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Brush Design in Photoshop User Magazine

The March issue of Photoshop User magazine has now been released.  If you’re a subscriber, it went out in the mail today or you can download it on the Zinio reader right now.  In the ‘Down and Dirty Tricks’ sections, I’ve got a four page step-by-step on Designing Dynamic Hair and Fur Brushes with some tips on how to use them.  This article was a challenge to write, as I wanted to make sure that I didn’t miss anything crucial, and I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out.  While brush design in Photoshop is an art form in and of itself, this should get you started.  The rest you get from putting in a lot of time and practice.

For more on how to paint fur and hair in Photoshop, check out my DVD, “PhotoshopCAFE Masterclass: Animal Painting in Photoshop.“

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Wacom’s Inkling – Lowering Expectations

Anybody who knows me or follows my work is well aware that I’m a big fan of Wacom tablets, so when I had the opportunity to put the new Inkling through its paces, I really wanted to like it.  If I drop all pretense, I’ll admit to being a little apprehensive about writing an honest review, as I really enjoy working with these folks.  But I also didn’t want to mislead any artists into buying the device and have them hold me responsible when it didn’t live up to their expectations.

The purpose of the Inkling is ingenious.  Attach a small clipped box to whatever page you’re working, use a pen device that draws just like a ballpoint pen, albeit a little larger in size, and whatever you draw is saved as a file, ready to be imported into your computer.

Let’s start with what I liked.  The device itself is elegant.  I doubt I could come up with any improvements in the case design, as everything fits together nicely, the pieces feel solid, and the case itself has a nice weight and construction.  Definitely doesn’t feel like a cheap piece of plastic that will break in a month.  While I’m normally a pencil sketcher, I did enjoy drawing with the pen.

Unfortunately, there’s a lot more that I didn’t like about the experience.  Frankly, the software is clunky.  While I’m not an engineer and can’t quite give a lot of specifics on where the shortcomings lie, it just didn’t seem comfortable to work with.  While it has a feature that records all of your strokes, enabling you to scrub or play them back, I didn’t really see the point.  Additionally, the layers didn’t really seem to work well for me, either.  I never felt the need to separate my sketches into components.

The biggest issue I had with the device is that it has serious accuracy issues.  In an effort to test this, I created a pencil drawing in my sketchbook, erased it until it was faint, and then traced over it with the Inkling pen, trying to get as clean a drawing as I could.  I created a total of four new layers, going over the same lines in places, just to test the accuracy.  Here is the result of that particular drawing experiment.

As you can see, the layers don’t line up and the recorded lines aren’t very accurate.  I repeated this experiment a few more times over a couple of days, just to make sure I didn’t bump the device or accidentally move it the first time out, and judging by the similar results, that wasn’t the case.  Even with only using one layer, the accuracy had noticeable issues.  Having imported the Inkling sketches into both Photoshop and Illustrator, I can verify that bringing the sketch and layers into both programs works as advertised.  It was a smooth import and looked the same as it did in the Inkling Sketch Manager, layers intact.  The problem seems to be in the capture itself.

In an effort to be fair, my expectations for the Inkling were pretty high, and I think the disappointment lies primarily with that.  I was expecting the same level of accuracy I get from an Intuos tablet.  If you look at the Wacom site, it says that the Inkling is  “Designed for rough concepting and creative brainstorming, Inkling is ideal for the front end of the creative process. Later, refine your work on your computer using an Intuos4 tablet or Cintiq interactive pen display.”

Using this device for solely that purpose, it works as advertised.  I did a page of rough sketches using the pen alone, the results you can see here.

If you weren’t being a stickler for accuracy and comparing it to the original sketch line by line, the Inkling does what it was designed to do.  For rough sketches and concept ideas, to simply record something you can throw into your laptop and email to a client or collaborator, it works just fine.  It just wouldn’t do what I wanted it to do, which basically was to replace my scanner.  I know a number of other artists that were hoping for the same thing, and for this purpose, the Inkling is not the right tool.

When it comes to creative tools, the goal should be to find ones that will make your life better and fill a need.  When it comes to the Inkling and my own personal workflow, I find myself struggling to invent a use for it, in order to justify having it.  Unfortunately, I can’t.  When I import a drawing into Photoshop, I need it to be clean, and I will rarely have any use for a rough unfinished sketch like the ones you see above.  Will this device be useful to others?  Yes, I’m sure that it will, but it’s not for me.

