The first issue of Tales from the Interface is now available for pre-order.
I just finished laying out the book and now I’m ready to go to print. I’d like to give you the opportunity to share in this exciting project.
This includes pages that have not yet been published on this website. It also includes my best illustrations and collects the tips and tricks from this website.
All details are available here: http://igg.me/at/tfti
I totally understand a lot of you may not have the means to purchase the book, but please consider sharing the campaign on social media. Every little bit helps.
This comes up often, people who start making comics often wonder what resolution to use.
I’ll make it simple: Just work as big as your computer will let you. It will allow more flexibility in the future for ads or reusing assets. But beware that performance will be largely affected by how you work. If you use a lot of layers, or a ton of effects or smart objects for example, performance will be greatly impacted.
Do a few trials to see what your computer will handle. You don’t have to care so much about PPI, as long as you have enough pixels, it should be fine. I work in 4800×6600. You can click the image above for a 800% zoom that will show you the size of my pixels. And for comparison purpose here’s the complete panel, the zoom is on the iron maiden.
If my computer could take more, I would. Make sure you have a large bleed area. This is another way to insure flexibility, your comic can be printed in a variety of format.
Here’s a nice trick: Colors don’t need as much sharpness as lineart. So one think you can do:
- Save your lineart in a separate file in high resolution.
- Lower the resolution and color your page. You should notice a performance improvement, especially as your page becomes more complex.
- When done, raise the resolution again. Photoshop is pretty good at interpolating so it should do a OK job.
- Paste your lineart on top.
Questions? Comments? What resolution do you work in? Please let me know in the comments below!
If you want to know more about how DPI/PPI work, check out this excellent article.
I often end up with hundreds of layers when I’m in the process of making a page. Here’s an overview of the big steps involved. Of course I always try to improve my workflow. I’m interested in hearing about your process, do you do thing differently
See the final page here
Storyboard
What you see up there is actually a pretty advanced storyboard. Generally I’m the only person who can understand the first version.
It seems a lot of beginners struggle with scanning. You’ve spent days working on the perfect page, but when you scan it your beautiful lines the result is not at all what you’d expect. While I barely do this anymore since I switch to a digital workflow, I’ve scanned my share of art. So, how exactly can you scan comic book art, whilst retaining the maximum amount of details.
1.Use quality cardboard
I suggest using Strathmore Bristol 300 Series. It’s a very robust board. Flimsy material will most likely get damaged or folded when erasing or manipulating the page.
2. Try and keep your pencils light
When doing pencils, try to use lighter graphite pens such as 4H or 2H. Also don’t press too hard, this will create indents in your board and make inking more difficult. Alternatively, you may like using blue pencils better.
3. Erase outstanding graphite
If you already used HB or darker instead of 2H or lighter, you will need to erase a bit to give a chance to your ink. You might even want to erase lightly before inking. Now, if your page is too messy it might be worth starting over. Don’t be afraid of redoing the pencilling of the page, it will be much faster and cleaner the second time around. And your inks will be cleaner too. A word of caution: Inks can be erased a bit. If you go to hard on the eraser, you’ll make little holes on your lines. Not very pretty, although if you only have a little bit, it can be fixed easily in photoshop.
4. Scan in high resolution
I recommend 1600dpi. It will make the next steps much easier. Don’t worry about file size, we will lower the resolution later. Scan in grayscale. Most scanner don’t do a really good job and will merge the graphite with your ink. If your using blue pencil, scan in color, obviously.
5. In photoshop
Use the levels (cmd+m) to remove all gray left over. Basically you’ll see spikes around the middle the graph, only keep those. After that, use the Filter>noise>Dust and scratches. A little bit goes a long way, just experiment until you are satisfied with your line quality. Median filter works in a similar way I think. This should remove any leftover little scratches. Now with select>color range, choose black. And fill (alt+enter) on a new layer. Delete the old one. You can reduce your resolution at this point. I like to keep it at 600, but 300 should be good enough. Your lines will now be on a transparent layer and you can color under them or even color the lines themselves! Remember to lock the transparency of the layer so that you don’t color on it by mistake.
If you used a blue pencil, you can simply remove the blue channel. MAGIC!
If your drawing is too low resolution, you can color on top of the ink by using a layer in multiply mode.
Was this helpful? Any Questions? Let me know in the comments.