How To Draw Background With Character By Betsy Lun Tao

Story Drawing Skills HOW TO DRAW BACKGROUNDS WITH CHARACTER

by Betsy Luntao

Mentions of specific companies, organizations or creative individuals within this digital book does not mean that those companies, organizations, or creative individuals support, or agree with the methods and opinions expressed in this e-book. They probably don’t even know that I exist. Licensed characters, artwork not owned or created by the author (that’s me, Betsy), are used under the American “Fair Use” trademark law. Said law, to my understanding at the time this work was self-published, grants the limited use of no more than 10% of a large single work (such as a film or book) or 5 single pieces from an artist for the use of non-profit*, educational* examples without the written consent of the owner/creator. (*This book is free and educational.)

However, I completely respect the wishes of my fellow artists. If you are, or officially represent, the creator of a piece that appears in this e-book, and you wish to have it removed, simply send me an e-mail identifying the piece, and page number on which the work appears to [email protected]. I’ll remove it as fast as my mouse-button clicking finger can go. Right about now, there would normally be a warning about not sharing or distributing this book without written consent, but on the contrary, I want you to share this book! Share it with anyone you think might be interested in it! Let’s help each other gain the skills needed to draw awesome stories so we can geek out over them! If you want to know more about me, my mission to help people gain story drawing skills, or want to check the availability of other stuff I’ve made, you’ll find it at:

storydrawingskills.com Copyright © 2017 Betsy Luntao.

Dedicated to those with a story in their heart that is still waiting to be drawn.

Thank you beta readers who graciously donated their time to send me feedback on this book: Aaron Bronte Imerei Jennifer Kathi Kre

Laura Lucía Maggie Phoebe Rosalie Sean

FOREWORD: It’s Not easy, But it’s not impossible. There is no denying that BGs (backgrounds) are not easy to draw. Just the scale is intimidating. BGs have to represent so much more space than the characters. Maybe that’s why BGs take so darn long to finish! My first semester in Art School came with one piece of advice: Don’t take Perspective class until you can dedicate 30-40 hours to the homework every week. Wow. Plus, let’s be honest, if you learned to draw characters first, BGs are unavoidably boring. Walls and objects just sitting there...lifeless. Ugh. I’m not going to lie and say that this book contains “tricks” or “shortcuts” to make BGs miraculously “easy, fast and

fun!” What I am going to share is how to take some of the mysteries, complexities, and boredom out of BG drawing. I’m going to show you how to you can treat it more like character drawing, which will overall make it less intimidating, understandable and (hopefully) more enjoyable. To reach that goal, this book is split up into 3 stages: Stage 1 is the Story Starters section and includes how to brainstorm story ideas. I’m a firm believer that if you care about the place you’re drawing, you’ll be much more enthusiastic about drawing it. Stage 2 is the Story Specifics section to help you design the personality of your background. In Stage 3, we go for it and begin Story Drawing, showing you how to build a background with as few apathetic, blank boxes or grids as I can.

While I’m sure you’re eager to get started, I do urge you to be patient. If you think you’re going to finish a super complex background in 2 hours, or even 1 day, you’re going to end up being really frustrated and disappointed. It’s quite likely that it’ll take you a whole week to finish a BG, depending on how often you draw. Like I said, it won’t be super easy, but it will be super worth it when you’ll be drawing BGs suited to your stories and characters!

Table of Contents Intro: Learn what you need- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1

STAGE 1: STORY STARTERS - - - - - - - - - - - - -

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Taglines - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 3 Thumbnail Composition Stuff - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 4 Thumbnail Proportions - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 7 Focal Points - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 8 Golden Rectangle vs. Rule of Thirds - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1 1 FMB(DB) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 19 Reads - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 23 Sequential Story Angles- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 30 Single Moment Story Angles - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 37

STAGE 2: STORY SPECIFICS- - - - - - - - - - - - - 48 Spark and Scrap Boards - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 49 Betsy’s Boards - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 54 Plus it and Ratio- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 58 Cultural Shape Identity- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 61 If These Walls Could Talk- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 66 Proportion and Scale - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 75 Visual and Touchable Textures- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 79

STAGE 3: STORY DRAWING - - - - - - - - - - - - - 83 Grid Basics - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 84 Divide and Replicate - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 89 0 Point (Isometric) Grid- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 93 Horizon Line - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 120 Vanishing Point - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 123 1 Point Perspective - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 125 Line of Sight - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 136 When Vanishing Points Get Crazy- - - - - - - - - - - - - - 138 2 Point Vertical Perspective- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 142 Grids are Guides, not Rules- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 156 2 Point Horizontal Perspective- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 160 Center of Vision Line - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 171 3 Point Perspective- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 172 Perspective Drawing Gallery - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 185 Perspective is Subjective- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 190

So... Now what? - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 194

LEARN WHAT YOU NEED. Drawing a random background for the sake of learning perspective, is much like practicing a scale of musical notes over and over on a piano. Sure, it does help you, but it can take some mighty disciplined willpower to stick to it. Especially if it’s for a hobby which is supposed to be fun, not mundane. I gave up at learning several musical instruments for that exact reason: I just couldn’t get into reading sheet music, or playing steadily with a metronome, or practicing musical scales for the sake of “practice makes perfect”. About 5 years ago, I realized that I didn’t want to be a master musician, I just wanted to learn how to play a few of

my favorite songs. The next day, I bought a cheap guitar and looked up the 4 chords to “Viva La Vida” by Coldplay. My weak fingers produced shaky, uneven notes, but I wasn’t discouraged, because it was a song I liked, I was having fun, and each properly played section of the song got me closer to my goal of learning a whole song! Musical scale practice never motivated me like that! Ever! A few months of playing by ear later, I made up some words to go with 4 chords and wrote my first song. Soon after that, I started performing at Open Mic nights with my friends. No one could tell that I couldn’t read sheet music! I still don’t have strong enough fingers to play all the chords, but I’m content, because it’s what I wanted.

My point is this: don’t try to learn everything in this book for the sake of “learning perspective”. Learn only what YOU need in order to draw what YOU want to draw next. Over time, the things you want to draw will naturally guide you to your next learning challenge, and your skills will develop from the practice of drawing what you like to draw. It’s the same way I wanted to learn a song that has a chord I don’t know yet, but I will learn the chord by practicing the song I like. (Not the other way around.) Having an interest in what you’re drawing won’t automatically make it easier to learn, but it will make it easier not to give up! Happy Drawing! ^ u ^ -Betsy

STAGE 1: STORY STARTERS Some of us have a million stories to tell, some of us don’t have any, and some of us are somewhere in the middle. Before you jump into BG drawing, we need to establish some kind of story. So like I said on the previous page, make it about something that you are interested in! If you love Pokémon, make it about Pokémon. If you love traveling circuses, make it about a traveling circus. If you love waffles, make it about waffles. (Mmmm, waffles...) You have the freedom to draw whatever your heart desires, so don’t waste the opportunity concerning yourself with “getting better”, or, “will my followers/friends/parents like it?”, or “following the steps in this book”. Draw for yourself. If you get stuck, or can’t decide what to draw check send me an email at: [email protected] and I’ll make sure you get some help.

Story first: Taglines #1 problem of most perspective practice is that it looks like practice.

Generic, empty rooms without any personality or character of there own. No evidence of something that happened or something that might happen. Just collections of apathetic furniture. The easiest way to make your perspective practice not look like perspective practice is to have a story. It doesn’t need to be an 50,000 word tale of bravery and sacrifice, it just has to be one sentence long. It’s called a tagline or log line and it’s actually Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

quite similar to a newspaper headline or article title. Check out these examples: ** Man bitten by radioactive spider gains superhuman abilities. (Spider-Man) ** Maiden breaks a Beast’s curse with true love. ** (Beauty and the Beast) ** Piloted giant robots defeat huge monsters. (Pacific Rim) ** Greek youth enters inescapable labyrinth to battle the Minotaur. (Greek Mythology) ** A man and woman fall in love despite disliking one another at first. (Oh my gosh, every Korean drama, ever.) 3

Those are great, but still too big. An artist needs to know about a particular moment of the story and answers to the questions: Who? Where? and “What is happening? The taglines look more like this:

If you were going to draw any of these, you’d be practicing perspective, but it would no longer look like practice for practicing’s sake, because there’s something happening! A story! Love it!

** Spider-Man shoots web at Doc Oc in the Doc’s lab. ** Belle reads to the Beast in the library.

Try it!

** Gypsy Danger punches Kaiju at the bottom of the ocean.

Write out 3-5 interior setting taglines that you’d be interested in drawing.

** Ariadne waits for Theseus to return from the Labyrinth. ** [Insert favorite hate-turns-tolove moment here.] Take a look at these shots on the right. We might not know everything about the story, but something is definitely happening.

Then roll a dice, ask a friend, or somehow find a way to choose just 1, and use it for Stage 3 drawing demos. Once you have your tagline decided, you have a choice: continue to the next page for Thumbnails if you want to get to start sketching, or, go to page 49 for Spark Boards if you like gathering inspirational reference images.

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THUMBNAIL COMPOSITION STUFF Since I can’t talk about all of them simultaneously, I tried my best to give them a logical order:

A “thumbnail” is a smaller version of a larger image that in this case is used for visual exploration. It’s the first test to see if all the things in your mind will work when it’s put on paper. That’s it. The end. (All right, it’s not really the end. ) Thumbnails are used to design pretty much anything from a potato peeler to an evening gown to a comic page layout. When planning out an illustration, there are a few things on my mind while I’m thumbnail sketching which are equally important.

1. Border Proportions 2. Focal Point 3. FMB (DB) 4. Reads

coming up next.) If it doesn’t matter what the finished measurements are, that’s cool, you can experiment with lots of different shapes and sizes. Alphonse Mucha utilized many different border shapes like thin rectangles, circles and crescents:

Again, that’s not really the order you have to follow, it’s just the order I’m going to introduce them so that all of you will know what I’m talking about when I start saying stuff like “I need a stronger read on the FMB, particularly near the focal point.” Border Proportions deal with the technical aspect of making sure the artwork fits a particular set of finished measurements, like a 5100 x 3300 pixel image for uploading to a T-shirt site. (More about that Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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this book, the DB part isn’t going to apply as much. More about FMB stuff on page 1 1.

Focal Point, the main event. The part that completes the story. It can be vibrantly highlighted like the picture above, or it can be subtle. Page 8 has more about that.

F M B FMB(DB), which stands for Foreground, Mid-ground and Background. (DB) stands for Distant Background, like clouds or mountains and sky. Because we’re doing interior backgrounds in

Reads refers to clarity. How easy is it to locate the characters, identify them and figure out what they are doing? Sometimes we want it to be easy, like in happy scenes. Other times, we want it to be difficult, such as a mysterious figure in the shadows following the hero. Page 15 has more details about Reads. You are free to completely ignore these topics. Some people have strong “gut feelings” which help them make their visual story choices. They are often the ones who are recognized Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

for having a personal style, or fresh view on a popular theme. The downside to that is the audience might not understand the story. (This doesn’t apply if you are creating solely for your own enjoyment—draw whatever makes you happy.) Some people (me included), like to think things through. It makes our work easy to understand, but we can get trapped in the “formula checklist”, being so authentic that it harms the story, or not having anything in our work that memorably stands out from the crowd. The happy medium is being aware of how the visual choices you make might affect how the story is understood by others, but pretty much doing things the way you want to do them.

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THUMBNAIL PROPORTIONS You may have the measurements of your finished piece already decided. Maybe you’ll be drawing on a particular size of paper, or, your design will be featured on a poster or book cover and you have to follow a template. In that case it’s best to make your thumbnail proportional to the actual finished dimensions.

Finished art size

tte r

To get a proportionally smaller

Or, even easier, if you have access to any sort of drawing program, make a new canvas with your desired finished proportions. Next, make sure the option to maintain/ constrain proportions of the canvas is activated. Then, shrink it down to a smaller thumbnail sketch size.

Basically all that’s happening is this:

a om p n ll hu tc s m a ma or till big ss er how

Proportions of ISO standard 21.0 x 29.7cm A4 paper

9 ÷ 6 = 1 1/2 inches 12 ÷ 6 = 2 inches

ahead!

rn

Proportions of U.S.A. standard 8 1/2 x 1 1 inch Letter paper

Example: 9 x 12 inch paper

Co

For instance, if you’re going to draw the image on an 8 1/2 x 1 1 inch piece of paper your thumbnail borders will be slightly different than if you were drawing on A4 paper:

thumbnail border shape, you need to divide the height and the width of the finished size by the same number.

Math Beware!

Thumbnail size

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Bingo, it’ll give you the exact inches (in decimals so you’ll have to convert it, ugh) or centimeters or whatever it is that you use. I’m sure mental math is a great way to keep your brain active and healthy, but, sometimes I just want to draw and not spend precious creative time figuring out dimensions. =_=; 7

Focal points Thumbnails often include a Focal Point (FP).There are many, many ways to create FPs and most of them fall under the principle of Contrast.

In each example, I only changed one thing. Check out how effective it is if I change more than one.

When something is different from the rest, it makes that something stand out. Like so:

It’s like a visual magnet. Even if you try to look only at a square, you won’t be able to ignore the orange dot in your peripheral vision.

or

or

or

or

We can’t help but look at the one thing that’s different.

Got 6 mermaid sisters? Have them all match their seashells with their fins and put their hair up while you rock loose hair and mixed colors so that you can stand out.

Now imagine that those squares were a crowd of people, but you wanted to make your main character stand out, how could you do it? Contrast. Consider the main character of a favorite movie or manga. What did the stylists or artists do to make the main character different from the rest? Color, shapes, proportion, lighting, staging, all these things come in to play, but let’s look at color for a second: Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Otherwise... no. Just no. That’s ridiculous. 8

More ways to make Focal Points:

Implied Lines & Familiarity

The Rule of Thirds (or Golden Ratio) Explained more on page 1 1. (Only a tool, not a rule! You don’t have to use it every time!)

Implied lines means other things in the picture are aligned in a way that they “point” to a particular area. Familiarity means we tend to look at things that are most like us; namely other humans. The woman is the only one facing us, so we look at her. There’s also this great Catwoman piece by Tim Sale that uses the same principles.

Isolation The horse on the far right is in isolation from the rest of the herd, and draws our attention because of its separation and clearer silhouette.

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Sharpest Edges/Depth of Field Purposefully leaving most of the piece blurry or “loose” in painting terms, and making one area sharp, or “tight”.

Most Value Contrast Just like a spotlight on a dark stage, the light on the face with dark shadows creates contrast. 9

For the purposes of creating character driven story images, this book is always going to use the character as the focal point, and I would recommend that at least for the first 4-5 drawings that you also keep the character(s) as the focal point.

“An artist must have his measuring tools not in the hand, but in the eye.”

Because, honestly, the viewers are going to look at the characters first anyway, so make your life easier and use that to your advantage.

-Michelangelo (The Italian Renaissance artist that the Turtle was named after.)

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Golden Rectangle vs. Rule of Thirds What are they and why do we care? Short answer is that they are two different formulated ways for creating pleasing positions for Focal Points. Compositions in photography, film, comics, painting, concept art, and illustration have all used these formulas. For the long answer, keep reading. The Golden Ratio is credited to an ancient Greek mathematician

(Pythagoras. Named his Fraternity of followers the Pythagorians, because he was humble like that.)

named Pythagoras. (Same guy as the Pythagorian Theorum, a2 + b2 = c2 for you math-lovers out there.) Pythagorians met in secret to talk about their mathematical discoveries back in the day, so you had to show the symbol of a pentagram to get in. (I didn’t think a mathematics club would be so exclusive!) Pythagoras chose the pentagram because he was totally geeking out over certain ratios found in the pentagram, specifically these lines:

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What is completely super cool is that if you combine the green with the orange, the length will equal the red line. Ditto for the orange line plus the red line equals the length of the blue.

