Blood for the Baron!

Okay we need colorist for this massive project were working on , so I found this article that might help some of you that has the time and want to help but dont know how to

follow this link

http://www.mangarevolution.com/tutorial ... rial_id=23

Here is a copy of the e-mail sent to me by Matthew Paternoster, it should be of some help to any budding colorists out there.

Hello there, My name is Matt and I have recently been coloring some of the pages of the old action force comics on that blood for the baron website. Jamar Miller is who I've mainly been in contact with and he said that these two emails needed some help with how to color the black and white pages. This may be very wordy and I am by no means a pro, but it may help you out. I use photoshop so this will help for photoshop version 7.0 and up.
There are many tutorials on how to do it online but I think the best one is from steel dolphin. His name is Chris Alridge and has worken on many high profile books like Battle Chasers. There are 2 parts, one for prepareing the lineart and one for the actual color. I suggest you disregard the first tutorial, maybe just look over it as the images we are coloring arent rreally lineart. Whoever cleaned up these images did a phenomenal job, but the resolution isn't nearly as high as lineart should be. Professional lineart should be at a minimun 1200dpi (dots per inch), these images are only at 300 dpi, which is fine to be posted on the internet. Anyway, the tutorial says to go into channels to do the coloring, but that is only to reduce the file size. A page scanned at 1200 dpi can be up to 150 megabytes, which can drastically slow you PC(it doesn't matter if it mac or PC, I use a PC). When the file is first opened, it will be a .jpg file, which is a basic image file. The first thing you want to do is change it from grayscale to RGB(color) mode. So go to image-mode-RGB. On the right side, there will be your layers window. There should be one layer named background on it, which is the black and white image. Click on the background layer and make a copy of it (ctrl-j). There should now be layer 1 and background. We do this because you shouldn't work directly on the original layer. Then, we want to make a new blank layer. The layer window has its own minimize/close box and right under that there is an arrow, click on it and the go to new layer, or press shift-ctrl-n. Name that layer color. Then, click that layer to select it(it should be highlighted blue to show it is selected) and wherethere is a drop down arrow box, select it to multiply. This will allow you to put the flat color down without having to worry about going over the black-just try it with the paintbrush tool-but make sure you are on the layer named color! To color them, I use a tablet which has a little pen on a plastic mousepad and it senses the pen so it is like a mouse, but using the mouse is ok too. You could do this for the entire page, which would make it look like a hand painted retro comic.
The next step is illustrated and probably told better than I could tell because I am a horrible writer, but it is very good. Basically all you need to know is where the light is coming from and what color that light is. For example, a blinking emergency light could be red, which you would make a red highlight on the character, or there might be daylight which would be a pale yellow on the character. Below are the links to the tutorials, and I have attatched 2 images of my computer screen to see what they look like. I apologize for this being so wordy but I don't know your photoshop skill or even if you have photoshop! Jamar just sent me these email addresses and said you were dying to know hot to do it. If you have any questions just email me but remember, I am not a pro, just a college student. Also, you can check my deviant art page if you'd like, I did a cool version of a cobra ninja:

http://livetoski.deviantart.com/

http://www.steeldolphin-forums.com/html ... part1.html
http://www.steeldolphin-forums.com/html ... part2.html

To summarise:

01 Select image> mode> RGB
02 On the layers window, click on the background layer and hit Ctrl-J
03 Press Shift-Ctrl-N, name that layer Colour.
04 On the Layers window drop down menu, select Multiply.
05 Save as .tiff

Does anybody know of a way to convert .bmp's to .jpg's without degradation? A lot of the new pages are coming in as .bmp's while my HTML is all geared for .jpg's. I can rewrite it if needs be but was hoping for a easier solution.

I've tried using the converter on picaview but there was some blurring.

The Baron wrote:Does anybody know of a way to convert .bmp's to .jpg's without degradation? A lot of the new pages are coming in as .bmp's while my HTML is all geared for .jpg's. I can rewrite it if needs be but was hoping for a easier solution.

I've tried using the converter on picaview but there was some blurring.

Some programs allow you to specify the quality of the .jpg when saving. Other than that, you could try saving as .png, which I believe does not allow for the degradation and should work with the html. Good luck!

This help guide is amazing and wonderful I am just now getting a hang of this so if anyone is wanting to do this and dont understand Photoshop like I did then use this. its quite easy

The Baron wrote: ...................

