Maulie
Tutorial: Basic Avatar Design
Shows the basics of avatar editing.
(Note: This tutorial assumes you are using some form of photoshop. maulie uses photoshop 6.0, and Ayanami uses photoshop elements 2.0. Non-photoshop tutorials will come in the future.)
1)Decide what you to do with your avatar. If needed find apporiate reference pictures to look at.
I decided to redo a old lost image of my avatar as a ninja, so I didn't have any reference pictures to look at.
2) Go to your inventory and strip your avatar down to his/her's skivvies. From here ether save the image to your hard drive or copy and paste into a new file in photoshop.
3) If the image is too small for you to see you can go to view/full screen or push Ctrl+0 to make it bigger. It would be a good idea to lock the layer your avatar is in. This will prevent you from accidently ruining your picture.
4) Make a new layer to draw in new clothing on. You can do this by ether clicking on the page icon in the layer's window or by layer/new/layer (pushing shift+ctrl+n also works.). Don't forget to name the layer so its easier to remember whats on it.
Select ether the pencil or paint brush tool. Making sure the right layer is highlighted, outline the piece of clothing.
5)Fill in the out lines with color using the brush tool (making sure the right layer is selected). Don't bother with the paint bucket, its more trouble than its worth.
Note: you don't have to worry too much about the color you use, in photoshop it is very easy to go back and change colors.
6)Now for the fun part: shading :3 ! Theres two basic ways you can shade. If your computer is on the sluggish side, you may simply want to lock the layer's transparency. This lets you color over what you have already without going out of the lines.
The next way is more forgiving of mistakes and gives you more control over what you are doing. Create a new layer for your shading and position it above what you want to shade in the layers window. Push ctrl+g and the two layers are now grouped. Shade in this grouped layer. You can alwo do a separate for highlights and such.
7) Finish the shading on everything. When satisfied, save for the web as a .gif or a .jpeg and upload to a server ().
Things to remember:
1) Save often. You never know when the computer will decide to call it quits.
2) Experiment. What I have showed here is simply the bare bones basics. Some usually options to play with: the opacity of the color, layer modes, and customizing the colors (double click the color used in the color window).
3) Most importantly--practicise!! Even the best have had to work to get to where they are ^_~ .
Shows the basics of avatar editing.
(Note: This tutorial assumes you are using some form of photoshop. maulie uses photoshop 6.0, and Ayanami uses photoshop elements 2.0. Non-photoshop tutorials will come in the future.)
1)Decide what you to do with your avatar. If needed find apporiate reference pictures to look at.
I decided to redo a old lost image of my avatar as a ninja, so I didn't have any reference pictures to look at.
2) Go to your inventory and strip your avatar down to his/her's skivvies. From here ether save the image to your hard drive or copy and paste into a new file in photoshop.
3) If the image is too small for you to see you can go to view/full screen or push Ctrl+0 to make it bigger. It would be a good idea to lock the layer your avatar is in. This will prevent you from accidently ruining your picture.
4) Make a new layer to draw in new clothing on. You can do this by ether clicking on the page icon in the layer's window or by layer/new/layer (pushing shift+ctrl+n also works.). Don't forget to name the layer so its easier to remember whats on it.
Select ether the pencil or paint brush tool. Making sure the right layer is highlighted, outline the piece of clothing.
5)Fill in the out lines with color using the brush tool (making sure the right layer is selected). Don't bother with the paint bucket, its more trouble than its worth.
Note: you don't have to worry too much about the color you use, in photoshop it is very easy to go back and change colors.
6)Now for the fun part: shading :3 ! Theres two basic ways you can shade. If your computer is on the sluggish side, you may simply want to lock the layer's transparency. This lets you color over what you have already without going out of the lines.
The next way is more forgiving of mistakes and gives you more control over what you are doing. Create a new layer for your shading and position it above what you want to shade in the layers window. Push ctrl+g and the two layers are now grouped. Shade in this grouped layer. You can alwo do a separate for highlights and such.
7) Finish the shading on everything. When satisfied, save for the web as a .gif or a .jpeg and upload to a server ().
Things to remember:
1) Save often. You never know when the computer will decide to call it quits.
2) Experiment. What I have showed here is simply the bare bones basics. Some usually options to play with: the opacity of the color, layer modes, and customizing the colors (double click the color used in the color window).
3) Most importantly--practicise!! Even the best have had to work to get to where they are ^_~ .
![[ShironX]'s avatar](https://a1cdn.gaiaonline.com/dress-up/avatar/ava/ac/d6/ecc131f29d6ac_flip.png?t=1193915121_6.00_00)