Yeah. When I want a straight line I build in vector (path). :)

It does complex curved lines, too, with only the sharpest of edges.

For most illustrations, especially for characters, sketch freehand, sure. Pencil, wacom, mouse, doesn't matter. Do the layout however you like. Import to Illustrator, Corel, whatever. Create curves/beziers/objects. Repeat.

People often talk like building vector is some huge pain in the ass, but then I watch all the time they spend in Photoshop trying to build clean lines and do "inking" by hand and I just chuckle. I think Photoshop outpaced vector in terms of complexity of work flow a while ago.

Then there's the added bonus everything you draw in vector can be exported, composited, recolored, color-indexed and separated, laser-cut, CAD milled, whatever.

Or you can export back to raster and paint/modify it in Photoshop (or work raster in Illustrator or InDesign) for more photographic effects.

I'm jealous - I can't make my hand do anything right! I guess I have to practice more. It makes a nice coaster, though...

Sorry, no Wacom stories, but I'll let you in on a little secret: sex is probably the most overrated thing in the universe.

loquacious, I know shit about vectors!

Aaaagh! And I know I need to learn!

I don't have Corel or Adobe Illustrator. Just Paintshop and Photoshop ;-(

But I have Flash MX. And I'm clueless.

I have a wacom intuos that I've adored for years now. My favorite way to use it was in Flash (MX, even... Jump in and play.) and with the pressure sensitivity/brush width options turned on.

One of the nice things with that combo is that you can go back and modify the edges of the shapes.

And what loq said about using vectors.

WAAAACOOOOOOM!

(To be shouted like Kirk screaming, "Khaaaaaaaan!")

It's actually pronounced "Wuh-COM." I called their tech support before I bought it to make sure I had system compatibility.

How do I learn vectors!? Very necessary for Flash animations too, eh?

In most vector programs, your pen draws "curve" or "path" instead of "ink", and as you build you focus on structure rather than pigment or line width - they can be edited to your hearts content.

You also usually get a number of other shape-tools like boxes, triangles, circles and polygons and even text - all of which can usually be converted to "curve" or "path" and edited/tweaked as such.

You also think in terms of "open" and "closed" curve. An open curve has an unconnected head and a tail, a closed one the head and tail are connected and makes a closed circle or polygon shape. (This matters because in many programs it effects how the object behaves when pen and fill colors are added.)

Now, these curves or paths things are made up of bezier curves. In most vector programs, you're provided with a curve edit mode in which those geometric Bezier control points are revealed to allow you to adjust the curve, the anchor points, the mid point, etc - or you can just click and drag the curve and bend it interactively with the mouse.

In most programs you can also use curves to edit other curves. For example you could have a circle object and a square object, manipulate them to overlap, select them both, and have them both combine into one compound curve, or have one object cut out the underlying object to make a new shape, or make an entirely new third shape out of the intersecting area of the two original shapes. This works with nearly all objects in most vector programs, be they complex or simple.


Now, if I were to do exploding dog-style cartoons in vector (for simplicity, without the squiggly pen effects, aiming for clean lines*) I'd sketch my layout and primary shapes/elements and either save it from photoshop or scan it from paper. I'd import that into a vector program so I could create/edit my vector objects right on top of it.

I'd then use the "line" mode of the pen tool - which allows me to click once and drag a straight line out to click again which places an anchor-node at that point, allowing me to click again and lay out another straight line in a chained manner - to lay down crude, straight segments of curve approximating my sketch. I'd pay attention to the structure of the curves of my sketch - which way is the vector line going to bend, and where do I place the nodes to get that? What're the primary shape-elements of the image? How complex do I want to make it? Do I have a thematic shape or style I want to emulate? How is it going to be colored? How thick of a line weight or style?

After I had my crude, segmented, flat-lined skeleton, I'd go into the curve-edit mode and tweak the curves by hand until it all fit. This can happen on a object-by-object basis or for less complex vector drawings, all at once.

