First up, there's a BRAND NEW Earthward-Ho strip today! I'm super proud of this one and it's the first of many that are in a brand new format. CHECK IT OUT NOW!
Secondly, I did a interview for Fulle Circle Productions that you can read here: http://www.fullecirclestuff.blogspot.com/
I'm spillin' the beans so you can see what it's REALLY like to work for cartoon big shots like John K., Dave Wasson, Jorge Gutierrez, Gabe Swarr, and Dave Thomas!
Third, Discover the Secrets of Making a Dumm Comic in 5 or so Dumm steps...
For this step by step I'm using the very first panel of this weeks Earthward-Ho! You will notice there is no dialog, don't worry, I didn't forget it, just go to Dumm Comics to look at the words (and complete strip)
The first pass is the thumbnail stage and it's super rough. I'm just trying to figure out where all the characters are going to be as well as where to put the word balloons and how large they need to be to fit the dialog. The main reason these are drawn so rough is because I may go through 3 or 4 version until I'm happy with the basic layout and don't want to get bogged down in details.
The second pass is basically just a tied down version of the thumbnail step. At this point I'm thinking more about the poses and especially (this is my favorite part) the expressions.
The third step is probably the most labor intensive. I take the roughs and scan 'em into the computer. From there I import them into Flash and ink them using the brush tool all the while making tiny corrections to the placement and size of the character, word balloons and backgrounds.
Once it's all inked I type in the font (jivetalk) and color the strip (still in Flash)
Finally, when I'm happy with everything I save it out of Flash as a jpeg and import it into Photoshop to add textures and shading.
All done. See how easy it is??? Be sure to check out Dumm Comics to view the strip in it's entirety!
And Finally, be sure to check out the brand new weekend guest spots starting tomorrow at www.dummcomics.com
16 comments:
awesome stuff! very cool style in your work-great meeting you at the blogger lunch on wednesday! : D
THIS is super informative and awesome. You rock Fred!
WOW! I love earthward ho, not just because it has geeky outer space facts, but also because it looks pretty slick.
I am now going to use flash for everything because of this informative tuotrial you have provided
cheers to you and your work
-LFW
Very cool behind the scenes insite, thanks for sharing!!!
JIVE TALK-HO!!!
Thank you for the links Fred! And for doing the interview!
oh so now you think you're better than me
oh look at me, i'm fred, i'm super awesome all the time plus i have dogs and a car
How do you get such nice lines in flash!?
Thanks for this dude!! Very informative!
Nice bro, now I must stop putting it off and embark on my own comic strip journey...Groovy
The look of this comic is very appealing, and humor hits home for me. I love it.
So, Fred, do you use a Wacom tablet to ink these drawings?
Hey JR Spumkin, most of this stuff was inked in Flash on an HP tablet pc. I prefer inking on the Wacom Cintiq but until I have a couple grand laying around that will have to wait.
Last minute question: do you do all this on a sheet of plain computer, or do you use Bristol board, etc.?
awesome stuff!THIS is super informative and awesome. You rock Fred!
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