Category: YouTube

Cartoon #6673 Sketch to Ink

andertoons

Lately I’ve been testing out a new setup for getting video of me working. Let me know what you think:

Video transcription:

Hi there. This is Mark Anderson from andertoons.com and I’m going to show you how I sketch and resketch and ink a cartoon from beginning to end. So, here we’re starting with the first pencil sketch. The cartoon I’m going to be doing is a medical cartoon where a guy is at the doctor and the doctor is giving him some advice. So, you can see I start with a circle there for the head and I’m drawing the legs. I go pretty fast with the initial sketch because I like to try to keep it real lose and real easy and I know that I’m going to do a sort of cleaned up version of this for myself later on, so I’m not super worried about how things go or erasing or changing things in the first sketch. So here he is on the little table. I got to say, this isn’t one of my favorite scenes to draw because it’s sort of a weird angle but I haven’t quite figured out a good way to do it yet and get the idea of being in that waiting room at the doctor. Okay. Here’s the doctor, I am putting a little bit different hair on him. I didn’t draw the rest of the guy’s legs over on the left because I’m planning on cutting the scene off there. I’ve drawn the scene a lot so I know that I’ll probably cut it off right there so I don’t even go all the way down and you can see I’m not even worrying like I’m drawing his arm right over the rest of him. Again, this is a very, very quick sort of dirty sketch. This part it only takes a few minutes. So see I’m sort of framing it in there, I’m sort of framing it and putting in some more details, making things a little darker for myself. I don’t know if that line over there is the one for the patient’s other arm. What am I doing? Oh, I’m giving him… oh I changed it into a gown. It’s been a little while since I looked at this. For a second, I thought I was giving him really long arm. I’m changing it to a gown because I hate drawing; the guy is in a boxer shorts at the doctor because it’s sort of a weird angle to draw the shorts from with the legs coming out. Yeah. That’s right, so I changed this to a like a gown. Like he got into a gown to be examined and I’m just finishing some… I don’t really need to sign this first sketch; I don’t know why I’m doing that but all right.

We’re going to be moving on to the cleaned up sketch here in just a second but there is one last look at the rough sketch and here we’re back. There…now, I’m turning on my light desk at the table there and getting my couple of pieces of paper lined up and trust me, it will focus here in just a second. So I have a drawing or drafting table and then I have a real flat light desk that I keep on top of it and then I use my giant hand there to keep you from seeing things. Now, I’m doing the clean-up sketch, this is like another chance for me to work on things that I liked and didn’t liked in the sketch before I ink it. I don’t necessarily need to do this but I find it over the years that it actually saves me time to do this sort of cleanup sketch even for myself. I do this for clients a lot because if you show a client that rough sketch, that beginning sketch and you say, “Well, here it is. What do you think?” They’re all like, “Oh… it’s terrible”. So you can’t show them, you have to show them a cleaned up sketch and I found over the years that doing a cleaned-up sketch for myself like this moves things along because you leave it real rough and then you go right to ink. At least for me, I find little problems then and I end up inking two or three times sometimes on a complicated cartoon. So over the years, I’ve just gotten used to doing this sort of like resketch for myself.

So basically, I’m tracing but I’m trying to trace quickly and lightly and I’m not…again, I don’t want to get bogged down in all kinds up nit-picky details because then you sort of leech the life out of the cartoon and I don’t want that. I want it to look sort of dashed off like I just sat down with my pen and ink and just went… oh look, oh the cartoon just flows, who knows where they come from. You want it to look like that but it doesn’t ever work like that. So there’s the finish clean-up sketch and I’m turning off the light desk so you can get a better look at it and focus, focus.

And so there is the rough sketch. It’s sort of messy and there is the cleaned up sketch for me. Rough sketch, clean up sketch. Rough sketch, clean up sketch.

All right, now what I’m going to show you is I take this cleaned up sketch and this is mainly because I’m getting old and my visions isn’t what it once was. I take this cleaned up sketch and I scan it… oh, it’s big. I scan it in, I have a little self-feeding scanner so I take this sketch here, I scan it in and then I blow it up. I print it out at about, I don’t know, 150%, something like that and then this is what I’ll do the ink off of. I used to… upside-down cartoon. See, I use the same piece of paper to do a bunch of cartoons. So yeah, up there at the top you see the other cartoon that I was working on upside-down. Now, I’m taping this on… taping my ink paper onto the sketch here so that it doesn’t move on while I’m working on it.

Yeah. I generally work small but I found—like in the past year, I need to work bigger but I don’t sketch big and I like my sketches to be what they are and I don’t want to change how big I sketch so I found the way it works for me is I don’t worry about anything what I’m sketching and then once I’m done with it then I blow it up to a size that I feel comfortable inking so that way I feel like I’m staying true to the original sketch but then I can draw something that I can see and the line isn’t like an inch thick when you’re done.

