For my latest video over on the Sasayaki Glitter YouTube channel I decided to recreate a card I’d made a little while before I joined the team. I thought it would be fun to play around with cast light, and see how to colour up an image with a specific light source in mind. Usually I colour my images as if there is ambient light, primarily coming from the right hand side. Colouring with a fixed, specific light source is more of a challenge to me, but it’s definitely a fun one!
I started by printing the Baby Elly’s Birthday image onto some alcohol marker friendly paper. I used Spectrum Noir Illustrator markers and Yosoo alcohol markers to colour up the image, starting by laying in the highlights with yellow, then adding my shadows and blending through. You can see the colouring in detail in the video above.
Once I was happy with the colouring I carefully fussy cut the image out and set it aside whilst I worked on my card base.
I picked a dark brown card base to go with my image. The cast light technique looks best with a dark background, as it enhances the idea of the candle being the sole source of light. I white heat embossed a sentiment from Heffy Doodle’s Elephant of Surprise stamp set onto the card base. I then adhered a die cut circle of yellow vellum to be my focal panel behind the elephant. Finally I attached the little elephant into place.
I didn’t look back at my previous iteration of this card until after I had finished colouring it. I didn’t want to be influenced by it, and I felt it would be easier to see how much (or whether!) my colouring has improved if I wasn’t trying to directly copy the other card. On this version of the card I was definitely a lot bolder with my cast light! I also think I have more depth to the shadows on this one. I do feel that I have improved.
Love,