= =

The ratio of the top line (green) to the bottom line (orange) is called The Golden Ratio (or sometimes the Golden Section.) If you use the bottom line (orange) to make a square and add the top line (green) to make it one big rectangle, you get a Golden Rectangle:

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What’s awesome about the Golden Rectangle is that by dividing the smaller section (green) with another square it can perfectly replicate the ratio of the entire Golden Rectangle all over again. What was blowing Pythagoras’ mind, is that the Golden Spiral, is found all over the place in nature. Humans, flowers, leopard spots, tree limbs, starfish, fruit—even hurricanes and galaxies! Just look!

From this Golden Spiral, there’s a grid that can be made called the Phi Grid. It looks like this:

This could continue on into infinity.

A mathematician in named it the “phi” after Phidias, an ancient Greek Sculptor who demonstrated the ratio in his work. I bet you Pythagoras wouldn’t have been happy about that.

This ratio of diminishing shapes creates a spiral that’s called—you guessed it—the Golden Spiral.

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In case you’ve never heard of the Rule of Thirds before, it’s a 9 unit grid that divides a composition into thirds vertically and horizontally.

interesting, is that the Rule of Thirds as we know it today is not at all what Mr. Smith wrote about. Here’s some of what he wrote:

To use the Phi Grid, place the focal point in one of the corner boxes, where the inner spiral would be.

The points where the vertical and horizontal lines intersect are sometimes referred to as “power points” since they are successful places to put the focal points of your composition. Like so:

So that’s great, except when you sit down in front of a blank piece of paper, how the heck are you going to make a Phi grid? And so enters the The Rule of Thirds which has a far more brief, and yet very mysterious origin story when compared to Pythagoras and the breathtaking partnership of mathematical facts and beauty of all creation found in the Golden spiral.

I have found the ratio of about two thirds to one third, or of one to two, a much better and more harmonizing proportion, than the precise formal half, the too-farextending four-fifths—and, in short, than any other proportion whatever.

Basically all he said was: “IMO, the 1/3 composition is awesome sauce.” Despite calling it the “Rule” of Thirds, Smith often uses the words “about”, “generally”, and “generally speaking” in his full writing on the subject. So who made this thing up? The first documentation was by a man named John Thomas Smith (Whoa... Pocahontas flashback). What’s Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

He never mentioned a grid, nor the “power points” at the intersections.

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Personally, I don’t think that the Rule of Thirds, or the Golden Spiral is entirely superior over the other. Art in general defies having any hard and fast rules that should be used 100% of the time, right? That’s why it’s art!

ints! Power Po

Wait, what? I didn’t say that...

But let’s compare them anyway, shall we? Wait, there’s not enough room on this page... awkward...

Yet, present-day cameras, Instagram, and just about every viewfinder has a 9 unit gird slapped on it. Sadly, the Rule of Thirds is progressively becoming more of the “joke” of the visual arts world, or the “mark of an amateur.” Like a really good song that gets so overplayed on the radio until everyone gets sick

To the next page! Stop doing this! ლ( ಠoಠლ) Don’t be a slave to the grid! of it, the Rule of Thirds is becoming so overused as a mechanical “never fail” composition tool, that it’s losing its original purpose of being a general guide. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Not that different, right? At least, I don’t think so, but I’m also going to assume I’ll get some hate mail from Pythagorians and/or Smithians for daring to say the two are equal.

Rule of Thirds

Phi Grid based off Golden Spiral

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Thirds Phi grid in yellow, Thirds in teal.

Another example of how nigh identical the two can be.

Phi Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Both methods have their pros and cons. In this book, I tend to use the Rule of Thirds in my thumbnail demonstrations, simply because it’s more easily created than the phi grid. Just don’t get obsessed over the “power points” when creating a FP. So instead of trying to prove which is the “one grid to rule them all,” I think more can be learned from the men who are credited to discovering/ promoting them. Pythagoras LOVED the pentagram and the mathematical ratios that seemed to be interwoven into life itself and kept exploring what he loved.

John Thomas Smith thought that Thirds were the coolest thing since sliced bread and I doubt would let any haters stop him from doing what he liked. Be fearless and use whichever one that you like the best, or, no grid at all. Check out a few compositions from artists who love formal, symmetrical compositions and don’t give a hoot about thirds or phi grids.

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Try it!

Focal Point Relay Step 1: If your tagline doesn’t have 2-3 subjects, create another one for this exercise. Examples: ** Red Hen serves bread to baby chicks in the kitchen. ** Hero and/or Heroine riding a motorcycle to chase down vandals on the city streets. ** Wizard dipping weapon into a potion to fortify it with magic protection inside a cottage. ** Singer singing the big note in front of cheering crowd at a concert.

Step 2: Draw a thumbnail that places the first character or object near the golden section. A princess protecting a wounded dragon from a knight in the forest.

Step 3: Draw another thumbnail, but change the Focal Point character: A princess protecting a wounded dragon from a knight in the forest.

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Step 4: If you have a third character or object, repeat. A princess protecting a wounded dragon from a knight in the forest.

Of course, you can also try the relay with value contrast, isolation or any of the previously mentioned methods. Thumbnails are meant for experimentation and exploration!

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FMB = Foreground, Mid-ground, Background While you’re sketching your thumbnails, keep in mind the 3 distances: ** Foreground. The closest stuff to the “camera” that gets cropped. Often in silhouette or really dark shapes. ** Mid-ground. The sweet spot in between the Foreground and Background. Often this is where the important stuff often happens. ** Background. The objects farther away than the mid-ground. For interior, it’s the walls, floor and ceiling. There is also “Distant Background” (DB) which would be mountains, clouds, and things very far away.

One way to think about it is to limit yourself to only 2-3 colors. Like gray and black, or blue, and dark blue plus the white of the paper. It forces you to decide what it is in the foreground, mid-ground and background. It also quickly shows you the shape of each distance’s “puzzle piece” or “layer.” Overlapping, uneven puzzle pieces look the best! Check out these Indiana Jones pieces that took FMB(DB) to the next level by layering even more shapes. (Art by Matthew Reynolds. Thanks for tracking him down, Phoebe!)

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Once you get used to seeing the puzzle pieces of FMB layers, you can start seeing them in finished works too. Try it with these examples.

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Next, for the sake of education, I’m going to reveal some artwork I did back in 2004. (The horrors!! \ʘAʘ/)

If I were to do this piece again, I would definitely add some foreground elements. Something like this maybe:

The idea was that this vegetarian Minotaur guy was locked up ‘cause everybody figures that Minotaur eat maidens and stuff.

Not only do the bars and chains in the foreground help to divide up the space, but they also very clearly deliver the imprisonment theme of the image.

Right now, there are only 2 depth layers: the character and the background.

If you want to include FMB, but aren’t sure where to start, just start like you would any drawing: story!

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Let’s say I wanted to draw Sailor Jupiter at the beach building an epic sand castle.

I know it’s at the beach, so naturally the background is going to have some ocean, seagulls, maybe a few beach umbrellas... If I wanted to put something in the foreground, I just have to think about what else could 21

have happened or will happen in this story. Maybe Jupiter was using some sand toys to build her castle. Or, maybe there’s a little crab walking by. Maybe she’ll play with a beach ball next. Maybe Luna the cat is napping under a straw beach hat. Once I pick some things from the story’s possibilities, I just overlap them on top of, or surrounding the main point of the story:

Not bad, right? I mean, don’t get me wrong, you don’t HAVE to have FMB(DB) in every single drawing you ever do. The point is to just be aware that what you’re doing is out of choice and not neglect. For instance, let’s say I’m using the image for invitation to a sand castle building party. (What? You want to tell me there’s not such thing as a sand castle building party? Well, no wonder you didn’t get the invitation. :P )

better without the foreground. If you find yourself with an illustration idea that seems to have a weird empty space on the edges, ask yourself if you need some foreground elements. If the answer is, “No,” try out some different composition designs to edit out that unwanted negative space:

On the front of the card, on the bottom, I want it to say, “You’re Invited!!” It would probably work Before Editing

You’re Invited!! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

After Editing

You’re Invited!! 22

Reads A question that you’ll hear a lot in concept art and visual development is “Does it read?” They aren’t talking about reading words, but they are talking about how easily your eye and brain can figure out the information in the picture. It’s not that different from reading a sentence and understanding its meaning.

photography. Whether it’s done for a laugh or by accident, a photo that doesn’t have a good read makes you try to figure out what’s going on. (Often with humourous results.)

As funny as those photos are, a weak read in a story-based piece (like a comic book, video game, animation, film or narrative illustration) can easily cause a viewer to become confused. They have to pull themselves out of the story to figure out what’s going on and it isn’t as great of an entertainment or learning experience as it could be.

If it’s a strong read, it means everything is clear and easy to understand visually. A weak read is when you aren’t sure of what you’re seeing, or your eye gets distracted by something else in the picture that really isn’t important.

One of the leading causes of weak reads are tangents. (There’s a super great blog post about tangents called, “Those Pesky Tangents” found at artofvisualthinking.blogspot.com/2012/10/ those-pesky-tangents.html)

A weak read isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Especially in ‘trick’ Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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That’s when everybody starts judging you and your visual storytelling skills. Many concept artists start with small silhouette thumbnails is for the very same reason of making sure that each design is identifiable even with the least amount of information possible. Grouping your lights and darks helps with reads as well. In this Puss in Boots piece, the foreground characters are dark against a beam of sunlight and the Queen character is light against dark. Strong reads show everything you need to know clearly. Next page has a bunch of great examples! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

I’m as much of a Sailor Moon fan as the next girl, but I’m not going to lie, big hair doesn’t help the reads. 24

Check out how color contrast, position, and FMB, create really strong reads in these pieces.

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There are two important reads to be aware of in your composition: One is the Entry Point, also called the First Read, the other is the Focal Point, which was covered on page 8.

The entry point is the doctor’s face. It has the highest value contrast of dark books surrounding his lighter head. There are also many implied lines (arrows) guiding our eyes back to the doctor.

The entry point, as it implies, is the place where the viewer looks first. The focal point has the most important information in the piece. Norman Rockwell is a master at this:

His face is pointed towards the viewer (familiarity), is in isolation from the other faces, and is near a “golden section” just like a Focal Point would be, but the doctor’s face Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

isn’t the message or focus of the illustration, it’s more like the question of the piece “Who is this doctor examining?” We travel down the doctor’s hands to see that he is pretending to perform a physical check up on a doll being held by a concerned little girl.

Now the story is complete: The doctor is pretending to check up on the little girl’s doll. Can’t you just imagine the dialogue that must have been said before this moment? “Doctor, could you check if my doll is sick?” “Hmm, let me see here...” 26

Without the doll, there’s no story: Nope. No story here.

Without the doctor’s play-along expression, the doll being medically checked just seems a little strange: Weirdo.

The doctor, doll and little girl are all needed to tell the whole story, and the composition visually tells you to look at the doctor first, then the doll, and lastly, the girl.

More examples of Entry Points and Focal Points:

First Read = A smoking gun! Who was shot?! Second Read/Focal point = A police officer was shot! OMG! Third Read = A woman outside saw the whole thing, she’s probably going to get shot next! First Read = Guy stuffing his face.

First Read = Dude with his sword ready to take someone down, but who? Second Read/Focal Point = The dudette on the balcony. Oh my gosh, what if they were engaged, but now they’re enemies?! Oh, the drama!

Second Read/ Focal Point = Girl freaking out about it. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Another typical use of two focal points is the situation of a character looking at particular location:

In this short animated film by Pixar, the setting is a magician’s dressing room, the main character rabbit in his cage, and the rabbit’s desire—the carrot— are introduced in one shot. (Do not attempt this at home.) What’s tricky with multiple focal points is to make sure each one is seen. For that, a “path” for eye movement needs to be designed. Different devices are used to bring attention to each one. The poster of the magician has the most contrast and is the highest thing in the shot. There’s a spotlight on the carrot, but the carrot generally points to the rabbit which dominates most of the space. The words on the poster also

draw our attention, and then lead to the picture of the magician again. This all happens in under one second. Yet, if the carrot was pointed in the other direction, it interrupts the flow and visually cuts the image in half.

Both the character and the location have elements that make us want to look at them. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Let’s finish off this section by looking at more examples! How many reads/ focal points stand out to you? Is there a visual path for your eye to move around the image?

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Sequential Story Angles While sketching out your own thumbnails, there’s probably a lot going on in your mind. Gravity

2 point perspective? 3 point perspective? Looking up? Looking down? Close up? Full shot? What about staging and composition? (Are my drawing skills even good enough to make the angle I see in my mind?!)

Instead of trying to decide the perspective first, think of the story first. What’s happening in the scene? It’s sometimes called a “story beat.” Something that need to happen in order for the story to progress. When including a story beat in film or comics, there’s a reason behind it. The reason generally falls into one of these four categories: ** Location To understand the environment. Example: A busy street corner in a big city.

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** Fact/Action The actions needed to progress the story. Example: A tramp buys a flower.

** Emotion To understand the character’s thoughts and feelings. Ex: The grateful vendor tries to locate the customer by touch and the tramp realizes the flower vendor is blind.

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** Symbolism/Theme Reoccurring objects and/or colors to represent an idea. Example: A single flower symbolizes the theme of unconditional love between the tramp and the flower vendor throughout this film.

Let’s say I’m drawing my own comic, and there’s a part in a story where a peaceful pirate is forced to take his captain hostage.

From an emotional view, we’d have to get closer to be able to see that the pirate doesn’t really want to hurt his captain, and the captain knew about it all along, so he’s got a backup plan. What we wouldn’t know is where exactly this is taking place.

Fact/Action

Visual stories use these four things to follow the cast through a series of events in a variety of locations that will probably change the characters in some way, and will present an overall idea, theme, or message to the viewer that is applicable to life in general... but, how to apply it?

From a Fact or Action set-up, we see what’s happening, but not necessarily what the characters are feeling.

Location In the dark belly of a pirate ship with no escape is felt from a location shot. (Suspense and thriller films go to great lengths to immerse the viewer in the surroundings of a haunted house, or the thought that aliens are hiding in a corn field.)

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It’s like saying “Is Tokyo or Paris the right answer?” Well, which country’s capital city are you trying to name? Symbolic Symbolic shots are tricky because depending on the theme or symbolism you’ve set up in your story, these types of shots will greatly differ. In this case of being seemingly at the brink of death, a symbolic shot might focus on a cat cornering a mouse to mirror the situation of the pirates. So which one is right for my comic? Honestly, at this point there is no right answer because I haven’t defined what I want my audience to experience.

?

?

Likewise: “Is an emotion shot or a location shot the right answer?” Impossible to say until the goal is known. Let’s take a look at those pirate shots again with a line of dialog. Sorry, Captain. I have no choice. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Sorry, Captain. I have no choice.

Sorry, Captain. I have no choice.

