What's your favorite part of the drawing process?

[Scootarooni]

I'm curious! For those who draw, what is your favorite part and why? I'd also love to hear if you have a specific way or method you go about that part of the process :^D

For me, I love coloring and adding texture! My current style is lineless and I color over my sketch, often on the same or one layer. It's very relaxing and easier for me to fix mistakes during this part, plus I get to play around with fun colors!

I don't have a method for this, per se! Just a pinterest board full of interesting color palettes and inspiration on how other artists use color. I'm sure there's some unconscious color theory going on somewhere in my head there, since I'm studying how other people color, but it's mostly me playing around with what looks good to me. I will play around with levels, curves and overlay layers to better tie my color choices together though!

So what about y'all?

[larvapuppy]

I like sketching the most. When I sketch I get the idea/outline for the art down. The rest just feels like work, and doesn't usually turn out as well as I pictured it in my head 

Not really sure about methods... sometimes I use references for objects or poses I'm unfamiliar with!

[TheNothingMonster]

I really enjoy shading/lighting! It makes the entire piece feel more alive and I love playing around with colours (their values, how they interact with each other and their surroundings, etc).

Methods vary drastically on what I am making or what I'm trying to convey, but I usually just paint and smooth colours by hand. I don't use any smudging tools, I just copy the colour between the two colours I want to connect together and paint on top of them. It kind of gets exhausting when I have to render/clean everything up, but I've gotten used to it.

[Finel]

Good question!
My favorite part has always been sketching, that's probably why most of my artworks are never finished and stay as sketches.
I also (somewhat recently) really got into adding textures into my pieces, using different brushes and overlaying layers. really fun to give a piece a unique feel.
(My least favorite part is coloring but that's just mostly cause I am bad at picking colors).
 
When it comes to textures, my library of brushes is not small but is full of different stuff I downloaded for free and it lets me do so many different stuff. I also have files downloaded of scanned paper textures, or public domain scans of news papers/ maps/ etc, that I like finding the opportunity to use if I can.

Sketching doesn't need a method, grab a pencil and have fun. digitally it did take me a while to find a brush that feels good to sketch with. If I am planning a piece I will have a bunch of references open and and will make half a dozen thumbnails at least but that's more of my process in a planned piece and not specifically how I sketch.

(When it comes to colors- when I see something with a cool color pallet I yoink it and make a color pallet out of it, I have probably a few dozens of those in procreate. so I tend to try basing my colors on one of those to have some semblance of color harmony (while adding more colors and I need them). playing with levels and overlay layer does help a lot as well.)     

This is mostly digital but that's cause that is my main art medium, traditional obviously goes different.

[axlna]

definitely playing around with the colours. I go to tone curve on fire alpaca and go wild.
I generally put down really moody and boring colours when i get my first draft, like i use them to shade and everything, and once i am finished. boom tone curve. i especilally do it after shading because i find it nice for the shadows to be a little more,,, colurful(?) than just ''gradient''

[owlhari]

coloring, definitely! i do love the sketching phase a lot but there's nothing more relaxing than sitting back with a fully lined piece and then paint-bucket-filling in a bunch of pretty colors. and i love adding little details when coloring, like blush, freckles, clothing designs.

i generally consider "coloring the lineart" to be a separate step but it still involves picking colors so i suppose it counts too. even if i don't shade a piece, going back over to change line colors makes it feel complete.

[vashti]

Hmmmm, an interesting question; I'd say my favorite part is the ideas stage, maybe sketching, but I think that's kind of an oversimplification. Oftentimes when I draw, I make multiple attempts at the same piece, trying to get it right. Not necessarily in the technical sense of making things look the way that I want, more in the sense of Am I expressing myself the way I want? My favorite part of the drawing process then is when I've discovered the direction that I'd like to take my drawing, kind of like an a-ha moment, or my favorite part is when I get totally involved in the act of drawing itself & out of my head.

[142]

For me, it would have to be the coloring/shading stage. While my line art never really changes in style, this part of the process is where I really like to have fun. I used to mainly shade through blending my colors, using the same basic flat brush with high blending for every image, but recently I've become a lot more interested in using texture and opacity to shade, or even just not shading at all.

Nowadays, when I do use blending I tend to abuse it, maxing out the setting so that the brush no longer "blends," but just paints with whatever color you first placed it down on. I've ended up with some of my favorite pieces using this style.

It may be why charcoal and pastel are my favorite traditional mediums. As soon as my sketch is down I get to skip immediately to the shading.

[floral-tears]

If I'm taking a more painterly approach to the piece, I actually enjoy the anatomy (and sometimes composition) troubleshooting the most! I love the feeling of going OH! making a few changes, and then the whole thing looks so much better!   On the flip side, if I can't work out how to make something look better in a timely manner I lose my mind I hate art its the worst its too hard AAAAAAA

If I'm drawing, my favorite part is when I'm done sketching the body of a character and get to add the clothes/hair/accessories/other details!

[Guest]

Shading and editing! These are the last steps typically in my drawing process, but they're easily the most fun. Not because they're at the end, but because I'm the most experimental during this stage. I love how soothing shading my artwork is, and I enjoy playing around with colours and textures with my shading. And the editing is where the wacky fun comes out :D!

[Scootarooni]

These have all been super fun and interesting to read. I really love hearing different perspectives and things when it comes to art!

[Nickolox]

I think doing lineart is the most fun, usually for my art process it'll either be cleaning up the sketch itself to make the line work or the sketch IS the lineart, either way, it's a lot of fun i think
Colouring is super duper tedious for me due to how my linework tends to turn out, lots of holes... have to fill it in manually... sore...
But sometimes to mitigate that I try a super thick, clean and stylish lineart style, both are super fun and they both look sooo cool   

Shading is a close 2nd, i love working on lighting in my pieces, i've done lots of b/w shaded pieces before to practice lighting n such, it's a lot of fun!