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skoolmunkee posted:Paint Tool SAI Thanks, I gave it a crack and already I'm loving SAI over Photoshop. Photoshop  PaintTool SAI  Crisper lines and better weight variation. Can't argue with those results! Once I tweak the settings I'll get exactly what i want.
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Feb 7, 2011 08:21
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Heck yeah, Paint Tool SAI is the coolest. I ink all of Luffinpuff and Eric with it. People Who Know More About Photoshop Than I Do, is there any way to get a brush in Photoshop that looks as crisp as the one in SAI? Whenever I use the default "hard" brushes in PS, it has a sort of fuzzy blur to it like the example posted by Fauntleroy. I still prefer SAI's smoothing and all that, but it'd be nice for fixing mistakes once I start coloring in Photoshop.
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Feb 7, 2011 08:56
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Scurvard posted:Heck yeah, Paint Tool SAI is the coolest. I ink all of Luffinpuff and Eric with it. All of the default brushes in Photoshop will do that, all you have to do is get some custom brushes and try them out until you get the sort of lines you like. It's sort of tedious to have to go through a ton of brushes before you find the one you want, but after it's smooth sailing.
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Feb 7, 2011 09:36
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I enable Scattering, lower the scatter and then raise the count to get sharper lines. The squiggle on the left is scattering disabled, the one in the middle is at a count of 2, and I think the one on the right is 6 or 8.
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Feb 7, 2011 09:51
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Does GIMP have similar options or resources for custom brushes?
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Feb 7, 2011 10:25
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So normally a comic as mediocre as El Goonish Shive doesn't really get my bile flowing as much as certain others, but it did something today that kind of really has me going "what" and I just have to ask the shop thread for opinions: Note the complete omission of nipples on the shirtless panel. Not especially noteworthy by itself, but in the 'commentary' the artist feels the need to justify this for some reason: Dan Shive posted:It's been commented on when I've done previous comics with shirtless males, but it's well-documented that I don't draw nipples on them. There are a few reasons for this, the most prominent being that they stand out a bit too much when I try to include them. They look fine if I'm sketching, but in ink, they're like beacons that draw the eye in like some sort of whirlpool. Really not what I'm going for, there. I really don't get this, at all. How exactly are nipples even remotely this difficult to draw in an unobtrusive way? I mean maybe I'm just being a stickler on anatomy but it just seems incredibly silly to me to say something like "NIPPLES ARE HARD TO DRAW GUYZ" when something as simple as a thin-line, vaguely oval shape would probably suffice in this sort of style. Then again, I'm not an artist, so....I dunno, what do you guys think? Is there legitimate difficulty here or is this just some lazy aversion to drawing basic loving anatomy? CidGregor fucked around with this message at 11:28 on Feb 7, 2011 |
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Feb 7, 2011 11:13
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Almost any excuse people come up with for not drawing nipples always sounds like a cover for "I can't draw them without it looking silly." I mean, really? "I don't draw female nipples, so I won't draw male ones"? How is that even equivalent at all? That doesn't make sense at all, not even "a twisted sort" of it.
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Feb 7, 2011 11:42
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Unless you are specifically omitting certain features because of style not drawing anatomical features is a lazy cop-out. And I don't mean "oh my art isn't bad it's my style", I mean "I have legitimate reasons to make these design choices". Speaking of omitted features, Mr. Shive needs to start giving people fingernails. Maybe I just have a strange obsession with hands, but backwards hands, missing fingernails, and even the 4-fingered cartoon hand really bug me.
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Feb 7, 2011 11:55
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I take more umbrage in the fact that the artist just decided to put Sakaki from Azumanga in his lovely comic.
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Feb 7, 2011 16:11
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Wow this thread reminded me I've been sitting on Mangastudio for over a year. I really need to start learning it. I've only heard good things about it, but I've been so lazy.
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Feb 7, 2011 16:13
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Kave posted:Wow this thread reminded me I've been sitting on Mangastudio for over a year. I really need to start learning it. I know I don't use SAI like I should. I ink my psd files in it and then toss them back into CS3 to color and everything. I didn't even know there was a vector inking option. There seem to be a lot of tutorials around for SAI though so I suppose that's a project I should take upon myself soon. I'm constantly annoyed that SAI doesn't seem to have a basic "draw a straight line" tool like photoshop does (U) but perhaps there is something there which will do it. I recently bought a Bamboo Fun because my old Intuos 2 wouldn't work right on Vista. However the Bamboo doesn't have a surface protection layer. Any ideas for something I could rig up? Also the nib seems to wear down really fast, do they make the nibs softer now or something? Maybe because there's no protection layer?
