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Questions, Discussion and Tutorials

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  • drinkinstoutdrinkinstout Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    My tablet is an older PenPartner one I got second-hand as a gift about 4 years ago and it too seems to have lost most of the sensitivity of the pen - it looks like the only option is to replace it - does anyone have experience with these tablets or their pens?

    drinkinstout on
  • MKRMKR Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    My tablet is an older PenPartner one I got second-hand as a gift about 4 years ago and it too seems to have lost most of the sensitivity of the pen - it looks like the only option is to replace it - does anyone have experience with these tablets or their pens?

    It's from Wacom - it seems odd that their tips wouldn't be replaceable.

    MKR on
  • drinkinstoutdrinkinstout Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    I'll check out the part number on the pen and see if Wacom says I can replace the tip... I hope I can :)

    drinkinstout on
  • lifeartistlifeartist Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    Haven't posted for awhile (Or drew anything for that matter) and recently to get my self back into the groove hopefully, I bought my self a small pack of General's Kimberly sketching pencils, because I always read people saying try different things and see what you like, so I figured why not. And I am amazed at how the Kimberly pencils are of such higher quality then what I was using before (One guess) Prismacolor sketching pencils.

    I did some comparisons for fun, figured I would post them, I don't think I will use a Prismacolor sketching pencil again! Here are the comparisons

    This one is a HB comparison, the bottom one is Prismacolor the other is Kimberly
    p1010002nm0.jpg


    This one is H2 comparison, bottom one is Prismacolor.
    p1010003xq6.jpg


    So what do you think?

    I also have a few questions that I've been meaning to ask. One, is there a difference between Graphite and Lead pencils, or do they just some times call them different things?

    I also got a General's Sketch and Wash (Really looking forward to using them!!!:D) and a General's Layout pencil, what is the Layout pencil do/for? Is it just a dark sketching pencil?

    Also, what is an Ebony pencil for/do?

    Thanks for reading my questions :)

    EDIT I suppose on a side note, that if I wanted the shade of say, the HB Kimberly pencil, I could just use a 2B Prismacolor pencil or something like that. I am slightly hesitent to use General stuff because it seems to be hard to find, while Prismacolor is a lot easier (Cheap to I think). I dunno, thoughts?

    lifeartist on
  • tmccooltmccool Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    my high school had boxes and boxes of Kimberly pencils, I liked them. my teacher never had trouble finding them. you could always order them if you wanted. you could also try staedtler's lumograph pencils, they're neat too.

    tmccool on
  • supabeastsupabeast Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    lifeartist wrote: »
    I also have a few questions that I've been meaning to ask. One, is there a difference between Graphite and Lead pencils, or do they just some times call them different things?

    There’s generally no such thing as a lead pencil anymore. Once upon a time people used lead, silver, and other metal styli to draw on rough paper. Eventually the lead was replaced by graphite, which was cheap, could be erased, and did not require special paper. But the term lead just never went away.

    supabeast on
  • GreatnationGreatnation Registered User regular
    edited June 2007
    Ticonderogas are teh win.

    Greatnation on
  • Ingenium NullusIngenium Nullus Registered User new member
    edited July 2007
    Hey guys. Tis my first post, lurked on here forever though. Got me a tablet, about a month ago, but I'm still not sure if I'm using it/photoshop right, so i got a couple of question regarding that and some other things.

    1. Is there a benchmark or standard pixel per inch/cm used for posting on the site?
    2. How do most of you guys go about posting your art here, uploading ti and embedding the url and such.
    3. Before posting, should I transfer the image to a less intensive file type, kb wise? I'v not been using Photoshop for long, but the file sizes seem awfully big, at least when up the pixels per inch to something that makes the lines look somewhat decent.


    Thanks for humoring me, I'm sure you guys have answered the majority of these question many times.

