i love computer artwork that has bean painter freehand. Ive bean tryin for some time to get such such an effect on my work, with out very much success. SO any one know how to paint stuff and make it look good??? here''s an example http://www.animewallpapers.com/wallpapers/magna/full_9_800.asp

Use Fractal Design Painter.

thats the problem now, a days... people trying to compensate skill with fancy software!! i''ve bean trying to do that myself for quite a while, now... but then u wonder why i would end up here?

my question is not software related, it is about the technics used to create this artwork... i was wondering if anyone here would have some tips, or better yet, links to a helpful tutorial...

I saw a nice tutorial a while back about creating a photorealistic wolf... not sure if that''s helpful. And I''m not that great of an artist. But this is what I do.

Scan.
Make a new "sketch" layer that I use for coloring over the entire sketch with pencil tool. I then select each area one part at a time and make a new layer to fill in the base color for. I use DIFFERENT colors, with maybe 50% opacity for shading. That way, it doesn''t look like I did it with one color, then burned/dodged it. Finally, I''ll burn and dodge the final touches and move to the next part.

That''s the best way I can explain without pics.

Well, the first key is practice. There''s nothing like the long grueling road of doing it a thousand times to make you good at something.

Things you can go for directly: Try to see the shapes before you go adding any color. Similarly with light and shadow, having a feel for where should be in the light and where should be in the shadow will give you a definate foundation on where to go. Again, easiest way to do this is practice (fruit on a table, that sort of thing).

Digitally re-creating the brush stroke effect without using a program like painter is going to be fairly difficult. But if you spend a lot of time and attention on it (look for things like the direction of the brush) I think you can do it.

Hope that helped a little.

Agreed to ThoughtBubble ...

Practice is the first (perhaps the only) step to take...
You can tell the needs for new tools or plugins whenever you
understand the style you would apply to your artwork ...

But, when you can ''shortcut'' any task with plugins, why should
you stick on the original features ???

That''s IMHO ...

quote: Original post by mentalstatement
thats the problem now, a days... people trying to compensate skill with fancy software!!

Painter is not fancy. It just has nice drawing tools like realistic looking paint and charcoal that kind of stuff.
Drawing in itself is just a matter of talent.

Painter is nothing if you don''t have a tablet (wacom of course)

quote: Original post by eng3d
Painter is nothing if you don''t have a tablet (wacom of course)

In other words, a fancy artwork could only be accomplished by a tablet ?

LOL

No, the thing about Painter is that it is a nice way for someone who is used to "natural media" and traditional techniques to get strated in digital media without having to do tremendous changes.
By using a tablet you reduce even more the trauma of abandoning your pen and paper to start working digital.

Computers offer a whole new set of media to work with for the artist, what anyone does with it is each artist''s decision.

to answer mentalstatement, there isnt a technique to answer your question directly.
If what you are interested in is the whole process of making things look natural by actually working hard at it, I think that the whole point would be to figure it out by yourself.
If you just want the look because you like it, then use Painter because it''s the best software there is to simulate natural media and tools, period.

to answer to your example, you could very well do it with DEluxe Paint and a LOT of work and zooming in and patience.
With Photoshop and the right brushes, or with Painter and a few minutes to spare...
it''s that simple But if you want more details, please do ask. I am sure I could do a wee tutorial, I havent done anything nice in a while, so why not.

Sancte Isidore ora pro nobis !