Cont Crayon Drawing


Conté Crayon Drawing

Conté Crayons are hardened and compressed pieces of chalk that have been used by artists for centuries. They typically come in shades of sienna and umber, as well as black, white, and gray. Artists often apply them to colored or toned paper so that they can use white to draw in highlights, leaving the paper as the midtone.

I confess that I hesitated to include this exploration for primarily two reasons: The first is that this is a photography book, and discussing chalk drawings seems somewhat divergent. Second, this effect takes a certain degree of skill. It's not just a follow-the-steps-and-get-these-results kind of task. You must be able to draw at least a little bit to get decent results. The good news is that you can undo each stroke if necessary to get it right; multiple layers allow you to protect the parts that look good, allowing you to draw with confidence, without fear of messing things up.

However, this book is also about Tuscany, which abounds with old master chalk drawings on faded and yellowed paper. I decided that the Conté Crayon effect did indeed fit with the subject matter and techniques offered in this book. Ultimately, even if you have drawing skills, you should still follow a process to translate those skills to the digital realm. This exploration provides a solid process for getting the most out of your current skills or developing new ones. As I've mentioned with other tasks in this chapter, you really need a digitizing tablet to make this work; this effect is impossible to achieve with a mouse.

Marconi Statue
Nikon D2H
1/350 sec, f/9.5
Focal length 80mm

Handmade Paper
Scanned paper image

About the Original Image

I love this statue. It stands in Marconi square in Siena, off to one side, looking somewhat innocuous amid the splendor of this old and beautiful city. I was supposed to meet a tour guide in the square to gain access to the Palio race, and the guide was following the time-honored Italian tradition of not honoring time. I sat in the square for an hour and a half before the guide showed up, which gave me plenty of time to study and photograph this immovable muse.

In addition, I also used a scanned piece of handmade paper to use as the ground for the drawing. Technically, it's not an original "image," but it is an external source, so I'm listing it here nonetheless.

Building the Effect

The first step in creating the drawing was to create two custom bushes that would simulate the texture and marks of Conté crayons. You can draw a line with a Conté crayon for detail work, but you can also turn it on its side to block-in broad tonal areas.

Build the Right Brush

To create a brush to simulate the detail and line effect, I opened the Brushes palette by selecting Window, Brushes; I then selected the Brush tool in the toolbox to activate the palette's contents. I selected Brush Tip Shape from the list on the left and set the Diameter slider to 28, leaving all other settings at their defaults. Still in the Brushes palette, I enabled the Shape Dynamics check box and set the Size Jitter slider to 23%; because I was using a digitizing pen, I selected Pen Pressure from the Control menu. I set Minimum Diameter at 1% and Angle Jitter at 23%, and selected Pen Pressure from the Control menu. I set Roundness Jitter to 29% with no Control menu setting, and set Minimum Roundness to 25%. Setting Pen Pressure as a control means that the pressure of the pen determines how the variable is applied. More pressure in this case would mean a larger brush size with more scattering of marks.

Then I went through the other sections in the Brushes palette and made adjustments to the settings. In the Scattering section, I set Scatter to 91%, set Control equal to Pen Pressure, enabled the Both Axes check box, and set Count to 2. In the Texture section, I selected the Wrinkles tile, set Scale to 112%, enabled the Texture Each Tip check box, set the Blending Mode to Hard Mix, and left all the other settings at their defaults. In the Other Dynamics section, I set Opacity Jitter to 100% and set its Control menu equal to Pen Pressure; I set Flow Jitter to 100% and set its Control menu equal to Pen Pressure also. Finally, I enabled the Noise check box, selected New Brush Preset, and named the brush Small Conte.

For the broad brush effect, I started with the previous settings and went through the sections in the Brushes palette and made adjustments to their variables. In the Texture section, I selected the Wrinkles tile, set Scale to 112%, enabled the Texture Each Tip check box, set the Blending Mode to Linear Burn, and left all other settings at their defaults. In the Other Dynamics section, I set Opacity Jitter to 55% and set its Control menu to Pen Pressure; I set Flow Jitter to 16% and its Control men to Pen Pressure also. Finally, I enabled the Noise check box, selected New Brush Preset, and named the brush Broad Conte.

Drawing in Layers

To start the drawing, I loaded the statue photo above the scanned paper layer and set the blending mode for the photo layer to Luminosity and its Opacity to 40%. I created a new layer by clicking the Create New Layer icon, double-clicking the layer name, and titling it Rough In. I double-clicked the foreground color and selected a rust-orange color with RGB values of R127, G60, B24.

I clicked the Brush tool in the toolbox and selected the Small Conte brush from the Brushes Presets section of the Brushes palette, and loosely traced the figure. The goal at this stage was simply to capture the proportions and globally map out the drawing (see Figure ).

Loosely outline the figure.

I created a new layer, which I titled Block Shading, and turned off the photo layer in an effort to draw the areas rather than simply tracing them. I began blocking in large areas of tone and shadow using the Broad Conte brush, filling in areas defined by the Rough In layer (see Figure ).

Block in areas of tone and shadow.

At this point, I was creating multiple layers right and left. My goal was to define the dark end of the tonal range, and I did so using four different layers. Throughout this process, I was turning the photo layer on periodically to check for general accuracy, while still letting the drawing remain loose and fluid. I repositioned the photo layer higher in the layer stack as needed to maintain visibility relative to the drawing layers as they were created. As you work, create a new layer to preserve any section that's starting to come together. When you're drawing, you don't always know that you'll want to revert or go back to a previous state until much later, after you see the drawing coming together. Layers protect your work and provide high flexibility (see Figure ).

Define the dark end of the tonal range.

To balance the darks, I created a single layer for the white marks. After selecting white as the foreground color, I began working the white color into the various areas (see Figure ). As you're doing this, try to resist the urge to simply trace the photo layer. I like to open the photo in a separate file and keep it next to the drawing file so that I can compare the images. It's okay to turn on the photo layer to check your work and proportions, but don't draw over the actual photo, or your image will take on a traced look.

Add the highlights.

Adding the Details

From here on in, it was painstaking work to polish the details in the face as well as the lower-leg area. I created a layer for the face and another for the figure as a whole. Throughout the process, I had been adjusting the Diameter slider in the Brush Tip Shape section of the Brushes palette to set the appropriate brush size for the task at hand. In the face area, I worked with a 5-to 8-pixel brush; I also erased liberally until I got the exact marks I was after (see Figure ).

Add facial detail.

I finished with a step that would be very hard to do with a conventional drawing. I was unhappy with the shadow area beneath the shieldit was too dark and muddled. With the Brush tool active, I Option-clicked (Alt-clicked in Windows) in the paper area to sample the paper color. I then used the Small Conte brush to draw into the arm and shield with the cream color of the paper. It lightened things up and visually worked to clean up the area (see Figure ).

Subtle details in the raised arm.

The entire drawing process for this image took me a little more than four hours. For best results, approach the Conté Crayon drawing task with patience, and practice as much as possible.




The Art of Photoshop for Digital Photographers
The Art of Photoshop for Digital Photographers
ISBN: 0672327139
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2006
Pages: 141

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