photoshop, painting, edges and lack there of

[thecosmicgoose]

Hola people. bran new poster here, so by gentle.

i tend to have a problem of losing my defining edges when i paint a subject. i've already looked through the tutorials section and read up on the proper use of edges, but my question is more technical then composition.

if you get a little to enthusiastic with blending in a painting and lose an edge, whats the best way to reintroduce that edge without undoing all the rendering you just did?

or alternately, is there a trick to rendering near one of your subjects edges so you don't accidentally lose it? a related question could be how to properly produce a smooth but abrupt blend using a hard edges brush.

hopefully those questions made sense.

[thecosmicgoose]

i should clarify a bit

i realize that drawing a line is an excellent way to portray an edge, but im trying to develop my technique to do without them if possible. hence the first question about reintroducing an edge without resorting to a line.

[Mihail]

Could you post some examples? Like, what are you doing and what are you trying to achieve?

[jfrancis]

You can paint in a layer above the bg and 'lock transparency' before your blending so that it is impossible to ruin the edge.

You can add to and then erase from the upper layer in order to define the shape, the way Craig Mullins does here

"I did a rough line sketch in a mask channel and then put a flat color in the background and a flat color in the foreground on a separate layer. This way I could add and subtract from the silhouette easily. I find that this additive and subtractive approach is very helpful in giving variety to your shapes, and can be used not only in drawing outlines, but in general painting as well. Put down a big shape, and cut away at it."

http://www.gfxartist.com/features/tutorials/974

[jfrancis]

You can paint through a selection like an airbrush artist does when he defines an edge with a frisket or stencil.

[jfrancis]

You can just sample your bg and hard-edge brush redefine the line from the outside, and sample the fg and redefine the edge from the inside, all in one layers. (If the areas along the edge are not too detailed)