How to: Flats

Day 3: Flats

What are flats?

Flats are the filled in blocks of colors on a piece. In traditional painting it is almost equivelant to an 'underpainting' layer.

Option 1: Just use the brush tool

⦁ Just use the Brush tool (B) and on a layer below the inks, paint in.

*this takes a loooooong time

Option 2: Paint around the rim and fill

⦁ Use the brush tool (B) and paint AROUND the edge of the shape you want.

⦁ Once done, use the Magic Wand tool (W) and select the inside that still needs to be  filled.

⦁ Go to Select > Modify > expand and expand by 3-5 pixels so that the selection completely fills in everything

⦁ Go to Edit > Fill > make sure 'Foreground color' is used and hit okay

Option 3: Magic wand tool

⦁ Use the Magic wand tool (W) and select the OUTSIDE space

⦁ Go to Select > Inverse (now your object is select instead of the outside space)

⦁ Go to Select > Modify > CONTRACT and contract by 3-5 pixels

⦁ Go to Edit > Fill > make sure 'Foreground color' is used and hit okay

Now duplicate this layer (drag the layer in the layer window to the 'create new layer' button)

Lock the layer by selecting the box next to the word lock in your layer window.

Now either use selection options or the brush tool (B) to start separating out your blocked in colors.

Step 1: Have a base flat layer (any color)

Step 2: Above the flat layer, do more flats for different sections.

Step 3: Have a layer ABOVE the flats that is a Multiply layer for your shadows.

And done!