Featured Artists-Craig Burt Collection

Painting by Numbers

"Lava Limb"

This picture is what I call a digital coloring; that is, basically, a black and white drawing that you scan into the PC then color in digitally. I find it a fun way to create pictures; you start with a relatively simple drawing and can then add effects and colors without the hassle of mixing paint and blending by hand. You also have the bonus of being able to try virtually endless variations easily.

1 Is the scan of the plain drawing, not completely black and white as you can see. It is drawn with Biro and large Artlline markers. As you can also see it's drawn on a scrap of tractor-feed computer paper. The inset is a larger look at the hatching lines of the Biro which are blurred in the under image. If I'm right the inspiration for the picture came from watching the leaked Back-in-Black footage of the final duel in Revenge of the Sith which was aggressive and fast.

2. The coloring was basically in my head from the start - as are most of my pictures meaning the prep sketches are usually only black and white - so I needed to decide what I was going to do with the background. This one is a try with texture.

3. Is another variation of the background. Here I was wondering if I should try smoke.

4. Here you can see I've decided on the background; it's a simple vertical linear fill with two colors. 

5. Is the start of the coloring of the figure and lava. I think after doing the lava I used a sharpening tool on there to raise it from the page and give it weight. 

6. More of the figure colored - almost done. 

7. Is the end product with a blur effect added to the background which provided a nice halo to Anakin's metal arm and highlights to his backlit hair and cloth. Like the simplistic, stylistic and expressive nature of this one - lovely color too.

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