# Photoshop still confuses me, but hey, i did my best.



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

So this is my oldest male betta, C2. I went and draw him by hand with pencil, then went pith pen on top, erased the pencil, scanned it, opened up PS, fiddled around with it till i got what i wanted figured out (more or less), and got this! I think it looks better than C2 himself, but then again, i couldnt get the little black pigments on this, nor could i get the scale lines. The eyes were the hardest part, ive never been good with eyes.

It really does look better than C2 himself, being that i couldnt meld multiple colors together, or make layers, or mask anything. I pretty much did it all with the paint brush, pencil, and smudge tools. But thats what C2 looks like in general, just not as brightly colored.


----------



## Adastra (Jun 18, 2010)

Good for your first try! You can do a lot with the blur and the smudge tool as far as color blending. It takes a little more mouse-work, but you can get some good results. For drawing and coloring, I prefer to use Easy Paint Tool Sai, though. Adobe programs are so bulky--and it's really catering a lot of that to photomanipulation tools.


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

Well originally i was just trying to manually color it, then i remembered tutorials on youtube about how to vectorize a picture and then make it look fantastic with layers, but it was so beyond my understanding that i closed it before my brain fried itself. Ive never heard of sai, but before PS i used paint, which i used to be a master with. One time i manually recolored a friend picture pixel by pixel. Looked great. Then i stopped photo editing an dlost my touch ;_;


----------



## Adastra (Jun 18, 2010)

You should try out SAI, great vectoring tools and some cool brushes. It's a lot smaller than PS because it doesn't have a lot of the fancy filters/effects crap people use for photomanipulation. The tool bars and menus are also a lot less convoluted. The main site has a 30-day version if you want to try it out. You can always buy a registration later or *ahem* bootleg a copy. u_u


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

Thats the thing, i dont knwo how to make vectors ._.


----------



## Adastra (Jun 18, 2010)

Oh it is suuuuper easy in SAI. ;3 You just create a vector layer and then either use the vector pen to make lines or the vector curve tool to click around the outline of whatever you're vectoring and line segments will fill in perfectly between the points. It's super easy to adjust pen pressure, move the points/lines any way you want, delete a specific line, etc. 

Photoshop doesn't have very comprehensive vectoring tools--but then again, they do have another program devoted completely to vectoring, Adobe Illustrator. I still prefer SAI though.


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

Just WHAT are you implying mister >w>


----------



## dramaqueen (Jul 7, 2008)

I think it looks great!!


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

Thanks ^_^


----------



## zelilaa (Jul 31, 2010)

i think hes implying that you should download a trial of SAI! ;D


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

I would sure hope so


----------



## Alex09 (Aug 9, 2010)

GIMP is the best. It is like the free version of Photoshop. The best thing about it is that it's multi-platform. Meanin it will work in windows, Mac, and Linux. Which is good because I mainly use Linux


----------



## Bloodeath (Aug 22, 2010)

I dig the picture , its good for someone who claims photoshop confuses them 

I dont mean to troll your thread, but if you ever need any photoshop hints, i consider myself an intermediate/expert user,

Heres 2 examples of me messing around:





















Not to steal your thread or anything, just trying to lend a hand if you ever need any help or a good place to get tutorials to improve your own work, .


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

XD you think your a troll, thats cute.
But if you want to help do some tutorials and upload them to youtube, i use CS5 if it matters ^_^


----------



## Bloodeath (Aug 22, 2010)

i currently use cs4 extended. So they may be a little bit different, but i have recently been thinking about doing some betta art, when i get around to it, ill upload vids of me doing them in photoshop so everyone can gain 2 cents from it. 

Edit: and i felt kinda like a troll whos trying to steal your thread, i jump in and post my own pics like im flaunting my work around or something, i just wanted to add a little reassurement to myself by saying i really didnt mean to steal your thread or anything xD


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

PB had a CS5 link, if you care ;-)


----------



## Bloodeath (Aug 22, 2010)

Nah to be quite honest, i havent noticed any change from cs1-4, i dont feel the need to upgrade until i cant download a brush selection or something like that.


----------



## Lenalee Nilla (Oct 23, 2010)

Well, you knwo, make some tutorials ^_^


----------



## Adastra (Jun 18, 2010)

zelilaa said:


> i think hes implying that you should download a trial of SAI! ;D


Yeah, I didn't mean anything more than that, lol. Especially if you want to get into vectoring, since its vector tools are way more comprehensive than photoshop and illustrator. Working with these programs can be frustrating, especially when they're as big and convoluted as PS.


----------



## bloo97 (Mar 6, 2010)

Nice!


----------

