August 2013 Video Tutorial: Digi-toons!

[angelize]

Ok here is a little doodle from me, I quite enjoyed this month's video and I really like the slower more relaxed pace. Yes it took 16 mins but hey I poured myself a coffee and took a break and I learned something

I do have one question for you Gary, is there a reason you suggest drawing a shape then feathering it instead of using the softness setting on the Shapebuilder/painter tool info bar?

[Gare]

That's a lovely cartoon, Frances, thanks for joining in and submitting your Digi-toon!

After 20 months hosting the Xone and 18 video tutorials, I'm finally beginning to relax the pace, therefore lengthening the tutorial (!), and I was thinking this works for both me and our community. It helps if you do the video over the course of a few days. Many tutorials were conceived of in the morning, filmed in the afternoon, and edited and produced at night with the help of Folger's High-Test.

I had no particular reason for showing the Shape Painter (Builder)'s Softness feature; something had to give in this 16 minute coverage, so this feature lost, but thank you for pointing that out.

Actually, the Softness feature with the Shape Painter is a Feathering function. Draw a line with Softness cranked up. Deselect the stroke (hit Esc). Then select it with the Selector tool, and lo and behold, you can see the Feathering slider on the Infobar cranked up and a tremendous value in the NumBox. You can make your soft stroke hard-edged by the Feathering slider—I'm not sure there's a different way to change the edge softness other than Feathering, so I went with Feathering in the tutorial.

My Best,

Gary

[angelize]

Thanks Gary, I've had a bit of time off this afternoon so here is another digi-toon! This one was inspired by my little Shih Tzu The word "treat" is not uttered in our house without him appearing from nowhere lol

[Gare]

That's a nice example of some of Xara's features, Frances.

You put a lot of detail into your 'toon!

Three thumbs up!

Gary

[Big Frank]

Ive run out of time to finish today - maybe tomorrow.

This is Wally the Toad. He's a frequent visitor on my terrace. I took a photo pf him a couple of nights ago so I just drew him from that photo :

• the photo
• the sketch
• the outline drawing
• the scan, white background removed

To be continued...

[JimToal]

Great tut Gary, gotta upgrade to XPGD 8. Man, how long have I been doing it the hard way !!!!!

[Gare]

Hi Jim—

I'm not sure after version 9 came out you can upgrade to version 8, but I can dig the sense of your remark, yes indeed! Glad you got something out of this month's tute!

@Big Frank—

Thanks so much for posting your progression, from photo to rough, and so on to Xara! Artists who have come to Xara with little or no help in learning physical art media (I'm marking my age here) can appreciate the workflow you've shown.

And I was serious about pencil sketching being one way to get your 'toons into Xara. I was lent a very early tablet from Wacom, never got around to adopting it, but I've seen fantastic work done with a digitizing pen and tablet.

I'd like to make this following month a round table discussion all about any stage of the digi-tooning pipeline:Xara's tools, lighting, scanning, the whole deal.

My Best,

Gary

[Big Frank]

Here we go. Almost 4 in the morning, but enjoyed doing it so it's worth it!

The final result :

Attachment 98263

Colouring the drawing in stages using only the Shape Painter :

Attachment 98264

[angelize]

Frank, your attachments appear to have gone AWOL. Can you try attaching them again please?