Questions, Discussion, Tutorials

m3nace

Sometimes my bamboo gets stuck in mouse mode and all I have to do is go the Pen Tablet Preference File Utility and hit "remove" under "All User preferences" and afterwards I restart photoshop. Don't fret, it won't remove the pen-screen dimensions (or whatever it's called) or anything else really, not as far as I have tried.

earthwormadam

Question!

How much would one reasonably charge to redraw an 11 by 17 poster in this style/colors scheme (with changes here and there to the character and background. It would also be getting the top and bottom cropped off for a CD cover.

My first thought is that it could take about 10 hours to pencil/ink/color that. Does that seem feasable? I'm terrible at estimating time and cost. Keep in mind it's for a struggling independant artist.

Rolo

Don't think that's being linked correctly, @earthwormadam

earthwormadam

ooopsie. I try again.

I guess maybe not a poster anymore, but still basically a cd cover, front only, in this style.

HALP?

Faded_Sneakers

I've been known to be lowball on charging people but $20 an hour is reasonable imo.

Granted the only people that pay me are friends and coworkers so I have no real experience legitimately charging folk.

earthwormadam

I was thinking it could take anywhere from 8 to 10 hours. Does that seem reasonable?

squidbunny

8 to 10 is about what it'd take me, I think, for a decent product.

earthwormadam

ok, thanks!

I guess he can either take, or leave my offer then!

square

I've studied some basic anatomy and I think is time to apply it to my cartoonish style. I just can't figure how. Can you guys give me some tips to develop a cartoony character based on anatomy rules? I've been trying a lot, but I can't develop good cartoon eye-shapes/mouths/and so on...

wahay

square wrote: »

I've studied some basic anatomy and I think is time to apply it to my cartoonish style. I just can't figure how. Can you guys give me some tips to develop a cartoony character based on anatomy rules? I've been trying a lot, but I can't develop good cartoon eye-shapes/mouths/and so on...

If you did your time and want to get your abstraction game on, I'd recommend following this very brief line of studies:

-Render Life/photography
-Figure drawing with rough gestures (keep it loose)
-Transition your muscle memory of drawing to an understanding of muscle overlay (I recommend Burne Hogarth)
-For surface exaggeration, it doesn't get better than J.C. Leyendecker
-To see the natural progression of Leyendecker's style, do some studies of Team Fortress 2's cast.

For your homework, check out this (big image warning) pdf off of Valve's site:
http://www.valvesoftware.com/publications/2008/GDC2008_StylizationWithAPurpose_TF2.pdf

vamen

I just started lurking here; hopefully this is the right place to ask.

Have any of you folks ever come across any good tutorials about techniques on doing sprite/pixel art in the same style has Chrono Trigger or Final Fantasy 6? I am helping a programmer friend of mine with a little project he is doing and he needs these type of character and visual design, and I am finding it painstaking to try and do it. I don't know if there's techniques to this type of art but if so I've yet to discover it.
Some vector environment/character design would not be amiss either, but that's more for personal interest =)

Thanks.

hadoken

http://penny-arcade.com/report/editorial-article/the-art-of-retro-on-modern-hardware

Does this help?

vamen

@hadoken - that is fantastic! Thanks so much, this is exactly the type of thing I was looking for =)

NakedZergling

Hey guys..i'm getting PISSED. I'm trying to do this flier for work because i'm the artist, so i get to do fliers and stuff for free....anywhoo
this guy i'm doing a flier for sent me this retarded amount of text to go on it. I've never had this issue before, but if i copy/paste the text in paragraph form into photoshop, it goes onto the image as one SUPER long line. Isn't there a way to copy paste it so it stays in the exact paragraph form i'm copying it from??

MagicToaster

You have to draw the shape you want the text to have with the text tool, paste it and move it around until it gets the shape you want.

NakedZergling

Thanks Magic!

Flay

I'm not sure how much experience you guys have with printing and binding, but I know absolutely nothing. I'm trying to figure out how to print a booklet such that the cover 'wraps around' and folds over the front of the booklet once more.

EDIT: Sort of like this

MagicToaster

This is the sort of thing you need to discuss with your print supplier. If you're doing it yourself, the first piece of data I'll ask is how thick is the stack of papers you're gonna bind?

brokecracker

MT is right, you would have to have exact dimentions. How tall is the stack of pages on the inside?

Yea, that looks like a standard receipt book template. Take a printoff of that to a local printer and they should have a catalog for you to choose from. Smaller local printers would be more likely custom build you something like that and if they do it is going to cost you an awful lot. Each bend of the wrap around has to be scored and that is where the exact dimentions come in.

Are those carbon pages? If so, black ink only might be the best route, color on carbons always reeked havoc at our shop. Also it looks like you have staples in the design, gumming the pages might be cheaper.

Molybdenum

Tablet / Cintiq users:

how do i get everything I draw on my tablet to look less obviously tablet-y?
Is this just a matter of using different brushes, and if so what kind?

I mean, my issue is that everything I do on a tablet looks nothing like what I sketch, even if I try to recreate the physical medium (usually a pen) as closely as possible with my brush. I'd rather have my tablet work look like my hand-sketched stuff, just cleaner.

