Artist of Dokuga, what do you use if you use a product and can you tell us if you think it's worth it, cost wise, and well as user friendly.

I use a combination PHOTOSHOP CS4 and Manga Creator 4.0

Manga Creator has a GREAT pencil/sketching tool that I just absolutely love :3 mostly because I used to draw on paper a lot and the pncil tools are easier to use.

I color on Photoshop :3 mostly because Manga creator is just for Black and White Only :3. All in all its SOOO worth it, both of them :3

just to say, r0o uses PhotoShop CS version 8.0. I LOVE it, but its an expensive product, the newest version CS4, because i can't find the cost of mine runs abotu $699 before taxes.

Personally i've had this for like 3 years, my CSv8 and i'm still finding out new things, most of the time i find it user friendly and i think if i had the money to spend easily i would. But i would advise before buying a large program like this that you invest in a good tablet.

Tablets they start as low as $39.99+ but as i said i got mine on a day after thanksgiving sale for $34.

Personally for my tablet i'm using a Wacom 3"x4" i love it, its not the bestest but it gets the job done! Jupe I know has a larger one that r0o's jealous of, she and i have talked about it, and she said it helps with making lines smoother.

I hope that helps any shoppers out there. Please before you buy any large program, see if you can find a trial free version online. :3

- r0o

I use GIMP--cost is free. It's definitely worth the download! I'm still learning new things though.

I use a small 8x6 tablet I got on Ebay, for like $35.00--I rarely used it though.

I have a 12 x 12 (approximately) Genius Pen and Mouse tablet.

Well worth the price (s-cheap), though my pen is getting a bit gritty! The pressure of the pen is... I have to say a bit better than a Wacom to my personal experience.


From my personal experience,

Digital Sketching: Adobe Photoshop 7 - 9
Digital Coloring: Adobe Photoshop 7 - 9

Mainly because I have lost my CS2 and I am relying on my AP 7. The CS+ has a lot of features, but unless you're actually editing an entire PHOTOGRAPH, you really don't need that expensive product.


I think GIMP may be the best Free program out there for digital coloring.


For Digital Painting is sort of another story to me.

I only use Corel Painter products for scenery painting. I attempted to use Photoshop (view 'God's Treasure'), but it doesn't work for me at all. You can do so much more in realism with Corel Painter than with Photoshop.


But all in all, they are ALL digital painting/sketching/coloring programs. The best one is the one that fits your needs the most.



And I say, in a biased way, Painter stomps on all of the other programs!!
Mwahahaha
(Oh no, don't get me wrong! I'm in no shape of saying that I'm an experienced digital artist. But I have tried enough products to make my head spin just by thinking about it!)

I have been using GIMP for quite a while now and I think it is an exceptional program, especially considering that it is free.

I also use one of the smaller wacom bamboo tablets which, as r0o said gets the job done, but I think I'd like a shiny new one. Also, I just downloaded Manga Studio. (Just today in fact)

I have no idea how to use it, but I suppose I'll have fun figuring it out!

Yar

Doku-artists make Manga look so uber awesome!!



But Misera can never make Manga! I lack warmth in my character poses... But I'm working on it.




I'm a big fan of Miss Sianna's artwork ^_^
I would love to see another Doujinshi piece from you!

I agree--I too would like to see another of your doujinshi pieces :wink:


MiserablySweet wrote:
I would love to see another Doujinshi piece from you!

Thanks Misera and Sahoila! I was actually planning on doing a Doujinshi based on my story Detrimental Desires. Since it's a shorter story, I will hopefully be able to get it done!

I'll be starting it fairly soon, I think.

I'm also a GIMP user and lover! Because it's totally free and awesome. It works five times better with my tablet though, as itty bitty as it is lol.

Hn...

I've always used Photoshop. I used to be stuck with Photoshop 6... which didn't have the brushes that you could custom adjust. I currently have PhotoshopCS2.

I've always wanted to try SAI though. I heard it's a free program, but that's just what i heard T____T

does anyone use it? is it good?

I have Photoshop 7.0. ^.^o It's rather on the old side, but it surely does get the job done. I have used a newer version, and must admit I miss some of those nice features, but this one works pretty well. My father had tons of programs, like Deluxe packages and the like. He had tons of them, so that he could use one, but use a feature in another one that the one being used doesn't have. One could have a shine tool, while the other one have a simpler way of getting things done.I think he use to use around 4-5 different programs at once. O.O

Miss Rikayu,

SAI is a great great program. But you have to pay for it. It's for pure digital painting in my opinion. I'm surprised I didn't mention it when I posted.


