Saturday, January 30, 2010

My creative process


Everyone has a different one, but I'll share mine with you. If I tried to sit in a room and stare at the wall and come up with an idea, nothing would ever come to me. I know because someone told me that was their creative process, and I tried it. Nothing. My mind was completely blank. I personally need to get the ball rolling. If I get a new scene, I just start drawing anything. If I want to draw a comic about a gangster or a spaceman, I just draw them. I need to get the ball rolling. Anything that comes to mind no matter how random. Now I have a character, and an environment to explore. I can look at the drawing and say. Hey, where is he walking, what is he looking at. You can't come up with an idea before you come up with an idea. If that makes any sense. You just go. Again, no thinking. Just explore. See if you get lead down a road. Once you have a couple of key ideas that you like, then you can move on to outlining or thumbnailing or whatever it is you want to do next.

I was talking to one of the writers at work about this and he said he did the same thing. He would actually type, "I am typing right now at my computer, and the door is over there, there's a bird outside my window..." and so on, just so he was moving forward and going somewhere. You basically have to get that ball rolling some how. Once you get that ball rolling, then the ideas come flooding. that's when you jump out of bed at 2 in the morning and right stuff down to use the next day. Then the ideas start playing out in your head.

If you ever have to storyboard a scene, just draw random shots of the location and characters. You may use them, you may not, but it really helps to get started.

Friday, January 29, 2010

The 180 rule

Edit: In a side note, the purpose of the 180 rule is to "not confuse the audience so they can focus on the story." this means, you can break the rule as long as people don't get confused. Unless of course you want to confuse them on purpose.

As some of you know, I actually studied mechanical engineering in school. It's part of the reason why I break everything down into steps. There is one thing I learned in engineering. Never think. I don't like to waste precious brain activity on thinking. For instance, if I get a math problem, I don't make any assumptions, I just start it and go step by step and let the problem lead me to the answer. I can almost completely shut off my brain. This applies to everything I do. Here for example is how I handle the 180 rule. I don't think about anything. I don't even take a guess where the characters will be. I just hold my finger up and say, "this guy's on this side, this guys on this side." then I flip back and forth and make sure they are on the same sides.


Thursday, January 28, 2010

more comic process

Here is the thumbnail. I don't worry about "drawing". I just scribble and figure out the panel layout.

Next I start to clean it up a little and figure out the drawing. I was having a really bad drawing day this day for some reason. sometimes I can go straight from the thumbnail to cleanup without even thinking. I almost wonder how I did it. But, then, some days I just can't for the life of me draw. It usually happens when I don't do any warm up studies. I don't think I did any before this page. Bad idea.

Here are some better clean ups. Like I mentioned before, sometimes I switch brushes, or change the background, or do anything just to trick myself into thinking something is different. Then, I start to color stuff that looks like fun.

and here is what a final page looks like. gotta get back to work. This comic is way past due!

Drawn!

I've noticed a lot of people coming from a link on Drawn! Thanks Drawn!

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

notes from Xav

so, Xav and I correspond through the internet, and we often exchange tips. Notes from people are like gold. this was so good I thought I had to share it with you guys. The fastest way to improve is to get notes from people who are better. I've found that there is no such thing as a good drawing. You can always find someone that can show you something to fix.

anatomy of a cleanup

So, here is the latest panel I'm working on for the comic.




Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Some good shape design and construction examples

These DWD model sheets were done by the great Toby Shelton, currently a storyboard artist on the movie I'm on. He is one of the best draftsmen at the studio. He really should start his own blog. (wink wink.) These are some of the best examples of construction I have ever seen.


Here is an example of good "big shape" design.