When building an illustration it's like colorforms or legos or something, you can mix and match your objects and switch which layer they're on with abandon. Broad colors, larger structural shapes and fills and such go on the bottom layers, keylines/inklines and other accents go on top.


And to top it off every single object (or groups of objects) can be colored with a variety of tools. Fountain fills/blends in varying geometry, textures, imported bitmaps or samples, solid tones in a dizzying variety of color models and spaces, dozens of varieties of pen styles, textures, and more.

Plus a lot of programs play nice with Photoshop, especially Illustrator. You can do a lot of Photoshop stuff in Illustrator. You can export single elements to PSD and use them as elements for compositing in Photoshop, or using in Photoshop's own limited "path" functions.

*Not that anyone would want a squiggle-free exploding dog.

pie: "...sex is probably the most overrated thing in the universe."

Not if you're doing it right. Trust me on this.

pie: "...sex is probably the most overrated thing in the universe."

Gotta say I agree with that. And I'd add that New Year's Eve is the most overrated holiday ever.

loquacious, THANKS for that detailed answer. I get it much better. And it doesn't sound as frightening as before.

I guess I need Illustrator. Although a lot of design departments are using Corell. I'll talk to people here at work.

Wow! It sounds brilliant. I can't wait to play. That's some clean, beautiful line work you could get, not to mention vectors translate to effective animations in Flash.

Not that the slightly squiggly stuff isn't fun and can't have a more old-fashioned "pen-and-ink" feel to it. But, man, sometimes it kills you holding your breath and drawing then redrawing the same long line five times 'cuz it's late and you're running on caffeine.
;-)

I REALLY hope you guys aren't disappointed in my emcee. I didn't have time to color it or do extensive backgrounds, and it ended up too wide to fit neatly in 315 pixels. I was just so happy to have finally produced something digitally that maybe APPROACHED a clean, simple, professional "comic book" illustration style. And I like the concept, too, if anyone "gets" it.

oh, and lest anyone think i'm a perv, no orgasm was achieved in conjunction with my Wacom, and never shall be unless the unlikely event that i go into the cartoon pron biz.
/kidding
;-)

Shane: Personally, I use CorelDraw! for building shapes and curve. I like the fact that it's more CAD-like than Illustrator-like.

There are lots of things that Illustrator does better than Corel. Text formatting. Layouts. Color control. For serious work in these areas, I'll use Illustrator.

Note: the rest of Corel's graphics suite is pretty much crap. Don't use their photo-editor, texture browser, font manager or any of that crap. Don't even install it, just install CorelDraw! So, for the purposes of this discussion Corel = CorelDraw!

There are a few important things CorelDraw! does much better than Illustrator, (or god forbid Flash). Building curve is easier. Using shapes to make shapes is easier. The workflow for building stuff is faster. Corel handles "larger" documents, and you can set the scale to miles or mm. (Last time I checked Illustrator has a workspace limitation that caps at about 150-180 feet or something. I've done virtual documents in Corel that were 5x5 miles. Find me a printer that big and it'll RIP and render from document - no scaling or fudging.) Corel also seems to handle very complex Bezier curves better. In my version the single-object size limitation is about 64kb, which can be millions of nodes and thousands upon thousands of subpaths. I've seen Illustrator crap out at around 10,000 nodes and a few dozen subpaths for a single object.

Self-appointed "serious" designers drinking deeply of the Adobe Kool-Aid will tell you Corel is a crappy toy.

My response to "serious" designers is that I'm agnostic, and will use the best tool where it fits. Furthermore I've been doing graphic design professionaly (for money) since I was about 10. I started in my dad's print shop, on the job. It doesn't get much more "serious" than that. I can strip a flexible litho plate, do indexed color seps from keyline by hand and w/ darkroom camera, I know how to use T-square and triangles for drafting or graphic design. I can properly use a French curve or flexible rule. I can ink blackline or stipple by hand.

