The main issue that I’ve hit is that Typekit is geared around web licensing and delivery of font files – so a subscription will give you access to a wide range of fonts that can then be downloaded from your site and used to render text. However the earlier stage in the workflow is working on page designs in Photoshop, and a Typekit subscription won’t give you any access or rights around downloading a font definition file to use for design work.

This means that theoretically I have much more freedom around typography, but only when I come to the build stage of the site. I wouldn’t necessarily mind paying for a font separately from the Typekit subscription, but I can’t actually find the same font I would like to use on the foundry site (admittedly this may just be my own stupidity).

I think this is just a teething issue with a new service – it’s being discussed on the support forum…

• Send a font list/library to a designer
• Use a font in Photoshop
• Downloadable versions

I was working on a character sketch last night, and finished drawing one of the hands. It was quite respectable, obviously hand-like and not particularly mutated or alien. However, only once I’d finished did I notice that it was a little bit too big and in the wrong place. So… I dragged a marquee around it to select, scaled it down, then pulled it into a better position.

I guess you could look at this as cheating, and that I should practice until I can sketch it right straight off. It just seems like a great idea if you’ve drawn something you’re happy with, but slightly wrong or out of position.

Another quite cool thing is to use different layers to try out alternate versions for particular parts of a sketch. So I could create a couple of alternate hand sketches for the same character, then use layer comps to look at the different versions and decide how to proceed.

I’m still playing around with some of this, but from my experience so far it seems like sketching directly to a PC opens up quite a lot of flexibility. I’m also wondering about scanning images, fading them right down to use in the background as a template. At this stage I’m just trying to emulate some of the styles I like, so this seems like a great way to learn.

I ended up ordering the Wacom Intuos3 A3 Wide tablet, and I’m very happy. It’s actually much larger than I’d visualised, but it’s delicious to work with. I was talking recently about how sketching directly with a tablet is tricky, but more flexible. It was tricky because I was using a tiny tablet with a large widescreen monitor. I think I actually prefer sketching with the new tablet to using paper.

I went through the whole process with a picture last night, going from rough sketches, using Illustrator to produce an ink outline, then exporting to Photoshop for colouring and shading. The Illustrator inking technique I mentioned yesterday definately seems to be the best way to produce the ink outline, and the whole thing was so much less painful than trying to achieve the same with a small tablet.

I want to practice some more and produce a few pictures I’m proud of before posting any work, but it’s coming along…

Producing sketches seems fairly straight-forward (in terms of process, not skill!). People either seem to sketch on paper and scan in, or sketch directly with a tablet. Using a tablet is more tricky, but you get lots more flexibility by working directly with a pc. The process described in the book is to make a very general sketch, fade it down to about 30% opacity, create a new layer, then produce a more refined sketch using the original as a template. By repeating the process for a few iterations you can arrive at sufficient definition to proceed with inking.

The area that really wasn’t too clear was the best technique for inking (an ink outline is produced from the sketch, then the sketch is discarded). Inking on paper seems to require a great deal of skill, and doesn’t allow you to easily correct mistakes. Digital inking looks like the best way to go, but there are a few different approaches that you can take to produce smooth ink outlines.

Drawing directly with a brush in photoshop is possible, but it’s very tricky to produce smooth lines. The better techniques make use of vector tools to produce smooth, consistent lines and curves.

All of the photoshop techniques I’ve seen use the pen tool to draw paths, then either stroke the path, or convert it to a selection and fill with colour. The downside about these techniques is that the end result is a raster graphic that can’t easily be edited or changed – i.e. it’s a little awkward to adjust the original vector that it was based on. You can convert the path to a selection, save the selection and use that to restore the original path at a later stage, but the process is quite cumbersome.

Knowing that Illustrator is a better tool for working with vector graphics, I then went searching for digital inking techniques for Illustrator. The best tutorial I found is available here. This technique means that the original vector paths are maintained and can be adjusted at any stage. The resulting brush stroke for the outline will automatically adjust in line with the path changes.

I won’t know for sure until I try out all of the different techniques, but at the moment this is looking like the best bet – so scan in a sketch, bring it into Illustrator to produce the ink outline, then export to Photoshop for colouring and shading.

I’ll post about how I get on…

I haven’t really done any drawing or sketching for a really long time, but this seems like a really fun thing to get my head around. I also hadn’t really been exposed to some of the techniques you can use in producing cartoon work digitally, so I’m currently reading through Digital Manga Techniques and starting to learn. I made my first manga character last night, and it didn’t turn out to be the monster I was expecting.

As I don’t particularly have a technique yet, it seemed like I should jump straight in and learn to work directly on a PC using a tablet. I know a lot of people sketch on paper, scan the images and work from there. However it seems (to me) that it’s so much more versatile to work directly.

I think sketching with a tablet probably takes longer to get the hang of, but you can do all kinds of things like move bits of the sketch around, rework sections, undo bad strokes etc. The technique I was trying involved making a very rough sketch, taking the opacity of the layer down to about 30%, then sketching it again on a new layer. By repeating this several times you can refine the design, until it’s ready to use in creating an ink outline for the final piece.

I also love how you can go back when you’re finished, and see the image gradually building up by making each layer visible. You can also try out different colours and shading styles, and keep the alternate versions. All of this is generally much less scary than working on paper where everything you do is a little more permanent.

I know it will take a while before I get the hang of this, but I’d love to be able to produce designs that combine elements of photo realism with cartoon drawing. I’ve also decided to get a lot more serious about photography to cover the other aspect of this.

Now I just need about twice as much free time