Welcome to Gaia! ::

Yes! Tutorials to do all of the things you have been seeing around Gaia.
Is there a tutorial you want? PM me with your tutorial requests!

Q: Can I use MSPaint?
A: MSPaint isn't the best for these tutorials, these tutorials are not made for MSPaint. You can try if you wan't but I cannot offer any help.

Q: But all I have is MSPaint!!1
A: Download The Gimp HERE It's free and far better than MSPaint.
When Downloading the GIMP, Download the GTK environment first and install it, then install the Gimp!

Post2: iPods and Airheads
Post3: I Wish for an Animated Wishlist and How to Make a Wishlist
Post4: THE iPod! and Cheap Jedi
Post5: Glitteh and the Gaia Button
Post6: Basic Blinkie
Post7: Coloring with Gimp
Post8: Avatar Clothing

Other Maki Tutorials:
ImageReady and Movies

Links Out:
BleedingTruth
audiotune brought this site to my attention because they have MSPaint brushes, which is splendid since I cannot offer too much information on Paint since I do not use it.

exclaim I Wish...
arrow Take the New PM image and paint over the Envelope with white (provided)
--- Color the border around it any color you like.
arrow Make a new image with your avatar in it. Increase the Canvas Size so there is room to the right of your Avie.
--- Paste the Popup next to your avatar.
arrow On Gaia find the items you are Questing for.
--- Copy the Item image and paste it in your Pupup bubble. Save this image as "animation1" the next as "animation2" and so on and so on.
--- For mine I am also goin to spell out P.L.E.A.S.E. Saving each image as "animationP" "animationL"and so on. Since I already made an E, I'm not going to remake it.

arrow Now that I have all of my frames I am going to Import them into my Animated Gif Maker. You can download many different Free ones at Downloads.com I use ImageReady, it is not free!
--- Import all of your frames into the animation program.
--- Make sure they are layed out properly and suplicate any that you may need twice.
--- Set their time per frame to Atleast .2 seconds a frame

arrow Save your animation and upload it to the internet.



exclaim How to Make a Wishlist

arrow A wishlist is just a simply graphic depicting what it is that you wish to own. Some advanced ones have graphics to show what they have bought, found and what was donated to them.

arrow Step 1: Make a new file
--- Make a new image file in what ever image program you use (photoshop, mspaint, painter, etc) Make sure that it is no larger than 500 pixels tall and 500 pixels wide. If you have a sig that is any bigger than this a Mod will disable your sig privilages!

arrow Step 2: Backgrounds
--- You can also add an image in the background. If you are using Photoshop or a program with Layers, just add in the background image on the last layer. If you are using a program that does not have layers, Add the background first.

arrow Step 3: Make your Dream Avie with the GavSim or tekTek
---Make an Avie at http://gavsim.net or http://www.tektek.org Copy it and Paste it into your file.

arrow Step 4: Get those items!
--- You can get the small item images from the GavSim, once you have slected them from the drop down menu. To save Right-click on the image and select Save Image As. We save instead of copying in order to preserve its transparency.
--- Go into your image program and Open the saved item. Now you can Copy it and Paste it into your wishlist.

arrow Step 5: Text and Emoticons
--- You should also add text. "Your Name's Wishlist" will do, but you can say whatever you want. To add the "Donated" "Bought" "Found" You can save emoticons from Gaia, open them in your program, Copy and Paste them into your wishlist. We save emoticons to preserve their transparency. If you want to use other small images to show what you bought, found, or was donated, then just draw them, but keep them in another file or on another layer so you can add them when needed.

arrow Step 6: Save and Upload
--- Save your new wishlist as a GIF or preferably a JPEG. BMP files are usually way to big. Make sure it is under 100,000 bytes. Now its time to upload your image to the internet. Go to one of these image hosting places and upload your image.
You may need to make an account there. These places are FREE.
Photobucket: http://www.photobucket.com/
Imageshack: http://imageshack.us/
Xs: http://xs.to/index.php

arrow Step 7: Your sig.
---When you upload your picture you should get a URL that looks like this : http://imagehoster.com/image.jpg or something even longer. This URL needs to be placed in your Signature box. To get there click on Profile, Edit Profile and scroll down to Signature. Once there type Finally scroll down and click SUBMIT.

exclaim Glitteh!
arrow Start with a picture of your avatar. Make Three copies of it.
arrow For each copy add Noise. Make sure it is Gaussian and check the Monochromatic box(if it applies to your program)
--Set the amount to anywhere around 3-5

arrow For Each picture draw a little star or if your program has a sparkle brush, just use that.
arrow In your Animated Gif Maker load each image and give them a timing of .1 seconds, or more if you prefer.

