Cartooning Update: Photo Reference

When I started taking a Fuzzy Knight comic revival seriously, I was jumping in the deep end (my early attempts were… not good.)

But successful comic drawing, in my opinion, hinges not just on skill, but creative shortcuts and cheats as well. If you have a deadline, you need time saving tricks to make those deadlines.

However, I didn’t just want to recycle my images endlessly. So I set up sketch templates at a very wide angle that included everyone. That way, I could show them at different angles, zoom in for close ups or medium shot, etc, then draw a fresh drawing from that base. It’s been working well enough so far.

Thing is, even that can feel a bit stale over time, so now I’m trying something else.

In the years I did Fuzzy Knights as a photo comic, I ended up collecting a lot of stock photos I could use in a pinch if I didn’t have time to set up a micro movie set that week.

So I’m taking those photographs and using them as the basis for fresh image angles. Not tracing, mind you, other than table lines, character sheets, and GM screen so the perspective is right, I use their placement as the basis for a new drawing. These are my early results, which will appear in an upcoming comic.

Eventually, this should lead to me revisiting some of my photocomics from way back! A “remastered” edition, if you will.