Trio DiD sketch; Pencil & Paper; Photoshop COLOR.

I decided to take my most popular sketch, albeit an older one, and take what advice and instruction I have been given from other dA artists that do color, and see what happens. I spent way too much time on this one, so I am sure there are still tricks and procedures that I am missing.

Color details:

I tried to stay within the Super Mario Brothers theme, despite Zelda's role, and that meant bright colors, and the RGB theme as well. I represented that in the big boards and the signage.

I made some frequent use of GRADIENT this time around, and it sure does help my flat colors a bit. One thing that I noticed for this sketch coloring from the last one is that I had to do a LOT of original sketch cleanup...moving to mechanical pencils (recently) from the Dixon Ticonderogas really shows through. I don't really like mechanical, but it is better for coloring, and probably better for sketching in my style. The Dixon's are still far superior for darkness, spreading, and shading, however.

For this one I also tried my hand at some shadows, seeing how this scene is out in the open, and it is a bright sunny day for an auction I lifted the color schemes for Daisy and Peach from several other dA works, and I mostly borrowed the Zelda scheme from the same source as when I sketched her.

There are issues all around for this one, but I did do it 8 months ago, and so I would hope that if I did it all over again it would be better now.

Let me know what you think of the coloring, as well as suggestions, critique, or just overall what you think of the finished product.

- JC