Hey fellow pencil wielders...
Lately I've been experimenting with clean up. I'm in 1st year animation at Sheridan and there are some people here that can clean up like it's nobody's business! I feel I've got to up my game!
I tend to draw very loose, very rough, and fairly dark. But anyway, when I clean up rough work the clean up line is often weak, trembling, and harsh. Maybe I should upload an example?
Anyways, I was wondering if anyone here had any tips on achieving LAZER PRINTER quality line clean up (be it how you sharpen your pencil to what kind of underwear you use for the job). I know its possible, I just can't do it :(
Thanks in advance.
Amen, brutha Ape. Once I did that, my line quality improved tremendously.
Re: Eustace's suggestion about cleaning up other people's roughs. Here's a source for rough animation you can purchase to study and, in your case, do cleanups on. If you order the mailed version, the pages come Acme-punched and ready to go.
Yeah, too much coffee will make for a shakey line quality, that's for sure.
Actually, my specific suggestion was to start by inbetweening clean up keys done by other people (professional level clean up keys) to learn good line quality and volume control by example and repetition . Of course it would also be valuable to do clean up keys of other people's roughs as a learning exercise , but the first step to gaining some control over line quality is to successfully follow up someone who has mastery of their line quality.
Finding appropriate practice drawings might be difficult outside of a studio environment . In the old days we students used to eagerly pass around xeroxed copies of various Disney scenes , some rough, but others of final clean up scenes , and those were a valuable source for inbetweening practice if the xeroxes were clean enough . You can paste up some key drawings from a scene with peg strips , then follow the charts on the key drawings and try to match the line quality and volume of the key drawings. Since ElephantDropBomb is at Sheridan I expect there are still scenes like that floating around the school, or maybe you could check with some of the animation studios in Toronto to see if they can let you have some xerox copies of key drawings from a Rice Krispies commercial or something to practice on. Explain to them that you are a student trying to improve your clean up skills and you just need some real-life examples of professional work to practice on . Also, if Sheridan still has a copy of John Canemaker's book "Treasures of Disney Animation Art" there are a number of excellent key clean up drawings in that book which you can photocopy or scan and print out on 11 x 17 paper , then carefully paste up with peg strips to practice inbetweening on . I'm thinking especially of the drawings of Peg from The Lady and The Tramp on page 275 of that book ; or the two keys of Flower the skunk from Bambi on page 193 . If you want a "graduation exercise" in inbetweening try pegging up the keys of Tony the chef playing the concertina/accordion from The Lady and the Tramp on pages 278 and 279 . Unfortunately, those Tony drawings aren't ideal for xeroxing and pegging up because they've got ink & paint mark-up notes all over them , which will make the xeroxes smudgey looking . Better if you can scan the drawings from the book at 300 dpi , then touch them up a bit in Photoshop (dropping out the red and green channels , removing the colored pencil mark up ) , adjust the levels so the black lines are clear and sharp, then make print outs on 11 x 17 paper from those. Also, there aren't timing charts on all those drawings, so you'll have to make something up , probably safe to just stick with straight half-way charts . It will teach you a lot about line quality control and volume control. Have someone else that you trust (a more advanced student or a teacher ) roll your practice drawings with the xeroxed keys to check them for accuracy and if they find mistakes then do them again. That's what it will be like in a real studio when you take your drawings to your Key Clean Up supervisor for checking . Again, as you do these practice exercises you will get better and more confident with your line quality as you go along.
Tony White's book "The Animator's Workbook" has some good technical info. on inbetweening and line control , in addition to the links given above to AnimationMeat.com and DonBluth.com
http://www.tonywhite.net/bookstore.htm
Tony's website has some clean up tips:
http://www.tonywhite.net/desk.htm
"EustaceScrubb" has left the building
Whoops; my bad. Your point is very well taken, and I should slow down a bit when I'm reading...
Upside to everything though; I had never seen that site and find even the tiniest of clips very awesome.
Yes, I totally agree. That Animation Inspiration site is good and the companion site , 1 On 1 Animation School , also has some great inspirational clips posted . Wayne Carlisi and Mike Polvani , the guys behind 1 On 1 Animation , are excellent animators who I was privileged to work with at the Baer Animation Co.
"EustaceScrubb" has left the building
Someone just brought up http://www.animationmeat.com/notes/featureanimation/featureanimation.html the other day. I think a section on Don Bluth's site covers it too.
Wow, thats fantastic! Thanks a lot man!
When I went to Sheridan they gave us inbetweening assignments , where we had to inbetween previously cleaned-up key drawings of some classic character (The Pink Panther and Merlin from The Sword and the Stone are two I recall) .
The teachers would then roll our inbetweened drawings between the two keys to check for accuracy of volume, detail, and line quality. Inbetweening someone else's work , especially someone with a really good line quality, will help you improve your own line quality , simply by the repetition of laying down a clean line over and over again in doing the inbetweens . Try your hardest to match the line quality on the keys , so your inbetweens are indistinguishable from the line quality of the key drawings. You'll find that it rubs off on you and you'll start to learn some tricks for laying down a clean line quickly and efficiently and maintaining correct volumes.
It's like a musician playing scales ; practicing over and over and over . Eventually all that practice gives you mastery over the basics and you can get down to the real work.
"EustaceScrubb" has left the building
http://www.donbluth.com/cleanup.html
There we go; that's the actual page. Sorry for being a bum before, I was inbetween activities.
After reading Tony White's new Pencil to Pixels book I get what Eustace said a lot more...the mark-making itself, the grace to the lines and how they properly emphasize the form and depth/space, etc...at times it seems to make all the difference.
Lay off the caffine. That was always my big advantage.
Aloha,
the Ape
...we must all face a choice, between what is right... and what is easy."
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