Masking VS Pixel lock (Photoshop CS5)

DrunkShaman

Greetings PCers;

This thread is for those who use Photoshop for their concept art. Anyways I've been practicing making concepts before I follow them in 3d modeling. I tried using both methods.

1) painting a base color and creating a mask out of it.
- In that case, you usually duplicate the masked layer and paint over it.

2) painting a base color and locking the pixels.
- In that, practically you do the same, you duplicate the layer and paint over it.

I wanted to know which method is used by the artists according to the CG industry standards.

Thanks

DrunkShaman

I wanted to know how you guys do it so I can focus on that method. (Assuming that you are following the industrial standard)

There is no question except for the one that; Masking after applying the base color and than painting parts of it is more tedious process than just pixel lock. And it takes more time if you have the masking approach for your concept art. Right?

If thats the case, which one is most preferred by an experienced 2d artist who has been in this field for a while.

pior

What are you talking about ?

throttlekitty

You'd probably get a better answer over at conceptart.org

Joseph Silverman

bwuh. I guess masking is more common. Use either or both or neither, there are no 'standards'

sprunghunt

I know plenty of concept artists who never use masks or layers. They'll just paint away like they were painting on a canvas.

so do whatever feels good.

Noors

I like to have mask on groups, lets you do whatever you want inside it. I'm not sure to get you anyway. No hard rules. It's collapsed at the end ^^

danr

wow, weird question. I think it's come from a couple of misunderstandings

first off, if ever there was an advanced, pretty expensive, and powerful piece of creative software built around letting the user do what the hell they want to get to an end result, then its Photoshop. As others have said, short of operating the basic interface, there are zero rules.

with that in mind ... i think i know what you're talking about. Laying down a flat shape on a layer, like a silhouette, and then using mask or lock to colour on top without going outside the boundaries? Aye? Second misunderstanding. This is not HOW the 'concepts' you may have seen are created, but they are potentially one of the techniques used WITHIN the creation. When you think about it, it sounds like a really really simplistic technique, like something you'd teach to someone just starting out to let them concentrate on colour and laying down details by whacking ht brush about but not making a mess of the overall form. Thats not to say people don't do this when they're working, they do - but there's a good reason why experienced people posting above struggled to get what you were asking, you've come in apparently assuming this is the process by which all photoshop art is created. Way off.

anyway, that out of the way ... masks or lock. Lock's quick enought to set as you say - say you've rasterized some type and want to scrub colour variation, whack on the lock, scrub away.

But then it's totally inflexible. Say you wanted to bring in some transparency variation to the edges of the text, blur or chip it or whatever, you'd have to erase this into the pixels themselves and put the lock back on. Make a mistake, all you can do is undo. Mask will let you work happily away, unconstained, do what you want, combine all the various tools on a pixel level, which is the crux of PS. And its not like creating one is a biggy - ctrl-click the layer to make a selection, click the 'make layer mask' button at the bottom of the layer rollout. I'm not sure what 'In that case, you usually duplicate the masked layer and paint over it' means, but it doesn't sound right to me.

DrunkShaman

danr wrote: »

there's a good reason why experienced people posting above struggled to get what you were asking, you've come in apparently assuming this is the process by which all photoshop art is created. Way off.

Ahahaha, finally!! someone who can understand where I am coming from without giving out comments such as "What the hell are you on about?"
Thank you for understanding.

anyway, that out of the way ... masks or lock. Lock's quick enought to set as you say - say you've rasterized some type and want to scrub colour variation, whack on the lock, scrub away.

But then it's totally inflexible. Say you wanted to bring in some transparency variation to the edges of the text, blur or chip it or whatever, you'd have to erase this into the pixels themselves and put the lock back on. Make a mistake, all you can do is undo. Mask will let you work happily away, unconstained, do what you want, combine all the various tools on a pixel level, which is the crux of PS. And its not like creating one is a biggy - ctrl-click the layer to make a selection, click the 'make layer mask' button at the bottom of the layer rollout. I'm not sure what 'In that case, you usually duplicate the masked layer and paint over it' means, but it doesn't sound right to me.

A good detailed message explaining how Masking works. (though I know how it works, also if you screw up on the base color and mask it, it will be a pain later on. I also know how Pixel lock works. But thanks for explaining so it would be worth for those who are willing to try this out)

So practically speaking, according to you and others, its none of the industry standard, as many artists are experienced and dont use it, but its a fine way if you are just starting."

Thanks, thats all I wanted to know.

danr

So practically speaking, according to you and others, its none of the industry standard, as many artists are experienced and dont use it, but its a fine way if you are just starting."

er ... no ... for the record, i'm not saying that. I'm not saying 'experienced' people don't use it, i'm saying that they do use all of these techniques, but by themselves they're likely not the making of a piece. PS is pretty much a freeform means to an end, which is why its so much fun, and so damn powerful. Its very nature means that there is, and will never ever be, a 'standard' way of doing something, let alone a (shudder) industry standard.

if you screw up on the base color and mask it, it will be a pain later on

... what the hell are you on about? (sorry, but you walked into that)

pior

Everytime this thread gets back on track, it soon enough becomes confusing again hehe

... many artists are experienced and dont use it, but its a fine way if you are just starting

This totally confuses me hehe. Pixel transparency locking is actually a bit of an advanced technique really - I would bet that around 90% of photoshop users don't even know what it is (and that's totally fine, to each their own)

It sounds like you think it's here for the first stage of the concept, so that everything done later would be painted out of it. Well to give you an example, I pretty much use it the opposite way. I don't use pixel transparency locking until waaaaay late in the concept stage, once my silhouette has been refined after quite a few passes of adjustements using quite a few different freeform tools. At that stage I find it very useful since it lets me play with the surface of different values very easily without having to worry about anything.

Again, do whatever works for you ... I love transparency locking, but as a matter of fact there is yet another alternative : ctrl-click whatever layer you want to use as a mask, hide the marching ants, and paint in there (or another layer on too).

There's no industry standard, so, just work smart!