Hello all – Colleen here with some coloring inspiration for you today!
One of the challenges given to us by Zoe was “Sharp Shadows”… now this can mean a lot of different things. It could be more of a Mange-type rendering where the shading isn’t blended out and each of the shadows has a very distinct edge. Me… I’m not really a huge fan of that style as I like to blend. So I’m taking a slightly different view of the challenge – and showing how to create sharp “CAST” shadows.
I used Rocker Roxette for this challenge as she had some nice areas of overlap for casting shadows.
Let’s take a closer look at what cast shadows are:
Anytime there is something (fabric, body parts, hair) that overlaps something else, it will cast a shadow. For this image, I used the viewer as my light source to make it simple.
For example, her bangs cast a shadow on her face, her nose casts a shadow on her face, her eyes cast shadows around her lids, her chin casts a shadow on her neck, and her choker casts a shadow too!
I used a mauve color for the cast shadows on the skin because blue/violet colors are a great complimentary color to the yellow/orange of the skin tone. Notice that the cast shadows are NOT blended out. Up close like this they look a little weird, but when viewed as a whole image, they look very natural.
Here are some more sharp cast shadows… Notice the mauve shadows on the skin cast by her skirt and hose.
Each section of the image will have cast shadows. I’m only pointing out the ones on the skin. But if you look at the final image closely, you will notice that the guitar casts a shadow on her shirt, her shirt casts a shadow on her skirt, her arm casts a shadow on the guitar, the boots cast a shadow on her hose… and so on.
The trick to creating nice, sharp cast shadows is to #1 – us a color that is either a complimentary color or a darker shade and #2 – wait for the image to dry completely before adding cast shadows, otherwise the edges will blend slightly.
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Supplies Used
Image: Rocker Roxette Digi Image (Make It Crafty)
Paper: X-Press It Blending Card (Imagination International Inc)
Copic Markers (Imagination International Inc.)
skin – E000/E11/E04
lips – R29
hair – B91/B93/C3/C5/C7/C9/100/black multiliner
shirt and hose – B00/B02/B04/B29
skirt and boots – C1/C3/C5/C7/C9/100
guitar – R24/R29/R89
I hope you find this helpful! Thank you for stopping in
Go Out and Color Your World!
Colleen
Thank you for the tutorial Colleen, Has really come at the right time for me as I am trying to work on cast shadows with my images. hugs
Fantastic tips, Colleen!
great help and fab shadows, Colleen.
I am loving all these tutorials. This one was really great as I have been wondering how everyone seems to be doing this. Thank you Colleen.
Wow, what a great tutorial! Do I get it right, that you used E04 for the mauve shadows on her skin?
Big Hugs
Barbara/Kreativmonster
Thanks for sharing. Hope you are also getting to have some fun in Vega. Know you like teaching but everybody needs to have some fun.
Fantstic tutorial Colleen! I know when I do these shadows they seem to stand out so much and look weird, so I immediately begin to blend them. I must start looking at them as part of the whole picture. Looking at your completed image it doesn’t look strange. But because I am looking for those areas you have added the cast shadow to I can see the crisp edge of the shadow and it looks right. Thanks for the inspiration!
So much to learn! Grateful for your tutorial!!!
Now why in the world would you lie about the “fabulous” group you taught in Las Vegas? LOL. Just wanted to thank you again for such a great class. Still don’t know where all that energy comes from. Once I’m able to review what I learned this weekend, maybe I’ll tackle this. Hope you had a quick and uneventful trip home.
Your “challenged” student!
I love the look of the cast shadows! You have to really examine her to pick them out but it adds so much to the coloring. Thanks for teaching us how to do this
Thanks so much Colleen! Your give me lots of useful tips!
Hugs, Franz.