Coloring with Traditional Media

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 12:35 pm

Well I've been doing some re-designing of my comic. Changed a few story aspects around and changed what the different races look like a bit. Overall I think it looks better, but my dilemia is I'm concidering adding in color to my comic to help with some of the impact that I want, and of course with special effects.

The problem I've run into is I've tried to color with different programs, like Paint Shop Pro and GIMP and well, it was a disaster. Even after running through some tutorials I just couldn't figure out how to color the comics properly with a computer program. And the fact I only have a mouse didn't help matter. So I've concidered trying traditional media for coloring, but I've not seen many webcomics done with that and I'm not sure what media would work and give the kind of apperance that I want. Of course theres the time factor too as it would take longer to do I think, even though I'm much more used to using traditional art matterials... Any tips?

Pattyannboyd · Post by **Pattyannboyd** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 2:51 pm

while I have noticed a tendency for colored comics to generally outrank black and white/grayscale, I don't think that it's an important thing to worry about. If you're just starting to work on this comic, it's best to teach yourself how to stick with a consistant schedule.
I suggest just doing what you can to make updates regular. If you find you have the time to work coloring into this than run with it. Or if you can't maybe color you work on a later date and save over you uncolored work.
also, digital colors doesn't always equal excellence.

good luck with your comic

Siabur · Post by **Siabur** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 5:14 pm

I have yet to make a decent colored comic in any media. For me it's not something I'm good at. So most anything is b/w. The stuff I have colored takes a while to do. In my experiance, multiple layers help with coloring. But after seeing what I do compared to others, b/w is my choice.
Good luck and lots of practice. See if there are any free or lowcost classes on graphic arts or photoshop(use on and most are similar).

Nomadic Phoenix · Post by **Nomadic Phoenix** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 6:49 pm

Ah, you do have PSP. That'll make this easier.

Right, so what you can do is draw your black lines. Whether you do it on the comp or not is up to you. Then, make that a layer somewhere at the top and then create layers beneath it for the coloring. If you do it right, it'll look awesome. If you can't get it to work, then there are other things to try, but I'll let you check it first.

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 6:54 pm

yeah I tried with paint shop pro and just ended up confusing myself and the comic looked ugly. I had a really hard time getting even the inking to go well and it just ended up super frustraiting me. I'll try again though and see if I can get it to work :/

Nomadic Phoenix · Post by **Nomadic Phoenix** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 7:16 pm

You try using the Color Replacer to make your black lines? And are you scanning or drawing with a mouse? Because that will change things.

I'm around if you need assistance. I use PSP all the time, so I know a bit about it.

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 7:47 pm

Hmm I'm trying to draw in with black marker, on a scanned image using a different layer. I tried using the pen tool and I couldn't get the smoothness I wanted.

Nomadic Phoenix · Post by **Nomadic Phoenix** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 7:58 pm

Try using the "Burn" and "Sharpen" tools on the background image. That might make it black enough to use. *Shrug*...if not, then you could try getting the outlines of things using the...

Effects -> Edge Effects -> Try something in here

tools...*shrug*...maybe that'll work.

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Tue Apr 24, 2007 8:06 pm

Thanks for the tips, I'll try that and see how it goes.

Siabur · Post by **Siabur** » Wed Apr 25, 2007 5:43 am

Yeah. A mouse. I'd recomend a tablet of anykind if you are going to ink digitally. For inking by hand, get a real drawing pen. Not markers, they won't have the nice crisp lines of a pen. The ones I use (can't think of the name,not at home now) are self contained and come in Fine, Medium, Brush and are a couple dollars. I never used inks until these pens. Then when scanning them they'll leave a nice line. Better than digital really.

I'd recomend that if you are going to color by hand, make an original and scan it. Print out a copy then color that one, then rescan it. I won't touch my originals. Everything is done in pieces. I draw in pencil, I'll trace that with ink using a light box. Scan that, lock it. Use another for the cartoon. Lock the finished version, then if I color it there will be another file. That way there's always a source if something get's messed up. I've learned the hard way and have had to start over.
As the say, practice, practice, practice.