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Feb 7, 2011 16:38
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skoolmunkee posted:
I use a Bamboo and I experience the wear-down of the nib too. The Bamboo has this molded texture on the drawing area made to imitate the tooth of paper and, while in practice it is very nice, I found two problems: A) Your nib will eventually grind grooves into the surface, creating little dips and bumps that you can actually feel when drawing and B) That tooth texture acts almost like sandpaper and slowly grinds your nib tip down -- my old graphire did that too, but after a MUCH longer period of time. I've been combating this by applying plastic film in the form of clear contact paper cut to fit. I have to reapply it every, like, 7 months and that requires cleaning some gunk up, but it combats the problem until I can think of a better solution or buy a different tablet. Otherwise, I really really like the Bamboo. Maybe I could sand the texture smooth, it is something I've thought about.
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Feb 7, 2011 17:27
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CidGregor posted:I really don't get this, at all. How exactly are nipples even remotely this difficult to draw in an unobtrusive way? I mean maybe I'm just being a stickler on anatomy but it just seems incredibly silly to me to say something like "NIPPLES ARE HARD TO DRAW GUYZ" when something as simple as a thin-line, vaguely oval shape would probably suffice in this sort of style. Then again, I'm not an artist, so....I dunno, what do you guys think? Is there legitimate difficulty here or is this just some lazy aversion to drawing basic loving anatomy? Basically everything about that chest looks weird to me, so I'm sure wherever he would have placed the nipples would have just made it worse.
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Feb 7, 2011 18:06
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Spookyblang posted:I use a Bamboo and I experience the wear-down of the nib too. The Bamboo has this molded texture on the drawing area made to imitate the tooth of paper and, while in practice it is very nice, I found two problems: A) Your nib will eventually grind grooves into the surface, creating little dips and bumps that you can actually feel when drawing and B) That tooth texture acts almost like sandpaper and slowly grinds your nib tip down -- my old graphire did that too, but after a MUCH longer period of time. Every week or so I tape a square of fairly heavy GSM paper to my bamboo. I cant really speak for what that does to the wear on the nip, but drat it feels much nicer to draw on.
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Feb 7, 2011 18:19
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Just for reference, this is my tablet: The drawing surface feels very smooth actually, I can't discern a texture to it by touch, which is why the nib wear puzzles me. I've considered just taping some paper over it, but that definitely feels more toothy and seems like it would wear the nib down even more. Maybe I'm wrong? skoolmunkee fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Feb 7, 2011 |
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Feb 7, 2011 18:38
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skoolmunkee posted:Also the nib seems to wear down really fast, do they make the nibs softer now or something? Maybe because there's no protection layer? Partially this, yes. There's also a business in replacement pens. That's the official Wacom site, in case you're wondering.
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Feb 7, 2011 18:58
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I have an ancient-rear end tablet that was probably repurposed from pieces of old refrigerator after the fall of the Soviet Union, and the pen that I got with it wore out after about three weeks of use. After searching fruitlessly for the original company, I ordered some weird and equally off-brand giant tablet pen based on an online recommendation, and that pen turned out to be immortal. I used it for something like five years with it sustaining practically no wear, and in the end the tablet died before the pen did. It was everything you could wish for from a pen, too. It worked perfectly with the tablet's pressure sensitivity, automatically mapped the standard shortcuts to all its buttons, and even had three extra buttons around the top for god only knows what. The tablet software didn't support them, so I never found out what kind of magical bonus function they might have unlocked, but I've always been curious.
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Feb 7, 2011 19:10
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I can just buy replacement nibs, but it's annoying when my Intuos went years without needing any. I've drawn like twenty relatively simple pictures with this one and it's developed a huge angle. Modern products 
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Feb 7, 2011 19:15
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One of the buttons on my Graphire (4x5) pen fell off around Thanksgiving and I still have no idea where it is. My last tablet had gotten to the point where the cord connecting the tablet to the computer was frayed almost all the way through, and packing tape alone kept it functional (unless I held it the wrong way). God knows whenever I eventually do get a bigger, better one, I'll probably use it until I've adapted to avoid holes in the screen with the stylus. All this talk of nib replacements and having a large drawing area just baffles me.
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Feb 7, 2011 19:53
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CidGregor posted:So normally a comic as mediocre as El Goonish Shive doesn't really get my bile flowing as much as certain others, but it did something today that kind of really has me going "what" and I just have to ask the shop thread for opinions: It has little to nothing to do with how nipples are difficult or not to draw, and everything to do with the underlying psychology of the dude drawing it. Specifically, EGS is the most fetish obsessed blueballs comic in the world. He draws everything with some sexual goal in mind and then veers hard to the right before it might become an actual issue.
