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Drawing, tools of the trade?

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Drawing, tools of the trade?

currently i see myself working using either my tablet, my run of the mill pencil and occasioanly i am so bold as to start or darken in pen.

I have seen many drawings usualy in a blue colored pencil what is that? any particular reason for it being that way?

i would like to know.

also what pens, pencils and other tools do you find to be good for drawing?

HBs rock in my opinion, but 2Bs and especially 2B mechanicals have a good lead for the kind of paper I can afford.

As I understand it blue pencil is usually the Col-Erase (CartoonSupplies or Chromacolour can supply 'em) colored pencils that don't turn up well from light reflection when doing scans and copies. That way you work up a rough with the blue, do real pencil over it, and you scan/copy and the outcome is your finished drawing.

The way I was taught was to do my rough work in red with just shapes and volume represented to get a quick sense of the timing in the animation. Next blue gets used to draw in the details, which can then be traced to another sheet in black.

What I've been doing some of is (since I'm not around my drawing table much since school has been back in) to draw scenes in my sketchbook during free moments using the red/blue method, then scan it and trace it using Flash orToon Boom.

Today the animation club at the high school I teach at had our second after school animation learning session. I had a two homemade disks and a lightboox, but I had forgotten to bring col-erase pencils, so we used regular pencil for the ball bounce exercise. I had a great time keeping it rough, and I think the kids got a sense of it, too. I didn't have a light box under my drawing, so I (for one of the first times ever) drew almost entirely by flip checking rather than semi-tracing another frame. I'm going to pencil test it in a few. I let you know how it goes.

What I think I'll be doing different as time goes on is doing the rough work in red/blue as always, but scanning the roughs and tracing the clean up with the stylus in Toon Boom. It's taken a while to have the faith in my stylus abilities, but I'm ready to go for it since the results are better.

Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...

The way I was taught was to do my rough work in red with just shapes and volume represented to get a quick sense of the timing in the animation. Next blue gets used to draw in the details, which can then be traced to another sheet in black.

What I've been doing some of is (since I'm not around my drawing table much since school has been back in) to draw scenes in my sketchbook during free moments using the red/blue method, then scan it and trace it using Flash orToon Boom.

Today the animation club at the high school I teach at had our second after school animation learning session. I had a two homemade disks and a lightboox, but I had forgotten to bring col-erase pencils, so we used regular pencil for the ball bounce exercise. I had a great time keeping it rough, and I think the kids got a sense of it, too. I didn't have a light box under my drawing, so I (for one of the first times ever) drew almost entirely by flip checking rather than semi-tracing another frame. I'm going to pencil test it in a few. I let you know how it goes.

What I think I'll be doing different as time goes on is doing the rough work in red/blue as always, but scanning the roughs and tracing the clean up with the stylus in Toon Boom. It's taken a while to have the faith in my stylus abilities, but I'm ready to go for it since the results are better.

Sounds great.

The blue pencil was traditionally non-photo. It doesn't show up in black and white xerox, as in the old cel days and in black and white film camera pencil tests. Many still use it for roughs. As the roughs get tighter they move to a darker pencil on the same drawing. Start with blue, tighter with red and final rough in pencil. Of course everyone is different. There was a time I had a brown stage between red and pencil. colerase has a nice smoothness to it but there was another one called the Berol Verithin # 740 & 1/2 Non-photo Blue that I first was recommended. The turquoise prismacolor worked well too.

psychological

ever wonder what a blue pencil can do that a regular pencil can't-- besides being non-photo?

it could be that since the mind knows that "it won't show" you are more uninhibited in sketching, thus more creative and less analytical.

hey rupert do you plan to animate on paper then clean up on Toon Boom?
won't that be too tedious?

Don't worry.  All shall be well.

Graphiteman: thanks for the encouragement.

As to the tediousness of cleaning up in Toon Boom, that's what I've been telling myself the whole time--that it'll take longer and be a pain. My speed and precision with the wacom is improving, however. While I can do a fairly fast cleanup with pencil, Toon Boom does some goofy stuff when I use the import/vectorize command. I feel like it makes my lines choppy looking and doesn't really respect my line widths. When I zoom in it looks like a catarpillar has been munching on the line.

Trouble with the pencil tool in Toon Boom is I can't vary my line weight. I might try adjusting the setting on the brush tool and see if I can get that to work for me.

I may just need to invest in better pencils for paper cleanup. I'm thinking of ordering a dozen Tombow pencils from Lightfoot and seeing of anything is very different. I'm thinking of trying black Col-erase, since I really like the feel of drawing with my red and blue ones.

Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...