I was lucky enough to pick up design just before the DTP revolution, before computers, before Photoshop, Illustrator, Quark Xpress or Corel - which taught me a lot. But I jumped right into DTP as soon as the tech became available. I've been using both Corel and Illustrator since version 1. Photoshop? Since before it was Photoshop, and it was called Aldus Photostyler.

After all these years CorelDraw! still has superior workflow, workspace and control for building curve. Those "serious" designers can have it when the pry it from my cold, dead hands, or until the day Hell freezes over and Adobe provides decent support - whichever comes first.


So, yeah. Obtain CorelDraw, hopefully version 9 or greater. Try it. Read the tutorials and help files. Email me if you have any questions.

Here's an example of something I'm working on in Corel. (direct link.)

≡ Click to see image ≡

Hrm, that got cropped funny by the MeCha engine. Direct link for full view.

loquacious,

thanks SO much! seriously. i loved every word, and don't be surprised if i email you some short questions...

man, i wish i'd been born into a print shop! other than the MEK fumes, if you're doing screening? heh, i'm sure it has its down sides, but you have a WEALTH of experience that many designers and artists would kill for.

what kind of music do you like? seriously, i want to send you a couple mix cds. least i can do. you've inspired me.

i've been depressed for weeks, but today i feel like a million bucks. i guess i just need creativity in my life.

Yes, Wacoms complete your life. Seriously, I really hate painting with oils and canvas but I can matte paint for hours w/ my tabby... snag some books on that subject, you won't regret it. Start here :P

Another really dope digital painter resides here, be sure to read about his techniques... really priceless posts.

Illustrator skills

Don't miss this, it's what got me inspired to paint digitally even though I have such a natural aversion to the process. What can I say... I'm also a vector kid at heart!

cool, appidydafoo, thanks--i have reading to do!

mix cds all around! who wants one, LOL?!

Yeah, tablets actually play pretty nice with Corel and Illustrator, too. You can muck around with the curve/line/pen detection settings to smooth out hand-jitter and use the pressure sensing to do stuff with different line widths and artistic effects/media and whatnot. (Which can even easily bypass/surpass the super-obsessive hand-building method I outline above)

There's also lot of painting-with-objects stuff I haven't even gotten into myself yet, stuff that would be awesome for doing ink shading and/or textures. (Think automagical cross-hatch or blob/stipple shading where you can just spray shapes like a spraycan with magic stencils.)

man, i wish i'd been born into a print shop! other than the MEK fumes, if you're doing screening? heh, i'm sure it has its down sides, but you have a WEALTH of experience that many designers and artists would kill for.

It was fun. No MEK, thankfully. Plenty of darkroom chemicals, acetone, ink, pigments, SafetyKleen thinner and such. We started small and ended up going international and pretty huge before NAFTA and cheap imports killed us off. And it's just as well, it was a messy, brutal job.

I don't miss film. Messy, labor intensive, slow, impossible to store. We had a horizontal-axis flatbed graphics/film reproduction camera that did about a 72"x50" piece of film, weighed about 3 tons, had a lens that could swallow your leg and sat on 18 foot long rails. The camera and darkroom consumed two large rooms, with the subject end of the camera in a normal light room and the film/vacuum platen end of the camera in a darkroom. The camera passed through a huge light-baffled hole in the wall.

Even with good film, top notch optics and good processing, the film offered limited reproduction, image degredation control had to be scientifically fastidious. Now it's pretty much as simple as 'don't save/edit in compressed files. Back up often'.

I miss being able to charge $250-$500 for a few hours of quality text layout and some simple graphics - not to mention film charges - but the massive advances in technology and craft are a nice consolation prize.

And you're welcome, shane.

I like noise, experimental, electronic, techno, downtempo, microsound, acid jazz, experimental/acid rock (like neu!, Can, Silver Apples, early Pink Floyd, Zappa) and basically anything that makes my head go "boing" or "owch".

If you'd like to yousendit anything I'd prefer that to physical media. :)