It's one of the main programs I used for fanart. You can't upload brushes in it, all you can do is work with the circle brushes with different feathers (solid edge, softer edge, softer softer edge, softest edge) (4 types of brushes only)

They do have different patterns available if you want to airbrush a pattern on it.



It's quite lovely actually. SAI is just about like Painter, except without all those other nifty functions O_O

Hey you guys! I was looking for the SAI program and I found this page. It has all kinds of art programs that I've never even heard of before! I don't know the prices of any of them but it might be worth taking a look at if you interested in seeing what other programs are available!

Thanks Miss Sianna!!


I really have never heard of those programs either!

But as always, try it out before you risk your money drowning in the toilet!

Okay, I made a list of all the programs my father used (which I could find the cd for) when he was working on the compy:

Corel Draw
5,000 Color Photos (I guess used for cards and the like)
12,000 Images
Your Printer and Business Pack
Photo Explosion Special Editions 1.5 and 2.5
The Print Shop Deluxe III

Stuff I remember him using:
Magic Paint (? I think it's called that. A type of off brand photoshop)
Adobe Photoshop 7.0
A really old version off brand version of Powerpoint for DOS that had tons of different things you can do on it. I never could get through it all, so I'm not sure all of the stuff it can do.


Sooo, he used a lot of programs that he magically came up with all sorts of neato designs and logos. I still don't know why he'd made logos and slogans for people for free. ~.~


((I'm still trying to figure out why things that sound like programs to work with your printer are actually full of art tools and the like.))


I also found something that must have been something I messed around with when I was a kid. Rugrats Print Shop. >.< Now I can't even watch the Rugrats opening without thinking about all the creepy things hidden within it, and how much easier it is to remember how cool it was when I was a kid.

I have a question about Line art inking...


How the heck do you do it?

O_O I can't draw a straight line even if my life depended on it!


But I noticed the other day in my college class, my "friend" showed me her digital linearts, and they were so amazing.

I asked her how she did it, and she said "Photoshop".


Is it even possible? The pen tool in PS, personally, it's a horrible tool for inking. Unless you use the anchor pen tool... which pretty much stinks too and takes way too much time.


It's time I learned how to ink, so... any tips?

I have Photoshop CS3 and it works really well. I mostly sketch the drawing by hand and then scan it into the program (or take a photo if the sketch is too big). It's a good program, even better if you work with a tablet. Occasionally, I might throw an image into Illustrator if I want to vectorize my lines.

So, mostly Photoshop and a little bit of Illustrator.

I have a quick questions for my fellow GIMP users. Do you know if there is a way to shrink pictures without diminishing the picture quality?

A lot of times I start off with a huge picture because it's easier to draw when the picture is big and the pixels are smaller. But I was wondering if you can keep a high number of pixels while also making the picture smaller?

Mis-
Inking on paper is wayy different than digital for obvious reasons.
If you want to do it by hand, I use different size pens that are recommended specifically for manga (which only cost me 10 dollars at micheals!) to do fine details or bold lines. And no worries I can't draw a straight line either, rulers are great for them though
If you want to clean up your hand drawn lines in a program I would recommend playing around with the balance between brightness and contrast. When you lower the brightness and add to the contrast it separates out the grey scale into just black and white so the lines are clearer and darker. However if you want reaaally smooth lines usually the only way that I know of is to buckle down and use the pen-anchor tool. Trust me, you get faster with it the more you use it.

Hope some of this helps.

I use Adobe Photoshop CS2 - cost: expensive? D: I got mine as a student package thing for only $400 ages ago

And I used a Wacom Intuos3 tablet - cost: approx $400, if I remember correctly. There is now Intuos4 and I have no idea what it costs.

I don't think I could live without either product x3. Although I would love to get corel Painter.

A quick note on the tablet...not all tablets are created equal!! The more expensive tablets are sooo worth it. I used to have a wacom graphire and while it lasted many years (only finally "died" because my puppy ate the cord -_-') it was pretty much crap compared to the Intuos I replaced it with. The Intuos has much better pressure sensitivity and can manage much more precise strokes than the graphire.

MiserablySweet wrote:
I have a question about Line art inking...


How the heck do you do it?

O_O I can't draw a straight line even if my life depended on it!


But I noticed the other day in my college class, my "friend" showed me her digital linearts, and they were so amazing.

I asked her how she did it, and she said "Photoshop".


