Gah! Four months after I spring for new Cintiq because it looked like Wacom weren't going to release the multi-touch product I'd been hanging on for… Wacom release the multi-touch enabled product I'd been hanging on for.
It's a thousand quid more than the non-touch version, mind, so I couldn't afford it even if hadn't just dropped a couple of grand on the regular 24HD, but still…
Hey all, I blogged a mini review of an iPad app - basically it's a human anatomy study for the iPad (a model that allows you to rotate and look at it from any angle). It's GREAT - and absolutely essential, if you've an ipad (works best on the new iPads - sorry!)
Manga Studio and Colour Holds. Colouring in Manga Studio is an exercise in total frustration, really. But, I'm trying, desperately, to move away from Photoshop* (and, with luck, when ver5 of MS comes along I can kiss PS goodbye). In the meantime, I've blogged how to do colour holds within it - and uploaded a bunch of actions that I use (including one to create a colour hold layer/mask combo)
I actually prefer MS over PS for coloring. For flatting at least, it's much more friendly, because it allows you to automatically expand your selections by X amount, to make sure you color into the lines, not just not-quite-up-to them. (That's the "Expand/Reduce Area" option on the Wand tool.) I also find it better at wand-selecting areas that have small breaks in the outline. (The "Close Gap" option.) The coloring tools themselves aren't all that impressive, but I'm not really much of a modern-fully-rendered-with-lens-flares colorist, so I don't miss them, and those two small features make a world of difference to me.
Not a damn thing. But - vers 3 was unusable for colour, ver 4 was a big step up.
(Mind you, I've been asked to email a guy who IS putting some feedback to Manga Studio for ver 5 - so if you have a wish list, post it here and I'll let someone know!)
This is also in the realm of click-flow for flatting. Typically I'm doing all of my wand selecting on one layer (or a group of layers), and all my coloring (usually by bucket) on a few others. So I have to keep selecting back and forth between those layers: select wand tool, select ink layer, use wand tool, select bucket tool, select the color layer that I'm working on, use bucket tool. It would streamline things immensely to be able to select the wand tool and have it already know that I want it to use the ink layer for that, so that when I select the bucket tool and use it, I'm still on the same color layer. It'd save two clicks (more for every time I forget) for each piece being colored.
In other words: Assign the wand tool in advance to act on a specific layer (alternately: remember the last layer), without having to select that layer each and every time you use the tool. Or more generally: Allow the user to arbitrarily and temporarily set the target layer for any tool, so that (for example) when you select the pencil tool, it draws on the layer you want to use for pencils, the pen tool goes on an inking layer, etc.
That's all the comes to mind at the moment (aside from the obvious stuff of emulating PS's repertoire of brushes and filters).
One of these days I'll have to try out MS. I THINK I might actually have a copy on my Mac I've never opened (always too busy on deadline to open anything that's not a project in progress ... and SW, of course.)
So I have to keep selecting back and forth between those layers
There's a keystroke to move between layers, BTW. On the Mac it's ALT-] and ALT-[ to move down and up one layer respectively.
I'm slightly confused why you can't make the wand pick up an area defined by the inks while you're on the flats layer. I've just tried it with a colour layer below the line layer, and the wand picks up areas based on the ink lines just fine. You can use the Fill with FG Color option from the 'Selection Launcher' to fill the wand area with one click, rather than having to switch to the Paint Bucket.
(I appreciate I'm probably missing something obvious in your workflow that keeps you from working this way, BTW!)
I'm often working on a TabletPC in slate mode, where keystrokes aren't available.
As for the method you described... I... um... didn't know you could do that. I'll give it a try, though I'm not sure how easy it'll be to do that with just a stylus.
How do you get it to select based on the ink layer? The only way I can see to make that happen would be to have it select based on "all layers" (sometimes problematic if you already have background colors laid down) or to go thru and set everything but the inks as "sketch" layers, and tell it to ignore those. That'd work, but not as elegantly as what I was thinking.
My stylus only has one button (assigned to erase), so right-clicking requires click-and-hold... but with practice I think I could get the fill-with-foreground option to work for me. Or add it to my Custom Tools palette. Thanks for the tip.
That's something else for the wish list, @pauljholden: allow user-specified abbreviations/icons on the Custom Tools palette.
Hmm. Well, if you've got pencil layers, ink layers and colour layers, why wouldn't you have the pencil layers set to 'Sketch'?* The page I tried it on had a scanned pencil layer (sketch) and three ink layers on top (basic line; black & heavy line; panel borders(rasterised)) all set to finish. I created a colour layer above the pencils and below the bottom ink layer and picked up areas with the wand. You can have the 'Selection Launcher' permanently visible as a little floating widget beneath your selection and apply the 'Fill with FG Colour' option from there with a single click (no need for right-clicking).
It's not just the pencil layers. I've been putting in background colors, which don't necessarily follow the ink lines, before adding layers for coloring foreground figures, so I'd have to tag any background-color layers as "sketch" too, and then change them back to "finish" later, which is... not intuitive. But you're right: it'd work.
This "Selection Launcher" thing is new to me. I didn't know it existed or what it was, so I never enabled it. L-) I found it now.
