Talking about process (I am a total art nerd)

So, while this isn't finished completely (needs a background), I am rather happy with what I have so far.

Semi-completed work: "Egg" (Obviously influenced by Escher).

 I also wanted to talk about process a little, since I've never actually taken a class on photoshop, I have no idea if I am doing this the most convenient way or not for the technology. Instead, I have a tendency to think go about the artwork as though I am creating an oil painting and not a digital work of art.

Step one:  Sketch, done in ms paint because my computer was having issues. For an oil painting I would have used brightly colored paint that was mixed with a great deal of medium (so it would dry faster).

Step 2: Under painting. I used the basic brushes in photoshop, with the tablet pen point set to "soft" (not completely, but mostly). Usually when I draw I have the pen tip set the the hardest possible setting, because that allows me to have the finest lines with the most obvious variation possible. If this was an oil painting (and thus in color) I would have not used black, but instead a color which would shine through the other layers. Blue, green, or red, for portraits, generally depending on the mood I'm trying to set.

In this step I used my hand as a reference, but I tried to use my knowledge of light and reflection, to paint the egg and background from my imagination.

 Step 3: Shading. I used a dry media brush at a lower opacity (and varying shades and opacities) to mimic a charcoal on paper feel, and a wet media brush to create the highlights with white at various opacities.

And then added more highlights with the wet media brush To get the final highlights, and added a final layer between the sketch and the rest of the drawing (painting? image?) to get rid of the red lines.