So I’m doing some inking here. You see I move pretty fast. I’m not worried about getting every line exactly as they were on the sketch. The sketch is sort of a guide more than anything and I’m just trying to move fast and loose and again keep that spontaneity in the final art that I have in the sketch hopefully. Now, this is of course like the third time I’ve done this little piece so every time, it becomes a little clearer and a little more finished but I really don’t want it to be dead on the page so I try to move fast and easy and just keep it fresh. There, I’m drawing the tie, putting in my little details there. All told like to do the first sketch and then the second sketch and then going here to ink. This video clock saying it’s just about 9-½ minutes. Of course, there’s time for scanning stuff in and I still need to shade it, I’ll do that in Photoshop. I used to do it with markers but I found now that I’m working bigger with my inks, it was taking so much time with the markers and I was using so many markers so that’s another thing that’s changed recently as I do all of my shading in Photoshop now. I recreated my markers, my Prismacolor markers into like an endless pattern in the different percentages and Photoshop and that’s what I use for shading now.

It looks pretty good and I try to keep that as organic as possible. Here’s that gown again, it’s looking pretty good and there’s his legs coming down. I don’t like to draw a feet so if I can cut that off so I don’t have to draw feet. I’m doing it, I am cheating. I am terrible at feet so unless I really have to draw them, I don’t.

So, it’s looking like a pretty good scene, just about done here. Need to add my signature. Hope you enjoyed this video. If you… you can check out this cartoon on my website. I forget which number it is but just look under medical or doctor and you’ll see it. And here it is, I’m turning off the tracing and there you go. So hope you like it, andertoons.com.
 

Cartoon Shading in Photoshop – Cartooning Tutorial

andertoons3 Comments

Normally when I shade a cartoon I use my good old Prismacolor cool greys. But lately I’ve been doing a lot of custom cartoons where a client could ask for changes to the final art, so I shade in Photoshop using some custom patterns I made from those aforementioned Prismacolors.

It’s not glamorous, and there’s certainly more educational Photoshop tutorials available, but if you want to see a cartoonist laying down some shading while watching MST3K: The Movie, here you go:

Video Transription

Hi there, this is Mark Anderson from Andertoons.com and I am going to show you how I shade a cartoon in Photoshop. The first thing I do is I use an action that I had created to move all of my layers around, I will show you how to do that some other time, but what it does is it moves the ink to the top layer and then creates some layers underneath that makes the ink layer a multiply layer. I also created some patterns here for myself using my markers and the paper that I normally use and I scanned that in and created some patterns to emulate what I would normally do.

The reason I am not shading this using my regular marker and papers that I would use for my regular cartoons, is this is a custom cartoon that I am doing for a client, so I like to use my Photoshop markers so that I can create layer after layer after layer and then if the client requires something different or like a person’s hair color changed or we need to do this or that, I can go back and change it without having to redraw the original art, so that’s why I am doing this.

And of course I’ve got Mystery Science Theater 3000 The Movie playing over here on the right side. Shading isn’t my favorite thing to do, it’s sort of a necessary evil, so when I have a lot of shading to do – poor Dr. Forrester – I put a movie on sort of in a little window there to, that I can listen to or you know tune into here and there again.

So here I am shading, let me get back to the actual shading part; I use again my pattern brush and the eraser, those are the two tools that I really use when I create different layers. So this first layer here is sort of a light grey, I think it is a 30% grey, for her hair and for the computer here. Now I have created another layer and I am going to use a slightly darker pattern for the chair, so it is pretty simple, you just sort of lay the shading in as nicely as you can – now I see the, because I put that layer underneath the other layer when I color over by that computer that shading goes underneath that layer so that you can’t see it.

This is pretty standard Photoshop coloring shading sort of thing, but if you do not, you know if you do not know you know how…I am going to choose another slightly darker color for his chair to sort of make him pop a little bit. I’ve noticed sometimes I have problems, I use a Wacom tablet, and sometimes it seems like it has a problem, maybe it is Photoshop, maybe it’s the tablet recognizing like that I want a variable brush size and I have all the settings set up correctly I am pretty sure, and sometimes it just, it does not seem to recognize it, I don’t know what that is – if anybody knows, if there is something that I am missing here let me know, I would appreciate it.

So I am sort of erasing around his arm here and getting this shading more and more correct and this is going pretty well, there is actually not a whole lot to shade in this cartoon, which is why I chose it, sometimes especially with a crowd scene, or something like that there can be a lot a lot a lot of shading and I did not want to show you half an hour of ‘look, I am shading, now I am erasing, now I am shading, now I am erasing, now I am shading, now I am erasing’, this is already going to be tedious enough, but I will try to make it interesting for you.

