coloring with photoshop
This evening, while in my usual procrastination mode, I decided to sketch a picture and figure out how to color it with Photoshop. You would think that I would have learned something like this when I worked for the Cavalier Daily, but no. I've always only had a very basic knowledge of the program; enough to fool around with photos, do basic web deisgn stuff (like the simple buttons and pictures on this page) and do elementary coloring-book-type coloring with the paint tool. I'd regulary check out sites like Designs By Mark and Phong, but that was it. I never colored Second Nature, mainly because it was too much extra work, but also because I believed in more traditional tools. Colored pencils have always been my weapon of choice when sketching. But Second Nature was a throwback to older comics, focusing solely on black and white lineart.
The recent change of drawing styles in Penny Arcade really caught my eye, though, and made me want to learn a little more about using computers to color hand-drawn sketches. So I decided to read through Clay Yount's photoshop tutorial since his comics have always looked incredible. And for a first shot, I think the end product turned out all right. It's a clean, crisper look that I could never get with colored pencils.
It's not much, but the main reason that I'm excited about this is for the children's book. This weekend I talked over the phone to a UVA grad who works at Viking, an imprint of Penguin Putnam. She answered all of my questions about the industry and kept my interest piqued. Now I'm excited to try Photoshop coloring with the ideas in my head and take it from there. Although attempting to draw a book entirely in colored pencils would be great, for purposes like reproduction, clarity and color selection, using the computer makes more sense. I never though that I would have said that at the Cav Daily, but I'm starting to come around.
Tuesday, January 21 at 7:29 PM
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