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12 vs. 16 field

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12 vs. 16 field

Can someone explain what the differences are between working in 12 vs. 16 field? Obviously 16 is larger, I get that much - so paper would be more expensive for one (and actually I'm not finding any 16 paper for sale just yet). But what are the other differences? Is one for film vs. tv or something like that?

Film is generally done on 16 field, although you can use 12 field as well. TV is almost exclusively done on 12 field.

If you're doing a solo project though, I'd recommend working in 8- or 9- field on a 12-field chart. It's less space to fill up, and unless you're doing an epic, it's more than big enough...;)

12 fld = easy to flip & draw.

16 fld = a bitch and a 1/2 to flip & draw.

Pan paper of almost any length = the kind of thing you have screaming nightmares about....

"We all grow older, we do not have to grow up"--Archie Goodwin ( 1937-1998)

Whenever I was given a 16 fld scene it was always an extreme long shot of characters...real teeny, no kiddin. I guess was becasue there was some small detail to truck-out of and the level of detail would be better on 16 than 12 (the starting field could be bigger on 16). But I tell ya, I almost literally cracked...Huge paper, teeny characters.

Personally, I would use 8.5 x 11 paper.

If I use 8.5 x 11 paper, then I'd have to triple punch it myself. What kind of pegbar would I use then? Would I have to make my own? That would be the cheap route I suppose. Can you get standard paper thin enough to work with so you can see what you are doing?

If I use 8.5 x 11 paper, then I'd have to triple punch it myself.

No, you wouldn't. You can still use an acme pegbar.

You really should start exploring some of the links that have been provided to you. You'll answer a lot of your own questions that way.

Hmm, I did in fact explore that site quite a bit, somehow I missed that page. Sounds like 10 field with an acme would be one way to go. Is this paper see-through enough to be workable? I mean I assume it is if they are selling it as student paper - but I'm curious how it differs from professional paper. I'm not beyond buying the pro paper if I am going to get better results.

The project I want this for is a hobby true, but it's more than just an experiment or a test, so I do want to end up with a good result, as close to professional as I can make it.

Student paper is generally thinner and not as white, so you can see through more layers with the student version. I'll use that for rough animation and only use the good pro paper for final clean-up work. I would really suggest you use the student paper. If you use the more expensive pro paper, you'll have a tendency to want to keep your drawings even if they don't look quite right. This also happens with bound vs spiral sketchbooks. If you can easily throw away a drawing if it's wrong, you'll get much better results and learn much quicker than if you try to do everything perfect on the first try.

Aloha,
the Ape

...we must all face a choice, between what is right... and what is easy."

I hear what you are saying Ape, but that brings up a question then - if I like X amount of drawings on the student paper, how do I get them to the good paper? Wouldn't I have to redraw them, or would I draw over them on the lightbox using the good drawing as a guide? Seems like that would be a lot of extra work for a one guy shop... but I'd love your take on it.

The way hand-drawn usually goes, whether a one-man operation or a studio, is the animation is initially done rough, then cleaned up. Yes, it means you'll have to re-draw the drawing on a fresh sheet of paper (probably the better quality stuff Ape mentioned), but that's a normal part of the process.

Whatever you do, DON'T try to do a finished-quality drawing as you animate. Worrying about detail and good drawing takes you out of the process and focuses your attention on the wrong thing. Focus on getting the motion right, and worry about what the actual drawing looks like later.

I got ya. So what I am worrying about on my initial drawings are lines of action, that stuff is timed and moving correctly, proportion and so on. Then when I am done, I do clean drawings for scanning in, etc.

How much do you guys use the blue pencils then? Or do you stick with regular pencil since you are drawing over it anyway?

I've never been a fan of blue pencils. Now red - there's a color I can get behind... :D

Seriously, I usually just use graphite pencils.

Great, thanks :D

Thanks again for the insight. I'm an User Interface/Web Developer guy by trade and I have a Fine Art/Graphic design background. So I'm real familiar with scanners and photoshop and the whole deal.

I guess my main concern with scanning stuff in is keeping the line integrity and line character. When you are scanning in and you want to get clean black lines with black blacks and white whites, you lose some information - and almost always some of that info is good.

Of course the key elements are both the quality of the scanning software and the scanning hardware - the higher quality the better. So I will have to look a little deeper into that at some point.

I suppose if you have a high enough quality digital camera you can get similar effects, but cost is going to be an issue there.

Thanks!

Agree Laurence, and yes answers are for everyone. Thanks!