    Ingenium Nullus on
    Its supposed to mean no talent. Then again, I wouldn't know, would I?
  • bread of wonderbread of wonder Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    1. For posting on the web, 70-75 pixels per inch should do it.
    2. Most people use imageshack or photobucket to host their image files. I use Flickr for my photos, and photobucket for anything else I need to host. Embedding images is easy. Just use the image tags: [*IMG*]http://imagehost.com/image.jpg[*/IMG*] (just without the *'s, and replacing the URL to your image's URL)
    3. jpeg compression works great. I'll assume you're referring to uncompressed photoshop .PSD files that are so big. Those can't be viewed on the web, anyway.

    bread of wonder on
    Long distance runner, what you standin' there for?
  • Stupid Mr Whoopsie NameStupid Mr Whoopsie Name Registered User, ClubPA regular
    edited July 2007
    DeMoN wrote: »
    Alright, so I'm fairly fresh to the art business, and I've got a few questions that I really hope belong in this thread.

    First of all, I'm pretty sure some of you have done some commissions, and how much do you usually get paid? A woman wants me to do a drawing of her kids, which I'll probably do on a 9 x 12 in either pencil or ink, how much money should I ask for?

    Second, another women wants my portfolio before I do any work for her. How are portfolios usually sent online? Do I upload it to a website and send a link, or do I just send a bunch of pictures in e-mail attachments?
    Price is really up to you, and usually depends on how much you think your talents are worth. I was just comissioned to do a simple black and white piece at an 8x10 size for $100, but that's because I felt like I was worth every penny.

    Right now its best to offer a flat rate, only when you get into doing major stuff with your talent should you worry about charging by the hour.

    As for sending a portfolio online, uploading it to a website is the best bet. If you don't have one, open up something like a Flickr account and upload it to that and send the person the link to your Flickr account.

    Stupid Mr Whoopsie Name on
  • AwkAwk Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Hey guys i got a question within Photoshop (CS3) using pressure sensitivity (Wacom tablet).

    Im using the pen tool in order to create some paths, i checked a tutorial that explained how to use pressure sensitivity in order to create a stroke that used the pressure. My brush palette has pressure sensitivity set as the control but when i create the stroke, its one thickness, every time. Can anyone give me some info on how to integrate the pressure sensitivity into the pen tool? I am a bit new at this.

    Love the site, love the art and advice. Thanks!

    Awk on
  • AwkAwk Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Silly me, there was an option to simulate pressure when applying the stroke that i did not notice!

    Awk on
  • DeeLockDeeLock Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Does photoshop have a hot key to change brush size?

    DeeLock on
  • GrifterGrifter title goes here 32, 64Moderator mod
    edited July 2007
    Square brackets change the size up and down.

    Grifter on
  • rtsrts Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    So I assume this is a good place to link these tutorials by one of the instructors at my school, Erik Gist. They cover the foundation of the drawing and painting programs at my school, Watts Atelier.

    Figure Drawing (NSFW)

    Reilly Portrait

    rts on
    skype: rtschutter
  • AwkAwk Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    The site is down at the moment, it seems.

    Awk on
  • rtsrts Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    If you are refering to the site I linked it seems to be up at the moment. Sometimes his site does weird stuff...but the tutorials are good so check them out if you get a chance.

    rts on
    skype: rtschutter
  • MKRMKR Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    A quick question about rulers:

    For the longest time, I've been doing all my drawing freehand, and never really considered using a ruler, and have become decent at doing lines and curves freehand. Well, I just found an old IBM flowcharting template in my closet (http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w186/herebepixels/flowchart.jpg ). Needless to say, my lines are a lot straighter, and better aligned with it. My concern is that if I come to rely on rulers and templates too much, my drawings will suffer.

    Are templates and rulers considered "crutches", or is it considered ok to rely on them?

    MKR on
  • supabeastsupabeast Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    MKR wrote: »
    A quick question about rulers:

    For the longest time, I've been doing all my drawing freehand, and never really considered using a ruler, and have become decent at doing lines and curves freehand. Well, I just found an old IBM flowcharting template in my closet (http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w186/herebepixels/flowchart.jpg ). Needless to say, my lines are a lot straighter, and better aligned with it. My concern is that if I come to rely on rulers and templates too much, my drawings will suffer.

