NEW ARTIST: hello! I'm ms.Anonymus i want to know you fellow artist! :)

[edensmith95]

hi I'm a new artist and would love for people to support me as i would love to read and support many of u other fellow artists! i would love for any advice for my up coming comic Gamma. So this is really cool so id love to talk to ya!

[pastchaser]

Hello new artist! What kind of advice are you looking for?

[edensmith95]

I'm really wondering whats a good art program to use for making online comics, thank u btw

[pastchaser]

no problem!

Really, any program can be used. Some of the more popular ones are photoshop, manga studio, and paint tool SAI. People also use paint.net, ms paint, gimp, and a variety of other programs, combinations of, or you can even make pages the good ol traditional way and scan them in!

for me personally, I use a combination of photoshop CS2 (which is available free on the Adobe site, as they have stopped creating updates/support for it, but it works pretty great for me!) and paint tool SAI (Which I did purchase a license for, as it was only about $70)

PS I use for the panelling, for text and bubbles, and other small additional effects. I use SAI for sketching, line art, and most of the colouring/painting process as I like the way it functions and the tools better (if only it had a text tool, I might switch over to it entirely ;_;)

But there are TONS of programs out there that are readily available to you for the general art process for making any sort of comic.

[kristintipping7]

Hi, welcome to Tapastic! What kind of comic is Gamma going to be? Is it gag-a-day, or serial? (It will be easier to give advice if I know)

[edensmith95]

Gamma is going to be serial and once i get a digital program imma make the series, its action, horror, and sic-fi! Gamma ch.1 page 1 will probably be hand made hehe thanks

[edensmith95]

OH WOW! i was told by another great artist to use SAI so imma go with that one, thank you for all ur help! i never realized there are so many I've read all ur comics btw awhile back and i love the charters! keep up the good work, hope i can show u mine someday!

[kristintipping7]

Ok, serials have tougher row to hoe than gag strips, in my opinion. Maybe I'm just saying that because my comic is serial, though, lol. There's a few things that jump to mind that I wish I'd known earlier.

1. It helps immensely to have the script done for the entire story, or at least the first plot ark, before you start drawing the pages. Preferably, you should have thumbnails done of all the page layouts as well. You may have already done this, but I used to never do it, and I completely shot my self in the foot most of the time because of it.

2. always make sure you have a "buffer" of at least a few finished pages ahead of the latest posted page. Why? Because life happens, that's why. At some point, so much life is going to happen to you that you won't be able to finish one or mere pages on time. This is another thing that might be obvious to you, but didn't occur to me for literally years. Yes, I'm an idiot.

3. Most drawing programs (including SAI, I think) have a trial version you can download for free. You might try downloading several and trying them all out before you settle on one.

4. If you decide to invest in marketing down the road, remember to look for your niche. Your comic probably isn't going to have a lot of audience overlap with the a slice of life comic or a lighthearted comedy. Make sure to only advertise on sites with users that will be interested in the kinds of things you're writing about.

Hope some of that was useful. Good luck with Gamma!

[owlsinsocks]

I don't know if this is weird but i do everything on Photoshop these days... Layers are a godsend and they seem to post okay xD love your stuff btw, blue/brown eyes = damn cool

tapastic.com/owlsinsocks

[edensmith95]

Thanks mate! if you wanna see more works heres a link to my devientart page http://msanonymus.deviantart.com Thanks a bunch friend!

[Sidulus]

I use Manga Studio and GIMP. I used to use Adobe Photoshop, but Adobe and I had some cough... issues... so I've pretty much been looking at alternative art programs. Currently I'm also trying to learn Anime Studio and Motion Artist in hopes of incorporating some animation elements into my comic.

Also, a horror comic sounds pretty cool. If you are into horror comics, this site has some pretty neat examples taken out of horror manga- http://spiraphobia.tumblr.com/

[Karl_Chubb]

Hey new artist. Everyone's different. I use traditional ink, but I used to rely heavily on photoshop. If you've got a wacom tablet you can pretty much do it all on your comp. Manga Studio is pretty good too.

SPARKO

[dairyfiend]

Welcome! Here's a thread I started with some great sites for tutorials, whether software specific or just art in general. Check em out!

Sincerely, The DairyFiend

[dairyfiend]

Also I use FireAlpaca. It's similar to Paint Tool SAI, but completely FREE. That and GIMP

[jessiepolfliet]

Another usefull tip, make a script for anything that has to happen in your comic.
I use Celtx for it is really handy in also making mastercatalogs in which you can describe your characters and their motives.