 

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The things I cannot say.

A recent chat with a colleague began with, “now promise me you won’t tell anybody about this.”

More and more of my discussions these days begin with a sentence very much like that.  Often in the freelancing business, it’ll be referred to as ‘consider this under NDA’ as well, without actually having a document to sign.  An NDA, for those who are unfamiliar, stands for Non-Disclosure Agreement, which is usually a legal document that basically says that if you sign it, you’re agreeing to keep your lips zipped about any information the client shares with you.  In my experience, it usually refers to an upcoming book, project, app, software or hardware release, and anything else where the launch would be severely damaged if word got out to customers and competitors.  NDAs are serious business and I’ve been asked to sign a few, even just to hear about a project that I either ultimately turned down, or it turned out that I was not right for.

As my time has worn on in this business, I’ve come to the conclusion that unless the person I am speaking with has specifically told me I can talk about it, whatever ‘it’ is, everything is under NDA, even if I haven’t signed anything.  In any business, trust is an immeasurable asset when it comes to forging and maintaining long-term relationships.  Work with people long enough, and show them that their confidence is not misplaced, and pretty soon, they won’t even bother to ask you to keep it confidential because they already know you will.

One of my biggest pet peeves is the excuse some will use for unethical behaviour, ‘it’s not personal, it’s just business.’  As long as you’re talking to a person, business IS personal, and if you tick that person off, you’ll likely never do business with them again.

Gossip is rampant.  Always has been.  With social media, however, people are sharing far too much information, far too often, simply to be popular and dish the dirt on anything and everything.  If a company hires you to do a job, it can be tempting to spill the beans in order to inflate your image in the eyes of your colleagues, but if that company has taken a risk on you and finds out they can’t trust you to be discreet, it will be the last time they hire you.  Popularity on social media doesn’t pay the bills, but a solid reputation as a professional certainly does.

Over the past year, I’ve worked on a number of projects that I couldn’t talk about while working on them.  There have been paintings I couldn’t share for a month or more after delivery, because they were gifts and the risk of the recipient seeing them would irreparably damage my relationship with the clients who hired me.  I’ve had illustration clients who’ve hired me for jobs where my contribution has long been finished, but their project is still in development and to this day, I can’t share even a sneak peek until they launch.  Just recently, I wrote an article for Photoshop User magazine that was written, finished and submitted well over a month ago, but I was only allowed to talk about it last week.  I made a point of asking early on, and was given the exact date after which I was allowed to reveal my involvement, and I even double-checked with the editor on that date to make sure.

The only way to gain a reputation for being trustworthy is to consistently prove it to every client and professional with whom you come in contact.  This is beneficial in many ways.  A client that trusts you will not only hire you again, but they”ll refer you.  Just as important, people that trust you will share information with you, and in this industry, information is power.  You can find out when new products, software, and projects are being launched, what advancements are coming soon from which companies, and most importantly, which people and companies are great to work with and which ones you want to avoid.

Trust is always a gamble, and sometimes those with whom you place your trust will abuse it and make you regret it.  If you’re smart, you won’t allow them to do it twice.  Word spreads fast and people don’t want to work with those who can’t keep their mouths shut.

To be trusted, you must be trustworthy.

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Why I Paint on the iPad

This is a painting I recently finished on the iPad.  For those who want the technical specs,  I’m using the first generation iPad, the Wacom Bamboo Stylus, and the procreate app.  The actual size and resolution of this image is roughly 13″ X 9″ at 72 ppi.  The only photo used was for reference (thanks, Pete!) and I designed my own brushes.  I have no idea how long it took me to paint as I worked on it over four or five days, an hour or two here and there.  I’ve never done a painting in one sitting and doubt I ever will.

Since the resolution and size for the iPad is so low, I’ll likely never be able to do what I call ‘finished work’ on it, so you might wonder why I bother at all.  As a sketch pad, it’s great, but why put all the time into painting in detail, light and shadow?  Very simply put, it’s a challenge, and it’s fun.

