1) Nearly all my comics begin life as a sketch and giving some thought about the script as well. I was tempted to go the easy route and use one of my sketches from a previous comic to do this FAQ. But I've decided to do a new one-frame comic just for this FAQ. In this case, it's a lady observing something. Read on and you'll find out eventually what Ol' Dan has in mind.
2) I normally print out square panels on A4 paper for drawing. This helps me to frame the subject and also gauge how much space I should leave for the dialogue. Based on the sketch, I then draw in pencil.
3) The pencil artwork serves as my 'master copy'. I then place tracing paper over it to trace it in ink.
4) The tracing is done.
5) The traced artwork with the master copy.
6) The traced artwork is scanned (at 300dpi resolution so that I can also print my comics out) into Adobe Photoshop (one of my 'rice bowls'). As you can see above, the scanned image contains the texture of the tracing paper as well as dot specks captured from the surface of the scanner. It's time to 'clean up' the image.
7) Clean up done! Next, colouring.
8) In Adobe Photoshop, I can have numerous layers in a single canvas. The artwork is always right on top with the other layers for different elements (skin colour, hair colour, etc) beneath it. In the artwork layer, I can specify white to become transparent by using one of the application's features, allowing other elements beneath the artwork to show. Each of the coloured circle above represents a layer.
9) Filling in colours for different elements of the subject, e.g. face colour, clothing colour, etc .
10) There, 'Nice Girl' is all dolled-up.
11) The background is coloured last. Next comes the final bit of producing a web comic, adding the dialogue and 'word balloons'. Now we shall find out what 'Nice Girl' is up to ;-)
ORH...
And here's a bonus comic for reading all the way to the end:
And for new readers who might be wondering what "Hutdugaikarsui" means, be sure to click the 'FAQ' tag below for the previous FAQ.
:)