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Wed Apr 25, 2007 6:23 am

Yep I have a wide variety of pens and brush pens, since I do alot of traditional
artwork with pens, mainly stipple. I was using the black marker tool to ink in digitally.

I really wish I could afford a tablet for my digital work, but unfortuently I can't at the moment, so I'm stuck using a mouse.

Thanks for the idea with using a copy to color, I'll try that as well and see what turns out the best looking.

Brigid · Post by **Brigid** » Wed Apr 25, 2007 3:40 pm

Personally, I do all my line art in ink and scan it into the computer. Partially because I like the look I get with inked lines and partially because I don't have a tablet and trying to get fine control with a touchpad is well nigh impossible. (I use a laptop, so I don't even have a mouse to work with.)

As for coloring, I don't know anything about PSP. I have Photoshop and I always put the coloring under the line art in a seperate layer. In fact, I usually have the solid colors in one layer, the shading in another, and the highlights in a third. Getting any kind of reasonable detail with the method I use takes a considerable amount of time, so I don't use color for my comic regularly. When I do I use a simplified "cell style" method.

Basically, I block out the solid color areas on a single layer. Making sure that there isn't any aliasing so that the colors don't blend, that's very important.

Then I select one of the areas of color and deselect any areas that I don't want shaded. (This time I do use aliasing.) One a seperate layer I fill the remaining layer in with the color I want for shading there.

Repeat with all color areas.

A tad time consuming, but it works for me. Don't know how much this applies to your situation, though. Hope it helps somewhat.

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Sat Apr 28, 2007 7:15 pm

Thanks for your help!

After some experementation I've decided to go ahead and color by hand and touch-up, enchance and do some things digitally as well. I kinda like how it turns out to look pretty "artsy" looking.

Heres and example. The first one isn't completely colored, it was just an experement, and the second picture is a close up of some of the rocks. I did those rocks a little differently than the others and I really like how they turned out. I'm going to try for that method of coloring.

How do you think these look? I do think I need to practice more and get some good reference photos of rocks and caves for some of this work.

Brigid · Post by **Brigid** » Sun Apr 29, 2007 12:23 pm

That is really cool! I think I'm detecting some marker work in the larger image? The rocks came out really well. (Wish I could get colored pencils to look like that.)

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Sun Apr 29, 2007 2:06 pm

Thanks!

Yep I used some marker, as well as watercolors, ink, and colored pencils.

Brigid · Post by **Brigid** » Sun Apr 29, 2007 6:58 pm

Wow, that's a lot. Never did get the hang of watercolors, myself. But they sure are pretty.

Io · Post by Io » Mon Apr 30, 2007 9:09 am

Very nice looking rocks. I wish I had the time to do real hand-coloring on my comic but ehh, with college, work and my MMO ( For research, honest) it's hard to spend that much time on each strip.

Joel · Post by **Joel** » Mon Apr 30, 2007 6:38 pm

i have one thing to say about the current picture that you have up right now,

like in the future, work on composition and contrast. right now the stalagtites blends with the background a too much where it looks like it's a giant empty void. and i end up staring at that instead of the whole cave hole thing.

TigerEye · Post by **TigerEye** » Mon Apr 30, 2007 7:34 pm

Thanks Io! Yeah that is one thing I'll have to work on, is making sure to keep concistant updates with this kind of coloring as I tend to be a pretty busy person as well. Hopefully it will go well.

Joel, I'll look into that. Though I will say this is an underground cavern and suppose to have a vast, black darkness feel to it. This was assically an experement in coloring and ussing different media to color it, so I think once I practice some more and start doing the real work it will look better.

Kels · Post by **Kels** » Thu May 03, 2007 1:16 pm

Hey, I saw you on another forum with the same comic. I just want to say again how great your traditional colour work looks. I'm considering doing something similar (probably coloured pencil) in the future, but I want to really concentrate on my black and white work for now.

In the closeup, you've gotten a really natural look to the rocks, and that helps a lot in immersing a viewer in the environment. Well done.