At the risk of sounding immodest, I already know how to make Photoshop sit up and do the boogaloo when it comes to painting.  I know what it takes to get the fine details and I’ll always keep working to add more realism and texture to my paintings, but any limitations I have in my painting are my own.  If my paintings aren’t as good as I can possibly make them, the fault doesn’t lie in Photoshop or my Wacom tablet, it’s in my ability.  I can’t remember the last time I thought, “I wish Photoshop could do…”

With the iPad, however, the challenge is to see just how far I can take a painting before I’m limited by the tools I’m using.  The resolution tops out at 72ppi.  The size is finite.  I have to work with what I’ve got, which is a combination of the device, the stylus and the app, all three I feel are the best I can find for my needs at the moment.  I’m not about to buy a new iPad while this one still works very well.  By working with limited hardware and software, it forces me to become a better painter, to find new ways of achieving the best I can from an image, with the tools I have at my disposal.  That stretching of skills can’t help but translate to better painting when I’m NOT limited by the hardware and software.

The fun part comes from being able to paint on a portable device.  As much as I enjoy working with the Wacom Cintiq 12wx and a laptop, or even just the Wacom Intuos4 small tablet and a laptop, neither option is REALLY as portable as a pencil and sketchbook, or an iPad and stylus.  Even though I work all day in my office, I often sketch the next day’s cartoon or paint on the iPad while sitting in front of the TV with my wife in the evening.

When I began to paint this ring-tailed lemur, I really had no intention of taking this image any further than this.  It was fun to work on, but it wasn’t supposed to be a finished painting.  But, much like the ostrich painting that was first started on the iPad, I’m pretty happy with it, and I love the manic expression in this little fella.  There is a very good chance I’ll be taking this painting into Photoshop, bumping up the size to 18″X24″ at 300 ppi and spending many more hours finishing it.

For the difference in iPad painting vs. Photoshop painting, here’s a comparison of the Ostrich Totem.

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What’s in a name?

As I often do, I was listening to the radio this morning while working on a cartoon.  My buddy, Eric, and his co-host Matt on JACK-FM in Calgary were talking about how many new parents have taken to buying the website domain name of their child’s name.  Even though the guys were kidding around about it, I know exactly why parents are doing this.  I’m sure at one point or another, every parent considers that their child may be somebody famous and their name will be well known.  The cost of registering a domain name really isn’t all that much, but the difficulty comes in getting it before somebody else does.

When I first started my business, I didn’t really know where things were going.  I figured I might be doing more graphic design or be known more for my syndicated cartoons through my business name, so I put that as a priority.  Thankfully, I got to cartoonink.com before anyone else did.  I’m sure if I hadn’t, and tried to register it now, it would have been long gone.  I did try to get lamontagne.com but it has been registered, and even lamontagne.ca (the Canadian suffix) was taken by a chocolate company in Quebec.  I figured I had Cartoon Ink and that would be good enough, because most English speaking people can’t even pronounce my last name, let alone spell it.  I was shortsighted.

The radio conversation, however, got me thinking.  Many artists, photographers, and designers are known because of their own names, difficult to spell or not.  Ten years ago, I had no idea where I’d end up, and things have turned out a lot better than I could have hoped for.  As I have no intention of slowing down now, it would seem prudent to assume that ten years from now,  I could very well be in a much better place than I imagine.

With that in mind, I contacted my web host this morning, and I finally bought www.patricklamontagne.com.  While I’ll still promote my business as cartoonink.com for now, in a few days (takes time for it to go through the system), anyone who types in the new domain name will end up on this site as well.  Almost every successful person out there was once a nobody on their way up.  When it comes to preparing for a future promoting your skills and talents, it is in your best interest to plan for being much bigger than you anticipate.  It is not arrogance or ego to think that, either.  Ambition and self-confidence can easily exist in harmony with humility.   An artist gains nothing by setting limiting goals or playing small.  Better to put that carrot out there on the stick where you can see it, to remind yourself that you can be more than you are, provided you’re willing to work for it.

Today, buying www.patricklamontagne.com was that carrot, and perhaps when my name and work becomes very well known, people will just type that into the address bar, assuming that they’ll find my work there.

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The blog has left the building.

A couple of weeks ago, I was surprised and appreciative that I was asked to write a guest blog entry for Scott Kelby’s blog today.  Scott is the President of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals, the founder of Kelby Training and the editor-in-chief of Photoshop User Magazine.  Scott is also a photographer so his blog is very much geared (pun intended) to that creative pursuit.  I’m sure more than a few of his regular photographer readers are initially wondering if my animal paintings are some sort of freaky new HDR technique, until they read the entry.

