【For beginners】For those of you who wish to begin manga creation! The effective way of using tones 〜Clothes edition〜

 

• I want to create manga by MediBang Paint!
• I want to use tones!

 

A series of tutorials of using tones for beginners, the clothes edition for this time.

Clothes are where tones can show their abilities, like expressing cloth patterns or shadows!

Learn how to use them and broaden your range of expression!

 

Link to the previous lesson↓

【For beginners】For those of you who wish to begin manga creation! The effective way of using tones 〜Skin edition〜

 

There are 2 general ways of using tones.

You use them when..

1. you want to depict clothes patterns
2. you want to depict clothes shaddows

 

Using tones as colors or patterns of clothes

 

Using “halftones” will make black and white mangas look as if they have colors.

 

 

• Check pattern
• Flower pattern
• Denim pattern

 

Such patterns, which are difficult to draw by hand, can be easily depicted with tones.

 

 

 

This is a line drawing of clothes.

Let’s add a pattern to the whole of this outfit.

 

Select the area where the pattern is to be placed

 

 

By “Magic Wand Tool”, select the area to where you want to place the pattern.

 

 

Selecting tones

Next, open the list of tone materials available in MediBang Paint.

(The following images are for PCs)

 

 

Open the material dialog.

You will see basic materials including halftones.

Now let’s call for more types of tones.

 

Select “Add Material from Cloud” below.

 

Scroll the page down in the “Tone” list and you will find many tones which may fit in clothes.

 

 

We will use this cosmos pattern this time!

Select “Paste to Canvas” on the lower left.

 

Look, we’ve got the tone pasted to where we have selected earlier!

 

 

Adjusting the pattern size and direction

Slide the bars of “Rotate” and “Zoom” on the lower part of the screen and adjust the size and direction of the pattern.

After adjusting, select “OK” on the right.

 

Well done♪

Not only materials for Western clothes, but there are also Japanese patterns useful for Japanese clothes!

Although tones with no description like “for clothes”, it’s possible to find them surprisingly go well with clothes.

Try out different types of tones!

 

Using tones as shadows of clothes

The next section explains how to use tones to create shadows.

There are two basic ways to create shadows using tones.

1. The method of adding the tone to the whole surface and then scraping it off
2. The method of painting needed areas with a pen (halftones)

 

The method of adding the tone to the whole surface and then scraping it off

 

This method requires almost the same process as what we did in adding the flower pattern.

You can paste tones to the whole surface of the clothes first.

Then, with “Eraser Tool”, scrape off where you want to trim and where the light hits.

This method is for when you add shadow in a wide range or when you depict backlit scenes.

 

 

The method of painting needed areas with a pen (halftones)

 

This is a method that uses the “halftone layer”, which allows you to change the part you have painted with brushes into tone patterns.

Shadows on clothing tend to be more detailed, so I personally recommend this method.

First select “Add Layer (Halftone)” from the icon at the bottom of the Layer window.

 

 

 

You will then see this window.

Select the type, lines and depth of the tone you want to add.

• “Net dots” is a ubiquitous one with polka dots.
•  “Lines” defines the density of the dots, the higher the number, the finer the dots.
• The larger the percentage of “Depth”, the darker the tone color.

 

Check “Set tone depth”.

If you don’t, the depth of tone will vary depending on the type of brush.

So when creating manga, you should “Set tone depth”.

 

Now you have applied the tones as you like with the brush!

This method is particularly useful when applying tones to detailed areas such as wrinkles in clothing.

 

Things to remember when choosing shadow tones

 

“I’m not sure how dark the shadow tones should be!”

There are so many combinations of lines and depths that it can be a difficult choice.

If you’re just starting out, I’d recommend setting it to “60 Lines, 20%”.

Try out this setting once and then you can adjust it as you like: do you like it lighter or darker?

As I told you in the Skin Edition tutorial, tones with small lines (large dots) don’t fit in the character drawings and can be an obstacle to the visibility of line drawings.

For most scenes, lighter shadows are fine, but you can also express the intensity of the light by adjusting the tone depth!

The shadows of the clothes will become darker as the light that hits them increases in intensity.

You should add darker shadows to scenes in the summer afternoon or in bright sunlight.

Conversely, you can describe the soft light by using lighter shadows.

Try using different tones in different ways once you get used to adding tones!

 

Things to remember when adding shadows

 

A common mistake beginners make when adding shadows is to “add shadows to every single wrinkle”.

It is true that if you have a close look at your clothes, there will be fine shadows in every crease and fold.

However, it is difficult to portray them as they are in real life in manga works. 

That’s Because:

• It usually doesn’t match the style of the drawing and looks disjointed.
• If the shadows are too detailed, the image loses its three-dimensionality.

Unless you want to make realistic manga, you have to look at the shadows not as part of the wrinkles, but as a larger image, and think “where is the light coming from?”.

It is not necessary to add shadows to every wrinkle.

It is also useful to use a gray brush to create a rough image of the shadow’s position before applying the tones!

Determine the position of the shadow roughly and add the tones along it. This will bring all the drawings together.

 

Conclusion: Tones are useful to express patterns and colors, so perfect for clothes

We have learnt the methods of adding tones to clothes.

• Using tones as colors or patterns of clothes
• Using tones as shadows of clothes
  The method of adding the tone to the whole surface and then scraping it off
  The method of painting needed areas with a pen (halftones)
• Things to remember when choosing shadow tones
• Things to remember when adding shadows

Tones are useful for expressing patterns and colors, so perfect for clothes!

I hope you will try different tones and methods!

 

（Text・Illustrations/はらなおこ）

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