Just want to say that, in the three or so weeks I've had possession of a Cintiq my attitude to digital drawing has changed considerably. I would never have imagined that it would work nicely for someone like me--my approach is very tactile (ie I make a fucking mess) and even even the paper stock makes a big difference to my ability to draw... but even the default photoshop brushes work well for me and the ability to zoom at will is invaluable.
I'll probably stick to 'pencilling' and leave the finishes to someone else, but so far I'm very pleased. I haven't tried to draw a full page yet , but I'm betting that the device will make composing multiple panels easier as well.
@pauljholden Oh... I have an ongoing feature list for MangaStudio. :-)
I've been using it, and loving it really, since v3. But you're right. Coloring is painful with it.
Blend modes would help a lot. I'd love to be able to import/export rulers as EPS files (or SVG, whatever vector format is easiest). Being able to hold shift to constrain a line, and shift click to draw from last point, would be excellent too. Plus add in a command to toggle to the last used brush, and one for toggling between foreground/background colors and I'd be ecstatic! Heh.
As long as we're talking about digital drawing tools, I've been playing with a free drawing app called FireAlpaca (firealpaca.com). It's rudimentary, but enjoyable. It feels a little like a simple Paint Tool SAI, but works on a Mac too.
In case you haven't seen it, the Windows 8 Surface devices are very promising. I recently got to play with one, and it's the first time I've actually had any kind of Tech-Device inspired lust in a LOOOONG time. Using both Photoshop and Alias Sketchbook pro (IMNECTHO) beat the experience of drawing with the Cintique. The fact that I can throw it in my satchel and take it with me... having workstation power on the go... makes it a "must have" device upgrade for me.
I got to "play" with a preview release of Windows 8 on a standard TabletPC computer recently, and to be blunt, I hate the new UI. Microsoft's obsession with hiding things from the user goes even further. But I was able to test Manga Studio on it, and it runs, so that part looks promising. And the Surface Pro does look like a slick piece of hardware, and I look forward to someday being able to use one, or something like it.
The secret to Windows 8 is to shun the Start screen and go straight to the Desktop. I threw the icons of stuff I use most there. I hate tablets and their one-program-at-a-time UI. But a tablet I can multi-task like a laptop/desktop? Sold.
If only the W8 Desktop wasn't missing a menu. To access various features you have to find the hidden secret clickspots, like using the cheat codes on a video game, or revealing the easter eggs on a DVD.
I don't mind the one-at-a-time UI of a tablet, because with a screen of 12" or under, that's all there's room for... and that's how I use my TabletPC: Windows is there to run Manga Studio on. On a desktop with two 20" screens, or even just one 24" screen... no.
Microsoft has finally announced pricing for the Surface Pro, which is the version of their new tablet that supports both 1) a real stylus, and 2) standard existing Windows apps. IMHO, that makes it a viable option for drawing, in the way that the iPad and Android tablets are not. The base price for the low-end model is $900. Less than a lot of people were predicting, but still a bit pricey. If I had $900 I wasn't doing anything with, I'd probably get one, because it looks like it really is a nice piece of portable hardware. But of course... I don't.
I was wondering if anyone here knew of a good tablet for the mac that is preferably on the cheaper side. I always wanted to get one but have never had the money, but now I am starting to see cheaper ones out but dont know how good they are.
Comments
That's going to have to wait awhile for me, then.
This is also in the realm of click-flow for flatting. Typically I'm doing all of my wand selecting on one layer (or a group of layers), and all my coloring (usually by bucket) on a few others. So I have to keep selecting back and forth between those layers: select wand tool, select ink layer, use wand tool, select bucket tool, select the color layer that I'm working on, use bucket tool. It would streamline things immensely to be able to select the wand tool and have it already know that I want it to use the ink layer for that, so that when I select the bucket tool and use it, I'm still on the same color layer. It'd save two clicks (more for every time I forget) for each piece being colored.
In other words: Assign the wand tool in advance to act on a specific layer (alternately: remember the last layer), without having to select that layer each and every time you use the tool. Or more generally: Allow the user to arbitrarily and temporarily set the target layer for any tool, so that (for example) when you select the pencil tool, it draws on the layer you want to use for pencils, the pen tool goes on an inking layer, etc.
That's all the comes to mind at the moment (aside from the obvious stuff of emulating PS's repertoire of brushes and filters).
As for the method you described... I... um... didn't know you could do that. I'll give it a try, though I'm not sure how easy it'll be to do that with just a stylus.
How do you get it to select based on the ink layer? The only way I can see to make that happen would be to have it select based on "all layers" (sometimes problematic if you already have background colors laid down) or to go thru and set everything but the inks as "sketch" layers, and tell it to ignore those. That'd work, but not as elegantly as what I was thinking.
My stylus only has one button (assigned to erase), so right-clicking requires click-and-hold... but with practice I think I could get the fill-with-foreground option to work for me. Or add it to my Custom Tools palette. Thanks for the tip.
That's something else for the wish list, @pauljholden: allow user-specified abbreviations/icons on the Custom Tools palette.
This "Selection Launcher" thing is new to me. I didn't know it existed or what it was, so I never enabled it. L-) I found it now.
I don't mind the one-at-a-time UI of a tablet, because with a screen of 12" or under, that's all there's room for... and that's how I use my TabletPC: Windows is there to run Manga Studio on. On a desktop with two 20" screens, or even just one 24" screen... no.