Here's something new I'm working on--the original sketch, and the color comp, with a little work on the thistle. I'm a little unsure about the process I'm using (the computer), since I want it to have that nice, old lithograph feel...but I'm not sure how to get that. I think I may end up printing it out and going all Barron on it. It's got a LONG ways to go still...I need to vary the lineweight, and color some lines. I don't mind switching back and forth between Illustrator and Photoshop, but I think a little more planning could have helped. I wanted to do this in watercolor, but I couldn't figure out how to get those perfectly crisp lines. I may end up starting this over, and doing something like tracing the line design onto watercolor paper and painting it, then scanning that in and lay the linework over the top. Anything to keep it from feeling too slick! More later...I'm doing a series of these... --L
Edit:
Ok, so I fiddled a little in the 'Shop, and came up with this, in terms of aging. I'm trying to mimic some things I see in lithograph prints (Steinlen, and various others), and definitely need to study them a bit more, and really disect, but I tried a couple things and it's already looking SO much better. I put a scanned brown paper over the top, which gave it some nice texture, added noise, and fiddled with a spray-can type of brush for shading and aging certain areas. I didn't change anything about the original color comp image, but it's already looking better, even in this very rough stage. Woot!