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Feb 7, 2011 20:14
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People are weird about nipples. I drew a big slimy demon thing once, it was humanoid male shaped, and it was shirtless. I got a comment about how it having nipples was 'weird' or 'gross' or something. They weren't like, giant hairy dicknipples, they were pretty much just little circles. I'm not saying to not draw them, not at all, it's just that webcomic readers can be as weird about them as webcomic artists :/
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Feb 7, 2011 21:20
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To say not drawing nipples on the men is okay because the artist doesn't draw them on the women either doesn't help matters. It just makes it twice as weird. He's basically saying there are enough frontal boob shots for a no-nipple standard to be established -- why show the breasts at all then? What is so necessary about a bare breast but not a nipple? Why do you need a breasts but not in its entirety? Either carefully censor it with the surroundings or character's arms or something, or just don't include it. Can't have your cake and eat it too.skoolmunkee posted:Just for reference, this is my tablet: Ah, see, I think I must have bought my Bamboo before a design change, because looking at the Bamboos on the market right now, they aren't even shaped the same. Huh. This is what I own --> http://www.tritech-computers.com/store2/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=714 Well, the small one, but you get the idea. Also I don't think a piece of paper would wear the nib down quite as much because, unlike a texture molded into plastic, paper has some give to it. But that comes down to the paper you're using: a bit of smooth Bristol or cardstock is going to feel completely different from vellum and rough sketching paper. As for options, I was reading last night about someone laying tracing paper over a very thin sheet of Plexiglas or plastic and setting or adhering that (temporarily) to their tablet. Spookyblang fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Feb 7, 2011 |
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Feb 7, 2011 21:50
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I felt like nipples turned into weird little visual homing beacons whenever I used to draw them, too. Then I realized I was giving everyone the same nipples. 
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Feb 8, 2011 00:23
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I tend to assume that people drawing nippleless chests have been watching too much anime, since Japan seems to believe that no nipples makes it not nudity. (And, more generally, that (animated) men Just Shouldn't Have Nipples.)
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Feb 8, 2011 00:50
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Spookyblang posted:To say not drawing nipples on the men is okay because the artist doesn't draw them on the women either doesn't help matters. It just makes it twice as weird. Well with EGS there's no female nipples ever shown, so it's actually a bizarre "double" standard really - he may not draw them on females but he never draws females unclothed, so it's actually a bit of a moot point. Well, I'm assuming he hasn't drawn any nippy-nips in the 2 years since I last paid attention to it (due to a blog we won't name).
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Feb 8, 2011 01:43
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Oh, see, I've never read that comic. I just assumed that if he was saying "My girls don't have nipples either," it'd have had to been drawn that way at some point, just as he had with the man/men. Otherwise, yeah, kind of a moot point. It doesn't matter that you draw your women the same way (in theory), what matters is you've got a naked man with relatively detailed musculature and no nipples and it just looks silly. Like there's a butt on his chest.
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Feb 8, 2011 06:32
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OK I just tried Manga Studio EX4 and I'm wondering why I haven't tried it earlier: (PS top, MS bottom) The vector brushes feel like they magically make my strokes look a lot sleeker. Part of the differences between the two were from my unresolved sketching but I did the hair pretty similarly and the differences are striking! Also, I find myself undoing/erasing too many of my strokes in PS but I did the one in manga studio without a single undo. I'll try SAI when I get back from a trip. Scurvard posted:People Who Know More About Photoshop Than I Do, is there any way to get a brush in Photoshop that looks as crisp as the one in SAI? Whenever I use the default "hard" brushes in PS, it has a sort of fuzzy blur to it like the example posted by Fauntleroy. I still prefer SAI's smoothing and all that, but it'd be nice for fixing mistakes once I start coloring in Photoshop. The default brushes in photoshop have a spacing of 25% under "Brush Tip Shape" and if you lower it to 0% the stroke gets considerably sharper but more CPU intensive. oldyogurt fucked around with this message at 09:12 on Feb 8, 2011 |
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Feb 8, 2011 06:47
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I love SAI but having to switch between my Mac and PC partitions to use it is really frustrating.