So I think I am on my third layer now, and again I’ve taken that third layer and put it underneath the first two, the ink layer on top is set to multiply so that you can see things under the ink. And then I do my shading layers underneath that and they are all set to normal and then I have a background layer of just pure white. And then of course I have other layers for laying in the captions, and other things. There was another layer for that eBay logo but I had just merged that in there.

Okay, doing a little detail there on the desk making sure that that all makes sense. I left her shirt and her phone white because the desk and the chair have already been shaded. Okay I am just doing a little bit of detail work on the supposed eBay page. It doesn’t need to be detailed there, in fact it’s better if it is not because you don’t want people asking ‘oh what is she looking at, is she looking at a purse, is she looking at a toy, or is she looking at, what is she looking at’, it does not really matter you just need it to register as eBay, also that eBay logo is really big, I know, but you need it to register and read quickly, so you sort of fudge how big it actually is, so that the reader can actually read it and understand that she is on eBay, for the purpose of this cartoon.

Okay, now I am doing his tie, and I am sort of erasing his hand out of the tie – I try to be as detailed as I can when I lay in the shading because then it, it sort of, you can either be detailed when you put in the shading, or you can worry about the detail when you are erasing, and I sort of go in-between there. You try to stay in the lines as much as you can, that’s, that would be a nice feature on Photoshop is stay in the lines, although most of my lines don’t connect, so that’s not really going to work, but it would be nice if it could sort of intuit that.

So for the Adobe people get to work on that or if someone knows, again if you know how to do that and I am just missing it, let me know, drop me an email. Okay, doing the desk here, we are getting towards the end of this one; this is a pretty quick shade. Here I am sort of doing that, doing his desk here, I will go ahead and do some erasing, sort of get that edge there so that it does not look too jagged or you know. I am erasing here on the top of the desk, still watching Mystery Science Theater 3000 the movie. This is all the intro they haven’t started, the movie is really good if you have not, this Island Earth, this is a great, it’s not an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 but it is the movie that they made, really fun.

Alright back to, back on task here. I did some shading and some erasing that I didn’t like, so I you know controlled, I think it is Ctrl+Shift+Z to go back a couple of steps, so I am taking another shot at that. I would prefer to do all of the shading like right on the actual paper with the actual art, but like I said you never know, I have had enough times where a client has come back and wanted something changed that I’ve sort of learned my lesson, so it is not as organic a look as I would like, but what you make up for in being able to go back and fix things, totally-totally makes this worth it.

So looks like we are just about done, so this is the final version of this and I think it was only two, three, four layers of shading and I think that looks pretty good, so I will add the caption later, save this for the client and send – oh and look the movie is starting – so I think that is my cue to leave, thank you for watching, make sure you visit Andertoons.com for lots of great cartoons and other fun stuff. And have a great day.
 

Valentine’s Day Cartoon – Sketch Video

andertoons4 Comments

I’m trying a whole new approach to blogging this year, and one aspect is going to be some video content.

And, since people seem to enjoy watching the drawing process, I’m beginning with a video of myself sketching an upcoming Valentine’s Day cartoon. It seemed a good place to start.

(Note – I don’t reveal the cartoon’s gag until the very end of the video, but if you’re one of those people who just can’t wait (like me!), I’ve posted an image of the final sketch below the video/transcript at the very end of this blog.)

Anyway, enjoy:

If you want to see the video bigger, you see it at YouTube here.

Hi there, this is Mark Anderson from Andertoons.com, and today I’m going to be sketching a Valentine’s Day cartoon. I’m only doing the sketch; I’ve done videos before where I’ve done a sketch and then the ink and then the Photoshop, but I thought this time I would just concentrate on the sketch portion.

So, here I am starting my guy… Here’s my big giant hand…

I tend to draw really small, as you can probably tell by the hand to drawing ratio. I draw relatively small. The final sketch will probably end up being like 5″ x 7″. I don’t actually have an oversized giganta-hand, but that’s why it looks so big.

This is an idea I came up with at about 4:30 in the morning yesterday. I was laying in bed, woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep, so sometimes what I do then is I sort of brainstorm ideas, and this one popped into my head.

(Sorry about the focus there. I’m using my iPhone on my lamp on my drafting table to record the video. So it’s a little shaky and sometimes the focus goes in and out. My apologies. This is the best system I could come up with other than hanging something over my head, and I’m not sure I want anything that permanent.)

