Color or Tones?

Chibiartstudios · Post by **Chibiartstudios** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 4:11 am

OK, I have been on the fence with this for a while now. If I stick to black and white comics I can probably double my production. The problem is that I like the color in the comics that I do have and am reluctant to give up doing color. As it stands I am thinking of switching to a less photoshop intensive style that is 90% just the ink drawings with digital lettering (Naruto is a decent example of this as are the Keenspace colluseum comics that I did) but I want to get imput first. So I ask you. Do you preffer more comics or comics in color?

Cope · Post by **Cope** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 4:50 am

Ditching colour can only be a good thing in my book, so long as it speeds up the pace of the story...

Faub · Post by **Faub** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 4:57 am

It really depends on where you want to take the comic. If B&W is a better fit then go for it. I wouldn't throw away color just so you can update more often. Quality over quantity any day.

JexKerome · Post by **JexKerome** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 10:25 am

If you started B&W you can usually get away with going to color. But if you started in color (and you did) you have to keep it up, sorry.

If you really want to change it, poll your readership about it. I polled mine when the strip hit one year and the results were incredible.

Terotrous · Post by **Terotrous** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 1:21 pm

JexKerome wrote:If you really want to change it, poll your readership about it. I polled mine when the strip hit one year and the results were incredible.

You mean you actually got responces? That's incredible! (no sarcasm)

JexKerome · Post by **JexKerome** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 2:33 pm

Terotrous wrote:
JexKerome wrote:If you really want to change it, poll your readership about it. I polled mine when the strip hit one year and the results were incredible.
You mean you actually got responces? That's incredible! (no sarcasm)

Yes, THREE OF THEM, out of who knows how many; that's what I meant by "incredible". I had 14 confirmed readers then, according to Onlinecomics.net, and my daily visits average for the prior month was 51, so I kinda expected a little more participation. People actually looked at the poll, but I guess they didn't care enough. They like to read, but not comment on it. That's why nowadays I pull any change I feel like it without remorse.

Same reason I pulled my tabgoard. It was just wasting space and bandwidth.

Steve Hogan · Post by **Steve Hogan** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 7:42 pm

If you like using color, keep it.

You might want to consider converting your inks into vectors through Flash or Illustrator. That's the route I go and I lay down tons of color very quickly.

Chibiartstudios · Post by **Chibiartstudios** » Wed Nov 10, 2004 9:31 pm

Thanks for the input. I guess I was considering doing BW for comics and covers in color. But I guess the jury is in and color wins. Oh well.

Also. I am considering switching to a different comic project after this arc is done. It would be one of those where you don't know what is going un untill the end and I realy like the idea. I have it all planned and everything. It would only be around 100-150 pages or so and I would continue WN right afterwords. Does this seem wise? I would wait untill WN is over. it's not that I am tired of WN, I just have alot of ideas I want to do. But since WN's story is LOOOONG I don't think I want to wait for a decade to try some of these other ideas. Also I could print out the short story and sell it at cons if I get popular. What say you?

Sidebar: And no. I tend to disslike the look of vector made comics. Bessides, I just really like the feel of a pencil in my hand.

Steve Hogan · Post by **Steve Hogan** » Thu Nov 11, 2004 6:30 pm

chibiartstudios wrote:Sidebar: And no. I tend to disslike the look of vector made comics. Bessides, I just really like the feel of a pencil in my hand.

Fair enough, although I should note that I draw my comics with real pencil and do a lot of the inking with a real pen. Vectors needn't be synonymous with drawing in the computer or using uniform lines. Most programs have an option to convert black and white line art into a vector format. The main advantages are that your source documents are always scalable, your file sizes stay small and you can mess around with color and line quality to your heart's content.

Chibiartstudios · Post by **Chibiartstudios** » Thu Nov 11, 2004 10:26 pm

I find this info interesting. Tell me more! Like where I can find tutorials of this.

Do it! *cracks whip*

Spools · Post by **Spools** » Fri Nov 12, 2004 3:44 am

Put the color on over the greyscale, gives depth and vibrance like nothin' else.

black-and-white has whole sets of things to watch out for, and when done well is completely different from drawing for color and then not coloring it.
Like film, you have to go about it with a whole different attitude.

Steve Hogan · Post by **Steve Hogan** » Fri Nov 12, 2004 3:47 pm

chibiartstudios wrote:I find this info interesting. Tell me more! Like where I can find tutorials of this.

Do it! *cracks whip*

Ow!

I learned on the job through trail and error. Here's a description of the process though. (More tutorials on the same page.)

http://www.webdevelopersnotes.com/tutor ... tmaps.php3

It works a lot better if you aren't monkeying around with photos like they are though. Simple black & white line art translates much better.

Faub · Post by **Faub** » Fri Nov 12, 2004 10:35 pm

If you're willing to learn how to use them, there are free tools that will do this type of conversion. They aren't as pretty or simple as the one Steve Hogan described but they work well enough.

http://autotrace.sourceforge.net/ (there is a windows version in there)

This is a command line tool to translate a bitmap/grayscale/color image into vector art. There are GUI front ends for autotrace out there as well.

Delineate is a front end written in java (there are other downloads required to make it work, though).

SkrwU02 · Post by **SkrwU02** » Fri Nov 12, 2004 10:43 pm

color color color color color!

Col · Post by **Col** » Sat Nov 13, 2004 7:33 am

Cortland's the guy to ask about going from color to black and white. He made the transition in his comic: http://cortland.keenspace.com/ Don't know how that's affected readership for him.[/url]

Chibiartstudios · Post by **Chibiartstudios** » Mon Nov 15, 2004 6:33 am

Cool! Thanks for the info Ya'll. I think I've been convinced to stick with color. I hope you like that because it's all your fault.

Anyways, thanks again.