So, this is pretty much how I got about doing interior illustrations for stories and novels, as well as most of my black/white work. Folks have been saying they wanted a layer break-down, so here it is. . . more or less. I cut out a bunch of the different shading layers so as to not be confusing. Suffice to say, I use more than one layer to do the shading, but not to use layer effects. . . just to keep things organized. I.E. shadows on one layer, highlights that have to overlap the linework on another, the background is on its own layer separate from the character, yadda yadda.

In this case, the refined linework was done digitally so as to save my hands, which have been getting quite the workout lately from so much writing. Often times, I refine my linework traditionally, which either involves a lot of erasing, or lightboxing the rough sketch.

This is a pretty basic illustration, don't use this as an accurate example of what can be done when you really put your nose to the grindstone. This piece took, total, I think six hours. You could spend as long as twenty on a black and white piece if you really wanted to make it look fantastic, if not longer.

I have another forum I'm setting up where I'm gonna post a lot more WIPs, and even tutorials, but it's taking me awhile to set it up. More about that later!

Tools used - Graphite Pencil, Intuos 5 Tablet, Photoshop CS2