x How To Draw Manga - The Only Tutorial That You Need!.doc

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<TBODY><DIV align=center>Materials</DIV>

Here's my list of art materials as requested. I'll do my best to explain what I use and why as well as where to get them. Lots of Manga specific art materials available HERE.

Work Space: How to set it up

Pencils: What Kinds do you need?

Erasers: They aren't only pink and square

Pens: What kind of inker are you?

Templates: Need a fast circle?

Curves and Edges: How to keep it all clean

Paper: How to choose.

Accesories: Not required..but nice to have

Digital Art: Is your system ready?

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What you see:

A) A nice, large,clean, flat,sturdy, well lit table.

B) A storage system for paper, reference materials, tools and other art related objects.

C) A tool rack within easy reach.

D) a comfortable chair.

The #1 important thing to consider when setting up your workspace is "comfort". Remember , you will be sitting here for hours at a time. Make sure your area is well lit and as clutter free as humanly possible. I like to keep inspirational objects and reference material around my work area so I can stay juiced about what I'm doing. (Notice the DangerGirl action figure set over the desk). I also like to keep all my tools with reaching distance so I don't have to break my train of thought to grab a tool while working. I hang them on the wall to keep my desk space clean and clear. I keep a large collection of Video Game mags and manga on hand to use as layout or reference material.

If you drink or eat at your desk make sure your food/drink items are secured. I've accidentally spilled more coffee on artwork than I care to mention so now I keep that stuff on a side stool away from my workspace.

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Pencils com in a wide array of options. You can pick up a box of designer pencils like the ones you see to the left. Or you can just individually pick out 2 or 3 that will work for you. I'll try to explain what factors should influence your decision.

The chart to the right shows what the different "Grades" of pencil are. You've seen the infamous yellow #2 or 2B pencil all your life at school. Now looking at this chart you can see what that means. H = Hard lead. Hard lead makes a lighter line and is used mostly for drafting. 9H is as hard as it gets.

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On the opposite side of the spectrum are the B grade pencils. B has a soft lead so it makes a darker line. 9B is like mascara.
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I choose the middle ground. an HB or F pencil has a nice versatile grade.

I use about 5 different pencils over the course of a drawing. I rough in with a photoblue. Clean up line art with a lead-holder pencil and then detail with a .03 mechanical.

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<TBODY>I've used Millions of erasers over the course of my art career but I've finally whittled my choices down to 2 kinds.

A) Kneaded Eraser:
This eraser usually comes as a plain Grey or Blue square. Once you open it from it's wrapping you start working it like silly putty. Squeezing it into a Ball...pulling it into a ribbon..folding it, squishing it..Kneading it, really. What's the purpose? Well, you can squeeze it down into a fine point and erase lines in hard to reach places without disturbing the pencil lines around it. Another handy feature is that it doesn't completly erase lines...If you just dab the eraser over the lines you can lighten them up for inking.

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B) White Nylon Eraser:
This style is the best eraser I have ever used for completly removing pencil lines without destroying your inks or gouging your paper. It also has a low "debris" factor. Debris is that rubb off you get from your eraser.</TBODY>

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<TBODY>Pens are a difficult thing to reccomend since so much of what you chppse is based on how you ink. I'm going to list the pens I personally choose to get the job done. They may or may not work for you...experiment as needed.

Sakura Pigma Micron:

My personal favorite inking pen. They have all the clean qualities of a techpen yet they also have a semi-flexible tip. SO the harder you press the wider your line will be. Variable line weight is very important for inking. Otherwise your drawings come out flat like a coloring book.

They come in .005 (very fine) to .08 (very thick)

These pens usually run about $12.00 for the whole set at your local art store.

The Sanford Sharpie:

I use these pens to fill in large black areas.

These pens are great but only useful for a short period of time. When they are new they have an excellent point and a very uniform Black. I only use these for coloring large areas of black...never for line work or detailing. They tend to "bleed" quite a bit on regular paper so leave a space between your blackline and fill area. You can fill in the gap between with a .08 Sakura micron

Sharpies are available almost everywhere.

The Tombo Brush Pen:

This pen takes a little getting used too. It acts like a brush but without all the hassle of cleaning a brush. It's not very good for inking mechanical things like Robots, ships or cars. But it's great for inking Hair, fur, trees..ect. Organic natural objects.

This pens a little harder to find but should be at most your major art stores.

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Templates come in a variety of shapes and sizes and are save you a great deal of time in precise drawing . Gun Muzzles, Car wheels..just about anything. It also saves you from using a traditional compass and punching holes in your paper. One problem though..They are flat so ink can run underneath them and smear your drawing. Tape pennies under the edges of the template to raise it from the surface and avoid the ink smear.

