Paint.NET

This was my 1st try at drawing a gemstone. And 1st try at making a tut
Comments & Ideas welcome



This is the way I got all the facets on the stone, there are many other ways to do it, so just try it and see if you like it. I used Xor to blend the 2 layers. then Flatten the image.




Then select the shape of the stone, adjust as needed, for this tut, I use oval. you do not need to de-select the selection from this point on.




On a new layer, Use gradient or whatever way to make Facets looks like they have range of shades. blend the layers as you see fit. Then flatten the image.




I used Curves tool to give the stone color, And a little zoom blur to mix things up a bit.

VVVV Gem Tut V2 readers can start from this step VVVV


Add new layer, Paint bucket White color.



Use Gradient Tools in Transparency mode to fade the white color. This will give the look of the reflective surface of the "table" of the stone.



Use Move selected pixels, hold shift key as you resize it. this will let you have the same shaped oval as the outer edge, this will be the "table" of the stone.




Add new layer. Do the same thing as above step but with black color on the other side. Flatten Image.




Don't foget to use Feather on each layers to soften them before Flatten
Add bcakground, shadow as needed.
And check this out for a little extra..
viewtopic.php?p=29087#p29087

Done

Hope this helps!!

That's pretty good, I just need to think what I'd need a gem stone for...

That hot dude. The edges are very defined though, maybe theres a way to make them more round.

Brilliant!

Just feather after every edge you made

Yeah, I wouldn't know that though because there's some sort of virus on my computer that doesn't allow me to download or save anything to my local disk files. So basically, I have no plug-ins.

Ash on the gradiants which did you use.?


old eyes can't quite see which from the screen shot.


OMA

Both of them look like Conical to me.

just impressed myself actually figured out which gradiant by myself

it was linear and moved the node around until I got the dark line in the centre and the white to the edges. then duplicated layer and inverted colors.

oh I'm so learning this

now on to step two.

OMA

Oh, I thought you meant step 6 and 11.

not a problem as I'd probably have asked at that point again.

worked my way down to the point where Ash uses curved tool sort of stuck there but I'll niggle away at this until I get it correct.


I'm using in an photo story 3 application. pics of the granddaughters pretty princes birthday party. intend to make png images. and insert into the photos
think the gemstones will look pretty neat poping up all over the place.

especially since all the little darlings were waving fairy wands around in the pictures i've got in mind.

what a grandmother won't do to impress the little ones.

guess i could always have just copied and pasted pictures of gems but needed and wanted to practise with paint net. (I really wanted an excuse to play)


OMA

Yeah I know
That's why there is this line near the end of the tut
"Don't foget to use Feather on each layers to soften them before Flatten"


Sorry was away for the weekend, Thx all who helped



Thats how i got the blue, select RGB at top left, put a check mark on whichever color you want to adjust, play around with this you might find something you will like better.
Hope this helps!


http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/ + good habbit = no virus
Hope this helps!

This was 2nd try (still forgot feather )


3rd try (feathered )

What do you think about this one ?
or
=> no use of 'XOR Gradients'
=> polygones and stars plugins (instead circle)

Doesn't look quite...right...I guess. Could be the use of lines in between shades of grey, could be the transparent "diamond" shape not quite matching up with the shadow, could be lack of true "shiny-ness"...?