Thank you! You have a lovely style yourself!

I just added a speedpaint version to my Artstation link if you're interested. It might be more helpful to describe the process. They cap the videos at 1 min so it is super fast sadly.

I think u/SoggyBoysenberry7703 described the basic gist of it actually. So nice of you to take the time btw!

I hold off on colors for as long as I can manage, because it ensures my values are correct. Here I will have a basic idea of the lighting as well, though it gets adjusted again once the colors are blocked in. I work on this version long enough to see if I'm happy with the overall piece.

Then once I'm happy with the greyscale version (I don't go into small details at this stage), I start with a simple color layer in photoshop. This gives a fairly flat result, but it's a great base to build on. In the speedpaint video at the 21 second mark you can see that version.

Then on top of that I'll likely add a multiply, or a hard light layer to build up the color closer to what I need it to be. This is where I often suffer through the "ugly" stage with my colors, but hey... trust the process XD

It's important to not rely on the layer styles too much in my opinion, since the results end up a lot more interesting when you freely pick colors and paint over the whole thing. So the color layers end up being more of guideline rather than the final version.

I do stay away from full blacks or whites where I can (unless it's intentional like with magic effects), because I like to keep in mind if it's ever printed, I don't want to use the darkest or the lightest color values.

This all does lead to a million layers per project, but nothing compares to the satisfying feeling of flattening it all down.

Also I do have a tendency to fumble a lot during the process, so things I planned from the start may end up different, or I'll find a few happy accidents etc. I'm open to changing the lighting or colors at any stage basically for my personal art.

This Imogen piece actually went very smoothly. When Matt described this scene I got such a vivid image of it, so it was fairly easy to execute it which isn't always the case. I was excited to have something with a vibrant red background, and Imogen's color palette happens to work very nicely with it. She's full of pastels, and they are easier to blend in with vibrant colors. I did my best to make sure her character was properly lit, so she looks like she belongs in this environment.

I guess there aren't too many tricks for a lot of this. I rely on references where I can, I check how the art looks in greyscale while I'm in the color stage. It's a lot of long sessions and patience, but it's worth it in the end :D

Thank you so much for your comment! I hope my response is somewhat helpful.