fancy jewelry tutorial

1. Open your finished doll.

2. Create a new layer (Layers > New Raster Layer) and name it "jewelry". This will make it easier to start over if you make a mistake.

3. Select your basic metallic color; I am going to use this gold palette, starting with the second darkest color.

4. Zoom in on your doll so you can see what you're doing. Carefully draw in the outline of the necklace.

Keep in mind during this step that jewelry typically hangs on the body. Chains and cords are flexible and will drape around the neck or wrist. Dangly earrings will swing toward the ground if the head is tilted.

In this example I am drawing a double-stranded necklace; it curves around the doll's body the same way the neckline of her dress does. I am also adding little pendant bits to make it look more interesting.

5. Select the Retouch tool. Set it to "Darken RGB", size 2, with Opacity about 30, as shown.

6. Lightly go over the necklace in the places where shadow might fall on it: the places where the chain falls over the shoulders, and the undersides of the dangling bits.

7. Change the setting to "Lighten RGB" and do the same for the highlights, going over the necklace where the light would hit it most strongly.

8. Zoom out to check how it looks so far.

9. If you want something even more elaborate, you can add pixels of color along the strands to give it a "bejewelled" effect.

10. You're done! Experiment more to get the look you want.