genes to be “switched on” in such a way that a bird develops teeth and survives to adulthood.

Anyway, I’ve always interpreted your wingtail characters as being sort of intermediate between dinosaurs and true birds. After all, they have dinosaur characteristics such as hands and a long, bony tail, a little like Archaeopteryx or Microraptor. (Didn’t you even say that their design was originally inspired by Guido?) And the fact that their wings have membranes clearly sets them apart from other birds. The way I see it, they’re sort of like “alternative birds”; a type of feathered dinosaur that developed a different way to fly (membranous wings with feathers on them instead of purely feathered wings). Thus they’re very similar to birdsóand could be even called birds, just as Archaeopteryx is called a bird despite the high likelihood that it was not a direct ancestor of birdsóbut they’re technically not true birds.

And, of course, creatures in animated films that are toothless in reality are often given temporary teeth for the same reasons you described. So arguably, wingtails could still be toothless.

Okay, new question: Is that notch in Sky’s tail vane a scar of some kind? If so, where did he get it?

[Sky]

Haha! With you around, you always learn new things everyday.
So we can call them somewhat a dinosaur/bird hybrid, hmm?

Didn’t you even say that their design was originally inspired by Guido?

Yup, that's right. :^.^:

Okay, new question: Is that notch in Sky’s tail vane a scar of some kind? If so, where did he get it?

Uh no, it's nothing like that. It's just a simple tail design.  

[Caustizer]

A Character question.

Does Sky embrace the possibility of a love affair with Star or does he feel a bit nervous about the whole thing, and see her more as a good friend?

[Sky]

A little bit of both. :^.^:

[Pangaea]

I’m trying to color something in on Photoshop, but am struggling with two things:

ï I can’t draw a lighter color over a darker color, and when I draw a darker color over a lighter color, it just ends up as a mixture between the two colors. For example, it won’t let me draw a white line on top of black, and if I try to draw a black line on purple, it ends up being dark purple.

ï I can’t use the Pencil, Brush, Eraser, or even the Bucket tool without the color I am adding blending with an adjacent color. For instance, if I’m filling in a blank space with blue right next to black, I end up with a bluish-black line where the colors meet.

As a Photoshop expert, could you please tell me if there is some kind of special tool or way to adjust the settings that would allow me to get around these problems? I would enormously appreciate it.

[Sky]

Hmm... do you work on seperate layers? Like, Layer1 is black and Layer2 is blue? It's really important.
You have probably given one of the layers a 'blending option'. On your layer window (depending which version of Photoshop you have), you can see a dropdown menu that gives your layers these options (multiply, screen, soft light,...). Your first problem sounds like that the layer was on 'multiply'. Just set it on 'normal' and you should do fine.

If not, then it might have something to do with opacity. On the layer window, there is the opacity option. Put it on 100%. You might want to check the 'fill' option under the 'opacity' option too as it's the same like the opacity option but adjusts only the layer itself without adjusting given layer-'styles'.

If the problem still occurs, click on the tool you were using to draw your lines and look on the top of your screen. Brushes for example have the same options (blending options, opacity) like above. Put them on normal and 100% opacity.

Your second problem might also have something to do with the above problem so it would be best to solve that one first.
You could try using the 'magic wand' tool. Click on the surface you want to color, then go to the menu and click 'Select'->'Modify'->'Expand...'.
Put 1 or 2 pixels to expand. Now make a new layer above and fill the space with color.

Well, that's all I know and I hope it will solve your problems.  

[Pangaea]

Thank you very much, Sky. I wasn’t aware of how important the layers were. I understand them a lot more now, thanks to you. As for the problem with the Brush, I realized that I should have just been using the Pencil tool.

New Photoshop question: I’m trying to digitally color a scanned piece of lineart, with the color on a separate layer from the lineart so that I can color the image without crossing over the lines, and then have the lineart be the top layer. Is there a way to set up the picture so that the blank spaces in each layer are transparent, and only the colored areas are opaque?

[Sky]

If you make a new layer, that layer should automatically be transparent. If you draw on it, everything else should be still transparent except the things you drew on that layer.

There is also the 'Magic Wand Tool'. Use the tool and click on all the blank spaces you want to remove and press 'Delete' on your keyboard. Note that the tool marks everything of the same color. So if you have a color and a 'slightly' different color next to it (without a border), the tool may mark the second color as well. After erasing, some spots may still be present and therefore use the eraser with a hard brush to remove them.

I'm not sure if I gave you the right information you wanted to know. It's probably easier if you only wanted to remove the white spaces of your scanned lineart.  :unsure: