Graphics Tutorials: Scanning Line Art
As a comic artist and cartoonist, I work with scanned line art just about every day. This tutorial will explain the way to scan artwork and "fix" problems that can occur in scanning.
Workflow. My typical workflow for creating artwork is as follows:
- Draw artwork in pencil.
- Ink the pencil work and erase the pencil lines.
- Scan the inked line art into Photoshop.
- Use Photoshop to adjust the black and white levels.
- Use Photoshop to add colors and effects. (that's covered in a subsequent tutorial)
Draw Artwork in Pencil. Let's assume you've completed step one above... you've drawn your artwork in pencil. Some people scan in penciled artwork and colorize it. Some comic studios these days go straight from pencils to colors without inking, or they accomplish the inking digitally. While you can certainly try this, I definitely prefer the strong crisp lines that come with inking. I find that the process of choosing which lines to ink and making some lines thicker and some thinner enables me to create a more smooth, sharp result. But you can achieve different effects with pencil work.
I should also mention that some many professional comic book artists use a blue pencil, which makes it easier to remove the pencil lines later in Photoshop. Other artists (such as Aaron MacGruder of Boondocks fame) prefer to draw their artwork directly on the computer with Wacom tablets. While I have tried this approach, I find my preferred method of working is to draw by hand and scan. But to each his or her own.
Inked artwork. Many fancy cartooning books talk about buying expensive brushes and India ink and such, but when I interned at a comic book studio, I quickly learned that whatever works for you is best. You can use El Marko brand makers if you want. I typically use black Micron or Faber Castell pens. They are a bit more pricey and you find them in specialty art stores, but they are worth it. I use varying widths or .03 or .05 for a standard line, .01 for fine lines, and .08 for thick lines. It is important to have variation in the thickness of your inked lines... it helps the artwork to "pop" more and gives it depth and weight.
I also go over my artwork with a thick marker that has a brush tip, such as the Micron Pigma. It gives the lines more artistic hetf. And I usually have a Sharpie on hand for filling in large areas of black. No need to waste my fancy art pens just to color in a large black area.
Regarding erasing your pencil lines, this is not an unimportant step. I have had many great images damaged by bad erasers that smudge my pencil lines. I have used all types of erasers... from your everyday pink erasers to those tan rectangular art gum erasers (hate 'em)... and the best type of erasers I have found are the simple click erasers. They are similar to mechanical pencils except they dispense more eraser, not pencil lead. I get the cleanest erasures from these guys every time.
Scanning your line art. Now that you have inked your artwork, you are ready to scan.
I use an Epson Perfection 1200 U scanner. I love my scanner and can recommend Epson as a quality scanner company. (My only complaint was that there was no support when upgrading to Windows Vista, but that's a different kettle of fish.) You can scan with the software that comes with the scanner, but I usually run the scanner from within Photoshop by choosing File > Import > [your scanner software name]. For example, I choose File > Import > Epson Twain 5.
When the scanner software initially opens up, the scanner will typically do a preliminary preview scan to show you what you have on the scanner bed. While scanners software may vary, there are typically three major settings you can choose from... Line Art/Text, Black and White Photo, and Color Photo.
If I click the Image Type button in my Epson scanner software, I get this dialog box.
Color Photo is the setting I use for a color photo (duh!) or any image that has color. Your output will almost always be in the RGB color mode (not CMYK).
Black and white photo is used for black and white photos (duh again!) or for any image that you want represented in Grayscale. It outputs to the Grayscale color mode. This is the setting I recommend for scanning your inked line art.
Text/ Line Art is the setting I USED TO recommend for scanning line art because it produces a high contrast image that has only black or white pixels. That way, your black lines come out SOLID black and your whites come out solid white... not off-white or light gray. While this is what we want to achieve with our scan eventually, it is better to scan in as a grayscale image and control the process of polarizing the colors to white and black in the next step... using a Levels adjustment.
About Resolution... The scanning resolution should normally be set to no higher than 300 ppi. Your scanner software may call it dpi but trust me, it's PPI. A scanner produces pixels, not dots. A resolution of 300 ppi is about as high as you're likely to need if you will be adding color. You can always lower the resolution but you never want to have to increase resolution. That's a big no-no. So start with the highest resolution you think you're likely to need and lower it as necessary in Photoshop.
Clean up the scan with a Levels Adjustment. After you have scanned in your artwork, you will need to clean it up a little in Photoshop. Specifically, you'll want to make sure that your white background is solid white and your black lineart is solid black.
Right now, your line art will have blacks that are not totally black and whites that are not solid white. Have a look at this scan from my buddy Shanehai. Note how you can see the marker lines in the solid black areas, and that the white background isn't pure white. This is in need of a Levels adjustment to make the blacks black and the whites white.
In Photoshop, open the Image menu and select Adjustment > Levels or use the shortcut Ctrl L to display the Levels dialog box.
The histogram shows that you have a cluster of pixels in the darker range (the hill on the left), but they are not solid black. You also have a cluster of pixels in the lighter range on the right. To make your blacks a more solid black, drag the Black input slider (the black triangle on the left) to the right of the hill. To make your "near-whites" become pure white, drag your White input slider to the left.
As you adjust your levels, you will see the darker shades become solid black and your lighter shades become pure white. Hover over the image below to toggle between the adjusted image and the "before" image. I think you will agree that it is much more satisfying to have solid blacks and solid whites.
Once you've made the lineart solid black and the background solid white, you're ready for the next part of the process... coloring the line art, which you can read about in my next tutorial.