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It is usually recommended to have a clean thumbnail or black/white sketch before you begin the coloring process (if not… you’ll end up like this guy!), but because of the way this piece was set compositionally, I felt that going for the colors and refinements early would help the editing process later. Since I knew that most of the piece would involve adornments that are viewed frontally and with very little perspective or foreshortening, adding shadows and the big shapes would be easier once the initial decoration was set.
For the coloring process I layered a couple of blending modes on top of the original black/white. I started with a COLOR MODE layer and blotted in the basic hues (the trick here is to have a medium gray as the lightest section in your black/white sketch) . Once its tinted, I moved into a MULTIPLY layer and added saturation to the original colors and darkened the shadows. When I was satisfied with these two, I moved into a SOFT LIGHT layer and added slight glow and lighting. More refinement will come later, but the basic shape and color of the main character was established with these few steps. .
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Phase 2 - The Background
Initially it was going to be a straight forward macabre scene - The original thought was of an actual murder with the character drenched in blood. After much thought I decided to work on the idea a bit more and have it end with a certain twist. This idea was suggested to me by artists in the competition and I think it gives the painting its uniqueness. I had the idea of a hallway early in the creative process and also the concept of the character dancing to some old tunes. I started working on the hallway’s wallpaper design thinking of eerie old-school homes that have a creepy feel to them. I wanted it to be very tasteless and something that looks unpleasing to the eye – this is used to enhance the unease created by the piece. I created a few swirly brush strokes that I could duplicate easily to create a tillable texture. Once I was satisfied with the design, I added the center drawing and tiled it vertically and again horizontally.
For the floor, I colored in a few brownish-yellow vertical strokes and stretched them in to create the wood grain. I tiled it several times and added the grooves with a thin stroke. Once I had enough tiled floor to cover the length of the painting I distorted the entire layer to create the illusion of perspective. And lastly the baseboard was a simple rectangular shape with a few lines running across it. Again, I used horizontal tiling to create the long slabs of wood. Once everything was set I added some texture and multiply layers to enhance the color of the wall. I also added the division in-between the wallpaper, grittiness to the baseboard and the door.
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