If my goal was to show the remorse of the pirate, I’d choose the emotion shot that shows it. If my goal was to make the audience think that the captain was actually taken hostage, I’d probably use the location shot that hides most of the details of the action and emotion. 32

The next few examples are going to be based off the same scene from the Fullmetal Alchemist manga by Hiromu Arakawa. (Please don’t expect me to draw exactly like she does... You’ve seen how I sketch. It isn’t pretty... ) ಥ_ಥ

Start here! 2. FACT

1. STORY BEAT:LOCATION

(Psst! Read from right to left) 3. By showing the interior location and characters in the scene, we get a sense of position. This would be important for an upcoming action scene, but it’s not necessary for a dialogue scene when we want to know about expressions. 5. When you have characters who don’t show emotion openly, like Jean Havoc (guy with the cigarette. Don’t smoke, kids!) they usually don’t require emotion shots to deliver their lines.

1. By starting with the exterior of the location, a lot of info is missing for the reader. Who is speaking? What are they speaking about? This kind of anticipation to find out what happens next can be both thrilling or irritating depending on how often it’s used. 2. In this case, the very next panel reveals what the dialogue refers to: a puppy!

3. LOCATION

5. EMOTION Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

4. ACTION

4. By using an action of picking up the puppy with the dialogue “I’m so sorry!” it makes the shot overly dramatic, and jars the flow of the story which is primarily casual dialogue. 33

Example #2 2. Officer Farman in an “emotional” shot. Like Jean Havoc, this character doesn’t have many expressions, so to use a emotion shot on just him is a bit of a moot point.

2. EMOTION

1. STORY BEAT:FACT

3. To see the puppy in this shot feels a little pointless... what new information are we getting visually? None really...

3. FACT

5. Ending on a location is tricky. Are they currently inside this building? Or, is this the dorm Sergeant Fury was talking about? 5. LOCATION

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4. FACT

1. By starting with the factual shot of the officers on the right and the puppy on the left, the visual idea that is being pointed out as the most important is that the puppy is small, but that doesn’t actually have anything to do with the story.

4. When we introduce a new character into the scene, we generally want to know what they look like with an emotion/ close up shot, but this shot is giving us the opposite, where we can’t see his expression, and the others are so far away, we can’t read their expressions either, so... it’s just a boring fact that they’re standing and talking. 34

And finally, here’s how Arakawa did it! 2. Uh-oh, Hawkeye is obviously not happy. Supporting characters are also shown in the background.

2. EMOTION, FACT

1. STORY BEAT: FACT

3. A lot of dialog, with a wellplanned profile emotion shot that uses less visible space than seeing the faces from front views. 3. EMOTION

5. At this point we’ve seen a lot of faces, and both characters’ body language/actions are communicating much more about the protection and idle curiosity of the puppy than facial expressions would.

5. ACTION, LOCATION Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

4. EMOTION, ACTION

1. By starting with the topic of the side story, Arakawa sets the tone of the story right away. “No explosions this week, readers, it’s puppy time!”

4. This shot is the perfect example of “show, don’t tell.” We can see that Sgt. Fury is returning from gathering puppy care supplies so no one has to say “Sgt. Fury! Where have you been?” We can also see his expression as he tries to avoid getting in trouble with his superior officers. 35

Interesting, isn’t it? The same dialog, same actions, same characters, but different feelings based on the angles chosen. Side by side like this, it’s easy to see how much better Arakawa’s version is since she chose angles based on the story.

There’s more to story angles than just story beats though! Next section has handy info on directional design, camera tilts, and frame dominance! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Single MOMENT Story ANGLES If you’re only doing a single illustration, photograph, or painting, you’re limited to a single moment. Without the luxury of running time, dialogue or sequential images to set up symbolism and character arcs, how do you choose which angle to use?

Direction Design is a good starting point. All compositions can be generalized into just 3 variations (or 4 depending on how you like to count the diagonal ones): horizontal, vertical and diagonal.

Horizontal gives off a feeling of stability, peace, isolation, or stillness/death.

In paintings, the most widely used tool for conveying a certain emotion or feeling is based in the psychology of visual composition.

Vertical gives a feeling of order, structure, or a little bit of danger from its application to heights and gravity.

Gadzooks! More long, boring words! So frustrated I’m going to flip this drawing table! (ノಠAಠ)ノ彡┻━┻

Diagonal gives the feeling of danger, speed/urgency, instability, or challenge.

Calmness, my art bro, it’s easier than it sounds. (~ ╯u╰)~

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Take a look at this set of snowy mountains all using different direction design. Diagonal

Vertical

Horizontal

The diagonal one is full of danger and excitement. The horizontal one is totally chill. The vertical one seems a little mysterious maybe, but not really threatening. Some might argue that it’s the characters setting the tone of the shot, not the directional design. So check this out: The stone guy in the horizontal example feels a bit more ominous when set at a diagonal.

The battle isn’t nearly as thrilling when vertical and on stable ground. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

The mystery of the vertical one is all gone if we change it to horizontal.

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By the way, this Direction Design doesn’t have anything to do with camera tilt—like looking up or looking down—only the 2D directional lines or implied lines that come from the 2D elements of a composition. Blah blah blah, look at these visual examples instead:

In this first example, we’re looking up at the waterfalls. In the second example we’re looking down on the city, but the directional composition lines in orange are still vertical for both pieces. There is a different reason for choosing a Camera Tilt: When we look up at something, we feel small. It’s why Superheroes, and other admirable icons are typically staged in the heroic “up shot”. We are literally and figuratively looking up to them.

#1 Don’t worry, we got this!

#2

Movie posters also fake the up shot by arranging the character pictures to mimic an up shot with the middle person being the highest, and the Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

side characters getting progressively smaller.

Looking down has the opposite effect. The viewer is in a superior position looking down on them, again, both literally and figuratively on the characters. The same Power Rangers that looked like they could take down the intergalactic bad guys before, don’t look so confident when we look down on them.

We’re doomed!

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SMILE!!

But... We’re wearing helmets.

(They’re rather blah straight on too.) I’m going to throw one last concept at you: Frame Dominance. It’s in regard to how much a subject fills the frame, or composition. Classic example is the poster for Jaws. Having the shark at a vertical direction isn’t all that dynamic, but the sheer size of him compared to

the swimmer is what makes him feel like such a big threat and scary to boot! Tremors used the same idea for their giant monster worms. When Frodo is near Mount Doom and encounters Shelob the spider, it’s in up shot:

Wow, that’s a lot to think about, for story angles, right? Let’s recap! Story Beats: Location (the where), action (the what happened), emotion (the character/s), symbolic (the message) Direction Design: horizontal (calm), vertical (slightly dynamic), diagonal (most dynamic) Camera Tilt: Up shot (character is generally powerful looking) or down shot (character is generally weak looking) Frame Dominance: the subject that takes up the most space seems the most powerful.

Normally a shot that would make Frodo look heroic. Yet, since it’s in a diagonal design (Danger!) and Shelob dominates more of the frame than Frodo does, he seems weak. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

As you saw with the Frodo example, if you have two or more things supporting one idea, it can override the “odd one out” that supports a different idea. 40

For instance, if you have horizontal design, but there’s a huge character dominating the frame and doing a high energy action, the horizontal design won’t feel as calm and relaxed anymore. That’s exactly what happens in one of the sequences in Evangelion 2.22, pictured below. The directional design is horizontal with the fairly flat mountain range, level city buildings and straight on camera angle. Normally, that would be very calm, except that we have

a giant robot running full speed. The action and frame dominance overrides the serenity of the horizontal design. This “2 overrides 1” principle is what saves us from being locked in to choosing the same types of shots every single time and let’s us develop a composition style of our own.

and still make them seem powerful, you can do it! You just have to choose two other things that equate power. Like, diagonal design + frame dominance. Or, frame dominance + power poses like this one:

For instance, if you want to use a down shot on your hero characters

Now that your brain is soaking in all of this story angle knowledge, let’s look at more examples and analyze the choices made by the artist.

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Story Beat: location, action Direction Design: diagonal Camera Tilt: down shot Frame Dominance: environment A down shot should make him weak, but because of the diagonal designs, and actions of summoning his powers, the character seems more mysterious and mystical.

Story Beat: action Direction Design: vertical Camera Tilt: up shot Frame Dominance: character The character is preparing to battle, and is dominating the frame which both support the feeling of power. The camera tilting up also gives the feeling of power. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Story Beat: location, emotion Direction Design: neutral (it has an equal amount of both vertical and horizontal elements) Camera Tilt: down shot Frame Dominance: environment The open space, looking down, and lack of strong direction design makes it feel quiet. All of that quietness lets the subtle emotional tension between the characters’ body language shine the brightest in the piece. 42

Story Beat: action, location Direction Design: diagonal Camera Tilt: none Frame Dominance: characters The diagonal design adds just enough tension that it feels as though a monster will pop out at any second!

Story Beat: action, location Direction: horizontal (Lots of vertical figures, but they all line up horizontally) Camera Tilt: up shot Frame Dominance: characters If we analyze the choices of up shot, and characters dominating the frame, it should feel like the hero archers are unstoppable. However, instead of seeing their determined faces, we only see their backs and their approaching enemies which puts kind of a downer on it. Despite the warships being small in the frame, there’s a lot of them. The odds seem to be pretty bad for the archers, but since they are ready to fight, it feels like some or all of the heroes may be defeated in the upcoming battle! (Oh no! oAo ) Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Story Beat: action Direction Design: horizontal Camera Tilt: none Frame Dominance: environment Story Beat: action, location Direction Design: diagonal Camera Tilt: up shot Frame Dominance: monsters The heroes are small in the frame, overpowered by the monsters surrounding them. A dangerous situation using a diagonal design to show that. The up shot of the main monster makes him feel the most powerful. So exciting!

Story Beat: action Direction Design: diagonal Camera Tilt: down shot Frame Dominance: characters Despite it being a down shot, Hulk still seems plenty powerful by being the dominating shape and having the most extreme emotion. The diagonal adds the danger and high energy. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

This image captures the feeling of summer vacation and freedom by using a low horizon line so that we see only a little bit of grass and a LOT of sky. The kids running aren’t enough to overpower all the calm and peace that surrounds and supports them. Do you think they are returning home or going somewhere? Reading direction has a strong influence over this. Left to right readers like English) may feel like they are returning. Right to left (like Japanese) will feel they’re going. 44

Let’s try one from scratch with a generic scenario of warrior vs. monster. The most basic set up would be horizontal, no camera tilt, neutral everything.

A tiny bit better, the hero looks a little more ready to fight. Diagonal the other way and the monster looks like he has the upper hand.

Over the monster’s shoulder we’ll get a down shot of the warrior looking small and weak.

Look like plastic action figures, don’t they? Diagonal direction design adds intensity so let’s do that.

If we put the camera behind the hero from this angle we’ll get this:

Eep! Scary! A great up shot if you want the monster to look super strong and terrifying! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

The hero seems to have a fighting chance with the diagonal direction on his side and the up shot making him look more heroic.

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If you really want the hero to look like he’s at a disadvantage, you can also use the monster as a foreground element to completely “trap” the hero. Like so.

It’s common in Japanese visual storytelling to show strength through lack of motion rather than large combative motion. Try it now and then.

Looking down on both of them has a bit of a security camera feeling. Whoever is higher in the frame seems to have a little bit of an advantage though. Compare to when the monster is higher up in the composition:

If you want to see both the entire action, you’ll likely have to go back to the very first set up, but will have to make the action poses and camera tilt support the high energy moment.

Hopefully the examples of story beats, direction design, camera tilt and frame domination have taken away some of the random guess work as to what kind of angle you should choose for a particular illustration. I highly recommend that you try rewatching some of your favorite anime episodes, movies, or reread a

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favorite comic or manga. Look at them with an analytic eye and observe how artists that you admire either follow or break the things that we’ve studied in this section.

“Drawing is not what one sees, but what one can make others see.”

If I failed to explain everything clearly and you’re still confused, no worries, just shoot me an e-mail with your question or the part that you don’t understand, and I’ll make sure you get some help.

-Edgar Degas (He’s most well-known for his ballet paintings and sculpture.)

❀◕ ‿ ◕❀

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STAGE 2: STORY SPECIFICS After you’ve gotten your story and thumbnails chosen, we need to go a bit further into the specifics of what things should look like. Otherwise known as “design.” Design is a huge, fascinating industry on its own. Fashion design, graphic design, industrial design, character design, creature design, prop design, automotive design, and on, and on, and on. “So, why isn’t this section called Stage 2: Design?” You might be wondering. (Or not, but I’m going to tell you anyway.) The reason it’s called Story Specifics is because I want you to hang on tight to your story while you make your decisions about design and style. Should the chair be simple or fancy? Should the floor be hardwood or carpet? Should the windows be round or square? These kinds of choices should have answers related to the story and characters: A big comfy chair because he loves reading his books. A luxurious carpet because she’s a princess. Small, round windows because they let in less sunlight that could damage the potions. Done. So easy because the story and characters practically make the decisions for you.

SPARK & SCRAP BOARDS A Spark Board is a collection of visual or audible stimuli which act as a catalyst for a specific creative expression. In other words, it’s a bunch of stuff that gives you inspiration, motivation and direction for making other stuff. Early on, Elsa’s design for “Frozen” was inspired by Amy Winehouse’s deep, soulful voice. (♪ She kept telling me to build a snowman, so I Let It Go, Go, Go! ♪)

What do you put on a Spark Board? Anything that gives you an idea! Maybe it’s a piece of song lyric, a quote, fashion/costumes, specific architecture, a still frame from a movie, an actor/actress, someone else’s art— anything that makes you think about a particular illustration idea or story project. Some might call it a Mood Board, but I prefer the word “spark” and how it perfectly describes how 99% of the time I’m doing a mundane (yet necessary) thing when I suddenly see or hear something that sparks an idea. I can’t just quit my current task, but I don’t want to lose that spark of an idea, so I save it on a Spark Board.

A 1954 Kurosawa film about seven samurai, inspired a Sturges 1960 film about seven cowboys, which inspired a Fuqua 2016 film remake of Sturges’ film.

images/links to songs or videos from anywhere on the internet and make as many boards as you want.

I looooove using Pinterest.com for my Spark Boards, since you can “pin” 49

The other is a Scrap Board. A collection of factual, historical, and explanatory images. I urge you to look at sources that were created at least 20 years before you were born and/or not made in your native country.

For example, artist, Iain McCaig, and Costume Designer, Trisha Biggar, looked at traditional hairstyles, cosmetics, and garments from many cultures to create looks for Queen Amidala in the Star Wars prequels:

If we all take inspiration from what we’ve grown up with, we’re all going to end up with the same sources. Boring!

The Spark, for what would be 7 novels following Harry Potter, happened when author, J.K. Rowling, was delayed on a train in 1990. She spent the next 5 years cultivating that spark.

Lipstick from the Qing Dynasty.

Hopi Tribe

Russian

Mongolian

Before you start accusing Star Wars of design theft or call them lazy hacks, read Steal Like An Artist. (I’ll probably say that like 20 times in this book.)

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Getting back to my example, if I loved Queen Amidala’s costumes so much that they inspired me to make my own character, of course, I’ll use photos of Amidala’s costumes on my Spark Board. However, if I use her for my Scrap Board, I’m really limited with McCaig/Biggar’s simplified version of the Mongolian influence:

Here’s some of what I found from image searching “Mongolian garments”:

Symmetrical arch motif Strong vertical lines

Applique rose-like decoration

Not good for Scrap Board Only 6 things to apply to a new design while trying not to rip off McCaig & Biggar.

Warm color palette

Heavy texture Asymmetrical

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More colors! More shapes! More bead work! More textures! More patterns! More inspiration!

Great for Scrap Board 51

While I was doing research on the subject of inspiration, I found out that Quentin Tarentino is the most commonly named influence for filming style. (Even more than Alfred Hitchcock!) Naturally, I wanted to know, “Where does Tarantino get his inspiration for film style?” According to Wikipedia, he says his creative spark comes from music! He imagines the cinematography while listening to music. I’m sure many people do that while listening to music, but only a

small handful of people (like Tarantino) actually follow through to feed that spark and let it burn long and hot enough to make something. The rest of us let the sparks stay in the confines of our minds, not that different from a candle flame in a bottle that eventually burns out if it doesn’t get some air. Like Tarantino not limiting his inspiration to other films, your art will be much richer and more creative if you explore outside of your chosen craft. Expose yourself to a variety of different arts, cultures, and sciences.

far and wide in this big ol’ world of ours! Now that you’re all pumped to start Spark & Scrap Boarding, a warning: You are not actually “working on a project” when you’re gathering your sparks or reference images. You are preparing to work on your project. Mind yourself so that you don’t spend all day collecting images and end up drawing nothing. Not that I’ve ever done that... *nervous whistle* 9.9; Looks like these two could be from the same anime, but they aren’t. They need some spark.

Anime artists that ONLY study other anime artists are going to be stuck in the limited world of anime art. The intention is usually to be “authentic” but it gets generic very quickly. Don’t limit yourself! Discover sparks Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Try it! Step 1: Choose one of the prompts below or make your own: ** Pizza Delivery Ninja ** Angel Taxi Driver ** Monster Teacher ** Zombie Cowboy ** Vampire Principal

Step 2: Gather 30 images that relate to your prompt by using a search engine, or Pinterest.com. Don’t worry about sorting them into Sparks or Scraps, just gather them all in one place first.

Step 3: Sort your images into inspirational (Sparks) and visual reference (Scraps). Sparks

Example: Robot Librarian

** Dragon Tamer School ** Theme Park for Cats ** Tooth Fairy Dental Office ** Space Diner

Scraps

By separating out the images, it’s easier to tell that my robot is going to look more like the ones Scrap board, but it will have the inspiration/ personality of the images in the Spark board.

By the way, 10-30 images are usually the best. Less than 10 doesn’t give a clear enough idea. Over 30 and you’ll have so many ideas that you’ll lose the focus. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Betsy’s demo spark board Woodland. fantasy.

Anthropomorphic skunk. Brews and sells medicinal potions. lives in a tree.

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Betsy’s Character from spark board

Corso Nothing visually copied from my Spark Board, but I was inspired to make this character from that Spark Board. 55

Betsy’s scrap board

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Props created from scrap board +

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Plus it & ratio As you saw from my Scrap Board, I don’t just straight up copy an item from one of my references. I try to find two or more that I like and combine them into something new. The process is sometimes called “Plussing” or, “Plus it.”

was to retell Treasure Island, a traditional tale of sea pirates and buried treasure, in the setting of outer space. But how much of the design should be traditional pirate and how much should be sciencefantasy?

are based in the past and 30% in sci-fantasy future. They chose this ratio because they wanted the audience to feel familiar with the image of a pirate ship, and only when looking closer would they reveal solar sails or rockets.

However, you don’t want to take 50% of this and 50% of that and end up with an equal mix of the two. That’s almost as bad as straight up copying. When you combine two or more things, it’s better to do one of the things at least 60% for stronger direction. For instance, in Disney’s Treasure Planet, the goal

Directors John Musker and Ron Clements suggested the “70/30” approach for the art direction. 70% of the inspiration for sets and props

Another take on this same space pirate combo is Space Pirate Captain Harlock. His ship looks nothing like a traditional pirate ship aside from the skull and crossbones motif. You could probably say Harlock designs are 70% sci-fantasy and 30% pirate. 58

I’ve been incredibly impressed with the designs in the video game, Splatoon, which has 60% Urban culture plus 30% squid/oceanic theme plus 10% traditional Japanese culture icons for a basic shooter game. They stick to their inspirations so well! Every single design is mostly Urban, some ocean, and sometimes a little Japanese. Mad respect, yo!

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More examples!

Samurai + Hip Hop Culture

Turtles + Ninjas + Mutant + Teenage

Wizards/Witches + Boarding School

Death + Matrimony

Martial Arts + Elemental Magic

Super villain + Clown Take moment to think about the sources of some of your favorite movies, TV shows, or video games. Which one is the main influence (60% or more) and which one(s) are plussing it?

Warrior + Princess Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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CULTURAL Shape Identity Each culture has its own characteristics and standards for language, fashion, food, beauty, measurement of wealth, among many other things. As artists and illustrators, we tend to default to our own culture’s standards. It wasn’t until I started watching more Eastern films that I realized something rather interesting about thrones, one of the oldest symbols of power and wealth in the history of humanity. In most Western hemisphere style throne rooms, the throne is very tall:

Thrones in Sleeping Beauty.

Thrones in Narnia.

Chinese throne in Mulan.

Back of the throne in Gondor. Lord of the Rings. Yet, in Eastern style throne rooms, the thrones are typically very wide:

Korean throne from Damo.

Mongolian throne in Marco Polo.

Indian throne in Jodhaa Akbar. 61

When you are creating your own fictional cultures, it will add a lot of believability if you set up the shape identity for different cultures. For instance, in The Lord of the Rings, we quickly associate garden greenery and roundness with Hobbits.

Underground, chiseled angles are for Dwarves.

Rustic peaked roofs and horse themes with the human horse-masters of Rohan.

Grand nature, delicate colors, woven curves are obviously the Elves. Yet, a different human kingdom of Minis Tirith with its very tall shapes that climb the mountainside.

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Because of this shape identity, when we see a blade like this:

We already know that the Hobbit culture did not make it. We did not make that.

Below are some items that have simple, friendly shapes, made with gardeny materials. Must be Hobbit-made.

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Shapes are also important for logos, emblems and related “branding” for a culture as well. The Star Trek versus Star Wars debate is one which will live on for generations, but one thing that

I think Star Trek beat Star Wars at was the emblem designs representing alien cultures, and organizations. Star Trek symbols have a huge variety in shapes, variety of detail,

Dominion

Andorian Empire

Ferengi

Star Fleet

Cardassian Union

Iyaaran

Angelone

Aldean

Tkon

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and variety in use of positive and negative space. It’s easy to imagine that these are alien cultures with different beliefs, customs, and goals.

Borg

Breen Confederation

Klingon

Romulan

United Federation of Planets

Vulcan

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Visually, this makes it look like all Jedi are Rebels and all Rebels are Jedi... but they aren’t.

Good guys, bad guys and neutrals all use circles.

Star Wars on the other hand... has a lot of circles. Honestly, if I were trying to brand myself as a Rebel against the Empire, I wouldn’t have used the same primary circular shape. What really confuses me is why the New Jedi Order has the Rebel Alliance symbol slapped on top.

I understand that Luke was a Rebel and oversaw the New Jedi Order (according to Wookiepedia), but being a Rebel and being a Jedi are two way different things, right? You could argue that Luke doesn’t know how to design logos— all right, moving on. Why do the Mandalorians use circular designs too? Yeah, they’ve got lots of spikes, but they’re still circles. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Mandalorians have nothing to do with either Empire or Rebels. What seems more likely, is that there’s a Star Wars game out there that needs interchangeable icons for the player’s allegiance. All these circles visually communicate that these are different sub-units of a single organization, which isn’t true.

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Division of an overall larger group isn’t always a bad thing. In fact, sometimes it’s exactly what you want. Consider the 4 houses of Hogwarts in Harry Potter.

Avatar the Last Airbender is an interesting case in which there are a few different sets of symbols to define each nation/element. On the Avatar world map, simplified Chinese characters were used, for water, earth, fire, and air.

The symbols for each nation (in color below) were more specific on each culture’s aesthetic and principles. Left to right: Water Tribe-flow & adaptability, Earth Kingdom-strength & security, Fire Nation-abundance & ambition, Air Nomads-harmony & enlightenment.

All 4 were have said to have been made by British wizards and witches, and they are 4 different sections of one school, so it makes sense that they all have roughly the same shape and design (and yet still had more variation than Star Wars! Just saying it like it is. I still love you, Star Wars.)

The element symbols (above) are the most cohesive symbols despite being different shapes because of the swirl that is used in each of them. It sends the visual message that all elements come from a universal energy source. Shape is powerful! Use it to identify your character’s culture! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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if these walls could talk When drawing an interior we might end up with the “Floor Model” problem. There’s definitely functional furniture in the room, storage, wall decorations, knickknacks like books and all that good stuff, but it feels like no one actually lives there. Think about it as if these walls could tell you about the person who lived there. What would they say? The first one says “This character really likes lime green + purple and jigsaw puzzle motifs.” The second says “This couple likes butterfly photos and drawers.” The third says “This person never uses anything on those shelves and uses the laptop on the floor.”

But what story do they tell? What year is this? What country is this? Who lives here? Is this person young, old, or somewhere in between? Do they have a dream? Fears? Issues? All of that information will dictate a ton about what the room will look like, because in the fictional world, characters are surrounded only by things that reveal the following about their character: ** What they love ** What they use ** What they aspire to be ** What confines them I claim this only happens in the fictional world, because I have had the actual experience of someone who didn’t know me looking at my room to deduce what I was like by 66

the things in there. In reality, my room was basically storage for some textbooks and other things that didn’t have any other place to go in the house. This person saw these textbooks in my bookcase and said “Wow, you must really love Math!” and I snort-laughed because nothing could be further from the truth.

well as reveals how a thief would make a security system to beat another thief: Just don’t give them a place to hide. All of Parker’s tools and equipment are laid out in neat rows so she can tell in an instant if anything was taken or moved.

But check out this fictional example:

This is the room / home of Parker the thief on one of my favorite TV shows, Leverage. She only uses a small space in the middle of her house which happens to be a warehouse. I thought it was brilliant. It shows her love for concealing darkness as

The only things unrelated to Parker’s work are the boxes of cereal and the stuffed rabbit toy on the bed.

The rabbit is the only thing Parker took with her when she left her abusive home as a young girl. Why does she still have it as an adult? In my opinion, she loves it. It was the only thing she considered to be family. The cereal, to me, represents the childhood that she was robbed of when she taken in to be trained as a thief. (Ironic, huh?) It could also be a nod to why Parker’s kind of crazy, like she’s on a sugar-high all the time. Regardless of what the viewer thinks it means, it will mean something if you include it. In Parker’s case, her room talks mostly about what she uses (thieving tools) with a little bit about what confines her emotionally (security and trust issues) and what she loves (rabbit toy & cereal).

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Here’s another example:

Yes, this man is sleeping in his bathtub. It’s a screen shot from the Korean drama, It’s Okay, That’s Love. (It’s kind if a heavy, strange show about how the human brain creates phobias, hallucinations, and such as a way to cope with severe trauma or guilt. I don’t really recommend it to everyone... @_@; )

character. The bedding in the bathtub is evidence of the psychological childhood trauma that still confines him as an adult. He’s also has obsessive-compulsive disorder which is partly shown through his a strict color palette that includes only white, black, red, blue, and yellow. To contrast that, the love interest, Haesoo, is a psychiatrist who works so much that she has a rather bland, mismatched room, with only a dominating photograph of a particular location that she loves.

At a certain point in the story after the two have started dating, Haesoo is struggling to understand Jaeyeol’s mental illness, but he’s chosen to distance himself from her. Feeling helpless and powerless, the only way she feels she can get closer to understanding him is to spend time in his old room, and even tries sleeping in his bed/bathtub.

(Oh the drama! Oh the feels! ಥ~ಥ )

This man in the tub, Jaeyeol, escaped being beaten to death as a child by hiding in an outhouse. Since then, the only place that feels safe enough for him to sleep is in a locked bathroom. Most definitely farfetched, but that room says a great deal about his

If either of those rooms had 5 math books in it, your first thought would be that they have a connection to math, not that someone else needed to store their textbooks in their rooms. ¬_¬; Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Granted, those are pretty extreme examples. Perhaps your character is not involved in theft and/or dealing with psychological trauma, but is just a fairly normal human-ish character trying to figure out what to do with his/her life.

Little boy Andy’s room from Toy Story 2.

Concept art of Princess Anna’s room from Frozen.

Let’s look at more examples of such characters and their rooms:

College student Andy’s room from Toy Story 3.

High school student Yui’s room from K-ON.

High school student Haru’s room from The Cat Returns. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Orphaned boy-ninja Naruto’s room

Gamer dude Mordecai’s room from Regular Show. 69

Normally, you might assume the more possessions a character has, the wealthier they are.

Anna’s Room

Yet, if you study Princess Anna’s room, it’s rather sparse. Yui’s and Haru’s rooms are full of things, but they don’t seem that rich. How does that work? It’s the design of the space and the objects, as well as the cultural standards of wealth. Anna’s room is spacious, has a tall ceiling, large windows, tall chairs, a huge painting, a chandelier and that typical princess-canopy curtain thing over her bed. All of that is difficult to install and expensive to produce.

Yui and Haru’s Rooms

Haru and Yui on the other hand have small rooms with furniture and items that look inexpensive and functional. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

As a little boy, we can see Andy loves cowboys and astronauts. He may even want to be a cowboy or astronaut when he grows up! There’s nothing that confines him, and he mostly uses his toys.

As a high school grad, Andy has surrounded himself with his new interests of skateboarding, rock’n’roll, sports cars and monster movies. He even partially covered up the Buzz Lightyear poster. 70

A visual item of confinement also makes its appearance! A white board with a grid of the days of the week show Andy is now confined by his schedule and isn’t free to play like he was when he was younger. The games and toys he used to play with daily on the shelves are now replaced with books and equipment for his other hobbies.

Even if your character doesn’t have many belongings, you can still show what they love, use, aspire to be and are confined by. Naruto’s room is rather sparse, but the only two images on the wall are the mark of his dream to be the leader of the hidden leaf clan, and his first true love: ramen. There’s an alarm clock, and laundry line which he uses.

loneliness. There is only one small bed here, and although it is difficult to see, his empty noodle cartons are still on the floor, so there’s definitely no one around to cook for him, or make sure he cleans up after himself. Is it just me, or does it feel like the plant in the corner and the two furniture units were just left there by the previous owner? You can design little things like that which are quite subtle, but because of your story and characters, they make perfect sense.

Although it may not be obvious right away, Naruto is confined by his Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Try it!

OR TRY THIS!

OR tHIS!

See what you can, (or can’t) deduce from the following rooms about what the character uses, loves, aspires to be, or is confined by. (Bonus points for time period or genre!)

Challenge yourself to draw a room based off of a character, or, a character based off of a room.

If you have a drawing buddy, you can each design a character, then design a room based on your buddy’s character. It also works if you both draw rooms and then swap.

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Try it!

Uses? Loves? Aspires to be? Confined by?

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Try it!

Uses? Loves? Aspires to be? Confined by?

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PROPORTIONS & SCALE Characters and their backgrounds are more alike and affect each other more than you might think. Two of the reasons are proportion and scale. Proportion is the size of a part as it relates to its whole.

Scale is the size of a whole as it relates to another whole. You could have built the perfectly proportioned doghouse, but if it wasn’t in scale with your dog, you would have a problem.

Is this a big nose? No one knows until we know whose nose! Hah! (I’m so easily entertained.) Actually, it’s a pretty enlightening little experiment to doodle two identical noses and try to make them look big or small depending on the proportion of the rest of the facial features.

Quite often I see artists struggling with backgrounds because they draw them “as they are” and don’t take their own story or style proportions into consideration. For instance, let’s say there are two family-friendly, animated movies that take place in ancient China about a main character who doesn’t fit in at first, but must save China

from a fearsome enemy threatening peace, and in doing so, prove their worth to everyone. One is Mulan, the Other is Kung Fu Panda.

The Emperor’s Palace in Mulan has proportions wider than they are tall, giving a sense of weight and power.

Kung Fu Panda wanted to emphasize the high level of training at the Jade Palace, so they made their proportions tall, stacked, and at the top of a mountain to boot. 75

Backgrounds and props should fit your characters as well as their clothes do. The first 3D version of Link from The Legend of Zelda games, wasn’t too far off from a regular human-like body proportion and scale. Then all of a sudden, we were introduced to “Toon Link.” The chibi, pocket-sized version of Link in the game The Wind Waker.

average human of the same height. Stairs and ladders have very small rises to accommodate the short legs.

interesting that nothing is perfectly vertical. The wedge shapes and unevenness of the buildings are whimsical and playful. Exact opposite is the design of TRON: Uprising. Short torsos with legs that go on for days.

The door and banister posts are short and stubby.

Obviously, new background designs needed to be made. The best thing about it was how apparent that the backgrounds were made by people who were not only small, but had proportionally shorter legs than an

The bigger ramp planks are thick and chunky to look stubby at a larger scale. All of that mirrors the proportions of Toon Link. It’s also Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Now, imagine there’s a scene where a character is sitting in a chair. Scale and proportion are going to be very, very important!

and have the same feeling of being lean and sleek.

In the real world, chairs have to be able to support the back of the thighs plus the gluteus maximus. The chair back usually stop just below the shoulders. Yet, if we were to follow the rules of the real world, we would end up with this:

Even if it doesn’t fit with real life standards, a chair in the TRON world should look more like this:

Not very TRON-esque looking, but all kinds of lame and boring.

I bet he hits his head on this...

The proportion ratio of TRON: Uprising is all about being thin and tall like the characters are. Obviously, the buildings are very tall

Ideally, a background style should be just as recognizable as the style of characters that populate them. I follow a lot of animation art blogs that show backgrounds. Even if I don’t watch/like the cartoon, I can usually tell where it came from. Try it for yourself, match the characters with the backgrounds that share their proportions.

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Proportion will be a memorable factor in defining your art style. What specific things come to mind about the following artists or their work?

TRY IT!

Chair Flair 1. Choose a character.

(If you don’t recognize a name/work, skip it and research it later.)

Hiromu Arakawa * Fullmetal Alchemist Don Bluth * An American Tail, Anastasia Tim Burton * Nightmare Before Christmas Walt Disney * Mickey Mouse, Oswald the Rabbit Lauren Faust * My Little Ponies: Friendship is Magic Carter Goodrich * Brave, Despicable Me Byron Howard * Bolt, Tangled Nico Marlet * Kung Fu Panda Hayao Miyazaki * Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro Nick Park * Wallace & Gromit, Chicken Run Beatrix Potter * Tale of Peter Rabbit Genndy Tartakovsky * Dexter’s Lab, Samurai Jack Rumiko Takahashi * Ranma 1/2, Inuyasha Terryl Whitlatch * Jar Jar Binks, Star Wars beasts Ai Yazawa * Nana, Paradise Kiss

2. Find reference for a chair, either real life or in a photo, but not already drawn. 3. Apply the proportional style of the character or art style to the chair. Don’t change the elements that make up the chair, just change the proportions.

It’s likely you’ll remember proportional comparisons in the art style like, big eyes, long torsos, stubby legs, small feet, etc. Those proportions provide visual guidelines to help keep both the characters and props consistent. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Visual & Touchable Textures Yes, there are two kinds of texture! The first is the “touchable” texture which we all know and love. It’s the way something feels. Like this bumpy, rough tree bark:

The other is visual texture. Such as the wood grain pattern that appears when the wood is sanded smooth.

Polka dots are a visual texture.

Although, technically, they are ALL visual textures. You can’t feel the rough bark or the raised dots of the Braille by touching your screen, can you? By the magic of our eyes, brains, and memory bank built from touching things our entire lives, we start to recognize that if something looks sharp, it probably feels sharp. If something looks fluffy, it probably feels soft. Clouds are collections of water vapor:

Braille dots have a touchable texture, of course. But the saying “like sleeping on a cloud” means sleeping on something that feels nice and soft because our brains fill in the expectation of fluffiness.

It doesn’t mean a bed that feels like falling right through water vapor and plummeting to the earth... (eesh, rough night.) For 2D artists, all textures are visual textures, so the artist has to be aware of edge variety to help express if something is a touchable texture, or a visual texture. One of these blocks has stripes (visual), one has ridges (touchable).

It’s the exact same block, just the edge contour let’s us know if the texture is touchable or not. (Lighting also lets you know if something is touchable, but let’s just save that for the book on Lighting. ^_^) 79

So there’s the clue: Touchable texture is shown through edges (until we study lighting in a different book). Visual texture doesn’t alter the edge of an object, but it gives wonderful contrast and variety for our eyes to enjoy. This room has almost no texture. Everything is smooth, and for the most part, also blank.

This room has visual texture, like wallpaper stripes, heart sticker and fake brick wallpaper.

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This room has visible and touchable textures, like actual bricks, a puffy blanket, heart cutout, weird cutout for Teddy Bear and a furry rug.

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Now that you know the two type of textures, take a look at these examples and observe how visual and/or touchable textures are used to describe an environment.

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Try it!

or try this:

1. Sketch out a simple background, completely free of texture.

2. Trace or copy the background and add only visual texture, also known as patterns.

3. Trace or copy the blank version of the background again and only add touchable texture, also known as uneven edges. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Do an image search for the room you are drawing. (Examples: “Teen bed room ideas” or “family room interior decoration”) Write down all the visual and touchable textures that you can identify in two separate columns. Which has more? 82

STAGE 3: STORY DRAWING In this section we finally get into some of the nuts and bolts of perspective drawing, and I offer a few demonstrations for drawing various objects in multiple perspectives. You may think that everything will go smoothly, but in my experience, it never does. If you run into a problem, I’d encourage you to just flow with it. Let it be a mistake and learn from it. Perfection is an overrated illusion and the arch-nemesis of productivity. My top 3 favorite quotes about perfection: “The artist who aims at perfection in everything achieves nothing.” -Eugene Delacroix “Have no fear of perfection—you’ll never reach it.” -Salvador Dali “Don’t trust a perfect person and don’t trust a song that’s flawless.” -”Lane Boy”, 21 Pilots

Grid Basics For the sake of an easy example, let’s start from a top view looking down like a floor plan. The grid will only have two directions: X and Z.

All objects have these 3 dimensions. Like this beautifully simple Ponderosa coffee table for instance:

X

Z

You don’t need exact dimensions, by the way, I just listed them to give you an idea of the scale.

2 wide (“X”)

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1 wide (“X”)

It would get confusing trying to talk about a 2 square wide table being drawn only one square wide, huh? Especially when we get into more complex furniture. Even though it sounds more technical than it should be, it’s pretty useful to start thinking in terms of X, Y and Z. A 2x1 on the X axis will look like this:

1 deep (“Z”)

The table dimensions are 44” wide x 15” high x 28” deep (1.1m x 38.1cm x 71.1cm).

Again for simplification, let’s say this Ponderosa table is 2 squares wide by 1 square deep (abbreviated as 2x1). Most would assume you draw the table on the grid like this:

But what if you actually wanted the table’s position like this:

2 deep (“Z”)

All linear perspective grids use the 3 dimensions for which “3D” stands for: width (X), height (Y), and depth (Z).

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2x1 table on the Z axis will look like this:

This book is going to cover the 5 most commonly used types of grids/ perspective:

1 Point Perspective Grid One axis converges to a vanishing point. Typically, it’s the Z axis.

Isometric Perspective Grid (or 0 Point Perspective) None of the axes converge.

Z axis

1 inch

Next thing to know: Linear perspective grids are categorized by which axes converge into a vanishing point. If the axis doesn’t converge, the measurements stay true to real-life measurements like inches or centimeters. X axis 1 inch

1 in

X axis Z axis

not

1 inch

ch

When they do converge, we can no longer measure them with a ruler.

You may see 1 point perspective where the Y axis converges: 0 point perspective does not exist in the real world but is fabulous for using in assembly instructions (like for Legos), casual games were you build/arrange things like Farmville or The Sims. All the measurements stay accurate in 0 Point. No vanishing points. No distortion at all. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

In general, it usually looks strange. I don’t recommend it. 85

2 Point Perspective Vertical Grid The Y and Z axes converge. This is what happens when the camera (or your head) is tilted to look down from 1 point perspective.

You can also use it for looking up at a hovering table.

2 Point Perspective Horizontal Grid The X and Z axes converge to a left and right vanishing point.

Note that these two points usually have to be very, very far away to look natural. It usually isn’t practical to tape 3 or 4 more papers to the sides of your piece to be able to use actual vanishing points with a really long ruler. Setting up only a small part of the grid is much easier. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

3 Point Perspective Grid You guessed it! All 3 axes converge!

Same as 2 point horizontal, 3 point need the 3 vanishing points to be very, very, very far away from each other in order to be rid of the distortion. Most of the time it isn’t realistic for traditional artists (or digital ones) to set up an entire grid, because you’d need a really long straight edge to line up with the vanishing points. Luckily for us, we can easily set up a smaller portion of the grid.

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Try it!

Grid Identification Practice identifying what kinds of perspective grids might be used to recreate the following images. *Hint, there’s more than one right answer.

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“Answers”

subtle 3 point that could be a 2 point

Depending on the amount of simplification or stylization, different perspective grids can be use. Here are some possibilities. 1 point

1 point 2 point vertical, or 3 point

2 point

2 point

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Divide and Replicate If life were easy (and boring) every piece of furniture or measurement needed would be an even square... but it’s not like that.

Amazingly, this still works on our perspective-warped friends:

You could find horizontal thirds with a sideways “v”: 1/ 3 1/ 3

1/ 3

Some things are 1/4 of a square, 1/ 3, 1/ 2, or 9/ 16. Again, it would be easy if they were flat squares, but perspective makes a square look like this:

From there, you just divide the shape parallel to the x, y, or z axis. To find thirds, you put a “v” over the “x”. Like this:

. .

Or this: Which is why, sometimes, we need to unleash the power of Equal Division. By geometric law, if you draw an “x” from corner to corner of any rectangle you will find the center.

Depending on how many vanishing points are in a grid, these lines will converge at the vanishing point instead of being parallel.

Thirds happen where the “v” lines intersect the “x” lines. 1/ 3

1/ 3

1/ 3

Absolute center (half) Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

1/ 3 1/ 3

1/ 3

Believe it or not, there’s a web page with instructions on how to equally divide a rectangle from 1/2 to 1/25! I don’t know why you’d need to, but for reference, here’s it is: http://andreasaronsson.com/guides/ perspective-drawing/divide-intoequal-parts/ 89

The opposite to that process is called Equal Repetition. Let’s say you have the first box that you want to repeat:

Simply locate the center with an X and extend the middle line.

Then draw line through from the upper corner through the border mid-point on the edge.

Where that line crosses the bottom border, send a line up.

Repeat as many times as needed.

Just like Equal Division, this pattern works in liner perspective.

Also incredibly useful, but a little most complicated is repeating two different widths. For example, that motorcycle has two wheels about equal

the same size, but the part in the middle is wider than the wheel’s measurement, so equal repetition won’t work. We need a pattern repetition. In the flat version, a pattern repetition looks like this: (wheel)

(body)

Cross through the middle of the space in between.

Ta-da!

not equal Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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If that pattern needs to continue, such as in a white picket fence, prison bars or pillars it looks like this:

pillar

empty space

pillar

empty space

pillar

empty space

pillar Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Try it!

Designs in 3D Try drawing windows and a door on the boxes to the right based on the designs below. Use your powers of equal division and replication!

side

front

front

side

front

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side

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0 Point / Isometric Perspective

As mentioned before, Isometric perspective has no distortion, and is locked into this angle which can make it look a bit stiff. Here’s an example my sister drew for me in 2012 when I first taught a 0 point perspective class using the inspiration of The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. I still love this piece a lot because even though the Isometric

perspective can be spotted a mile away, the storytelling is so good that I don’t get distracted by the perspective at all. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

(A big help with making 0 point perspective more natural looking is having a foreground character or object.) 93

More examples of 0 point perspective. Notice that ones with people in them feel like they are part of a bigger story where as the empty house layout above just looks like an interior design concept for who knows what.

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Thumbnails for Isometric Perspective For all of the demonstrational pieces, I’ll be using the same tagline: Corso (the skunk) is stirring a medicinal potion in his tree house.

I set up as many thumbnail grids as I could fit on my paper. Although, some people don’t like to set them up ahead of time. Do whatever makes more sense to you.

I only added the rule of thirds guides to the left column because I like to practice visualizing without a grid for the rest.

I know that I want the finished image to fit in this book, which will be dimensions of 10.5 x 7 inches. Using the thumbnail proportion math, that comes out to 2.25” x 1.5” for my thumbnails. Personally, I like to use ballpoint pens with different colored ink to plan out my thumbnails. Not being able to erase stops me from fussing over unimportant details. I use one color (in this case pink)for the grid lines and a different color (black) for the actual drawing. Doesn’t have to be a perfect grid! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Here’s a look at how I sketched each of my thumbnails. 1. Focal Point/Story I almost always draw the character first. 2. Counter Balance Next I try to add a shape or piece of furniture that fills in the biggest empty space a bit.

3. Overlapping Place an object in front of another object to overlap. Or, draw something behind an object. (I guess that’s “Underlapping”?) 4. Repeat Keep repeating steps 2 and 3 until your time limit is up.

5. Draw Another One! Keep sketching thumbnails. Some draw 10, others 90. Change something with each and every thumbnail. You have these options: a. Camera Position (Even applies to Isometric, it could be looking up instead of looking down.) b. Format/Borders (Change the paper format to portrait, landscape, square, etc. I’m not at liberty to do that because of my predetermined paper measurements.) c. Subject Pose or Object Position (Move the character, furniture, or buildings around.) d. Any combination of the options above Whatever you do, don’t change your story!

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Before you begin thumbnail sketching, set a timer for 1-2 minutes. Yes, only 1-2 minutes! The biggest problem with thumbnail sketching is thinking about it too much. A short time limit helps you to just draw without second-guessing yourself. For the next few pages, I’ll share those same progress steps for the following thumbnail sketches.

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Woohoo! 16 composition thumbnails to choose from!

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There are also some to be tossed out just because they ended up have some awkward empty space (#1-3) or important parts of the story are too close to the edge. (#4).

Once I’ve drawn 10 to 50 thumbnails, I like to go through and eliminate the ones that are obviously not communicating the story that I want to tell. For example, #8 makes the character look sinister because the extreme looking up angle makes the viewer feel small and powerless.

#6, 7, 10, and 11, have the character’s back to the viewer which takes the attention off of him. Not great since he is supposed to be the focal point!

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After culling the sketches down to the ones that tell a story without major composition weaknesses, I glanced over the remaining options to choose whichever one that I liked the best.

#14 was my favorite so far, but I still wanted to try a few more things. I drew one more thumbnail with changes to the positioning of the characters and objects, as well as added some stuff. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Characters in 0 Point Perspective 0 Point Perspective can be great for displaying information about a character, but it can also be really stiff.

I’ll be drawing my skunk character stirring his latest medicinal concoction in a big cauldron. The pose I want is something like this:

Next, I added the legs organically, keeping in mind the general “looking down” angle.

(Not 0 Point Perspective)

When you pose your characters in 0 Point, don’t mind the grid so much. The only things that need to stay on grid are the shoulders and hips (highlighted below.)

I started with putting the shoulder and hip lines parallel to the grid and sketched out the torso shape.

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Sketched out the angle of the spoon, which doesn’t need to stay on-grid, the position of the arms, and hands.

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Head and tail sketched in next.

For heads, you may want to try using the grid angles for the construction lines at first.

Added on more construction lines for his glasses, “hair”, and head shape.

Tunic, spoon, more adjustments to the pose.

Refined it with some darker lines and hey, look at that! He isn’t posed like a robot.

Here’s how it looks overlaid on my thumbnail sketch. I changed the tail position a bit, but he mostly fits in the planned space.

The angles are more tilted than you might think. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Rectangular Stuff in 0 Point Perspective Here’s how I would go about drawing the table from my Props designs:

Right now, my character’s height is something like 10 cubes tall. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

First, I’d need to figure out how big it is in comparison to my character. It’s roughly 1/3 of his height.

Trying to divide that into thirds would be a pain for me. Instead, I can just change the size of the grid so that he’s 9, 6, or 3 cubes tall.

Now it’s easy to make the side of the table 2 cubes tall, and 2 deep. I know I want the table top to be about a third of the table’s height.

To find 1/3, I use equal division as explained on page 93. 1/ 3

6 5 4 3 2 1

Comparing the prop to your character, instead of the grid, offers way more flexibility. For instance, the size of the grid can be changed. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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For the width of the table, I estimate it’s 2 and 1/2 wider than it is tall.

From here, I don’t measure too much because it’s a made-up table. If you were to draw an actual table for the purpose of building one in your garage, that would be a different matter. Since this is art, I have some wiggle room as far as proportions go.

Obviously the height will be the same and the table top will also be the same thickness.

Looks ten times better after I just cut a few spaces out of the legs and made the table top larger than the table base.

This table is also unique in that it has a small fire pit on top. I simply draw out the dimensions of the fire pit using the grid angles... Remember, when something looks like it was made out of a cardboard boxes, it’s usually because the overall shapes are too smooth.

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Here it is added to the illustration.

...and add the inside lines.

If a drawer look like it is drawn with a marker on the table’s surface like this:

That’s a nice start, but the whole table looks really sharp and cold, which is the opposite of what I want. Using this general construction, I can freehand draw right over the top of it and round off all the sharp corners.

By the way, traditional artists, if you use a light table or window to allow you to see the grid underneath your drawing paper, all of these techniques can still apply to you! Next up is how to draw ovals in 0 point, since I’ll need some of those to draw the cauldron.

Then go and study some real life drawers to see how they pop out or sink into the table or desk.

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Ellipses in 0 Point Perspective It’s tempting to slap any sized ellipse (that’s a fancy word for “oval”) can go on top of an isometric grid. Since it’s curved, it shouldn’t have to follow a linear grid, right?

squares first. I’ll be adding the cauldron to my character drawing from earlier. Cauldron needed.

I want to know how much grid space the whole cauldron will take up, so I plot out the whole cube.

Umm... no. Not right. An ellipse does follow the grid in its own way. It basically needs to be an Isometric square with its corners rounded off.

Draw wheels, clocks, and circular windows by thinking of them as

(Yes, he’s hovering in midair, but I can add a step stool later.)

I like to plot out the cubic space first.

Here’s the square that will mark the top of the cauldron. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Plotting out the ellipse on the top. 110

Next I create an oval that follows the curve of the top oval, but extends down to the bottom cube corners. This is the body of the cauldron.

There we go! And what about a handle?

You really only need to draw 1 chain link when working in isometric. Digital artists can copy, paste, and flip horizontally. Traditional artists can use a light box method to trace the chain link once, flip the paper over (the horizontal flip) and trace it again. +

At this point, I’m just freehand sketching the chain and handles. Not a bad, but it needs that rounded rim that cauldrons have. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

=

Of course, it is tedious to create all those chain links, so think carefully if you want to put the time into it! 111

There it is so far. Poor guy is still standing on thin air, so let’s give him a step stool.

Next, I need to make it the same height as the cauldron, so that it is on the floor surface.

Already there’s a problem: how does the skunk guy even get on that stool with his short legs? Here’s a side view of some steps added:

Notice, I didn’t follow the grid perfectly. Using my character as the point of reference, I’ll start out by making the surface that he’s standing on.

I want it to look similar to the table, so I’ll start by deciding how thick the top part will be.

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Then I fill in the top of each step. (If you’re drawing with pencil, you don’t have to fill it in, it’s just easier to see that way in this demonstration.)

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I don’t like how the side is completely smooth, so I’ll cut away from the sides a bit. First I just mark out the top plank of each step.

A few more lines added to remove a small amount from the side of the stool.

Looks better! I’ll also cut some away from the base because I want to.

Move this line up. I decide how much I want to remove from the side and copy that measurement to the stair top corners. (Even the highest one.)

I don’t really like the way the middle step seems too low, so no big deal in isometric, we just move it up a bit.

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Give it some line treatment to round off the corners and take away the mechanical precision of the straight lines, and now it looks like this.

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Irregular forms in 0 Point Perspective Time to draw a tea kettle, a very irregular form, in 0 point perspective. I found three tea pots that had elements that I wanted for my own design:

Which all put together ended up like this:

With an irregular shape, the first decision to make is how to use the standardized cube unit to measure the object. Option A: Use a square plus an addition of 1/4 square.

1: a “flat” body shape.

2: A natural tree branch handle.

This tea kettle is going on the table I drew before: Option B: Encompass whole thing in a square and subtract 1/4 at the top.

3: A leaf motif. And should fit in the little fire pit on the table. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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I’m going to choose option A, because I feel like it. Honestly, either way is fine. Whichever makes more sense to you; do that.

Then I put an ellipses inside the blue marks. This is the widest part of the tea kettle’s body.

The widest part of the tea kettle body is about 1/3 of the cube. But the lid is obviously a smaller oval than the body, so I shrink the top (red) oval down to the size I want it.

So I mark that on the cube*

The height (not counting the lid’s little handle) comes at about half of the cube, so I mark that out too.

1/2 I’ll make the same sized oval for the bottom base as well, and then connect up the 3 ovals to make my first 3-D shape of the kettle body.

*equal division on page: 89 Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Using this:

The handle takes up 1/3 of the cube as well, so going back to the 1/3 marks, I can plot out the space for the handle.

I’m going to add an oval just under the centered guidelines as the circumference of the branch, as well as two more ovals for the ends of the branch handle.

To make this:

Not particularly impressive for the amount of work that went into it, but the first shape is always the most labor intensive. It gets way easier from here.

The handle is going to touch the top plane of the cube, which can be difficult to guess where that is exactly. So don’t guess, and instead put some centered guide lines on the top plane.

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These ovals do not have to follow the isometric grid because the branch is not perfectly circular. Once I have the simple form, I’ll just connect it to the body.

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Finally, let’s make the kettle functional by adding the spout. I first check the spout’s height, and lucky for us, it’s about halfway. The very same measurement for the body of the tea kettle. Which will make this super easy.

I’m going to start by drawing an iso square extends 1/4 of a cube farther than the body.

And since we also know that the spout is 1/2 of a cube high, we can easily extend the lines from the top of the body and connect them up like this.

And add an oval for the spout like so.

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I placed a larger oval on the kettle body that doesn’t have to be isometric.

Connect them up based on the design.

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Added the lid knob.

And there’s the finished tea kettle, a very irregular shape in Isometric perspective.

You can draw a lot of complex forms and items by breaking it down into cubes and relative measurements. Social “app” games that allow the player to build a custom room, town, farm, diner, or other environment put isometric skills back in high demand since it’s the only way a single building, rug, or table can remian in the correct perspective no matter where the player places it on the map.

Lastly, the leaf motif and surface detail.

Here’s an example of some isometric game assests.

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The big picture in 0 point By using the same methods of building objects from simple shapes, your character’s environment will come to life piece by piece.

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The Horizon Line For 1 Point Perspective, coming up next, it’ll be helpful to know a few things about the Horizon Line.

same level of their bodies depending on the eye level.

The Horizon Line is an imaginary, but fabulously helpful, guide line that represents where the sky touches the earth or sea. It divides the space into when something should show the top side or under side. Above the HL, curves go up and the underside is seen. Below the HL, curves go down and the topside is seen. Another super useful thing about the horizon line is that if there are multiple figures of the same height, they will pass the horizon line at the

As you can see, if the photographer is standing, the horizon line will be passing through the model’s heads at her eye level. For right now, you can think of the eye level and the horizon line as the same thing. In the next couple of examples, there will be a diagram of a photographer and four identical models. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

No matter how close the women come to the camera, or how far they walk away, because they are exactly the same height, they will always pass the horizon line at the same place on their body. 120

If the photographer kneels, the eye level will make the horizon line pass through her at the wrists and hips.

Perhaps it goes without saying, but I’m going to say it anyway: A person’s feet shouldn’t ever touch the horizon line. It’s impossible unless she’s flying...

Up, up, and away!

Or, laying on the ground, it could pass through the knees.

In the diagram of the leg, you can see how the cuff of a sock would curve downward since it is below the horizon line, but a belt would actually curve upward because it is above the horizon line and eye level. belt

sock Using those two facts: (1.) The horizon line divides where a curve goes up or down, and, (2.) the horizon line passes through the same level of a person’s body (if they are the same height!) no matter how close or far she is standing, here is a diagram from one of the Andrew Loomis books about drawing the human figure in perspective. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

These figures would have the belt and socks both curve down. The small one at the top, right, would have socks, belt and everything curving upwards.

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There will be times that a person isn’t standing on ground level, so how does that affect the eyes level and horizon line? The same sized ladies can be moved up or down on the page without changing their sizes, but the contours will change.

Before

It’s not likely that you’ll have a picture with multiple figures all exactly the same height, which is where a height chart for your characters comes in really handy. For an explanation on how to calculate the heights of figures that are different heights, check out my tutorial using chess pieces here: http://betsyillustration.deviantart. com/art/03-Here-s-the-ThingAbout-1pt-Perspective-489304072

For more stuff on drawing multiple figures in 1 point perspective, I recommend reading the book “Successful Drawing” by Andrew Loomis.

After Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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The Vanishing point The vanishing point (VP) is another imaginary guide line that gives us a point of reference for how much something should “shrink” as it gets farther and farther away from the camera.

For 1 point perspective, we will need to place one VP on the horizon line. This point may seem like something arbitrary, but it’s actually pretty specific. The VP represents where your nose is pointed when you look straight ahead. Meaning: it has to be in the center to look the most natural.

Anytime you see 1 point perspective where the horizon is high or low on the paper, it feels like it was a photo that was cropped, because your “nose” isn’t in the center. Centered VP/”nose”

Like this:

vanishing point Not like this:

VP/”nose” not centered so this part feels strange.*

(*2 or 3 point perspective would correct this.) Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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NO! Not a 90 degree angle wid th

But before you let all this technical information go to your head, remember that none of this matters if you don’t have a story.

width This is still true of the angle horizon line. line horizon th p de

height

If you rotate the camera on its Z axis, it’s called a “Dutch angle.” Doing that can add mystery, suspense, or a feeling of instability. Using a Dutch angle on this room from earlier changes the feeling of it lot. I feel like I should enter with caution when it’s at an angle like that.

line n o z i r o h th p de height

The vanishing point is only used for the lines that are on the “Z” axis, or in other words, the depth of things. Widths will be perfectly parallel to the horizon line, and heights will be perfectly perpendicular to the horizon line. horizon line h pt e d height

This doesn’t mean you are required to put the VP in the center. It’s simply the most natural looking there.

wid th Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

YES! A 90 degree angle!

Story: In the supplies room, Arietty and her dad prepare to borrow things from the human “beans”. 124

1 point perspective 1 Point Perspective may be brushed off as being boring because it only has the one vanishing point. I would challenge that opinion by asking is it the perspective that’s boring or the story that’s boring?

moments similar to how the melody of a song needs resting pauses in between the notes.

This piece to the left is anything but boring! Plus, it makes me want to see what would happen next! The other pieces have calmer story moments, but stories need quiet

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There are 4 things to keep in mind when you start drawing your 1 point thumbnail sketches. Number 1! The height (Y) lines must be perpendicular to the HL.

Yes!

HL No!

HL No!

Number 3! The horizon line must be near the center of the composition for the least amount of distortion.

Yes!

Number 4! The vanishing point must be on the HL and near the center of the composition for the least amount of distortion.

Yes!

No HL HL

HL

HL

Yes!

Yes!

Number 2! The width lines (X) must be parallel to the horizon line.

HL Yes!

HL

HL

No! No!

Yes! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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There are also few traps awaiting you with 1 point perspective. I would like to briefly point them out and hopefully save you some frustration later. Limousine syndrome This happens when items are drawn too much along the vanishing point guidelines of the Z axis. It makes regular cars look like limousines.

With this small room:

Compare how little you can see of the cars’ side doors in this photograph. To beat Limousine syndrome, remember that the less we see of the side, the more it is in perspective. Unintentionally large room Compare this big room:

This isn’t helped by the fact that most photographers use wide angle lenses (including those of you who take ref photos with your smart phone) which distorts the appearance of objects more so than they actually are in real life. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

The wall is the same size in both, but because of the bottom edge of the wall is being placed farther away from the HL in this second example, it appears to be a smaller room. Accuracy Obsession After practicing perspective drawing for a while, you may find yourself so caught up in measurements and calculations that you’re suddenly afraid to draw anything without measuring out a perfectly accurate cube first, and end up losing the heart of the story artist that you once were. Don’t stress yourself out! 127

For the 1 point perspective demonstration, I drew another 16 thumbnails following the same steps as for the Isometric: 1. Focal point/character 2. Counter balance object 3. Overlap/Underlap objects 4. Repeat until time runs out

perspective.” You just want to get the general feeling of the composition down on paper. Again, I used a different color ink (red) to show the perspective lines. My favorite thumbnail comp is this one.

The big difference between 0 point and 1 point is that it’s really difficult to just draw one thing all the way and pray that it all works out in the end. Safer to slowly build up everything all at once to better problem-solve as problems arise.

While you’re drawing your thumbnails, don’t worry about making things “in

I set up the HL and VP. I made a crosshair mark instead of a dot because I might measure off of the edge of it one time and off the center of the dot another time.

A dot can be less accurate. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

An intersecting line is more accurate. 128

I sketch out the gesture of my character and the nearest side of the step stool (without the steps).

Then cast the lines from the VP.

I decide how much bigger I wanted the nearer half to be... (Green)

I know I want the cauldron to be a little bit bigger than the step stool, so I extend out the stool’s lines (orange) and add some lines from the VP somewhat based on my thumbnail’s size of cauldron.

...and then doubled it. (Darker green)

The cauldron is going to be in a fire pit type thing, so I can draw out the main boundaries for that too.

I can choose however far back I want the stool to go, but to avoid Limousine syndrome, it’s most natural if I keep it close to his feet.

Also set up for equal repetition. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Remember that this drawing isn’t your “finished” drawing, it’s your preliminary one, so it’s OK to use a bunch of different colored pencils/ inks if that helps you to keep the lines more organized.

