I used to draw them when I was at school a few years ago. Mostly just little characters with funny expressions when I should have been doing physics or French or something.

So the other day I had an idea for my new blog; I’d start a weekly web comic. Why not? People like them, they’re fun to make, more memorable than an average post and they keep people coming back when you post them on a regular basis.

But there were a couple of obstacles in my path when I considered how to make a web comic. The first one was that I hadn’t picked up a pencil in almost five years. The second one (and perhaps the bigger problem of the two) was that my scanner is currently out of operation. And what I mean by that is I lost the power cable and the adapter.  However, there really is no extreme need for a scanner if you’re only making a basic web comic.

So my first task. Draw my cartoon. I decided that I’d make my first strip a quick one using the same image three times. The joy of drawing cartoons is that they don’t have to be good. Just draw it big. Really big. An A4 page will make up one panel. Then, when you shrink it down and edit it a little your mistakes will become so miniscule they won’t matter. In fact, blemishes and bad effects add character to a drawing.

So I drew out my basic shapes and added some features to make a fat, round man sitting at a computer. It’s not perfect. His hands can even touch the keyboard for God’s sake but that’s what makes it a cartoon. Then I took a snap of it with my mobile phone and sent it to my PC via Bluetooth. This is what I got on my screen: not exactly the makings of a great cartoon (like if I’d had a scanner) but fully workable.

This is where technology works its magic. Send the drawing to a Photoshop program. I used Gimp because it’s free but you could also use Adobe or another program similar to that. If you need to brush up on your Photoshop skills I suggest reading MUO’s Idiot’s Guide to Photoshop.

The first thing we want to do in Photoshop is blow the picture up to 200%. This is normally found under the ‘Image‘ tab along the top of Photoshop programs. This is so the editing tools used later on will be more accurate. Then we want to highlight the different areas and separate the lines from the open spaces. To do this, lower the level of brightness and up the contrast like in the screenshot below.

This will give you red areas with deep black lines like they’ve been inked beforehand. Now it’s time to clean it all up. Using the eraser tool (on its largest setting) clean up all the spotty and blotchy areas from when I altered the brightness and contrast. Don’t try to be too perfect as you’ll be there for hours. Just get the big areas and the blemishes in noticeable places. All the bad areas will be further cleaned up as you go along and then made smaller when downsizing the image.Your image should look like this when you’re erasing all the blemishes.

Now that you’ve got all the main blemishes and marks removed, fill in the large areas with the colours and textures that you want. I chose to go with the simple ‘fill with colour‘ tool but you can use different brush styles and patterns to replicate hair, leaves, sky etc. It all depends on what style you want your drawing to be. Since I’ll be posting mine weekly to my blog I want to keep it simple so it won’t take up too much of my time.

When all of your main areas are coloured there will still be marks and the image won’t look good at all. No really I mean it, it won’t. Click ‘Save‘ and then open the file with MS Paint. The reason I’m using Paint to finish off the editing is because it has some good ‘line tools’ to make the objects look better and it’s easier to work with.

Your image should look much bigger in Paint. Use this opportunity to go around with the paint brush and fill in any missing details and white areas. Use the colour matching tool highlighted in the screenshot to the right to match the colour exactly.

Then use the line tools and the box tools to make regularly shaped objects look better. You can see how I made the table appear better by using the deep, bold lines but I’ve still left in some blemishes and crooked lines because that’s the style of my drawing.

If you’re going to use the same drawing in multiple panels like I did then select it with the cropping tool. When you have it selected, right-click on it and click ‘Copy’ and right click on the page and paste the drawing in again. Then move it into the next panel area.

Use the shape tools to add panels (don’t be afraid to experiment with different style panels ““ when they’re all the same it can get boring. It’s not a spreadsheet!). Finally, resize your image to a good size for your blog. Six hundred pixels wide is about the max you can hope for on the web.

The final task is to add captions and speech bubbles. You do this last because resizing text ruins it completely. Enter in the text where you want it to go in the panel. Then surround it with a shape which will form the basis of a speech bubble. Erase one of the corners, and by using two lines make a little point towards your character. You can used curved lines for this if you wish.

Here is my finished comic strip. Nothing fancy as it was largely just a test to see if I could do it.

