Learning to Color

[tbrotomo]

I learned how to do flat colors on photoshop the other night. Now I know what colorists have to go through and it's so time consuming! I don't really know where to go beyond that, if there's a couple good youtube tutorial type things I'd love to see them.

Here's the first page I've ever colored so bear with me here! It's just flats and would love a bit of advice on how to do better in the future. There were a couple spots I didn't really know what to do and just threw a couple of colors in and i think that looks a little obvious.

[HaphazardJoy]

Just search "coloring comics", there's dozens of videos and tutorials out there. Beyond that, I initially learned from AP/GuruEFX's How To Color For Comics, which is a decent beginner's guide if you know a little Photoshop.

[Miguel Marques]

I liked the colors but could be better. The grass is very dark and saturated fat. And to show the depth of an object, each angle of the wall has to be a different tone.
DC Comics Guide to Coloring & Lettering;
You have an initiation into color theory and also some samples of how to use to make comics.

[Miguel Marques]

Art tutorial
http://www.itchstudios.com/psg/art_tut.htm#light_stuff

[tbrotomo]

Awesome, thanks guys. I didn't realize that about the walls needing to be different shades to show depth. I'll check out the tutorial as well!

[HaphazardJoy]

Originally Posted by tbrotomo

I didn't realize that about the walls needing to be different shades to show depth.

Oh yeah. I mean, what you've posted is just flats as you said, so don't sweat it. Only thing you could do with the flats to make them better is to not reuse colors across multiple areas. For example, the master and the butler appear to both have the same color vest. Even if the end product calls for them having the same color vest, it's good practice to give them different colors in the flats. The point of flats is less to represent the final product, and more to provide as a tool to go back and reselect discrete areas using the wand versus having to re-lasso entire sections on the fly.

As far as walls being different colors to show depth, and to expand on the decent tutorial Miguel provided, this is perhaps the best lighting tutorial ever written, and you should make yourself familiar with it. It will remain invaluable no matter how good you get. Itchy Animation's Light tutorial

Another comment, and one that I found extremely useful when I first started: Especially as you're learning, practice coloring with professional line art. I don't know whose artwork you're coloring here, and it's not horrible, but it's much easier to learn to do the thing proper by starting off coloring really high quality art.

Another comment, one that I've never heard anyone else make, but that I personally found to be a useful exercise: Try coloring something that's already been done professionally. Try and recreate what the professional did. Over time, you'll learn why to do one thing versus another, but it also helps to do exercises like this to figure out HOW to do certain looks.

Finally, for now, and in conjunction with those last two points, with sites like this, and via artist portfolios online at sites like DeviantArt, you can find tons and tons of high quality line art. Not all of it is high, high resolution, but even there you can often request high res files from artists and get a positive response if you're polite and respectful. In general, you should always try to credit the other artists who worked on the art before you added your colors, and if you want to make it part of a professional portfolio, you should always request permission from the artists. Some artists, like Al Rio, don't usually give permission to use their art publicly, and you should respect that, but that doesn't stop you from learning and having fun coloring them privately.

[Miguel Marques]

You really have to put the credits of the designer ... Find pages in high resolution I only know a place online page of Sean ... But pages in low resolution is hard to ask permission for use.About what I think is most important you learn immediately ...You know how to separate the persoagem object or the bottom of the page the contrast of the page.This does not depend on the color that you can use ... Only the color tones.
I found examples in glogle