You’ll find a number of different takes on keeping a blog.  Some say it’s a waste of time, others swear by it.   In keeping with the theme of the entry on Scott’s blog, I decided awhile ago to just ignore what others say about blogs, and I enjoy writing in mine.  I’ve always liked writing, even in school.  Those that know me best know that I’ve even written a couple of novels, the last one over ten years ago,  although if I’m being honest, I chickened out when it came to really putting in an effort to get them published, but I enjoyed the process immensely.  I’ve been toying with the idea of dusting one of them off, re-editing it with the voice of a little more experience, and giving it another shot, just because I love the story so much.

I also find that I enjoy the ‘keeping a diary’ aspect of a blog.  At the end of each year, I write a summary of what I did and didn’t get done over the past 12 months, and I derive quiet satisfaction from going through my posts, especially since there are always little things I’d forgotten about.

From a marketing standpoint, a blog is supposed to be a good thing.  It gives you something new to post on social media, offers a little more insight into your work, and keeps you focused on your goals.   Personally, I like that it gives me a chance to write a lot more often than I would otherwise.  For those of you that stop by often or even just once in awhile to read it, “Thank you.”

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Tough Decisions

Regular readers will know of my plans to have a booth at the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo in April.  Sounds like it’s far off, but it’s not.  In the past month or so, I’ve been doing a lot of research into what it takes to set up a booth at a trade/art show and I’ve been reconsidering.

There are pros and cons to everything.  I’m fond of saying that ‘fortune favors the bold,’ but the opposite side of that coin is that ‘fools rush in.’  Considering the latter doesn’t make you a pessimist, just realistic.  In the past 10 years, I’ve made a few business decisions that ended up making my life very difficult, one or two that took a couple of years to recover from financially.  Now that I’m in a better position,  I’ve learned the lesson, and I don’t care to repeat mistakes.

I’ve talked to a few people that have made very good money selling their art at shows.  For all intents and purposes, if your work is in demand, you can do very well at them.  Risks are part of the business, and I think I’ve got a pretty good track record for taking them.  Some have turned out less than ideal, many have turned out well, but I’m starting to recognize which are more likely to bear fruit and which have a greater potential to be barren.

I awoke on Saturday morning with this conundrum rattling around in my head, asking myself a tough question.  “Am I thinking of backing out simply because I’m afraid of this new challenge or are my reasons legitimate?”

Now, they say in business you should always be wary of your image, and put forth the persona of someone who is successful all the time.  I’m finding that feels a little too hypocritical sometimes.   I found out these past few years that many people whom I thought were wildly successful were just skilled at the image they project.  Good for them for managing that and I try to do the same, but on occasion, I wouldn’t mind revealing a little behind the curtain to help somebody else who might be facing the same struggles I did on my way up.  I sure would have liked to have seen some of the real world, instead of thinking I was lagging far behind all the time, when I really wasn’t.

While I do consider myself successful, it’s a relative thing.  I haven’t had to worry about paying the mortgage each month for a very long time, and when my car needs a repair or a big expense comes up, it definitely screws up the budget, but it’s manageable.  I make a good living, but we’re far from being able to have dinner out every night,  take a tropical vacation whenever we feel like it or walk in and buy an 80″ TV on impulse.  And I have a love hate relationship with my credit card.  Years ago, I carried a very nice size balance for quite a long time, and after digging myself out of that hole, I refuse to ever be in it again, so I rarely put anything on credit.

They say you have to spend money to make money, but the caveat should be that you have to HAVE money before you can spend it.  Racking up credit card debt and spending money we don’t have is the whole reason the world is in this economic mess in the first place.  Many businesses have failed because of a ‘spend now, worry about it later’ attitude.  Looking at my upcoming expenses for this Spring, alarm bells have been going off.