Is it even possible? The pen tool in PS, personally, it's a horrible tool for inking. Unless you use the anchor pen tool... which pretty much stinks too and takes way too much time.


It's time I learned how to ink, so... any tips?

Just had to reply to this really quick...

Inking in photoshop is very simple although it eludes many an artist. First off, never, ever ink at the resolution you want the finished image to be. Go to image>image size and then change the size to at least 200% (you could even go 400 or 600 if you like, but I prefer 200). Now get a hard round brush and decrease the flow and possibly even the opacity, depending on how shaky your hand is (when your hand gets steadier you can ink at 100% on both, although I usually keep the flow between 75-90%). Now, do not use long strokes. Use short, quick strokes and your mistakes will barely show up due to your decreased flow/opacity and your hightened resolution (to see your image at the size it will be, just zoom out to 50%). I reccomend colouring at this higher resolution as well. When you're done, just go back to image>image size and reduce to 50% and viola! You have pretty lines :3

Btw, you are magic if you can do this with a mouse o__o...I am totally assuming you have a pressure sensitive tablet.

SAI is amazing u can go between photoshop and Sai to get your stuff done and what you need. Its simple and just great to use.

Its like painter and photoshop in one . I swear by sai .

ANd i just love plain sketching pencil to paper. More intimate for me and able to connect with my pencil instead of my tablet.

So, what's the rating on GIMP... especially if you're a user of Photoshop or Corel?

Is it worth the time to download and learn the tools and such?

Pros? Cons? Ehhs?

Every drawing in my Dokuga gallary so far has been done with a mouse, but now that I have a tablet, I'm never going to draw with a mouse again! ... Unless my tablet completely dies on me, of course - then I'll have no choice but to use the mouse. XD Anyway, I have a Genius MousePen 8 x 6-Inch Graphic Tablet, which is great when I'm drawing, it really is, but I think I might have to send it back since I find myself twisting it this way and that more often now just to get it working. Not a very good sign for only having it for month, eh? XD

As for the programs I use to draw on, here they are:


MS Paint: I like to scribble on here until an idea forms. 8D
Cost: Free!


Paint Shop Pro: I used to do my lineart along with my colouring on here, but now that I have a new program for that (I'll tell you what it is in a sec) I now use it for just colouring. It's more of a photo editing program than a drawing tool, though, so if you want a program to draw/colour on, I think Photoshop would be better since it seems to have the right tools for creating artwork. (I've never tried PS before but I've seen enough tutorials to feel a strong sense of longing. XD)
Cost: When I got PSP, it was about 90 dollars. Now, you can get it from 60-70 dollars. *Mourns for the $20 extra I could have had*


Manga Studio EX:
I just got this for Christmas! It's a program I've been drooling after for two years. I didn't really do much with it until I got a tablet for my birthday (which was in February), so the program was pretty much lying dormant until then. XD However, once my tablet arrived, I've been working on the program more and more - it makes drawing soooooo much easier. I used to make a lot of mistakes on PSP because I kept forgetting what layer I was working on, so I would accidentally draw my lineart on my messy guideline layer, which caused me to curse under my breath and rapidly click the "undo" button until I was on the correct layer again... not fun. On Manga Studio, though, not only are the "sketch" and "draw" areas separate, you can choose which colour each layer has at any time. So I'll have my guidelines blue and my lineart black - I'll never get mixed up because my pen tool's ink will come out in whatever colour my layer is set at. =] MSEX has 5 separate areas to make things easier for drawing comics (though you can use the program for just normal drawings as well):

Sketch - Goes without saying, really. >_>
Panel - You can create your own panels here, or choose from the many panel layouts built into the program. =D
Draw - Time for lineart! 8D
Tone - Haven't tried out the tones yet, but I'll be sure to do that once I get around to making my fan-comic. MSEX is said to come with over 3,000 screen tones! So I'll have a lot to work with. 8D
Characters - This area is full of lots of different speech balloons, all split up into categories: normal, surprise, sadness, anger and so on. I haven't been using this one much either but I love all the speech bubbles you can choose from! Especially the ones I couldn't ever have the patience to draw myself. <3

MSEX also comes with many other things, such as 3D models, special rulers for making curved lines, symmetrical lines and so on. If you want to learn more about this glorious program, I highly suggest going to this site where it will tell you everything you need/want to know about it. =D
Cost: I think my mum got mine at a special and very temporary price of $190... but it's back up between $200-300 now. It's well worth every penny, though! =)