Hello there, My name is Matt and I have recently been coloring some of the pages of the old action force comics on that blood for the baron website. Jamar Miller is who I've mainly been in contact with and he said that these two emails needed some help with how to color the black and white pages. This may be very wordy and I am by no means a pro, but it may help you out. I use photoshop so this will help for photoshop version 7.0 and up.
There are many tutorials on how to do it online but I think the best one is from steel dolphin. His name is Chris Alridge and has worken on many high profile books like Battle Chasers. There are 2 parts, one for prepareing the lineart and one for the actual color. I suggest you disregard the first tutorial, maybe just look over it as the images we are coloring arent rreally lineart. Whoever cleaned up these images did a phenomenal job, but the resolution isn't nearly as high as lineart should be. Professional lineart should be at a minimun 1200dpi (dots per inch), these images are only at 300 dpi, which is fine to be posted on the internet. Anyway, the tutorial says to go into channels to do the coloring, but that is only to reduce the file size. A page scanned at 1200 dpi can be up to 150 megabytes, which can drastically slow you PC(it doesn't matter if it mac or PC, I use a PC). When the file is first opened, it will be a .jpg file, which is a basic image file. The first thing you want to do is change it from grayscale to RGB(color) mode. So go to image-mode-RGB. On the right side, there will be your layers window. There should be one layer named background on it, which is the black and white image. Click on the background layer and make a copy of it (ctrl-j). There should now be layer 1 and background. We do this because you shouldn't work directly on the original layer. Then, we want to make a new blank layer. The layer window has its own minimize/close box and right under that there is an arrow, click on it and the go to new layer, or press shift-ctrl-n. Name that layer color. Then, click that layer to select it(it should be highlighted blue to show it is selected) and wherethere is a drop down arrow box, select it to multiply. This will allow you to put the flat color down without having to worry about going over the black-just try it with the paintbrush tool-but make sure you are on the layer named color! To color them, I use a tablet which has a little pen on a plastic mousepad and it senses the pen so it is like a mouse, but using the mouse is ok too. You could do this for the entire page, which would make it look like a hand painted retro comic.
The next step is illustrated and probably told better than I could tell because I am a horrible writer, but it is very good. Basically all you need to know is where the light is coming from and what color that light is. For example, a blinking emergency light could be red, which you would make a red highlight on the character, or there might be daylight which would be a pale yellow on the character. Below are the links to the tutorials, and I have attatched 2 images of my computer screen to see what they look like. I apologize for this being so wordy but I don't know your photoshop skill or even if you have photoshop! Jamar just sent me these email addresses and said you were dying to know hot to do it. If you have any questions just email me but remember, I am not a pro, just a college student. Also, you can check my deviant art page if you'd like, I did a cool version of a cobra ninja:

http://livetoski.deviantart.com/

http://www.steeldolphin-forums.com/html ... part1.html
http://www.steeldolphin-forums.com/html ... part2.html

This help guide is amazing and wonderful I am just now getting a hang of this so if anyone is wanting to do this and dont understand Photoshop like I did then use this. its quite easy

I am going to break down the steps a little so everyone can see how easy it is !


1. Open the file with photoshop

2. In the tool bar Go to image then -mode and make sure its on -RGB if not change it. Also make sure its on 8 Bits not 16 bits


3.On the right side, there will be your layers window. There should be one layer named background on it, which is the black and white image. Click on the background layer and make a copy of it (ctrl-j). There should now be layer 1 and background. We do this because you shouldn't work directly on the original layer.


4. Then, we want to make a new blank layer. The layer window has its own minimize/close box and right under that there is an arrow, click on it and the go to new layer, or press shift-ctrl-n. Name that layer color.


5. Then, click that layer to select it(it should be highlighted blue to show it is selected) and wherethere is a drop down arrow box, select it to multiply. This will allow you to put the flat color down without having to worry about going over the black-just try it with the paintbrush tool-but make sure you are on the layer named color!


6. Start to color them !



So its only 6 easy and quick steps to do !!!

thanks to Matthew Paternoster to the wonderful help!

Thanx Jamar! I think that may shave off an hour or two from the time it takes me to crank these pages out

Glad that could help, here is another thing I have learned that may shave off some more time.

IF and I repeat IF the background is clear or very few Lines or details then you can

1. go to your layer 1 ,

2. Then highlight it with the Magic Wand and

3. Use the fill bucket.

BUT I repeat ONLY BACK GROUNDS with NO DETAILS IN IT , the minute you start putting it on vechiles or Characters it will look like Crap!! It will be tempting to use it more but DONT use it any other place other than CLEAR backgrounds. If you do this it will give a 3D look to it almost too so use it but sparingly! NO CHARACTER NO VECHILES and only backgrounds with little lines


For an example at what I mean on what to use the Fill bucket on look at the pic below



Now for an example of what NOT to use it on please see the pic below.



Hopefully the pic is bigh enough for you to see but just so I describe the problem, If you use it on backgrounds like this you will have lots of white and gray areas that if you dont fill in Pixel by pixel it makes your work look like crap

so I cant repeat this enough Only USE THE FILL BUCKET ON 1st LAYER sparingly on areas of no details in it. I contemplated whether to put this up or not because the tempation to use it more in areas other than what its intended for.

But if you use it , It will look awesome and give it almost a 3D look to it

hope that helps

And that's one reason why it'll take me 4 hours to do one panel 80% of the time I use bucket fill. Course I've found messing with the opacity can give you more colors and sometimes can make bucket fills, in cases like you showed, look fine (Typically only with light colors)

I probably do everything the hard way when it comes to photoshop

ya I have found it takes me about 10 hours to do one page, my eyes have been really bothering me LOL. 12 days straight I need a break LOL

I just use a big wide brush and splat it all over, and then touch up the edges with a fine brush at 200% magnification afterwards.