[mothpaw]

Hey guys, im having trouble getting to know the Oekaki :c I looked at the guide to it, but it's a bit confusing. Whenever i try to color on layer 2, nothing shows. Just all around im having trouble with it. Could someone help me?

[claypigeon]

make sure your on pen or pencil. make sure your NOT on lock alpha and lastly make sure your color isn't white (if your bg is white)

[mothpaw]

Alright I'll try that thanks c:

[mothpaw]

hmm, nothing seems to be working

[claypigeon]

i don't know then. add me and i can try to fix it <3

[mothpaw]

added <3

[oceanic;]

Make sure the little dot beside the layer is black, that means it is showing up. Just click on it<3

[mothpaw]

Thank you <3 It's nice to get advise from all these people once again thanks cx

[Caela]

You probably won't need all the information I am about to give you, but I'm putting it here anyways. This might turn out harder to understand than the guide. =P

I assume you understand the pencil and pen tools at least a little, so I won't be too detailed. In the upper right corner is a rectangle that contains things like brush size, opacity, color, ect. That is where you change how the tool looks and functions. Slide the bar that says brush size to the right to make your strokes thicker and to the left for thinner strokes. Opacity effects how opaque the stroke is. So the smaller the number, the more of the below color(s) will show through. Color is used with the watercolor setting. It essentially does the same thing as adding water to real watercolor paints. Blend is how well your strokes blend with the colors below. Spacing causes your strokes to break up into a bunch of dots. Scattering also breaks your strokes up into dots. Unlike spacing, scattering spreads the dots out randomly and doesn't follow the line you drew exactly. If you use scattering and spacing, your dots will be further apart. Smoothing removes most of the bumps in the lines you draw.

The layer box, located below the tool option box, is where you control layers. Clicking sample all layers will allow you to smudge lines drawn on other layers. As far as I know, that is all it does. Lock alpha means that you can only draw over lines already drawn on the currently selected layer. Areas without lines cannot be colored. Opacity makes everything on the currently selected layer more opaque. Click the black dot next to a layer to make it transparent. Click the dot again to make the layer visible.

If you are using ChibiPaint v1.0, these next instructions will not apply to you. You will see a box next to the tool option box. It should have 6 pre-set colors, white, black, red, green, blue, and yellow. This is your box for color swatches. Click the plus symbol to add a new swatch, which will be your current brush color. The gear above that allows you to download and upload swatches from your computer. Click on any swatch to immediately set your brush color to that swatch's color. Right-clicking any swatch will give you 2 options; remove and replace with current color. Remove deletes the swatch and replace with current color does just what you think it does.

The box with three lines is your stroke type box. It has one squiggly line, one straight line, and one weird, hard to describe line. If you select the squiggly line, you can draw, well... squiggly lines (just keep reading. I know that was a weird description). The straight line means you can only draw straight lines and the hard to describe line serves 2 purposes. You can click on one spot and then another, which will make an arch between the 2 spots (a weird arch, mind you), or you can click and hold. Release the mouse button over whatever spot you want. A thin black line will appear with one straight line. The straight line is attached to the place where you clicked and the black line stretches between where you clicked and where you released. The black line is what your stroke will look like. As you move your mouse around, the straight line will follow and the black line will bend based on the straight line's placement. After you click, the straight line will stop following your mouse pointer and a new straight line will appear. Use that line the same way you used the first and when you click, the black line will change into the color you have selected and become thicker if needed. I doubt any of that made sense, but at least I tried.

In the box directly left of that one, you should see 6 squares. Zoom in and zoom out are self-explanatory, and you can use the mouse wheel to achieve the same thing. Zoom 100% takes you back to the original zoom setting. Undo undoes your last stroke. Redo redoes the most recent undone stroke. And then save pic needs no explanation.

And what about the really colorful box in the bottom left corner? That is your color box. I presume you understand the color selecting process, so I'll skip that. The bar along the bottom displays your current color. Right click that bar and it will show you the hex code of your current color. It will also ask you to enter a new hex code.

I don't use the texture box very often so I'll skip that. I wouldn't know what I'm talking about and I'm sure someone else can explain it wonderfully.

The last box is the tool type box. It's one of the easiest to master so I'll just give a quick description of a few select options. The marquee, located in the top corner, allows you to select areas of your drawing and copy them. You can use the fill option (found under the effects file) to fill only the marquee. Clear works the same way. The button located to the right of that lets you move the marquee and everything inside it. It is called the move tool. These two tools will only effect things on the currently selected layer. The rotate tool (directly below the move tool) Will rotate the entire canvas. It will NOT remain rotated when you post it. The smudge, blender, and water tools all blend colors together. Smudge is marked by a hand and the water tool is a water droplet. Dodge lightens colors and burn darkens them.

I would explain the list of words at the top of the screen but I've been working on this for 2 1/4 hours.

Just a few tips. Try setting your pen to red and creating a new layer. Make a sketch on that layer. I often make 2 sketch layers. Then create one more layer. If you want lineart, draw that on this layer. Then, for coloring, create yet another layer. Move this layer below the lineart layer by clicking and dragging it below your lineart layer. Now choose one color and fill in the lineart. I often use a large brush size (50-70 works well) and scribble inside as well as outside of the lines. I then use the eraser tool to remove everything that is outside of the lineart. Click lock alpha and draw the correct color(s) on your character(s). For shading, I like to duplicate my color layer by pressing ctrl+shift+d. I then set the layer to multiply. This is done by clicking where it says Normal in the layer box and then clicking Multiply. I then chose a dark color (blue for the purposes of this explanation), turn lock alpha on, and scribble over the original colors until the entire shading layer is covered by blue. Set the layer's opacity to something like 40 and erase the blue wherever the object isn't shaded. I do the same thing for lighting except using a bright color like yellow. I tend to have 4-6 shading layers and 2 lighting layers. To make a vertical oekaki, make sure you are using ChibiPaint v2.0. You can do that here. Once you have done that, use the rotate tool to rotate the drawing space until it's vertical. I haven't finished any of my pictures that use a vertical canvas, but I recommend saving the drawing, leaving the oekaki, then coming back. Re-open your drawing. If it's vertical, then it worked. If not, something went awry.

Thanks for bearing with me. I know this is long. It took 2 3/4 hours to write. =P Sorry if it has too much information, I got really carried away. If it doesn't make sense then I can try to elaborate.

[mothpaw]

Whoaaaaa this is like.. the most helpful post I've ever seen OUO geez thank you sooo much!! Anytime I need help I'll just come check this out! Thank you for taking so much of your time just to help me! Wow. I just. Thank you XD