Duotone Recommendations
-
Hi I was hoping the clever people here might be able to offer me some recommendations of artists that work in what, I think, is called duotone.
I've noticed in some chapter books it's B&W with one other colour (often pink or blue) and was wondering if people could recommend some of their favourite books or artists that use this technique.
Bonus points if they show diverse races since I'm a bit stuck on how to best show different skin and hair tones.
This is what I have so far but I feel it doesn't use duotone as well as it could. -
@CukiArtist Hey friend! I was wondering if you have ever used colour half tone in photoshop? it pixelates and separates dpi ( dots per inch ) in your image. It's actually quite common in comic books, but if you fine tune the pixels ever so slightly, you could end up with a look you may like. You should experiment with it and look up tutorials for it. what do you think?
-
What you're doing does not look like a duotone.
A duotone is two spot color inks being used in an image. It is much less expensive that full process printing when printed traditionally. If it is being digitally there is little is any price difference due to digital converting all to 4c-process.
In photoshop you select menu Image >>> Duotone. In the duotone window you then choose the colors and curves you want.
-
@jimsz Do you think then there is even a point in including duotone in a portfolio for Middle school/chapter books?
Here is the same art using Photoshop instead of Clip Studio. There is some difference in saturation and normal differences in how they address tones. (same thing happens if you use different programs to make greyscale). Shade of blue I used might be slightly different and I didn't bother cleaning up some artefacts since this was a quick test. But both have blue, black and white so I'm not sure why one is duotone and the other isn't. -
Creating a quality duotone takes a lot of practice and experience. Experiment with the duotone curves or using a different color blue.
The purpose of a duotone (or tritone, quadtone) is to add to the tonal range of an image that would otherwise be greyscale (or single color).
I don't see many greyscale or single/2 color books being printed any longer.
-
@jimsz thanks for all the advice. Sounds like I might be better off at this point to focus on just B&W art for my chapter book/middle grade portfolio. I originally wanted to include it to add some variety and colour but I can always sort that out later.
-
@CukiArtist yes approach it as greyscale and them go to duotones