idea You can also select only a small part of your image. In each picture select only the area you want to be glitter and add the noise to that selection.


exclaim Gaia Button
arrow Start with any of Gaia's Oval buttons. Preview, Submit, any with the emoticon will work.
---Make your image canvas twice as long, or if you know how long your text is going to be, make it the length of your text.

arrow Copy of of Gaia's emoticons. Paste it over the current one.
arrow Type in the words you want.
idea I use a size 9 Tahoma font + an outer glow with size 1, spread 0

arrow Select the right half of the Gaia button and move it down to the end of the text.

arrow Using a 1 pixel pencil/brush draw the black line back in for the top and the bottom. Fillin the center with whatever color you want.
---Crop out any of the canvas you don't need.

idea If you know how to make an animated gif try saving the animated emmoticons and playing around with those.

exclaim Coloring in GIMP
arrow Setting up your desktop.
Note: This is just how I prefer to work as it is similar to photoshop.


1. Brushes and Tools. This should open up as soon as you load Gimp.
2. Your file, when you open a file it will create a new window, this is where you draw and such.
3.. Navigation. Go to Dialogs-> Navigation. This is very helpful when you zoom in. You can drag the box inside around and it will change where you are looking in window 2.
4. Layers. You gotta love em. This is what makes everything better. Go to Dialogs-> Layers to open up this window.

:Idea: Things to Know!
-> Brushes- the Paintbrush can be different shapes. These are known as Brushes. Personally I use Circular brushes though I know some great artists who use caligraphy type brushes, ones that are flatter and at a slant.

-> Opacity- Transparency, how see-through something is. This is mainly going to be used for your Layers and especially for your Brushes.

-> Eye Dropper- If you press CTRL and click on your painting you will take a Sample of the color that you clicked. This is VERY important for blending colors. Use a lower Opacity brush to blend colors by mixing.
Click here for an Example
I Sampled the Blue and using a 50% Opacity brush I painted onto the Red, then I sampled the New color and Painted it onto the Blue. I continued to sample the colors and blend them further. I turned down the Opacity further in the last image and blended more.

-> Zooming - You can Zoom in with SHIFT+ "+" and Zoom out with "-" When zoomed in use the Navigator to move around your canvas.


arrow Preparing your Line Art.
You'll want to start off with clean, inked like art. This is not an inking tutorial. You can scan in your work or, for the sake of practice, you can download the Orc lineart Here

Step1. You can't use transparency and such on the Background Layer. Duplicate the Lineart layer and delete the old one. Rename the layer "Lineart" or "Lines" Create a new White Layer. Name it Background. Make sure that Background is on the bottom.
Step2. Click on the Lines Layer. Change its Mode to Multiply.
Create a third layer, call it Color. Color should be inbetween Lines and Background.



Step3. Color
On our color layer lets put down a basic skin color. My Orc is green. Use whatever color you like. This will be the basic, unshaded color of the Orc. I used a large circular brush with the Opacity set to 100%. After Coloring everything I made sure to erase everything that was over the lines. I then Locked the Color Layer's Transparency.
This will make it so that when we draw on Color it won't go outside of our lines.










Step4. Shadow
I tend to start the next step with coloring in the Shadows. This helps me to decide where the light source is coming from. In my Orc's case, its from the top right. Use a darker version of the first color. Sometimes its good to use a darker color with a hint of purple. I used a large circular brush with an Opacity of about 50%. Go over the darker areas, places where shadows will be cast, like the legs, tummy, neck and where two body parts are close.











Step5: Light and Bounce Light
My light source is yellow. For this reason I have painted Yellow highlights where the light would hit more, like the head, arm and leg. I have also added a bounce light, mine is a cool blue and its coming from the bottom left, pointing upwards. Im still using a lowered Opacity brush.













Step6: Details and Blending
This is a bit of a jump from the last step, and a lot has occured. I blended some of the colors. See the Tips at the top of this post for more info on blending. I also lightened the belly and colored the nails, horns and egg. I used a yellowish color for the horns and nails. I then used a dirty red for the top of the base of the horns and nails. I used a very low opacity, smaller brush with the red and streaked the nails.
I also added spots. Why not right? I painted white for the eyes and like our eyes, I added pink to the outside.
For the egg I used a blue and red. Similar to the nails, I used a small brush just to add some texture to the egg.
As you can see, I still have a lot of blending to do and a lot more detail to add.










Finishing Up: Blending and Additional Stuff
Here it is, finalized, or as far as I want to go. I have smoothed out the colors, added some more detail to the spots and given the egg a faint blue glow.

exclaim If you have used this tutorial please post what you've done, I would love to see. ^_^
If you need any further help or tips you can post your progress and Ill get back to you promptly.

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<3
Really helpful. Thank you~!