(Pink lines are the character’s height, brown is the stool he’s standing on.) (He can jump down off the stool.)

with the biggest question being how can I figure out how tall to make each step? The answer is easy actually, go back to the source of the story! I can measure out a natural stair height for my character on his step stool and then just carry the measurement over to the staircase! Brilliant!

I want the room to be about 3 more fire pits deep, so I used some equal replication to plan that out. Now I can decorate the back wall to my heart’s desire since it’s mostly horizontal and vertical lines.

That will tell me where the back wall meets the floor and I like to take a measurement of how tall my character would be if he walked over to the back wall just for some scale reference of how large things should be.

The stairs on the right hand side are probably the next thing to tackle Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

(Equal division at work to figure out thirds.)

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I plot out the entire height of the staircase which differs slightly from my thumbnail.

And, of course, the VP needs to do its thing and make depth lines.

Height of the first step travelling to the right.

Marked out a line in green so that the VP would have something to go to, and show me how the first step’s height would shrink as it recedes in space.

Using inches or centimeters or whatever unit of measurement you use, repeat the height of the step all the way up the entire height of the stair case. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

I add a diagonal line to mark out the nose of each step.

“tread” side view of stairs

“nose”

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The nose alignment line will have a big influence on the t read of each step, as demonst rated below.

Each time the orange line crosses a VP line, I draw a horizontal line to mark the nose of the step.

Add an additional parallel diagonal line (orange) to cut down the width of the stairs.

Then I just cut out the treads and I end up with a really wide set of stairs. The heights of the steps are exactly the same, but the t reads get longer or shorter depending on the angle. Use this boring knowledge to create stairs in scale with your character. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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With some patience, following this routine of heights, widths and depths will become faster and more second-nature so that measuring won’t have to happen quite so much. For example, I didn’t measure out the steps of the ladder, the scale of the cupboard under the stairs,

or the size of the table in the foreground (with the tea pot on it). I also changed the size of the cauldron and fire pit blocks because artists can change their mind all the time. Nothing’s written or drawn in stone when it comes to perspective.

To add a railing, I just need to draw a few more parallel orange lines.

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The cauldron is obviously going to use ellipses, but first I’m going to block it out.

Then draw the cauldron over it.

It would probably take 50 more pages to show every single item drawn step-by-step, but it really is just more of the same process I’ve been demonstrating so far. Each and every time I want to draw something in the room, I either refer to the VP, the character, or another object. The first few objects in the piece are the slowest, but once you have more and more things to reference from, you’ll likely notice the progress of the drawing getting faster.

Then I can put ovals on the top bottom, and middle based on each plane.

To make it rounder, I’ll adjust the top opening (green) and base (magenta) ovals to be narrower.

However, you may notice that the orange oval and most of the magenta oval didn’t really show up in the cauldron sketch, so again, you don’t have to do all this stuff, just draw as much as you need for it to make sense to you. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Not going to lie, it does take some time. I recommend setting a timer for 45-90 minutes of drawing at a time. That way you’ll be reminded to rest your eyes, get up and move around, not to mention you might notice something you didn’t before if you come back to it after a break. 134

If you’re wondering how far to go with the preliminary drawing, it’s really up to you. This is just an example of when I might put the pencil down and move on to ink pens. Onward to 2 point vertical perspective!

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Line of Sight As we saw in the previous section, 1 point perspective is a situation when the viewer, or photographer, looks straight ahead at one side of an object. Line of sight HL

1 Point Perspective side

But what if the LOS is tilted down? Line

of s

HL

Then we get Vertical 2 Point Perspective which looks something like this:

Top Depth VP

HL

HL

1 Point Perspective Line of Sight (LOS)

ight

The two vanishing points in 2 point vertical perspective represent gravity and depth. If you want the LOS to be angled down, the top VP will be the depth VP. Like this*:

top

top

Front

1 Point Perspective Or this:

HL

Front

top

*Note this is purposefully distorted and exaggerated for clarity

Front 1 Point Perspective Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Gravity aka Height VP 136

An LOS angled up like this:

e Lin

of

h sig

(Height VP)

If you’re confused about how to pick which VP to be the depth VP, just remember that the depth VP is always on the horizon line.

t

HL Is like looking up at tall buildings.

Depth VP, always.

If you put your second VP below the HL, then it will be looking down. Depth VP

HL

HL

If you put your second VP above the HL, then it will be looking up.

The Sun

And now you know about the Line of Sight! Woohoo! HL Depth VP

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When Vanishing points get Crazy Before we move on to 2 Point Vertical Perspective, we need to talk about the extreme pain in the neck it is to use more than one vanishing point. For example, let’s say I were going to draw something like this screenshot from Spirited Away:

All the extra paper you’d need to reach the VPs.

It’s a subtle 3 point perspective, but if I were to follow the angles all the way to the Vanishing Points, I’d end up with something like the mess over on the right.

Keep going!

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Obviously this is both impractical and improbable, so what is an artist to do? Forget the VPs and work off of a partial grid of perspective lines instead! 138

When the VP is inside, or near, the comp borders, it’s not that bad to use it, but it give off really steep and extreme angles.

VP

horizon line

With that observation alone, we can reverse-engineer a grid to make it feel like the VP is super far away without having to make a 7 league paper trail.

VP I can start with a horizon line:

Angles change direction a lot.

e ste

p!

HL

composition borders / edges of paper

When the VP is far away from the comp borders, it looks more natural and the guidelines are “shallow” or “nearly horizontal”.

And choose the angle I want at the edge of my comp. VP

horizon line

HL

shallow!

Angles don’t change that much. composition borders / edges of paper

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We already get the feeling that the VP is far away because it’s a shallow angle. A line added between this one and the horizon line has to be at an angle that splits the difference.

Much easier to start with the farthest out lines, then divide the space between it and the HL, and repeat.

HL

Choose an angle for the other side too.

It won’t be exact, but it’ll be close. :) 4th

HL

2nd

1/2 way

1/2 way

1st

Like this. Not 1/2 way Not this. Any lines below will be more angled, but it’s difficult to tell how much more angled they will be, especially when you’re just learning.

And repeat the process.

3rd

Repeat on the top. (The lines do not need to be evenly spaced by the way)

HL

HL Maybe like

If it’s 3 point perspective, repeat one more time. (Again, this is where the different color ink/lines can come in handy.)

this? Not sure.. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Because there is no vertical horizon line, we have to add that Center of Vision line (COV). COV

Of course, if you wanted to try getting extra pieces of paper and using a really long straight edge to reach the distant VPs, you can do that.

I hope this will encourage you to not only use 2 and 3 point perspective in high-flying action-adventure scenes, but also in quieter talking scenes.

I did it a few times, and it was a great learning experience. But I never wanted to have to repeat the process again! ಥ3ಥ

Keep your angle subtle!

Just like when you were learning to write the letters of the alphabet, you probably had guidelines to help you keep the proportions of the letters accurate. These grids are similar to that. Only guiding lines. After you got used to writing your letters, you didn’t need all the guide lines anymore. The same will be true for perspective. Use a grid only as long as you need it.

Ta-da! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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2 Point Vertical Perspective I feel like 2 Point Vertical Perspective is highly overlooked. I didn’t even know it existed until I took a class on perspective drawing. It’s a really great stepping stone in-between 1 Point and 3 Point since it allows you the dynamic angles of looking up or down, with a 1/3 less work! The diner image to the right was my very first attempt at using 2 point vertical perspective, and earned me the highest grade I received in the class because it had the most storytelling out of everything I had done that semester! Below are two more examples that show the versatility of 2 point looking up or looking down.

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There are 4 things to keep in mind when you start drawing your 2 point vertical thumbnail sketches. Number 1! The width (X) lines must be parallel to the HL.

Yes!

Yes!

No!

Number 3! A bit of a continuation of #2, the VPs must be 90 degrees apart. In other words, a perfect square rotated to be a diamond like this. VP

HL HL

HL

from one VP to the other. But personally, I like to be on the safe side and do a little more than that.

No!

I measure the longest side.

Triple it.

90 degrees

Your drawing fits inside.

Number 2! You can have one VP inside the comp, but not both because of #3.

VP

Yes! Because humans have around a 60 degree range of vision, the longest side of your composition border can only be 2/3 the length (maximum) Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Easy! 143

The horizon line must be either at the very top (to look downward) or at the very bottom (to look upward). Like this to look down.

HL

Having the VPs this far apart means you can actually put 2 or 3 thumbnails in between, keeping in mind that the longest side has to be no longer than 2/3.

Yes!

Yes! Still OK. Yes!

No! No!

HL

Or like this to look up.

(*Remember: the Depth VP is always on the HL)

Number 4! Your composition need to be center aligned close to the true vertical line between the VPs. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

This is called the “Center of Vision” line and will be looked at a bit more in 3 Point. For now, just keep those thumbnail comps close to center alignment. 144

After you set up some 2 Point Vertical Perspective thumbnail borders with VPs, it’s back to the heart and soul of your drawing: the story! Follow the same steps as described for Isometric thumbnails on page 96, which I will recap here so that you don’t have to go find that page again. 1. Focal Point/Story I almost always draw the character first. 2. Counter Balance Next I try to add a shape or piece of furniture that fills in the biggest empty space a bit. 3. Overlapping Overlap or “underlap” anothe robject or character.

4. Repeat Keep repeating steps 2 and 3 until your 1-2 minute time limit is up. 5. Draw Another One! Keep sketching thumbnails until you have 10-100 done. Change something with each and every thumbnail. Things to change are: a. Camera Position (Looking up or down, greater or lesser angles) b. Format/Borders (Change the paper format to portrait, landscape, square, etc. Not an option if there is a predetermined final image size.) c. Subject Pose or Object Position (Move the character, furniture, or buildings around.) d. Any combination of the options above (Fun!) Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Whatever you do, don’t change your story! I’m super indecisive when it comes to drawing, so I actually keep a small note pad nearby when I’m working on thumbnails. Then if I get a new idea while I’m sketching a specific story, I just write down the tagline to be used another time. Thumbnail sketches with my story now

Notebook with story taglines for later If you do this habitually, pretty soon you have a collection of story taglines just waiting for those times that you can’t think of what to draw! 145

Here’s a look at a few of my own thumbnails for the 2 point vertical demonstration piece. Again, I’m using more colored ballpoint pens cause I like them. ^_^ I use one color ink for each VP, but I switch the height/depth roles at will. For instance, in the second column, the top ones are looking down, but the third one is looking up.

I ended up choosing thumbnail #16 for the demonstration. Even though I tend to choose a thumbnail under 20, if you can do 30, that would Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

be awesome! Or 50? Whoa, you’re a superstar! It’s not uncommon to have to do 90-100 thumbs for Finals project in art school just so you know. 146

Same as the 1 point perspective piece, I enlarge my thumbnail to the actual size that I want to draw, and sketch in the character first. But this perspective is a little more extreme than 1 point, so what if I don’t know how to draw my character at this angle?

with the midpoint being just under his arm pits. On my drawing, I’ll plot out a block following the height/gravity lines.

Treat the character just like any other object, and start with the height measurements. Corso happens to be 4 heads tall,

Then I’ll use equal division to mark out 4 horizontal sections.

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By the way, if your character happens to be 10 heads tall, you don’t have to divide the block into 10 unless you want to. 4 is usually enough.

Like before, after my character is plotted out, I can add the block for the step stool following the depth and height.

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Most of the step stool will be covered up by the cauldron, but the step stool block will help me to figure out where the bottom of the cauldron will be by extending some lines forward on the depth guides.

A thing to know about ellipses is that they are always perpendicular to the axis. A little bit like a straw through a lid.

I have to find the center of the top plane first (equal division, page 89).

90 degrees

Make the axis by following the height guidelines. Keeping in mind the cauldron is widest at its middle, I build up the block following all the guideline directions.

So I can’t just put an oval in like this:

axis

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Add a line (brown) perpendicular to the axis line (red.)

The difference may appear to be subtle, but it makes a big difference in your linear perspective!

The top of a cupboard shows up in the bottom right corner. Since we can’t see where it touches the floor, there’s no need to scale it in relation to my character.

90 degrees

Then place the oval accordingly.

Repeating the blocking in process for the book shelf on the right. Keep following those height and depth guidelines.

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Some kind of rug in the back.

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In the thumbnail I had a table (highlighted orange) with a bunch of doodled jars and things on it.

I want that table to be just a bit taller than the step stool, so I send out a line to represent the height of the table following the thumbnail.

Then extend the height of the step stool sideways.

Then I just take the lines back along the depth angles.

This becomes the table’s height line.

And move the height bar back too.

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I want it a little taller, so I extend the line up.

Lastly, I can finish up the block based on the height. With all the major items plotted out according to the height of my character, from here it’s going to be more of the same processes: equal division, equal repetition, and ovals on an axis. The following pages will have a few progress pictures for you to see the objects all being built up at once.

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I am not liking this tangent one bit. Nor this big empty space. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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More shelves full of stuff to cover those problem areas. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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And there we have the underrated 2 point vertical perspective in action. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Grids are Guides, not rules Now that you know a little more about the grids, here’s a really important thing to remember:

And these are photographs of real world cities. See the difference?

Grids are guides, not rules. Here are a few CG images of cities that stay exactly on the grid.

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In real life, buildings have to acclimate to the mountains, rivers, and other factors that might make them go off the grid. One way is to break out of the confines of the grid is to use more Vanishing Points. Vanishing points are more versatile than grids because individual objects within the image can have its own set of vanishing points. In other words, this means that a piece in 3 Point Perspective could (and should) have more than 3 VPs.

Exact horizontal and vertical

Top of door frame Window and wall edges

At first glance, little girl Boo’s room is in 1 point perspective. At second glance, it’s a very subtle 3 point perspective, because the horizontals and verticals aren’t exactly straight. See: Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

It’s 3 point perspective, but how many Vanishing Points are really being used in this image? Again, any object that is off the grid has its own set of vanishing points. The table, chairs, laundry basket, toy blocks, knocked over toys, stuffed bear, easel, bed, books, bunny slippers, tea pot, floor boards, and rug all have their own vanishing points. 157

book

HL la

le

r

ta b

g chai

ket s a yb undr

b blue

lock

air

be

hin

d

ro c k i n

ch

easel

f

r loo

ds r a bo

bear

chair

eas

el

rug

Here are just a few of the VPs in use.

Kind of reminds me of Ocean’s Twelve. That one laser dance scene that was the only cool thing in the whole movie.

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VP’s everywhere!

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What in the world are we supposed to do, then? Draw a million vanishing points on top of the grid or what?! (My brain can’t take it! ಥ3ಥ) That’s up to you. This isn’t a rule, just a tool.

Really, the only thing that needs to happen (which you may have already noticed) is that all the objects’ various vanishing points, still rested on the horizon line. Even the ones that go out of frame eventually would join up at the horizon line. book

ro c k i n

g chai

r

la

bas y r und

ket

b blue

lock

easel

eas

el

rug Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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2 point Horizontal perspective And now, the companion to 2 Point Vertical Perspective is 2 Point Horizontal perspective. It’s also what is classically more well-known as simply “2 point perspective” to most people. Like 1 point perspective, it must look straight ahead at the horizon line, no looking up or down (that would change it to 3 point perspective). You can still get some pretty cool story moments out of 2 point perspective as demonstrated by the examples on the left. And as with all perspective drawing, it must have a story. (Have I said that enough yet?) So get your taglines, spark and scrap boards ready!

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There are 4 things to keep in mind when you start drawing your 2 point horizontal thumbnail sketches.