    Are templates and rulers considered "crutches", or is it considered ok to rely on them?

    If you like to obsess over straight lines, use them. If you don’t care, don’t use them. In the long run, 99.9% of the people who look at your drawings won’t give a damn either way either way as long as you aren’t trying to draw architectural renderings freehand.

    supabeast on
  • GrifterGrifter title goes here 32, 64Moderator mod
    edited July 2007
    Most of the time templates are good to use when you want to draw something accurately like vehicles and, as was said, architecture. I wouldn't try using them to draw the human figure or a tree but they are handy to have around in case you need them. Template and rullers are definitely tools of the trade. It's up to your discretion whether or not you use them.

    Grifter on
  • NakedZerglingNakedZergling A more apocalyptic post apocalypse Portland OregonRegistered User regular
    edited July 2007
    I just got this message when opening photoshop cs. Its never happened before.
    "memory could not be allocated for the activation process. Please close all applications and try again".
    i installed yahoo messenger recently, but deleted it. i defragged my comp and deleted all the bs programs that i need.
    after doing all this i restarted the comp, and it doesn't look like anyting is sucking up too much ram. ram really shouldn't be an issue. i can open up painter with no problem. illustrator as well. hell both at the same time, but no photoshop.
    anyone know what might be up?

    NakedZergling on
  • Kewop DecamKewop Decam Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    i've gotten errors like that back in the day for random programs for no reason. Sometimes they just went away and other times I'd just reinstall the program

    Kewop Decam on
    pasigfa7.jpg
  • supabeastsupabeast Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Are you getting the message from Photoshop or from Windows?

    supabeast on
  • BedlamBedlam Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    So thanks to AOB legthy post I finally got some acrylic materials together and have began painting (thank you Mr. Bacon)

    I did one where I painted a background first and then tried to paint over it with a different color and I get a little bit of bleed through (red on top of blue looks a little purple in spots where its just suposed to be red) and was wondering what the common practice is for it. Do I just add more coats?

    Oh also I am doing it on paper made for acrylics.

    Bedlam on
  • supabeastsupabeast Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Bedlam wrote: »
    So thanks to AOB legthy post I finally got some acrylic materials together and have began painting (thank you Mr. Bacon)

    I did one where I painted a background first and then tried to paint over it with a different color and I get a little bit of bleed through (red on top of blue looks a little purple in spots where its just suposed to be red) and was wondering what the common practice is for it. Do I just add more coats?

    Oh also I am doing it on paper made for acrylics.

    Show-through is normal. All pigments have varying levels of opacity, play around with the different paints and you’ll learn them all eventually. More expensive brands of paint (usually) have more pigments and thus have less show through, Liquitex medium and low viscosity paints are the worst when it comes to pigment density, Golden paints are the best. The easiest way to avoid this problem is to plan ahead and not paint dark colors into areas you want to paint over, and remember, you can always put a coat of white over a spot before putting another color on.

    supabeast on
  • EdmundZeThirdEdmundZeThird Registered User new member
    edited July 2007
    I looked through using the search tool, but couldn't find it anywhere...

    For drawing purposes (using actual pencils, chalks, etc.) I was hoping to buy a sketchbook or sketch pad of brown paper, or paper of any colour, really, just not white or creme. Does anyone know of, say, online stores where they sell this kind of stuff? I've tried searches, but haven't come up with any. Brand names or websites would be greatly appreciated.

    EdmundZeThird on
  • supabeastsupabeast Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    I looked through using the search tool, but couldn't find it anywhere...

    For drawing purposes (using actual pencils, chalks, etc.) I was hoping to buy a sketchbook or sketch pad of brown paper, or paper of any colour, really, just not white or creme. Does anyone know of, say, online stores where they sell this kind of stuff? I've tried searches, but haven't come up with any. Brand names or websites would be greatly appreciated.

