How to Create Realistic Soap Bubbles in Procreate
Sometimes, drawing in Procreate is just about making something fun. And what’s more fun than bubbles?
In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to draw your very own realistic, translucent, floating soap bubbles. It’s a sure-fire way to bring back childhood memories with these colorful orbs.
Open Procreate, tap+to start a new project, and choose a canvas size. Tap thecolor pickerand choose black. Using your finger or the Apple Pencil, drag from the color picker to the canvas. Now you have a dark background to work from. We have a guide onhow to use the color picker in Procreateif you need a refresher.
In thelayerspalette, tap+to open a new layer. Change the color to white. In thebrushmenu, choose a brush that has a consistent style. There’s lots of choice with Procreate brushes, like Monoline in the Calligraphy set; it’s possible to eveninstall your own brushes. Set the brush opacity to 100% on the toggle and choose a mid-range size.
Draw a circle. Without lifting your pencil, use a separate finger to hold down on the screen. This creates an ellipse.
Now to duplicate the layer, open the layers palette and swipe your circle layer to the left using one finger. TapDuplicate. Uncheck the duplicated layer so it’s invisible.
Select your original circle layer. Drag the white from the color picker onto your original circle to give it a white fill. Then change the color picker to black and color the circle black, which colors both the stroke and the fill.
On the layers palette, recheck the hidden layer, so it’s visible again. Select the duplicated layer then tap back on the canvas. Go toAdjustments > Gaussian Blurand slide your finger or pencil across the screen until you’re satisfied with the blur amount.
On the layers palette, tap the white circle’s layer and chooseClipping Maskfrom the menu.
This creates a tight outside edge of the black circle while also keeping the blurred inside edge of the white circle outline.
Color Your Bubble
The colors found in soap bubbles are often hues of pinks, yellows, blues, and greens. Although a real bubble is reflective of its environment, we’re going to focus only on the refracted colors that form from the soapy oils.
Open a new layer and choose any brush. With a bright pink color, draw a half-circle around the inner edge of one side of the bubble. On the opposite side, draw a shorter curved line. Change the color to a bright yellow and draw a rounded line in between the bottom gap of the two pink lines.
Using a bright blue, draw one rounded line between the top gap of the pink lines and another line on the inside of the yellow line, closer to the circle’s center. Finally, change the color to a bright green and draw a line on the inside of the top line of pink.
Use Gaussian Blur
With all the lines of color on one layer, tapAdjustments > Gaussian Blurand slide the scale until the lines blur together.
Change the color to white, and on a new layer, draw a small white circle or triangle just off-center at the top of the bubble. Fill it in with white. Then draw a smaller filled-in circle below it to the left. Along the bottom-right edge, draw a white rounded line.
Go toAdjustments > Gaussian Blurand slide the scale until the white blur looks natural.
You can go back in and add more blurs of color to their own layers. You may want smaller sections of brighter colors to show where the light hits; use less Gaussian blur on these areas.
You can experiment with the width of your colored lines or draw blobs of color rather than simple thin lines. You can also use wiggled lines instead of plain rounded lines to increase the areas of colors naturally, but this can also be achieved by using a wider brush.
Be creative and use your bubbles as part of an entry toa creative design challenge. Once you’re happy with your bubble art, don’t forget toadd your artist signature.
Animate Your Floating Bubbles
We already have a guide onhow to create an animation in Procreate. You can use the same process with your bubble drawing. We duplicated the bubbles to make a moving scene of floating bubbles.
Duplicate the individual bubbles and then merge the layers to form a scene. Each one of those layers becomes a frame in the animation.
Create Realistic Soap Bubbles
Whether you add soap bubbles to other artwork or just draw them for fun, they’re a great way to have some fun and expand your skills. You can experiment with different colors and see what other bubble styles you can make. Animating the bubbles can be a way to create a cool and relaxing video screensaver, too.
The best thing about these bubbles? They won’t accidentally pop.
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