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Feb 8, 2011 06:50
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oldyogurt posted:The vector brushes feel like they magically make my strokes look a lot sleeker. Part of the differences between the two were from my unresolved sketching but I did the hair pretty similarly and the differences are striking! Also, I find myself undoing/erasing too many of my strokes in PS but I did the one in manga studio without a single undo. Would you say MS's vector brushes act anything like freeform brushes in Flash or Illustrator? I mean, do they hold true to the strokes you actually make with your stylus, or do they automatically "snap down" to something smoother or simpler? (And if so, is that a setting you can change?) I stayed away from MS for a long time after hearing tales of woe about earlier versions, but it seems like a lot of those problems have been cleared up... (Also, hi, rejoined the forums after 4 years just for this thread, I've been off drawing comics about waitressing and dudes) bigbigtruck fucked around with this message at 19:15 on Feb 8, 2011 |
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Feb 8, 2011 16:46
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(Hi!) I played with the MS vector pen last night, and it seems to work just as well as the raster tool -- I occasionally forgot I was working on a different layer type. There are several pen tool options: Size, Shape, Stroke-in and Stroke-out (whether the ends of the stroke taper and how much), Correction (anti-jitter), and in vector mode allows you to turn vector Snap on or off (and control the degree), and Delete Overlapping Lines.
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Feb 8, 2011 17:02
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oldyogurt posted:OK I just tried Manga Studio EX4 and I'm wondering why I haven't tried it earlier: I am looking forward to another comparison piece made after a week or made after some reasonable effort using MS. The results with Manga Studio are interesting... however (but surely I'm wrong) it looks more like the program just made things look more like the programmer wanted them to look. The PS may be a bit rougher, but instead it seems you put your intention in it. Also, a question to tablet users: after how much time did you get accustomed to how the tablet/pen/ps handled instead of using pencil+paper/marker/brushes? Also, found this dusty link in my google reader: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/interactive/2008/oct/16/posy-simmonds-tamara-drewe
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Feb 8, 2011 21:52
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limaCAT posted:
A couple months of everyday (or near everyday) use did it for me. Once you get over the disorientation of not being able to look where you draw it's not very hard.
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Feb 8, 2011 22:50
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limaCAT posted:Also, a question to tablet users: after how much time did you get accustomed to how the tablet/pen/ps handled instead of using pencil+paper/marker/brushes? I still have the same tablet my parents bought me for Christmas that year, and it works fine! It looks cruddy -- got a loose cable and held together with duct tape -- but I don't think I'll replace it until it totally dies. Unless I finally cave and get a Cintiq.
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Feb 9, 2011 01:25
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See I'm one of the few who is completely against the Cintiq. I think drawing without your hand blocking your view is kid of a revolution of art. Digitally I can see my whole drawing without ever moving my hand to stop drawing. I'll always stick with the Intuos line myself.
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Feb 9, 2011 01:38
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Jarthus posted:See I'm one of the few who is completely against the Cintiq. I think drawing without your hand blocking your view is kid of a revolution of art. Digitally I can see my whole drawing without ever moving my hand to stop drawing. I'll always stick with the Intuos line myself. when i was a wee lad i developed a sense of object permanence. conversely: how in the world are you holding your pen that your hand is obstructing your view?
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Feb 9, 2011 02:28
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Of course you can see the immediate area you are drawing but your hand will always be obscuring a part of whatever you are drawing. It's not for everyone but I have come to like not seeing my hand on or around what I am drawing.
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Feb 9, 2011 03:22
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I feel like if I didn't have to stop and move my hand or something I'd take fewer opportunities to pause and look at the picture and make sure it's not completely terrible.
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Feb 9, 2011 04:48
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Furikku posted:I feel like if I didn't have to stop and move my hand or something I'd take fewer opportunities to pause and look at the picture and make sure it's not completely terrible. Hm, I guess I am just an oddball. After 12 years of so of tablet work the old way just seems like a nuisance. I mean, it's still simple to do but I feel most comfortable when I am not registering my hand visually and instead concentrating completely on my forms and lines.
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Feb 9, 2011 05:07
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Chiming in to agree that my hand just gets in the way. I'm right-handed but hold my pencil "like a lefty", so it hooks around and gets all up ins. It's less smudgey with a tablet and I can also see the drawing better, as was already stated. Different strokes for different folks. haaaa
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Feb 9, 2011 05:15
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Quetzal-Coital posted:It has little to nothing to do with how nipples are difficult or not to draw, and everything to do with the underlying psychology of the dude drawing it. I seriously considered it might be something like this but I decided against planting the thought myself and seeing if other people came to that conclusion. But yeah, I really get the feeling there's some serious sexual dysfunction going on in this comic and the mind of the man behind it, way beyond just "oh nips are hard to draw."
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Feb 9, 2011 05:38
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