1) First, I drew a sketch with pencil on paper. I usually like to draw traditionally rather than digitally-- it's more comfortable/familiar, and I like having something physical to show for it. Then I took a photo of the drawing and uploaded it onto the computer (I would use a scanner, but I don't currently have one).
2) Next I went over the sketch digitally to create line drawing. To do this, I created a new layer and set the sketch layer to a lower opacity. As you can see, I then adjusted some of line drawing to fix crookedness and proportion issues (such as making Hopper bigger).
3)I then picked a neutral color that was a little lighter than the lines to fill in the background. This gives me a good starting place for coloring and helps me keep my colors in the same range.
4) Then in a new layer (I have a layer problem by the way...) I did the basic flat colors for the figures. I tried to pick colors that stayed in the same general range of saturation as the background to keep it harmonious.
5) Next I did the same thing with the background-- filled in flat color shapes.
6) The next step probably takes me the longest, even though it doesn't look dramatically different. On a new layer I added all the shading and highlights to the figures and the background. Since this isn't supposed to be a highly-rendered, realistic style, I didn't do dramatic shading. I mostly just added shadows and highlights to the places that I thought would help give the piece more depth and clarity.
7) Now I should probably figure out how to paint textures myself by hand, but.... I really like overlaying textures onto my drawings. It adds a lot of "oomph" to the image I think! I started by adding textures to the background. To do this, I found free images online of wood textures (one for the wall, one for the floor, and one for the cabinet) that fit my mental image of a cabin. Then I selected the area on my drawing and chose the "Paste Into" option to fill just that shape with the image of the texture. Then I changed that layer to the "Multiply" setting and adjusted the opacity until it looked like it fit with the rest of the drawing.
8) I then repeated those steps using textures for the clothes (cotton, khaki, plaid, and denim materials). Make sure these layers are above the layers with the flat colors and the shading.
9) To add the final touches, I found images online of light streaming through windows and little dust light particles. Then I arranged them where I wanted them and set those layers to the "Overlay" setting and adjusted the opacity. That created the final image!
10) In order to create the animation, I copied basically all the layers I had. Then I went and re-drew and re-colored the arms,Hopper's leg, and the music notes (since those were the only elements of the drawing that were changing). I had to adjust some of the texture layers to fill in the new spaces, but overall it was a lot quicker since most of the work was already done. Then I merged all the layers into the two parts "Frame One" and "Frame Two". I went to File->Export->Save for Web and then saved this final image as a Gif with 256 colors and a "forever" repeating loop.
Voila! There you have it. Easy peasy, right? ;) I had a lot of fun making this picture, and I feel like I relearned/learned a lot (especially how to do the animation-- that took me waaaaay too long to figure out). Hooray for fan art! :D