    Try Jerry’s, they have pretty much every pastel paper that you can get without ordering direct from the manufacturer, with colored sheets in packs and pads. The only downside is that you’ll probably have to buy in bulk.

    supabeast on
  • Bear CavalryBear Cavalry Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Would it be against the rules if I made a thread that I did a drawing a day in? I'm a noob to drawing and I'm not sure if I have to be really good to post.

    Bear Cavalry on
  • MKRMKR Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Would it be against the rules if I made a thread that I did a drawing a day in? I'm a noob to drawing and I'm not sure if I have to be really good to post.

    The worst that could happen is AoB will lock it with a witty and sarcastic remark. As long as it's not kindergarten scrawling terrible and you listen to advice, I can't see it being an issue.

    Plus your name rocks.

    MKR on
  • Bear CavalryBear Cavalry Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    MKR wrote: »
    Would it be against the rules if I made a thread that I did a drawing a day in? I'm a noob to drawing and I'm not sure if I have to be really good to post.

    The worst that could happen is AoB will lock it with a witty and sarcastic remark. As long as it's not kindergarten scrawling terrible and you listen to advice, I can't see it being an issue.

    Plus your name rocks.
    :P I'm not that bad. Ty as well

    Bear Cavalry on
  • NightDragonNightDragon 6th Grade Username Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    MKR wrote: »
    Would it be against the rules if I made a thread that I did a drawing a day in? I'm a noob to drawing and I'm not sure if I have to be really good to post.

    The worst that could happen is AoB will lock it with a witty and sarcastic remark. As long as it's not kindergarten scrawling terrible and you listen to advice, I can't see it being an issue.

    Plus your name rocks.
    :P I'm not that bad. Ty as well

    With almost every drawing-a-day thread that I've [ever] seen, where the person keeps it up for a decent amount of time, there is a considerable amount of improvement from the first drawing to the most recent. I would recommend it to anybody, really. I would start doing it myself, only I know I don't have that kind of dedication to actually do a study every day. :)

    I looked through using the search tool, but couldn't find it anywhere...

    For drawing purposes (using actual pencils, chalks, etc.) I was hoping to buy a sketchbook or sketch pad of brown paper, or paper of any colour, really, just not white or creme. Does anyone know of, say, online stores where they sell this kind of stuff? I've tried searches, but haven't come up with any. Brand names or websites would be greatly appreciated.

    Utrecht, baby.

    http://www.utrechtart.com/Paper_Boards/Drawing_Sketch_Paper.cfm

    NightDragon on
  • EinEin CaliforniaRegistered User regular
    edited July 2007
    I have a bit of a photoshopping question.

    I have this image...

    mypicture.jpg

    I had a very large 3000x2000 original that I literally just magic lasso'd the background out of prior to scaling it down, which was simple enough as scaling it down eliminated any of the jaggy edges that would go with it.

    However, I need to change that background color entirely.

    bgcolorexample.jpg

    #151515, in hex, is basically what I want to replace that white background with. When I try and do that with Photoshop's replace color thing, however, I end up with a pretty serious white jaggy border around the body.

    Is there an easy way of simply overlaying the non-white bits (ignoring stuff like teeth and buttons) onto that background color without losing the actual colors of the rest of it?

    Ein on
  • Wonder BreadWonder Bread Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    -snip-

    fill a layer with the new color you want the background to be, and set the photo layer as screen.
    This is not ideal since it will probably make all the white parts into #151515 (the buttons, reflection on glasses, etc.)
    I'd recommend re-doing it except putting in the right colour. Lasso'ing isn't that time-consuming, really. You kept the original, I assume?

    Wonder Bread on
  • tmccooltmccool Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Whenever I do adjustments in Photoshop now, I've gotten into the habit of not working directly on the original. I recommend it...

    tmccool on
  • supabeastsupabeast Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    tmccool wrote: »
    Whenever I do adjustments in Photoshop now, I've gotten into the habit of not working directly on the original. I recommend it...

