Newbie Question: Blue LIne pencil art?

[faust1103]

Hi,

 

I was wondering whether some artists (obviously quite a few) seem to do their prelimary pencils with a blue pencil instead of a black one.

 

What is the oint of the blue line? Is it easier to ink? And if so, why?

 

Also I have often seen the blue line pencil being still available after the drwing is finished. Does this mean the inker is working from a copy of the pencils?

 

Anyone knows?

 

 

 

[Royd]

Hi Faust,

 

If I understand correctly, the simple or quick answer is that the blue pencil doesn't show up in the printing process. It doesn't register as a colour so the artist can pencil over the blue-line work (which he/she uses to establish the preliminary image) and not be concerned that the blue will show up in the final printed version.

 

As for your second query, I'm guessing that a blue pencil version being available occurs where the artist has completed a blue pencil version and lightboxed it so that he/she can complete the illustration in pencil as a clean finished image without all the preliminary lines in the blue line version showing up underneath the pencils.

 

If there are any artists or other collectors with a better understanding of the process than mine, please let me know if I've got it wrong

 

There's also the situation where you have original pencil pieces and then an inked version of the same page which "involves the penciller transferring full-sized digital copies of the pencils directly to the inker to be printed out in a non-photo blue ink on standard bristol artboard to be finished off in the inking process in preparation for publication.

 

The reason for this process is that quite frequently, pencillers and inkers work together but actually live far apart, sometimes even on opposite sides of the world abd it would take forever if they had to send everything back and forth through "snail mail""

 

Hope that helped Best,

 

Royd

 

 

Hi,

 

I was wondering whether some artists (obviously quite a few) seem to do their prelimary pencils with a blue pencil instead of a black one.

 

What is the oint of the blue line? Is it easier to ink? And if so, why?

 

Also I have often seen the blue line pencil being still available after the drwing is finished. Does this mean the inker is working from a copy of the pencils?

 

Anyone knows?

 

 

[comics-rock]

Response directly from Darick robertson:

 

"Hi Paul,

 

Simply, it saves time. I personally have all but abandoned regular pencils for the blue pencil because they're more versatile.

 

A regular pencil leaves it's tracks in the scanned art where blue pencil disappears when scanning the B & W Line art as a bitmap. In my case, I am able to draw my pages in blue, scan them and turn the line grey in Photoshop so my team can see the first stages of the art, and when everyone's had their say, I can go in and ink right over it, keeping the drawing more lively and less labored.

 

Also, regular pencil needs to be erased and often you can lose the ink work and have to go back over it, and sometimes, you lose something in the piece as a result, or get a smeared look to your piece that has to be covered with graphic white. For this reason I don't erase my blue pencil work. I don't want to damage the inks!

 

So blue pencil isn't meant to be seen by anyone but the artist, and in this case, the owner of the original.

 

In some cases, if I know the piece is going to be used primarily as something on a wall and not for publishing, like a portrait, I make an effort to hide my breakdown process more, but it's not conducive to meeting deadlines."

 

Explains everything really...

[comics-rock]

Response directly from Darick robertson:

 

"Hi Paul,

 

Simply, it saves time. I personally have all but abandoned regular pencils for the blue pencil because they're more versatile.

 

A regular pencil leaves it's tracks in the scanned art where blue pencil disappears when scanning the B & W Line art as a bitmap. In my case, I am able to draw my pages in blue, scan them and turn the line grey in Photoshop so my team can see the first stages of the art, and when everyone's had their say, I can go in and ink right over it, keeping the drawing more lively and less labored.

 

Also, regular pencil needs to be erased and often you can lose the ink work and have to go back over it, and sometimes, you lose something in the piece as a result, or get a smeared look to your piece that has to be covered with graphic white. For this reason I don't erase my blue pencil work. I don't want to damage the inks!

 

So blue pencil isn't meant to be seen by anyone but the artist, and in this case, the owner of the original.

 

In some cases, if I know the piece is going to be used primarily as something on a wall and not for publishing, like a portrait, I make an effort to hide my breakdown process more, but it's not conducive to meeting deadlines."

 

Explains everything really...

 

just bought the prelim of # 14 The Boys cover...it had the blue ink on it as well...truely nice guy, threw in a signed copy of # 14 as well...