Flay

MagicToaster wrote: »

This is the sort of thing you need to discuss with your print supplier. If you're doing it yourself, the first piece of data I'll ask is how thick is the stack of papers you're gonna bind?

I haven't completed the design yet, so I can't say exactly, but it won't be very thick. Probably no more than around 10 pages.

brokecracker wrote: »

MT is right, you would have to have exact dimentions. How tall is the stack of pages on the inside?

Yea, that looks like a standard receipt book template. Take a printoff of that to a local printer and they should have a catalog for you to choose from. Smaller local printers would be more likely custom build you something like that and if they do it is going to cost you an awful lot. Each bend of the wrap around has to be scored and that is where the exact dimentions come in.

Are those carbon pages? If so, black ink only might be the best route, color on carbons always reeked havoc at our shop. Also it looks like you have staples in the design, gumming the pages might be cheaper.

Oh, I'm not actually going to be printing on a receipt book. It was just the best example I could find to illustrate a cover that wraps all the way around.

NakedZergling

QUESTION>>>>>>

Caricatures! So my friend wants me to draw caricatures for him during his wedding. It's in July. Ive been trying to find out a good book, or ideally a website with tutorials. Nothing Ive found is all that great. Anyone here know anything about this? where should i begin?

The_Glad_Hatter

NakedZergling wrote: »

QUESTION>>>>>>

Caricatures! So my friend wants me to draw caricatures for him during his wedding. It's in July. Ive been trying to find out a good book, or ideally a website with tutorials. Nothing Ive found is all that great. Anyone here know anything about this? where should i begin?

This is not exactly the tutorial or tips you're looking for, but i find Jason Sieler to be quite an inspirational caricaturist (particularly his studies and WIP's).

NakedZergling

YES! He's actually my favorite caricature artist ever.

Golem

okie so Tablet and PS installed, anyone know how to setup pressure settings, I'm trained in pencil and paper so I'm used to pressing harder for a bolder line..anyway to set that up easily?

Angel_of_Bacon

In the Brushes window, go to Shape Dynamics and set the Size Jitter Control to Pen Pressure.
Then go to Other Dynamics (or Transfer in newer versions) and set Opacity Jitter to Pen Pressure.

Actually it's worth your time to mess around with the various settings in the Brushes window just to see what everything does.

Golem

edit: whoops crappy net

Golem

Angel_of_Bacon wrote: »

In the Brushes window, go to Shape Dynamics and set the Size Jitter Control to Pen Pressure.
Then go to Other Dynamics (or Transfer in newer versions) and set Opacity Jitter to Pen Pressure.

Actually it's worth your time to mess around with the various settings in the Brushes window just to see what everything does.

Thank you a million times thank you :DDD so happy right now! play time!

Golem

aww dammit, I need help again. My tablet does this weird thing after a few strokes of the pen, photoshop will only let me draw straight lines. If I open my pressure tester for the tablet then close it it goes back to normal for a min, then goes right back to drawing only straight lines. Anyone have any experience with this?

Edit: Hmm still having the problem but after a reinstall it seems like, it only happens when I use my mouse to open another window or create a new file in CS5. Doesn't seem like my tablet was made to be compatible with win7 or CS5 so I've kind of jury rigged it to work.

Warpony

Hope this questio is allowed. What kind of mechanical pencil lead thickness¿ wise is best for sketching something later to be a finished drawing?

Forbe!

I remember seeing a few good websites linked in the past for this sort of thing. Does anyone have a decent place to get reference photos of clothing and how it drapes over the body.

To be specific, I remember there being a website that had a model that was in a specific pose that you could turn around to view all sides.

Thanks

supabeast

Warpony wrote: »

Hope this questio is allowed. What kind of mechanical pencil lead thickness¿ wise is best for sketching something later to be a finished drawing?

2mm drafting leads, HB or harder.

Godfather

Question about my new bamboo tablet!

It works beautifully, except for some reason I can't get the eraser to work when I assign it to any of the hotkeys, whether it be on the tablet itself or on the side pen buttons! It's set to eraser in the preferences menu, but no matter where I assign it to the thing acts as if nothing is assigned there at all!

How do I fix this problem?

MagicToaster

Doesn't the pen have an eraser end?

Godfather

Not the bamboo tablet ones, no.

You can set an eraser to any of the side pen buttons, but photoshop never recognizes the eraser function

MagicToaster

Whaaaa? That sucks.

I dunno how to fix it, but what I do is I just use the keyboard shortcut for the Eraser (E).

Godfather

Yeah same here, it's just annoying to do that when all you'll be doing is adding and subtracting/erasing values for a couple of hours

Iruka

Are you using the tablet preset (an option called erase) or just setting the tablet button to a key stroke (E)? If you are doing the latter, I dont know what it is. I know that various programs don't recognize some tablet functions, like my pan button.

Godfather

Actually I do use the option called erase on the list, but it doesn't work

Iruka

Set it to keystroke and set it to E. Set another to brush so you can toggle back and forth. Short of making sure your drivers are up to date (download them from the wacom site, dont use the one on the disk) thats probably the best option.