    Adjustment layers and layer masks RULE!

    supabeast on
  • GeminiGodGeminiGod Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    So here's my problem: I'm using Gimp 2.2 as my program, and I loved the Ruxpin 'teaser poster' comic too much to not turn it into a wallpaper. Thing is, the only way I can figure to clean the edges of Ruxpin up so that I can drop him over another layer is using the brush with color erase. This works well enough, but I can't figure out how to get color erase to work on all colors equally, and not just colors nearest to that color (i.e., #000000 kills #000000 easily, but only kills some of #153D35, leaving a sort of residue).

    So the question is: Is there a way to do a color erase that will work across all colors, or do I just have to use the sampler and go back and forth sampling and then scrubbing out the edges that I want to be clear?

    http://members.cox.net/geminigod/ruxpin1.png

    Link shows the wallpaper I made, and if you look at the word 'Ruxpin' you can see around the edges where I got fed up and stopped trying to clean it.

    GeminiGod on
    "Dear World, I am leaving because I am bored. I feel I have lived long enough. I am leaving you with your worries in this sweet cesspool. Good luck." - George Sanders (suicide note)
  • NightDragonNightDragon 6th Grade Username Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    I have a bit of a photoshopping question.

    There should be a movable scale-like-thing under the Color Replace that tells Photoshop how much it should "fuzz" the edges or not. I think it goes all the way up to 200, but I've never used it to that degree. Basically, when you tell PS to "replace white" it replaces that EXACT white color, and nothing that's even slightly off-white. That scale tells PS that it can replace all the white, as well as replace the deviations from white (off-white, pale yellow, etc/whathaveyou). This gives it a softer edge. If you already have white in your image, use the lasso tool to create circles of space around them, then reverse the selection (that's under one of the menus when something is already selected, I forget which though)...now, you should have everythign selected, EXCEPT those certain bits with the white in them. Use the Color Replace tool, and bump up the fuzziness with the scale as much as you need to for the jagged edges to disappear.

    If PS is still being a jerk, I duplicate the original layer, do the above to the top layer, and then just erase the mistakes off the top layer so the bottom, original layer shows through.

    That's probably an amateur way of going about it, haha...but it seems simple enough, and it's always worked for me. :)

    NightDragon on
  • MaskedWallabyMaskedWallaby Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    Alright, I have a bit of an off-the-wall, technical tablet question (which I don't wholeheartedly expect will be replied to), but I'll ask anyway:

    I have an Intuos2 serial tablet. I recently required a Macbook, which has only USB and firewire (no serial ports). Initially I was going to assume that I would have to buy a new tablet (fuck me), but then I stumbled upon this: TabletMagic. It (supposedly) allows a serial tablet (with a usb-to-serial adaptor) to plug into a Mac and be used (via the program's serial translation thingamajigger).

    Now, has anyone tried this out before? Anybody with an adapter and time to spare trying it out? I'd rather spend $30 on an adapter than $300+ for a new tablet, but I'd also rather not spend the money on the adapter at all if it doesn't work well.

    edit: Also wondering-- How does it feel to step down from an Intuos to a Graphire? I love my 6x8, but I want to move my work to the Mac and I can't afford another $300 tablet.

    MaskedWallaby on
  • core tacticcore tactic Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    So, I really want to get into Zbrush, but I fear my system might be too weak to run the newer versions. (1.7ghz processor, 1gb ram, 32mb videocard). If I could get an earlier version, like 1.5 or 2, could I still make some decent looking things with enough practice?

    core tactic on
    6700ab2ed7bb6f9876150c388a78a011.png
  • tmccooltmccool Registered User regular
    edited July 2007
    guys...

    is there a special kind of spray paint that works really well on tshirts or should I just use the same stuff that goes on walls?

    tmccool on
This discussion has been closed.