Part THREE!

3. We can color now, right?

Hold on! Let me show you just one little thing, okay? Go to Modify>Document ("modify movie" in older Flash versions?) and change the background color to something other than white to give yourself a better idea of what has actually happened.

Notice that the closed shapes are already filled with white, whereas open spaces are hollow (this is not true of Live Trace in Illustrator CS2 , which just puts white behind everything). Anything behind these hollow spaces will show through. If you want to get rid of a fill, just click on it and hit delete. I'm going to erase the fills in the crook of the arms, between the legs and in the letters. Remember how I said this isn't an ideal technique for crosshatching (I did, remember?)? Maybe you can see why now.

4. We can color now, right?

Yes, we really can! This is the easy part, the fun part, and the creative part. Closed shapes can be colored with the paint bucket, just make sure it's set to "Don't Close Gaps," or some corners may be excluded.

You can really color just about everything with the paint bucket, and then use the paintbrush to finesse it. Get to know your paintbrush settings:

"Paint Inside" is useful for for adding shades and highlights to fills without changing the lines of your drawing (the dark shadow on this guy's face is the paintbrush set to "Paint Inside"):


"Paint Behind" is helpful when you need to close off an open path and fill it. Basically, you're painting behind the black to close off the shape, and then filling it with the paint bucket:

Next, the final product and some final comments...

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LET'S GO BACK TO VINSDOJO.COM

This is the official site of illustrator/designer/artist Vin Rowe, aka Vincent Rowe.