FanArt: Medium & Method discussion

[Skuda]

alright guys and gals, today [while walking my doggy] I began to ponder about what kind of mediums people use for their art.

Perhaps some people have a different way of using a certain medium. So, [assuming this thread doesn't get a wave of flames] I'd like it if all you artist out there could discuss your ways of putting your ideas to paper (or computer screen, or canvas or whatever) and discuss others techniques and methods.





Myself, I mostly use my trusty .5mm mechanical bic pencil. that and a fine tip ballpoint.

I know alot of people who go out and buy those big packs of fancy pencils with different lead, but I'm just fine drawing with a mechanical one.

I usually do a quick proportion sketch, and basic details. then I go over it with my ballpoint pen (black of course) and flesh out the details and erase the previous pencil sketch

Then after that's all done, I trace the drawing onto antoher sheet with my pencil, and fill it in with shading.

[InfinityXXX]

I just use a normal #2 pencil and draw on some computer paper. I don't really erase anything. After i finish i scan my drawing and then use my paint program(Jasc paint shop) and erase all marks and paint my pic. It usually takes abour 6-8hrs to paint a drawing fully.

(The comic i just posted, i started it at 11p.m took a break at 5 p.m and finished it around 8 or 7 p.m.)

I never owned any fancy pencils or pens or used any except for a $10 felt pen a friend gave to me and then he stole it back.lol

[Sagasu]

I'm not quite sure I use one medium enough to call it my own 'style', but currently I'm working with cell shading.

Which requires,

-Clean line art
-A decent art program.
-Lots of music, coffee, and insomnia.

The process itself is simple, like yours, kuda.

-line art

-Porportions sketch
-Clothing, hair, etc detail sketches
-Cleaning up and 'inking' the outlines & details
-Additional cleanup (scratch remover, contrast/ hue adjustments)
-The black lines from this are generally still quite visible, so you're going to want to take great care with fixing mistakes before you get to far into this process.

-Primary Color Layers

-Basically, you have your colors for the different areas. Skin, clothes, hair, yet you want to stick to a paticular 'theme' and not just mix match randomly.
-Skin is all the same, not adding shading at this point and time.
-Hair is also all the same, though shading is the time taking part.
-Different sections and layers of clothing/accessories/equipment are done in colors that compliment or contrast well with one another.

-shading / lighting/ tone| By the end of all this, I've got many layers of effects and colors

-Shading comes first, darker shadows tend to give the picture more strength and a 'deeper' feel to it, whereas subtle changes can make whatever it is that you're coloring quite soft, and generally more 'smooth'. I used to use subtle shades for the hair, but now tend to favor much darker shadows. I like depth

-Lighting speaks for itself, theres the bright highlights of white that can often add glossy contrast (often just paintbrushed in)

-Tone/tone coloring is where a lot of the 'profesional' feel comes in. Where we clean up the highlights and make them look more smooth, (even create highlights with tone between different shades of the same color) and also used to correct the existing colors as nessesary to add a bit more glamour to it all.

yeash, real simple



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Sagasu on 2005-06-15 19:55 ]</font>

[ForceOfBrokenGlass]

In the rare times I draw in my leisure time. (I'm not an artist, I guess I'm just pretending to be one in college.) I just use a regular .5mm and .7mm mechanical pencils on computer paper or notepad paper.

I don't shade very often since I normally don't draw very large, and I don't make alot of pre-sketching either. It's almost entirely freehand.

[Ness]

I use a .7mm pencil for the drawing, and colored pencils for color.

I'm not so good at shading so I color a lot instead.

[Blitzkommando]

I generally use a .5mm Mechanical pencil, specifically a metal tipped one, I get a better grip usually. I do it on 50 pound 9x12, extra white, acid free paper. I need the heavier paper because, well, I have this uncanny problem of pressing way too hard down. I then trace the sketch with a Uniball Ultra-fine V-Tip pen. Ballpoint don't keep the even flow of color that I like whereas V-Tip have the thicker, darker ink. I use a variety of colors as well, but most often Red, Blue or Black. Then, if I feel it is good enough I scan it in and touch it up and colorize it.

But if I am doing just a B&W shaded, I use the sketch and just fill in the shading there.

Occasionally, I go straight to using the ink, with no prep work. Sometimes it comes out really nice and sharp, other times like crap. It just depends on how much I want it to get done heehe...

[Outrider]

Just a normal .7 mm mechanical pencil for my sketching and drawing on computer paper. Don't ink, though I should.

Anyway, I should also mention that I use the eraser like it's my job. That's usually the main reason I replace pencils.

[Anubis_]

Mechanical Pencil
8.5 x 11 blank paper
Scanner
Photo shop, in that order.

Not very complicated I know.


Now I know a guy that lived near an architectual store and he hot his hands on some 20 dollor super fine point pens and pencils.

He's more of a DC comic style artist.

His free hand needs some work, but is copy skills are extreamly impressive. Especialy since he uses sutch small itybitty teensy tiny pens. Their like super duper small. Exactorific. Perfectionation. Pinpointality.

The only reason I don't buy the pens is cause i'm afraid I'll loose em, and thats 20 bucks down the drain. Besides my method plenty works for me..

[Ancient]

I used to use the fancy shmancy pencil set, but then I realised that I only used 2 of them, so I've switched to mechanical pencils and I'm much happier. I alternate between 0.3mm and .7mm ones depending on what I'm doing. 0.7 for rough sketching and idea work, and 0.3 for more of the fine detail work.

For my comics I draw them out totally randomly in my sketch book, then I scan them and completly re-make them in Illustrator to get a clean look. I also assemble the comic in illustrator as well. Then I export it to photoshop for coloring and stuff and thats it. Its a long proccess and I'm still working on optimizing it to take less time.

For other things I might do any number of things depending on what I want to try. I still have no set way.

I do have two very large and expensive sets of pastels/markers/colored pencils that I havent touched at all. They were gifts and I constantly feel guilty for not wanting to touch them in the least...

[Neith]

Haven't drawn much recently, but meh..

Uriko's 'Tools of the Trade'
Derwent Graphic Pencils (from 4H through to 8B)
Faber-Castell Mechanical Pencil (.5mm)
Berol Finewriters.. I abuse these, go through a pen every 2-3 drawings..<3 Sketchy Drawings.

For colouring, I need some more stuff, but this is what I use so far.
Kurecolor markers (Natural colour 12 pen set)
Derwent Watercolour Pencils (12pack, rarely used)
Adobe Photoshop 7.0/7.0.1

Very, very rarely, Macromedia Flash MX.

If only my scanner worked, I could post my drawings here Could use my phone camera, but it sucks >_>