Hot take: "Quick" watercolor fix took me 7 hours of layer hell

I was doing a digital watercolor portrait for a gallery showcase last weekend. Client said "just soften the edges a bit" so I thought 30 minutes tops. But my blending layers were all locked to specific opacity settings and I had like 15 separate wash layers. I spent 7 hours redoing the whole thing from scratch because it was faster than untangling my own mess. Does anyone else build up their digital watercolor in such a complicated way that you can't make simple edits later?

3 comments

3 Comments

anna7174d agoOG Member

Yeah, "layer hell" is the perfect name for it. I've been there with 20+ wash layers all set to different blending modes and opacities. One tiny tweak breaks the whole thing. Seven hours for a "quick fix" sounds about right for that kind of mess.

dakota_miller934d agoMost Upvoted

Quick restart always beats untangling 15 layers of blended mess.

alex8204d ago

Stop fighting your old layers and just start fresh next time, it always saves hours in the long run.