You know a tip that's you're proud of, but you can't show to anyone around you? Or maybe you just want to share it with Toyhouse users? You can tell it here!
Can be for anything: Toyhouse, art, writting, video game or passion, really everything that crosses your mind as long it's not NSFW or hateful/aggresive.
Have fun!
If you're a beginner to paint I would recommend acrylic paint over watercolour.
It is more thicker and it dries fairly quickly compared to water colour and it is also easier to layer on colours.
(And also clean the carpet, bed, or desk after you finish painting otherwise it wouldn't make the most of sense to clean it in the beginning or middle section of the painting)
Pureref is a great software for references! It's essentially a blank canvas/moodboard you can have as a floating window, you can even lower its opacity, add text and ctrl + v any images grabbed online!
You can get it for free if you input 0 on "custom amount" when downloading, but of course, it'll be cool if you can donate a bit as well!
Gradient maps are great for getting transparent lineart for traditional lines.
Basically, after you do the page tweaks and clean-up (getting rid of scanner dust, upping the contrast/levels, line corrections) use a black to transparent Gradient map and boom. Lineart ready to color with no random white pixels, or needing to make it super pixel-y
wish I knew this earlier, would've made getting colored lines with tra-digital a lot easier
v On using off-white, I feel like I should add consider the pic, the usecase (or style) you're going for first. For example, I found using off-whites for pics with transparent backgrounds to make my artwork appear more muted than it should be on some displays, especially if the site it's on has a light mode or BG it could warp how you see the colors bc it's ever-so-slightly off. Though for scenes heavily affected by lighting, it could help keep the colors balanced or make certain colors 'pop' (eg: saving white for heavily lighted areas, or balancing it with the most dominant color). Though this is based off my own style & how I use my art so it might not apply to everyone
For toyhouse coding: If you want to change the colours of a lot of objects on a toyhouse code (too many to do it manually) copy the code into a google doc, use edit find and replace and replace all the already listed colours with the colour codes you want, saves so much time. On my computer you can only find words using the shortcuts and not edit them all directly so I'm glad google docs has this feature.
As for a few art tips, All vertebrate land animals (especially mammals) Have more similar skeletal structures than you might imagine. So if you're an animal artist who can't draw humans or vise versa, having a look at the skeletons might give you a point of reference.
Another art tip is try making your art pieces "white" colour different from a stark white (I like to use light blue) and work off of that, it has a nice effect
CalicoRex You don't even need to use GDocs! As long as you've clicked within the code editer, using the keyboard shortcut CTRL+F will apply to just the text within the editer. And then you've got the option to do find+replace. :)
v Oh interesting! Maybe it's specific to computer type or OS? 🤔
If you can't get something right in art, perhaps a part of anatomy, or if you're learning to draw something new and it just won't look right- trace your references! And I don't mean for the art piece. Trace the reference to LEARN how what you're drawing works. And do not just outline the shape, try to learn by applying shapes and the like to it. And after you feel it has helped, try and draw it yourself this time! It works wonders for me and I hope it can help others!
dogstarlite I do use control F, though on my computer it doesn’t let me edit and replace words all at once like google docs does :0
Ik it's common to recommend, but I genuinely do recommend looking at the Dota 2 character art guide if you're starting off with, or even looking to study character design.
Most of the tips are pretty universial (eg: value distribution & color choices) but the reason I think it's a valueable resource is because it's not just a "you should do this" tutorial, it breaks down why the designers went with the design choices they did, like putting more visual interest on the upper parts of each character/creature because due to the game being top-down that's what the player's gonna be seeing most.
https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/0688-7692-4D5A-1935
If you're looking for a live code editor other than the one specifically made for toyhouse, use codepen! It's one of the best ways to code and at the same time being able to see what you do without much external software or extra steps. Though I would highly recommend disabling the auto update, it loves to jump randomly after that so you have to find the line in your code again you were working on, which can be pretty annoying.
If you have an art block and really want to draw something (like me), lower your standards. By lowering your standards, I mean draw like an idiot. I got this tip from Toniko Pantoja's video about other ways to deal with art block and it helps a lot, to me at least.
Draw something shitposty or stupid, or draw something effortlessly that it looks bad. If you can't draw better drawings yet because of art block, try drawing some idiotic drawings. Go wild, go experimental, be funny and you might discovered something by accident or get inspiration from it!