I decided to let You enter ‘Circles of Magic’ backstage for a while and share some of my inking approach in creating fantasy comic. During last live stream I digitally inked one page from upcoming first chapter and, because no one would ever watch this again for 3 hours, I created timelapsed version.

Inking comic

In case You wonder what inking  means – it’s a step when artist is creating final quality lines over initial rough drawing. It’s last step before applying colors. Inking is very often done by seperate artist who specialize in this kind of art. Because I decided to simplify things I do Circles fully on my laptop + cintiq.

I do sketching and drawings on 500 dpi A4 format which is approximately 4134 x 5846. Then I resize my files to 800 dpi for inking stage and use always one settings of a brush so I can mantain consistency along all pages. For coloring, file is resized back to 500 dpi and to 300 dpi for printing. This way I get rid of most of small errors and flaws of digital medium.

I use support od 3d software for repeating things that are harder to draw consistently. In this example – wagon. I bring my sketch inside Maya and do simple clay renders of  models to match sketched story. I will probably use it a lot more for important architecture during whole series.

I’m not spending much time on smaller details or hatching a lot because I decided to wait for coloring stage and then do additional layer of inks that emphasize important spots.

Yes, I’m still learning to do this better and better. I know I’ll have to redo couple of first pages because they are not even close to what I do now :)
If you’d ask me for any beginners hints – be patient, create few rules allowing You to keep consitant and stick to them.

Also visit makingcomics.com for much much more informations about creating comics.