[Vazchu]

Gather 'round, those of you whom wants to visit the past of a world known as Delau... Let us all go back to the very moment when the last Colourful Darkness dragon hatched all those years ago...

Okay... I think this turned out more like a doodle... I should have finished it the same day I started with it instead of just drawing a little here and a little there from time to time just like I've done this past week... Oh well, it's finished now anyway and as always I'm able to move past everything and anything while I draw Cour. The little fellow is one of the best things that ever happened to me.

Cour and the spieces known as colourful darkness dragon belongs to me.

[nalia]

This looks amazing! Can't wait to see it when its done!

[Vazchu]

I was able to get at least some screen shots when I went back to hide and show some of the layers (sometimes it's kind of good to overuse layers, just so you know) so I can show at least a little "step by step" for this picture after all. Though, I beg your pardon that I can't show everything exactly as I did it... Apparently I messed up with some of the layers (like drawing on the wrong layer every now and then). But I hope it shows at least a little how I draw here in the Chibi painter. :3

Step One

I always sketch in two steps, but I’ll never ever show the first one… Because it’s so horrible that even I sometimes can’t make out what I’ve tried to draw. I tend to call that first step of sketching “rough sketch” – that’s where I put up where I want everything to be when the picture is finished and put up some basic anatomy. After that I immediately move on to sketch step two, the detailed sketch - that’s where most of my attention is turned. I draw most of the details that I feel the need of drawing right now and do (if I find it necessary to accomplish a certain feeling or that I simply realize that something is wrong with the picture).

When it comes to this picture I wanted to give Cour a innocent look, as this picture is supposed to be right after he hatched from his egg. So I ended up changing how he held his head at this point (at first he was supposed to face the viewer, but I thought he looked more innocent and shy if I were to turn his head slightly more so just one side of his face could be viewed).

Step Two

This step is one of those that are quite messed up… But whatever; just ignore the shading and pretend that the egg is gray and we’ve it all as it should be.

Step two for me is as good as always to choose whether I want to begin with the background or the character(s) I’m drawing. In this case I chose the character. So I gave him his base colour and I ended up giving the egg a light gray base colour to start with since I wanted something to work with when I came around to give it its real colours (I hope you can understand why… It’s quite colourful after all...).

Step Three

This is the step where I in truth begin to shade and add the highlights to a picture. In this case I also started to add the real colours to the egg.
After I added the shading and highlights so it pleased me I went on ahead and added Cour’s fur. Since he’s supposed to be newly hatched in this picture I decided to do it a whole lot shorter than what they actually are when I usually draw him.

By now I also hide the rough sketch and lower the opacity on the detailed sketch.

Step Four'

The background next… In truth I’ve never been any good with backgrounds, but since I started to paint with the Chibi painter here on CS I decided that I want to become better and actually learn how to draw acceptable backgrounds.

Unfortunately I can’t show the background step by step due to that I made the whole thing on the same layer, but I can at least try to explain how I made it.

I started with a dark gray background, since Cour was born in a cave in the south of Delau’s flying forest (lol, no, you haven’t missed anything if you don’t know what I’m talking about right now, you wouldn’t know anything about Delau due to that I never say too much about that world). After that I decided to go for a normal brown (if there’s such a thing as “normal” when it comes to colours) for the straw that his egg is resting in. After that I added more straws over and over again in different shades and then I decided to go for the two tools that I rarely use – the burn tool and dodge tool. Those two were used to the gray part of the background as well.

I also lowered the opacity on the detailed sketch even more.

Step Five

I actually decide long before this step where my light source for a picture should be. In this case I thought it would be fun if his egg was the light source, by some reason I liked that thought the most when I made the sketch.
For now I just added the glow from the egg that was coming from the opposite side from where we as viewers are.

Step Six

Now some glow on the front of the egg as well, to make it all even. Then some more straw to make it more like Cour is a part of the background and not just sitting in front of a drawing.

Step Seven

And at last, to the last part of the eggs from a Colourful darkness dragon – the “fog” around them. Surely this might be a way to ruin the picture, but they are named “Colourful darkness” for a reason. I worked in layers for this one and from time to time I pretended that I were drawing some clouds (because I’ve never drawn fog digitally before).
I kept working with it until I had reached the point when I decided to call this “finished”.

[~ZE̡͜͡RO̵.̛~]

Excuse me. What's this doing in beginners?

[Vazchu]

Excuse me. What's this doing in beginners?

Well, as far as I know a mod moved it here from intermediate when I finished it last week. So I guess it belongs in here.