Do you have any tips on drawing slime?

Shrill Torstén, Denmark

Answer John replies

Slime is a fun but tricky substance to paint, because it’s highly glossy and somewhat translucent. It’s neither quite solid nor liquid.

If it’s dripping or flowing down then you’ll be able to see faint traces of object shapes and light sources behind it. Regarding light interaction, slime behaves very similarly to stained glass. It’s generally considered greenish-yellow, but you could apply these principles to any colour, and since it’s very glossy it will also have very sharp highlights.

I have my character already composed here, and I know that I want the slime to trail from his nose to the totally inadequate handkerchief. My approach is to lay down a basic diffuse colour and then let the light come through where you’d expect it to, applying shadows and background shapes accordingly.

Then it’s just a matter of adding those glossy highlights and reflections. I’ve drawn the goblin in a coloured, line-art style using Photoshop, so I also want to make sure the slime matches the background when it’s done.