To be fair, I made this for myself but I thought I'd be nice and share!... Eyeballs are so hit or miss with me, sometimes I make them and they are amazing (at the time at least), then I take a hiatus from rendering are on a computer and forget what it was I did to make them look so cool. I told myself, if I ever figure out that magic trick again, I'd write it down. This isn't like the only/best way to do this, there are about 300+ different ways to do eyes, but I like this look when I nail it. =)

If you want a little more information about this process:

Step 1: You want to start with a grey colour, and put in the basic colour of the iris. This step kind of throws you off because they will look flat, boring, and sometimes desaturated. Try not to fuss with it too much here, this is just a foundation. Tip: Put down the grey base first, then lock transparency. This lets you paint freely with out spilling out of the eye area (plus it helps with steps 2 and 3).

Step 2: Copy the layer, fill it in completely white, and switch it to "Multiply". This will allow you to take a shade brush and go around the outer parameter. You want this to go all the way around because the eye socket will cast a shadow, and the spherical nature of the eye will also cast a shadow. Don't put too much thought into the light source at this stage, it doesn't matter too much here.

Step 3: Copy up the layer again, fill it in completely black, and switch it to "*Glow". You want to take a grey brush (the lighter is is the more it will bloom) and lighten up the centre. You want to focus into the bowl of the iris, and the centre of the eye closest to the light source. To add that extra bit of sparkle, put 2-3 specular dots close to where the light source is coming from. There should be at least one in the iris (if looking in the general direction of the light), and one near the upper part of the light area we put in earlier. This make the eye look shiny/wet and adds a bit of saturation back to the eye.

*If you don't have "Glow" layers, you should be able to use a "Screen" layer in the same fashion. The only thing screen will not do is saturate the colours and add that bloom automatically. For this you may need to merge the eye layers and use "Hue/Saturation/Lightness" for the colour correction, and use either "Levels" or "Brightness/Contrast" to get the bloom/glow (Levels is better for this, but if you don't have it you can use the latter)

All this was done in AutoDesk SketchBook Pro if you are curious about those things. Not completely important, use what you know. Practice makes you good, not the program! =)

Art © Rattra