I have a sort of weird system. I do all my necessary real live work on the lightbox. If I am at the computer and get a quick urge, OR if I just wanna shits-and-giggles figure out how some crazy small idea I have might move, I dash in a few frames on the tablet and then I'm done.

thanks guys, one other question:

how much does this cost to get ahold of and where can i get it?

http://www.toonboom.com/buy/onlinestore/customer/home.php for ToonBoom (how'd ya guess) -- the prices there say 374 for the bells & whistles, and a more reasonable Express version of the software at 144. If that's what you even meant. They say they retail to resellers, so it's about like most things like Flash which I've never seen at a Best Buy but specialty stores and college campuses can carry it.

Flash is at 424 right now (if this link even works at their heavily, well, Flash site it's in this long address ...I got the educational version for a couple hundred cheaper because I'm not doing anything fancy or things like contract work with it, plus I have student identification. But that's about the only restriction I've run into. Cheaper version of the same thing. For going into roughs and learning movement, I haven't used ToonBoom but from watching others and seeing demos and the like, it seems as if ToonBoom might be something with more targeted gimmicks -once you already are familiar with Flash like processes-. So that's my vote. Plus if you ever get into designing there is an easy to learn programming language and all that interface jazz. Good product. Hopefully Microsoft's supposed alternative will blow up in their face.

i actualy own Flash MX 2004 Pro,

i was wondering where to get the pencils, unless you made a post in the wrong forum...

If it is the Col-erase pencils of which you speak, they can be ordered from Cartoon Supplies, Lightfoot Ltd, or even Office Depot, among other places. Cartoon Supplies also has the Tombow pencils.

Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...

>>thanks guys, one other question:

>>how much does this cost to get ahold of and where can i get it?

i actualy own Flash MX 2004 Pro,

i was wondering where to get the pencils, unless you made a post in the wrong forum...

Definitely not the wrong thread; your antecedent merely confused me, because reading in order I misunderstood what "this" referred to...singular/plural confusion. Sorry for the inconvenience.

this is the first time I've heard anyone besides myself use the word "antecedent". Did you know it comes from Latin (I'm sure you do) ante, before, cedo, to come? Fascinating stuff.

Scattered, perhaps you'd like to cover my English classes for a few weeks next month after my wife has our son? You'd likely also be able to handle my two periods of Multimedia--whaddaya say? And if you're anything like your name says, the kids would hardly know I was gone!

California's Central coast is a lovely place this time of year...

Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...

If I was anything like my name, your kids would think I was one of them. I have yet to hear a complaint on the somewhat obfuscated semantic pun. I am male and 20 so I am not without my appreciation for toilet humor (if no one's following, "scatalogical"), but I'm glad that you saw it for the more innocent description of my mental processes.

I'd love to take those classes for a few weeks. I've been through way too many classes to not know a thing or two, plus I have an enormous vocabulary. And I was born in Travis AFB, so I know I'd love the scenery =)

If it makes you feel any better, I am doing an en masse sort of teaching through my work on StudentOfAnimation.com. Keep an eye out.

Well thanks Scatto-- can I call you Scat for short? :p

I've always said I'm too immature for this job myself, but at 37 with a child on the way in a few weeks, I seem to be, aah, getting more responsible without growing up.

My mom lives in Napa and gets her medical stuff done at Travis--she's married to a retired Navy guy. I also went to an air show there once and got boomed by a plane directly above as I was walking away. My friends got a big kick when I hit the deck out of pure shock.

I'll check out your site--I bet there's some stuff I can use there. Just reading what's there now, I'm inspired and feel it speaks directly to me.

Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...

Yes, yes...I'm the Scat man =)

I was born at the David Grant Medical Center, my dad was a Staff Sargeant. (I have cystic fibrosis and it was one of the first and only treatment centers after I was diagnosed). Very few images in my memory but they're vivid. The enormous commissary, the base housing, etc.

The "park page" at SoA is a bit vague, but rest assured if everything stays on track it's about a two-week ETA. Feel free to spread the word until then. It may be updated with a more elaborate feature page soon enough. There's a pretty interesting word-of-mouth campaign in the works. Right now some of the initial interviews are tying up but the main focus is on the structure of the site itself and some visual presentation issues. It's a decent sized site with lots to do so getting the continuity of the look should be fun =) Check your PMs..

I'll put a link to it at Cartoon Thunder.

Cartoon Thunder
There's a little biker in all of us...

:P

well this is a pickle yes?

i have ADD which leaves me staring at the celing wondering about other stories and such. then i have OCD which is posibly my creativity source. and the thing that makes me strive for perfection...