Shaded folds?

Hi everyone.

Still here, still practicing. Still glueing my brain back together every time it goes splodey.

Ok. The effect I'm trying to acheive is a layered skirt. The front of the skirt at the crotch area is haging down to knee level, the rest of the skirt is at high thigh level. Getting the basic shape was a snap, BUT....

..remember you're dealing with a mink here whom has no concept of shading, hehe. How to I shade the center peice of the skirt to make it look as if it has depth from the rest of the skirt? Meaning, where the center of the skirt 'meets up' with the rest of the skirt I know that on each side there would be shading. I tried the air brush tool, the paint brush tool and ect. I know where the shading is realistically supposed to go, but getting it to look realistic is the kicker.

Any advice?

For getting the basic concept of shading and doing folds I really like this tutorial. http://skinmachine.tripod.com/tutorials/folds/folds.htm
It's simple, effective and fairly realistic I think.

-Sun

Wow Sunshine,

Thanks very much!!!

if i remember there is a little thing is that the eye consider dark stuffs to be low and bright one high

so played right it might make the illusion with a bit onf darkening on the edges of the low part

Hi Athene, one easy way might be to put the middle section on it's own layer below the side sections. Then, apply a drop shadow to the side section layer and voila!, instant even shadowing! Play with the distance and spread sliders in the drop shadow to get the desired effect.

Drop Shadow is my friend!

There was a great thread on the subject not to long ago with several great tips using different methods.

/109/b3/60167/1.html

That worked like a charm, Blaze. Thanks very much!

Hi Blaze.

*sigh*

Drop shadow isn't working. I can't get it to select the edge of the skirt, it just keeps drop shadowing on the entire template edge. How do I select just one particular area?

Well, Drop shadow will always apply to the whole layer you are working on. Not knowing what you are referring to as 'template', i'm not sure of the answer.

You can adjust the direction and amount of the shadow, but not what part of the layer it applies to (unless you separate the layer, but that might add more problems!)

When I'm designing, many times I bleed my fabric parts past the edges of the used template area, so in those cases, I don't care about what the drop shadow does because it will never show up.

Depending on your layer, drop shadow may not be the easiest route. I just can't way without seeing what you are working on. Maybe I should do a crease/fold drop shadow tutorial