It took me about 45 minutes from start to finish. It would have taken less if I had a scanner ““ that would have meant less cleaning up in the beginning.

Here are some tips for how to make a web comic on your PC:

• Make lines/shading bolder where there will be less light. I’ve done this on his back as the light from the computer screen doesn’t reach there. Do the opposite for where there is light ““ such as on Harold’s face in my cartoon.
• Be sure to blow your image up big in the beginning to make your tools more accurate.
• Always leave text until last.
• Experiment with different panel styles.
• Use textures in Photoshop to replicate water, sky, sand, wood etc…
• It’s okay to crop the one image and simply reuse it if you’re feeling lazy like I was.
• Make your character simple ““ you’ll have to draw him/her again and again ““ remember that!

Of course, if you have a drawing tablet you can simply draw it directly onto your PC and forget about all that cleaning up!

How do you manage to draw and produce your web comics?   Any tips you’d like to pass on?

Thumbnail Image Credit: atibens

What PimpTheFace lets you do is create a awesome face with their different body parts. You can create some really cool looking faces with this service. Drawing cartoon faces of someone is definitely a good way to kill a few hours.

Let’s take a look at how it works and then I will show you two videos on the service. First start off by browsing on over to PimpTheFace.

Once you are there, click on the paint splatter that says click here. Right after you click on that you will be pushed to a page with a Photoshop-esque editor. It might look intimidating at first but it is really quite easy to use and master.

You will see two columns on the left and one more on the right. One of those columns – the left most one, allows you to pick the body part out of the choices. This includes the head shape, hair, eyes, nose, mouth, facial hair and more.

The column closer to the middle is how you select which body part you want to add next. Select the top icon like you can see in the below screen shot. This is the faces outline or silhouette. Once you click on it, the items you can pick are on the left. Click on one of them and it will appear in the drawing window. If you want to change it simply select another icon. It will replace the one that is currently there ““ easy peasy.

In the above shot I added my silhouette and below you will see my head or dome type. I am really having fun with this – are you having fun yet?

Now you should have the hang of it. Once you see how it works it is pretty intuitive. Keep on adding facial items until you reach the bottom of the list and have a full face. You can go back and change any items you like until you have an image you love.  Here is the image I created in about 5 minutes.

After you are happy with your face you can let him travel the world in the form of adding backgrounds. You can do that by using this toolbar on the right: It allows you to save your face as well as print or store it online. You will need an account for these features. I just copied my face out.

Here is a video on creating a face with PimpTheFace:

And one more on how to draw President Obama using PimpTheFace.

We would love to see your creations! Post them up for us to see. Link to em’ or what ever you want but we can’t wait to see your creativeness! If you’re familiar with any other website offering easy tools for drawing cartoon like faces please let us know about them.

But I do enjoy doodling, so a boring meeting plus a pad and pencil equals time-killing fun. I have been doodling since elementary school and I enjoy looking at other people’s doodles’ as well. I am not talking about the application Doodle, either. I am talking about good old fashioned pen and paper doodles!

Now, I came across an awesome blog that not only showcases people’s doodles but they also let you upload your own! It is called DoodlerBlog.

Have you ever came across a website and said ” I SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF THAT!” ““ well this is one of them!

I can see this going the way of lolCatz or Failblog and blowing up.

The first time I visited the site I enjoyed looking at doodles from Billy Gates, Barrack Obama and even George Bush. But that is not why I like the site so much. It has a uploader so you can submit your own doodles and have them published on the site for posterity!

I choose a few of my favorites to show you:

Barrack Obama Doodle

Inferno Doodle

Ronald Regan Doodle

Tribal Doodle

And I even uploaded one of my Doodle’s and it was published

Graffiti Doodle

You can visit the site and upload your own doodles (or email them at doodlerblog@gmail.com) to use the aptly named “Nifty Submitter Thingy” on the right sidebar as you can see below:

Simply fill in your Name and Email address. Then, locate to the doodle on your computer. It needs to be in .jpg, .gif, .png or .pdf format and under 2 MB. After you select the image, hit the Upload button.

Then, hit the confirm button and off it goes! Do you doodle? Does sharing your doodles with the world interest you? Have some doodles you want to share with us? Link us or upload them to DoodlerBlog!