The idea is a guy at a card store for Valentine’s Day. This will start looking better here in just a second. I think I’m writing “Valentines” on the sign above.

This is an idea I came up with the other day very very early in the morning. I have to make sure when I come up with an idea like that that I sort of repeat it to myself. I actually have to mouth it to myself, and I have to mouth it quietly because I don’t want to wake anybody up. I have to lay there in bed and say “Valentines. A guy shopping for cards…” I have to do it like two or three times, otherwise it won’t stick. Or I have to get up right away and go downstairs and write it down. In this case I got up, and went downstairs and wrote it down and now I’m sketching it here soon after.

I was trying to come up with something different than your standard Cupid cartoon, so I branched out into Valentines cards.

You can see I stay pretty loose with a sketch (the guy there is really sketchy). I start with basic shapes and do details from there. I would assume everybody sketches largely the same way. I don’t think I do anything special, but I thought it would be interesting to see how this works.

This ended up being a problem with all of the cards. I’ll tell you the idea at the end, I don’t want to jump to the joke. But part of the problem with this cartoon is having to draw all of these cards. There is a reason I have to draw somewhat specifically on each card to make the joke make sense. That will become evident at the end.

I’m using a ForestChoice pencil which I love! I adore these pencils. If you get a chance to get a box of those… I think you can just go to ForestChoice.com and buy them. I love ’em! They keep a nice point, it’s a good eraser, the pencil just feels good in my hand. I love these. I think the paper is just some standard laser printer paper.

So here I am drawing hearts and frilly lace stuff on the sides. The person there shopping for the cards is obviously a guy.

I tend to draw pretty heavy too. I normally, and you probably can’t see it in this video because I’m so tightly cropped on what I’m doing, I normally sharpen my pencils every 30 seconds. Even though the ForestChoice keeps a pretty decent point, I sharpen my pencils a lot. Because I just have a thing about sharp pencils.

Some more hearts and pretty Valentine’s Day cards… (Focusing iPhone.)

I apologize that you can’t see what I’m drawing there until my giganta-hand moves out of the way, but this is the best system I could come up with. I tried coming at it sideways, and this is the best system.

I actually tried drawing stuff on Photoshop. I got a nice pencil brush type thing on Photoshop and I tried it out because I thought it would be easier to record a screencast, but as much as I like coloring in Photoshop, I don’t like sketching and I don’t like inking in Photoshop. Maybe I just haven’t put in the time or gotten myself the correct tools, but sketching or inking I go really really fast, generally.

This one is slower, I think this whole video is about 10 minutes from beginning to end, and the reason this is… I can normally do a sketch in about half this time, but this is a scene I’m not familiar with. I don’t draw a lot of guys shopping for cards, so I haven’t learned the tricks yet of who goes where.

You know if this were a sales graph scene I could probably knock out a sketch for that in like two minutes because I know where everybody sits, I know where the table goes, I know how to set that scene. This is a different scene, and some of it is that there are a million cards to do stuff on.

So you can see on the left side I’m doing a happy bear, and there’s a cat, and a guy, and I tried to draw some cartoon panels and there’s a bunny, I think there’s a wolf… So I tried to draw funny cartoony stuff on the left series of cards, and on the right side I did romantic-y stuff.

Again, I won’t fill in the gag until the end, but see if you can figure it out.

The scene itself is pretty simple. You just have a guy, and then you have that sort of angled card display, and there isn’t need to do a whole lot more than that for this joke. I could draw another thing of cards in the background, and a woman shopping. Or I could draw a register in the background or a display or a sale thing. You could draw the whole card shop if you wanted to, but it doesn’t help the gag.

This gag has got to read quick. You’ve got like 3-5 seconds and so the card… It has to read that it’s a card store, it has to read that it’s a guy, and it has to read that they’re valentines. So you have to get all those things across, it needs to read left to right, and you need to do it all quickly.

You need to set the scene, set the characters, set all that stuff up quickly, so I tend toward as simple a scene as I can.Of course everybody likes to put in details now and again, of course that’s fun.

Here I’m sort of darkening this guy up so you can see him a little bit. Not that you can see him with my giganta-hand in the way, but I’m trying to darken him up a little bit. You get a little reflection off the graphite there. I apologize for that. Looks like I’m darkening up the signs that are up top.

There’s two sections of cards as I mentioned, so I’m starting to write what’s going to be the joke. There’s no caption, it’s a captionless cartoon, so there’s not a gag line underneath. It’s all dealing with the signs in the card store here.

I’ll end the transcript here and show you the finished sketch below:

valentine cartoon sketch

Thanks so much for watching, I hope you enjoyed it! And let me know if there are any other videos you’d like to see!

And feel free to check out some finished Valentines Day cartoons!