Number 3! The horizon line must be near the center of the composition just like it was discussed in 1 point perspective.

Yes!

Yes!

No HL HL

HL No!

Number 2! You can have one VP near the composition borders, but not both. Yes!

Right VP

Human vision is only 60 degrees

No!

Number 1! The height (Y) lines must be perpendicular to the HL.

Yes!

90 degrees

Left VP

Again, since humans have around a 60 degree range of vision, the longest side of your composition border can only be 2/3 the length (maximum) from one VP to the other. But personally, I like to be on the safe side and do a little more than that. I measure the longest side.

Number 4! A bit of a continuation of #2, the VPs must be 90 degrees apart. In other words, a perfect square rotated to be a diamond like this. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Triple it.

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You can put more than one composition border between the VPs, but the longest side can’t be more than 2/3 of the distance between the VPs.

Follow the same steps to draw your thumbnail sketches: 1. Focal Point/Story Draw the character or object of attention first. 2. Counter Balance Add a shape or piece of furniture that fills in the biggest empty space. 3. Overlapping Overlap or “underlap” another object or character.

Yes!

4. Repeat Keep repeating steps 2 and 3 until your 1-2 minute time limit is up.

Yes!

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5. Draw Another One! Keep sketching thumbnails until you have 10-100 done. Change something with each and every thumbnail.

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As demonstrated with 2 point vertical, I also sketched out 2 points horizontally and fit 2 or 3 composition thumbnails in between them to get more natural looking (less distorted) perspective.

I chose thumbnail #11 for this demonstration, but it didn’t have a foreground element, so I added a candle in Photoshop, and I moved the book on the stand closer to him.

There is no need to recreate or use actual vanishing points since I already have perspective guidelines in the thumbnail. All I have to do is enlarge the thumbnail to the actual size which is 10 x 7 inches.

It will come at no surprise that I’ll draw Corso, my character, first. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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I want the cauldron wider than that, but how would I know if it remains centered to the step stool? Use Equal division to find the center, that’s how!

His step stool is quit a bit taller in this composition compared to the other drawings, but regardless of its height, I’m going to draw in the top of the step stool based purely on the size of Corso and the VP guidelines.

This is the first time we haven’t been able to see the ground in a composition. OMG! Plot twist! How are we going to figure out where the cauldron goes?! Well, here’s one way: I choose how tall I want the cauldron to be (seriously, I just pick whatever I think looks good).

Same as in the 1 point perspective demonstration, I’ll figure out how big I want one side of the cauldron to be and then mirror it with equal repetition. You may need to adjust it a few times on this part because when the guidelines are so close to the horizon line, they have a way of distorting things more than you might think they will and then somehow you end

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up with a 10 foot coffee table. It’s probably less than you think it should be.

The book stand is so close to the HL that the lines are pretty straight. I also sketch in the shelf that the candle is on by just following the VP guideline.

Keeping in mind all the stuff about ellipses, I doodle in the general shape of the cauldron.

There’s another table behind the candle, but how to figure out how tall it is? We could do it from measuring the character, but even easier would be to just compare it to the cauldron. I’ll start out by carrying over the cauldron height along the VP guidelines.

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comparison.

I want the table a bit shorter than the cauldron, so I’ll mark out some spacing.

Then following the guidelines, I’ll make an edge of the table block and make sure that it underlaps the cauldron rather that draw according to the thumbnail.

It ended up being kind of a huge looking table, and I’m not really liking it, so I’ll fiddle with the depth, height and width until I do like it.

Since the bottom of the cupboards can’t be seen, it’s a little ambiguous as to how far back it is in the room. This can work to my advantage since it means I won’t have to accurately measure it against anything. I just follow the guidelines and the thumbnail.

I ended up changing the shape of the table and putting it farther back. The first attempt table is in pink and the final one in brown just as a Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Here’s what it looks like so far. It may seem like it’s barely even started, but a lot of the stuff left to draw doesn’t need any specific measurement.

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After some freehand sketching and doodling. I thought it might be neat to include a stone fireplace/oven in the back.

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More items on the table and in he cupboards. Remembering that anything below the horizon line should show a bit of its top side, and anything about the horizon won’t. Also, that the ellipses are going to be rather flat throughout the image.

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Clean up the objects a little bit more and slap on some basic tones, and I call this under drawing finished!

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CENTER OF VISION The Center of Vision line was mentioned briefly earlier in the book, so let’s take a little deeper look at what it does for us in perspective drawing. The COV line is, again, basically where your nose is pointed when you are looking at something, and is perfectly perpendicular to the horizon line.

This one: COV? Not so much because the center of the picture doesn’t have any vertical, or nearly vertical lines and it messes with our minds. People would be walking tilted too!

In one of my early 3 point perspective pieces for a class, I tried to be “original” and “unique” by plotting out my comp like this:

My teacher was somewhat horrified and said very urgently, “No, no, no, no, no, you can’t do that. It’ll look so weird.” It’s called the center of vision line for a good reason: it really should stay near the center for normal looking backgrounds. Now that you know that, let’s move on to 3 point perspective!

HL COV Above, this photograph of city buildings looks all right because the COV is near the center.

COV way over here.

Characters walking tilted over here.

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3 point perspective Because it is the last perspective to be introduced, it’s easy to assume that 3 point perspective is the hardest, grandest perspective of them all. This is only somewhat true. When most books talk about 3 point perspective, there is an emphasis on super dynamic camera angles like these:

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The lesser talked about truth is how often 3 point perspective is used for very subtle backgrounds. So subtle in fact, you’d almost mistake them for 2 or 1 point perspective.

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But first, let’s look a little bit at what defines a 3 point perspective drawing.

Y - height

If you think about the buttons on the elevator, one is a triangle with the apex at the top, and the other is a triangle with apex at the bottom.

Z - depth X - width For looking down, use the down button on the elevator. Z - depth X - width Imagine that each point of the triangle is a vanishing point, and you have 3 point perspective. If you want looking up, use the 3 points of the up button on the elevator.

There is a crazy amount of distortion in many 3 point perspective images because the artist is trying to trace back to the actual vanishing points. Which, as was addressed earlier, isn’t very practical if you have to tape 40 extra sheets of paper to your composition. So what’s an artist to do? Number 1 Do not include the HL inside of your composition borders. WHAT?! I know, this is a shocker, but for a natural looking up or looking down, we’re going to exclude the HL from the composition borders.

Nope. Y - height 174

HL outside of composition borders Yep! Not this.

Number 2 Start out with subtle angles on your partial grids. It’s tempting to make clear cut, more dynamic angles to see the 3 point perspective at its more obvious, but it will also lead to distortion.

Number 3 The side with the bigger angle dictates if it’s looking up or down.

Number 4 Keep the COV (the perfectly vertical line) near the center of your composition.

No!

Bigger angle on bottom = looking down

Yes!

Yes! Bigger angle on top = looking up

And of course, get your tagline ready before you start sketching thumbnails. 175

Or, you can also just take a thumbnail from earlier and adapt it to 3 point. Isometric is a perfect candidate for this.

Then I add the new 3 point perspective guidelines.

And the second half of the story is the cauldron and its contents which he is stirring. That little shelf in the bottom right corner too.

I’ll take the very same thumbnail that I used in the beginning. (I love it when a story comes around full circle. ^_^) It looked like this:

I think I’ll horizontally flip it horizontally this time.

I know it looks super chaotic right now, but I’m going to start changing the objects to the 3 Point guides. Of course, starting with the star of the show and using those greenish guidelines to help me position his feet and the step stool block.

Then the major change of the short wall where the floor rises, stairs, fire pit, and foreground bottle on the left.

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Table, bookshelf, background walls— ALL shall follow the guidelines.

Refining Corso and his step stool block first.

You can definitely tell the difference from the 0 Point I started with!

Sketching out half of the cauldron’s block.

Using equal repetition to get the full size. Followed by some equal division to find the mid point so that I can center the cauldron. And place the oval with the perpendicular axis in mind.

From here, it’s the same old process. First, enlarge the thumbnail to the actual working size. For me, it’s 10 x 6.5 inches.

(follo

se gu ws the

ideline

s)

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While sketching in the cauldron, it made a tangent with one of the lines of the step stool, so I altered the shape slightly to get more overlap.

Fire pit underneath, just eye-balling it and following the guidelines

I decided to change the bottle on the right to a quill left in a jar of ink just for something different.

Then, I tackled the boards along the short wall. I could have used equal repetition, but I wanted the boards to be varied in size.

The foreground bottles with corks. Trying to keep those ellipses nice and flat.

I tried freehand drawing the table, but it was looking a little weird, so I made a block following the guidelines to help me out.

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Freehand sketching the details.

I’m going to use the table height as a measurement for the bookcase in back. I figure the height of the table is probably the height of the bottom most shelf.

Trying to avoid tangents, I position the bottom and side of the bookcase (in orange).

Where the table guide cross the bottom of the book shelf, I’ll go upward until I cross the other table guideline.

Following the guidelines, that will tell me the height of the first shelf.

I add a few more guidelines for the shelf thickness and such.

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I sketch some empty bookshelves on top of the plot following the angles of the guidelines.

Continuing with the other wall.

Opening for another little room.

I put in an angle for the back wall. If I had wanted to, I could have replicated the table depth a couple of times to measure, but I think it looks OK like this, so why question it? Darkened it so I’d understand the depth of it better.

Adding all the knickknacks.

I didn’t measure for any of the ovals, but the closer they were to the to—where the horizon line is out of frame—the flatter I made them.

Don’t forget to put some time into where the floor meets the wall. I did an online image search for “wall trim ideas” and was instantly shown more wall trim options than I even knew existed. 180

I set up some guides for the wall trim to stay consistent on all the walls.

There’s an awkward empty space right here.

Then add the paneling based on what looks good to me, although you could also do equal repetition. Never underestimate the power of throw rugs.

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Here’s what it looks like so far.

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Starting the cleaner line work...

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And the finished underdrawing!

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Perspective Drawing gallery Isometric / 0 Point Perspective

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1 Point Perspective

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2 Point Vertical Perspective

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2 Point Horizontal Perspective

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3 Point Perspective

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PERSPECTIVE IS SUBJECTIVE Perspective drawing is one of those topics that seem to be objective, factual, and an absolute truth. There’s a clear line between the perspective being right or not, and people will be sure to tell you which side you’re on. Yet, in the artistic and visual storytelling world, perspective is subjective. It changes depending on your personal preferences and story goals. For example, Leonardo da Vinci has

been called the most famous artist of all time for having painted the two most famous pieces of art of all time. The Last Supper (below) is considered a linear perspective marvel. In its original location at a monastery’s dining hall, The Last Supper’s perspective matched perfectly with the view of the actual buildings perspective. Art Historians have said that the monks of the time must have been amazed with the optical illusion that were dining in the same room as Jesus and his disciples.

This same artist who achieved this spectacular linear feat, of course, also painted Mona Lisa. Surprisingly, the perspective of the background in the Mona Lisa painting is “incorrect”.

The background on the left is seen from a higher angle than the background on the right. Whaaaaat?? WHY?? Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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Some say that Leonardo did the incorrect perspective on purpose so that the viewer’s eyes and brain subconsciously want to look where the two different backgrounds meet. Yet, that area is exactly where her head covers up the background’s transition. Instead of discovering the solution to the background, we are forced to look at her face, which was possibly Leonardo’s plan all along. (Mind blown.)

Comical?

Epic?

Your art style and story tone will also play a big part in how “correct” your background needs to be.

Samurai Jack purposefully did not use linear perspective opting for a more 2D paper cut-out style.

Avatar: The Last Airbender wanted to recreate a naturalistic world with linear perspective.

Will it be melodramatic?

The most important thing is supporting the story and the characters!! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

Kim Possible had BGs with very few parallel lines to stay upbeat and fun. 191

More “incorrect,” but whimsical BGs for Bugs Bunny, and the rest of the Looney Tunes’ backgrounds. Tim Burton... Enough said. Kim Jung Gi. Enough said here too.

Linear perspective is a great tool, but you don’t always need to use it. Like, you don’t use a hammer to eat cake.

So, why learn linear perspective at all? To answer that question, here’s a brief, related story about Sal:

She wanted to use linear perspective for the heist one, so I visualized her trying to draw something like this over and over:

Ahhhhh, cha. ♡

Or drawing stuff like this: Once upon a time in late 2009, Sal decided she was going to make her first webcomic, but didn’t know which of her many story ideas to choose. By the time she came to seek my opinion on the matter, she had narrowed it down to two choices: A heist story about gangsters in 1930’s New York, or, a Japanese style fantasy-adventure with magical foxes and stuff. Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

We discussed the difficultly of drawing cars, and buildings that were very important to the tone and events in the story. Plus, they had 192

to be historically accurate (hours of research!), compared to the organic, freeness of fantasy-nature. Although the linear perspective wasn’t the sole deciding factor, Sal’s limited linear perspective skills at the time made the heist story a MUCH more labor and time intensive option, and she decided on the fantasy comic, Hotarugari. (She ended up needing linear perspective in the fantasy comic anyway, though.)

So, the honest answer to the question, “Why learn linear perspective?” is: You don’t have to learn it, but it does give you more choices in the style of art for the stories you want to tell. Mastering Linear Perspective is not necessarily the next step to being a better artist. It only does one thing: assists you to draw inorganic backgrounds in a visually similar way to reality. That’s it. The end.

So if linear perspective is something you want to be able to do, that’s great! I hope this book will help you practice and hone your skills! If not, that’s great too! Just go do whatever suits your story’s art style!

Linear perspective doesn’t help much with nature backgrounds, because there aren’t any straight lines. Liner perspective doesn’t help you paint, understand composition, design, or tell stories, either! Background Basics: Academies & High Schools

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So... Now What? Wooooow! You got through the whole book! Congratulations!

If you keep making stuff, it’s likely you’ll get a body of work.

If you’re anything like me, after finishing any kind of instructional book, your last thought is, “So...now what?”

If you have a large body of work, it’s more likely to get you hired than on an art school degree or resume/CV alone will because it’ll prove what you can But why wait for that? If do instead of just describing you have an idea for a story— what you can do. make it and finish it!

Make stuff and finish it. It sounds dumb, it really does, but it’s true. There is no drawback to making stuff and finishing it. You’ll gain the additional skills of seeing things through to the end, time management, as well as the improvement of your art skills.

More easily said than done though, right? That’s why storydrawingskills.com is going to be the home of guided drawing challenges, workshops and prompts based on this book as well as other story art related topics like character design and story writing for comics.

I’ve also got some longer term projects in the works, like coaching a group of 5-10 people for 6 months while they draw their first 22 page manga or webtoon.

Until next time, happy drawing! -Betsy

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Yarrr! This is me best pirate face!

I’m Betsy Luntao and I thought I wanted to work in a feature film animation studio, so I went to art school and got myself a degree. During the pursuit of that degree, I ended up being hired as an art teacher in 2011 for an af ter-school program type thing. I came to the realization that I enjoyed teaching drawing even more than I liked drawing for an employer, but I’m too, um, “free-spirited” to work at a real school. My new mission in life: To provide guidance to artists who want to develop skills for film-style storytelling in online comics and storyboards. Yet, I came to find my local art classes very limiting in that mission. Frequently, I was asked, “Do you have any lessons online?” I finally decided to write this ebook as the first step to offering art instruction outside of my local art classes. I hope the contents of this ebook was of some help to you, but if not, I would love to hear what your biggest struggle in drawing is right now: [email protected] (Yes, I do read every single email!)