I've had Dixie as a character in my mind for a long time, but this is the first sketch where I can actually recognize her on the page!

I couldn't pass up the opportunity to add color, but I also hadn't ever successfully added color to a traditional sketch on toned paper. When working with white paper, it's super simple to add color: set the sketch layer to multiply and paint normally underneath. You can't do the same with toned paper. The main issue is that lighter colors on top of the base sketch will wash out the lines and generally look gross.

I was eventually able get colors to show through by: (1) setting up a white-fill character mask in overlay mode; (2) clipping a coloring layer folder to the mask; (3) trial-and-error with color selection. A palette containing the underlying normal-mode colors is also helpful, since you can't pick the colors back up from the image if it's being rendered through the overlay.

https://perlat.us/dixie/