A little searching can turn up some very useful templates like this one I picked up in Tokyo. I suck at drawing word balloons and before I purchased Adobe Illustrator this was the only way I could draw them with looking like an amatuer.

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<TBODY>You can't really do a good job without these tools unless your some kind of machine. Let's see what they do for us.

French Curves:

These tools come in several different sizes and shapes. I use at least 4 on any given drawing. You rotate them around on your drawing till you find an egde that closely matches the curve you're trying to ink. You can also purchase a "Flexible Curve" which looks like a peice of rubber railroad track. It's no good for tight curves but works nice on long curves.

Triangles:

A must have for Comic book paneling and perspective work. The triangle rest on your T-Square. Use the T-square to draw Horizontal lines and the Triangle to draw Vertical lines. The 45 degee angles com in andy for drawing perspective lines back to the "Vanishing point". I'll cover perspective in another tutorial.

Ruler with Inking Edge:

Really, all your tools should have an inking edge. Notice the diagram on the left depicting the way an inking edge works with a Pen. The Ruler edge is raised from the drawing surface allowing the ink to apply cleanly. If that edge was flat on the paper the ink would bleed between the edge on the paper making an ugly mess.

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<TBODY>I assume most of you are interested in comic style art so I'm showcasing the comic type paper. If you're into Watercolors or Charcoal you'll want a different type of paper than what's show below.

Bristol Board Smooth:

Bristol board is a heavy, bright white paper. It comes in several sizes and surfaces. For comic book art you want a fairly large size (11x14) and a smooth surface. Bristol takes ink very well but because of it's smoothness it takes the ink a bit longer to dry. Be very carefull when inking not to drag your hand across the page or you'll end up with smudges and smears. Also give the ink a while to dry before attempting to erase your pencil marks.

Acid Free board will stay whiter longer.( Age can yellow the paper). Vellum coating is ultra smooth and ideal for inking.

This paper can be expensive so don't use it for sketching. It's for final peices....course, if you buy it you can do whatever you want with it...see if I care.

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Drawing Aids and Stuff

the Dummy:

This can be an excellent tool for helping you keep anatomy proportions correct. The only thing that kinda sucks about the dummy is that he's not really all that poseable. I've found that I get more out of Highly detailed action figures (like Todd McFarlanes). Still, Everyone should have a dummy.

the Brush:

How many times have you gone to swipe off the eraser debris with you hand an smear the inks on your picture with your big sweaty mits. The brush is the elegant answer to debris removal. It protects your art and removes a lot more crap than your hand does. Most drafting supply stores carry the brush.

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<TBODY>So you've drawn what you came to draw...how do you digitize it?

Top 10 System Recommendations:
A great system (for PC) consist of
1) Faster the better (600mhz minimum)
2) 256 MB of Ram (more is better)
3) 32mb Video Card
4) 13-25 Gig hard drive
5) A Wacom Tablet (shown at Right)
6) A 5 button Mouse
7) a 19-22 inch monitor
8) Adobe Photoshop 5.5 - 6.0
9) A digital Camera
10) A Scanner

I'm not going to get into what brands I think are the best because I don't want to start any arguments. Just find what works for you.As time rolls on the above figures will look very dated. Just get as fast and as much of Everything as you can.
 

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What Scanner should I buy?:
I bought a cheap scanner at Costco (a MAG Innoscan DTS-3060) for about $100.00. It works fine for web and lineart..if you're looking to do hirez print work for magazines you may want something a little more high end. My Mag is working very well for me though proving you don't have to drop $3000.00 for something decent. You'll get faster performance from a USB or SCSI interface scanner than from a parallel port scaner.

What Size should I scan my line art at?
Scan your blacklines as 150 to 300 dpi greyscale images. I know that Black and White is an option but Greyscale gives you a smoother line. Adjust the contrast using "curves" in photoshop. Make sure to reduce your resolution to 72dpi before saving it for Web use. Photoshop 5.5 will do this for you automatically.

How does a Wacom Tablet work with Photoshop?
Photoshop takes adavantage of the Pressure sensitive capabilities of your Wacom Tablet. You can now contraol the opacity, strokewidth and color of the paint tools sinmple by pressing harder or softer on the tablet. You can tweak which pressure options it uses by going to the tool options palette and checking/unchecking boxes in the "Stylus" section on the lower half of the pallette. That way you can set your airrush to be effected by stroke size but not opacity or opacity and not stroke size. You can also set the index finger button on the stylus to perform Photoshop keyboard shortcuts. I keep mine set to "Alt"(Alt in Photoshop will bring up the eyedropper tool if you have a paint tool currently selected) so when I'm painting I can just press it and grab the color I need from the art I'm working on.
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