CREATE ETHEREAL LIGHT AND COLOUR

Pauline Voss shares her approach to crafting luminous, mystical lighting and using layered colours for atmospheric characters

- Pauline Voss

For me, light and colour are everything. They define the mood, depth, and emotional core of an artwork.

Over the years, I've developed my own approach to creating ethereal, glowing light effects, which I'll be breaking down in this tutorial.

I build my lighting up gradually, layer-by-layer, playing with various blending modes, opacity and subtle erasing to create soft, semi-realistic effects. It's an organic process rather than a fixed method, which means there is always room to play and discover happy accidents, too. But for this breakdown I'll try my best to give a more structured explanation that will help get you started.

The tutorial follows my core workflow: sketching and refining line work; laying down flat colours; gradually building shadows and highlights; and experimenting with layer blending and all the different effects available to achieve that glowing, dreamlike effect.

This process helps me retain control while allowing for creative discovery. Whether you're new to digital painting or looking to refine your colour and lighting skills, this method might help you push the depth and luminosity of your work.

I'll be using my custom Procreate brush pack throughout this tutorial, which you can find all the details for at the bottom-left of this page.

1 Sketch the foundation

Before diving into colours, establish a solid base sketch. This step focuses on defining proportions, gesture and composition to create a strong foundation. Keep your lines loose and organic at first, then refine them until you’re happy with the level of detail.

2 Block in the image