Ask Dr. Stupid.

Umm... I was asked how I do my clean up in Photoshop.

It's fairly simple really and has more to do with your own skill and patience with a stylus than with any sort of program or technique.

I start out AT LEAST 300dpi. I throw a layer of white underneath whatever layer has the rough drawing on it. Then I lower the opacity on the rough layer.


I tend to choose light grey or blue for the rough drawing and deep red for the final line just so it shows up nice an bright on the screen. It's not as easy to judge line quality with black and white.


Ok, here's the secret...well, not really. Zoom in fairly close, make sure shape dynamics are on so I can utilize thick/thin lines and basically hold my breath and cntrl-Z until I get a line I like. Yep, that's it. I also kinda "sculpt" the line with the eraser tool to further tune it. Also, zoom out often to check on how the line looks as you draw.

BTW- see those squiggly parts in the line? They pretty much don't make much of an impact if you're working at such a high resolution. When you res it down for the web (72dpi) it's pretty much non-existent. You can work at 600dpi and res down to 300dpi for print to do the same thing but still maintain decent resolution. However, if you're looking to make movie sized posters or anything, just use illustrator, Flash or ink by hand.

Draw straight through the shape and erase accordingly. You lines will be smoother and more consistent.


That's pretty much it. No Jimmie Hoffa secrets here but I hope that helps.

Dust 'er off...

Non Monstroville related art. This is an old story of mine about space ships, laser guns and prehensile tails. Finally got some inspiration to further develop the characters and just needed to draw something different for a change. WIP.

It's not a tumor!

Bleep. Blorp. Blop!

5 upside.

Phantasmo and his Hand of Fate lay the smack down on any criminal element caught running amok in Monstroville!

burn.

A newer version of the Baron. BTW he's makes Halloween candy in his secret candy factory.


The clean lines of the Vamps in their Hot Rod. This one burnt me out due my not being able to settle on any design for the hot rod that i was truly happy with. Poor planning (as far as the car was concerned, the characters were the easiest part) and just generally trying out everything to the point where I got seriously off track. Days of post-its and light boxing and redrawing and erasing and fuggedaboutit.

Here's the rough of what I eventually used for the complete version above. You can see the post-its where I basically drew and redrew parts over and over. This isn't counting the post its I threw out.


Going off on a tangent. The original intent was a "wacky racers" feel and this is like some gothic skeleton space ship... thing. More layers of post-its. This is maybe version 3 out of 5 versions I did. All of them with their layers and layers of post its.

Drag-u-La

WIP. Some Vampy Greasers speeding around in their blood fueled coffin shaped conveyance.

Gonna head out to Amoeba and satisfy a DVD craving real quick then I'll finish this up.

Something for something...

Some designs inspired by Viktor Von Kreep's Monstroville


A short gag sequence...

Bits of Gold.

Mr. Fun's Blog



Floyd Norman, AKA "Mr. Fun" has a damn interesting blog consisting of anecdotes about his experiences in the animation Disney and of his life in general. I'm led to believe he was the first black animator to work at Disney studios but the blog really shows that the subject of being a black animator is besides the point, he is experienced, full of wisdom and is one of those rare artists that seem open to sharing his opinions as shown on the "gag wall" section of his site. Brilliant stuff.