"Bear With Me" goes digital

[bruinwi]

I spent much of the evening playing with my new digital stylus and sketch pad, and I think I've learned enough of the basics to put out a half-way decent looking episode of "Bear With Me" using it. So far, I've learned to do line drawings, and tonight, I was playing with fill-in color. I had penciled in a rough draft, and scanned it in last night

Comments

[jamesbeary]

There are lots of beautiful comics that are digitally colored. the one I consider to be the standard-bearer is the for better or for worst sunday comics by Lynn Johnson. check her website, http://www.fborfw.com and check out the sunday comics. very well done and not very distracting or too vivid. It is all entirely done on a computer

[bruinwi]

Thanks for the support and advice.

I've been aware of Lynn Johnson's work for some time. Not only does her artwork rock, she's one of the few cartoonists that age her characters convincingly.

Lar Desousa does some excellent digital art/coloring work on the strip with which he collaborates with Ryan Sohmer: "Least I Could Do" (http://www.leasticoulddo.com).

I have a long way to go, but I'm having fun.

Thanks again!

[designerotter]

YAY for you ! Since you're already an adept with computers, looks like your learning curve with the new gadgetry is taking flight.
Apparently you're not even having to deal with layers ... the system is more direct than I had thought.
Looking forward to seeing what kinds of amazing color effects you'll discover.
As an army pal of mine used to say - Go, Rembrandt !!

[bruinwi]

Frankly, I surprised myself and discovered adding color was easier than I had initially thot.

jamesbeary does make an interesting observation: He LIKES the hand-colored look of the strip, and I'd like to keep that, if possible. I may have to play with the paper "texture" or the "brushes" that I use.

More playtime!

[designerotter]

Funny, but just this morning I was thinking along the same line of thought. I wonder if the slick new colorization might appear too glib, and if we'd miss the texture you created with colored pencils. You might even try posting a 'double' episode where we see the same images in both versions - then take a poll among your fans. Of course now that I've said that, a caveat comes to mind: In the long run, the artist is always right, whatever the decision.

'Texture' and 'brushes' can be really nifty tools. Once (by accident of course) I impressed the hell out of a bunch of grad students by selecting the 'John Singer Sargent' brush and dabbling away in a fit of frustration.
That's probably proof that it pays to steal from the best.
Have fun !!

[bruinwi]

I DID have fun playing with the air brushes. It provides a nice way to add gradiated shading.

[dedos]

When you have a chance, you may want to play with layers in Photoshop. If you sketch on one layer and have your finished line art on another, clean up is a cinch ("hide layer").

[bruinwi]

Thanks for the tip! That would save me a boatload of time.