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Digital 101: Coloring Techniques #1
Continuing from basic colors blocked in...
At this point I would assume you have already blocked in the basic colors as described in the Digital 101: Basic Coloring tutorial. We are now ready to move on to some of the different techniques/styles used in digital coloring (some of these examples are of older techniques of mine - more advanced/newer techniques will be covered in follow up tutorials). You may also wish to look at the Shading 101 tutorial as proper shading can really improve a picture!
Experimenting with Colors
Most people, when they start of coloring, shade and highlight using darker and lighter versions of their basic color. You can actually achieve some very interesting moods/effects by using colors you would not normally use. For example you could shade "skin" color with pink/red, blue. green etc. and each creates a different look as shown in these examples:
This may be useful if you want your picture to have a certain feel (including hot sun, twilight etc.). It never hurts to experiment with colors, so don't get stuck using just darker and lighter versions of your basic colors.
 Reserving White & Black: White is the brightest color you can use (though in some cases a very intense yellow can appear brighter!), and black is the darkest. Use these in your picture WITH care. Some of the most interesting pictures I have colored use NO perfect black/white. For example people often make the "whites" of the eyes... well... white! But if you look at a real person their "whites" probably won't be bright white. Unless you want your character's eyes to look like they are glowing (or for a very clean look in some anime styles) you may want to use a color slightly darker then white (as shown in the example eyes here it still appears white, but is more natural looking).
Using Selections to create highlights
One coloring style very popular in American comic books (check out the awesome comic book Fray for an example) is to add highlights using selections. You do your basic shading (soft or solid) and then use the lasso tool to create selections where you want your highlights/shadows to be. Then you use the dodge tool (I use it set to "highlights") to carefully add in a little highlight. Or you can use the gradient tool (as shown in the bottom section of the image). See Comic Book Style for more related techniques.
For a complete picture highlighted this way see my Mushrooms By Night picture.
 Detailing & Blending Techniques
This is one set of techniques I developed for coloring in Photoshop (my more recent techniques will be colored in follow-up tutorials):
I normally start with face/and skin of the character when I'm coloring as this is defines a lot of the mood and personality of a picture. I am including several examples using my old "Masked Elf" pictures. I use only two tools for this - the Brush tool and the Smudge tool. Both set to use brushes as specified in the Photoshop brush tutorial section. The "eye" example shows a more soft line layer and the more full portrait a more solid one (I'm partial to the solid one, I think the soft one is too soft, but people have asked me about it so I'm showing it).
- I already have my basic "white" of the eye blocked in under my line drawing.
- I then color the eye pupil in the basic color I want the eye to be (in the examples here yellow).
- I then shade in the dark part of the eye. In this style of eyes it is a dark shape with a half circle showing at the bottom.
- Next I add the highlight using the DODGE tool (set to highlights). The more you use the DODGE tool the lighter an area gets. I also sometimes use a very solid white (or light colored) paintbrush to add in highlights.
 - Next I look at the overall effect and may decide to adjust the brightness/contrast or hue/saturation of the eye if it's not looking the way I want.
- With the eye completed I move on to the skin. I start with a basic color blocked in and then add a darker color (and sometimes some highlights) all pretty much blocked in with the paintbrush. Do not be afraid of too much contrast in the colors - a lot of contrast can be good if you want to draw attention to the face.
- I then blend the Skin using the smudge brush (as always on med pressure) and may darken it a bit more while blending. As I always say beware of too much smudging! It can make a picture look sloppy!
- Lastly I smudge my line layer around the edges so it will blend in with the skin layer. Do not go "back and forth" when blending a line layer in, instead zoom in and gently smudge following the lines. I may also add details like wrinkles or scars before I am finished.
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