Let’s talk about some of the expenses involved with having a booth at a trade show, and I’ll likely forget a few.  There’s renting the booth, electricity, parking, hotel for two nights, credit card transaction software, hardware and fees, and meals.  Things I have to buy include banner and hardware, display hardware, wall racks, easels, and promotional material.   Then the largest expense shows up, and that’s inventory.  Talking to people I know who’ve done trade shows, they all say bring more than you need.  While I wouldn’t bring prints of all of my animal paintings, I would probably bring prints of 7 or 8 of them.  That’s small matted prints, large matted prints, 12X16 canvas prints and a few 18X24 canvas prints, framed and unframed.  Plus art cards and DVDs, which I still have to buy, too.  Canvas prints are expensive.  I would estimate that I would have to bring about 20-30 canvases for three days, not knowing which are going to sell or not,  and many more matted prints of both sizes and LOTS of art cards.  Some people (who don’t do trade and art shows) have suggested that people could just order one if you don’t have it on hand.  People buy at the shows on impulse.  Buyer’s remorse is very real.  I know because I’ve done it, and been there, and multiple sites I’ve read about art shows confirm it.  If you don’t have the product on hand, don’t expect to sell it.

So, while I’m not about to give you my whole art cost structure, let’s just say the cost here is now more than a few thousand dollars.  Here’s the argument I get from others,  “Yes, but think of the money you’ll be making.  You could make twice that.”

That’s true.  The other arguments are that anything I don’t sell, I just bring home and hold onto it for the galleries, and that it’s a great learning experience, and it could be wildly successful, and, and, and…

In the grand scheme of things, it may hurt for awhile, but that expense isn’t all that much, and an investment in the business.  I get that.  But here’s the other shoe.  My work is still selling well in the galleries, but these days, art is not flying off the shelves.  Despite what the stuffed shirts on CNN say, we’re still very much in an economic crisis, and art is a luxury.  Is this the right time to gamble a great deal of money on it?

It should also be noted that this expense doesn’t exist in a bubble.  I’ve also recently realized that I will need to buy TWO new computers this year.  A desktop and a laptop.  The current ones have gotten too old, and with Photoshop CS6 likely to come out this Spring, I’ll need hardware that can run it, especially given that I want to paint larger paintings.  On top of that, there’s likely a not-insignificant tax bill coming in April, despite the fact that I pay installments all year.  I’m also releasing four more paintings this Spring in limited edition canvases (both sizes) and matted prints (both sizes) and have to stock the galleries with those.  And finally, there are those expenses that show up that you don’t expect.  You can’t put out a fire if you’ve drained the well.

Do I think this show would be a valuable experience and benefit to my business?  Absolutely, but I no longer think this is the year to do it.  I’m unwilling to cut corners to save money and have a skeleton bare bones booth.  Putting forward the wrong image with my work would be worse than not being seen there at all.  I’ve spent too many years becoming skilled at my profession to look like a kid with a lemonade stand.

Timing is important in business, and unfortunately, there is no way to know if this is the right decision or not.  I believe in taking risks and being willing to fail,  I’ve done it a lot in the past decade,  but there is a difference between smart risk and foolhardy impatience.   Gut instinct plays a large part in business.  While it was that instinct that told me to take a chance on being a cartoonist and artist in the first place, it was also that which told me not to quit my full-time job until my business could pay my half of our bills.

I plan to attend more trade shows this year, but not as a vendor, so that when I am ready for it, hopefully this time next year, I’ll be armed with more information.  Sometimes the best way to keep moving forward is to not only knowing what to do, but knowing what not to do.  Right now, the timing for this just doesn’t feel right, and as much as I don’t like it, my instinct is telling me to wait.

With all of that in mind,  I’ve decided not to have a booth at the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo this year, and I’m comfortable that it’s the right decision.

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Gilly

Here’s a painting I just finished this morning, a commission of a Pomeranian named Gilly, who passed away last year.

While I’m happy with the finished painting, the work itself was very difficult.  Unfortunately, the photo reference was a lot less quality than I would usually consent to working with.  The pose was awkward, the photo was out of focus, and his eyes were reflecting the light from the flash.  Anyone who has ever taken a photo of a pet with a flash knows what that looks like and it’s as undesirable in a photo as it is in a painting.  Suffice it to say, this was one of the most challenging paintings I’ve done, and I really didn’t enjoy it all that much, which says a lot about my frustration level, since after all, I was still painting.

As this wraps up my current painting commissions for the moment, I’ll be starting on another Totem painting this week, and since I’ve already got that photo reference ready to go, it should be an enjoyable process.

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The best laid plans of mice and me.

At the beginning of 2011, there were a number of things I set out to do that didn’t get done, primarily because I was busy on projects I hadn’t anticipated.  Nothing monumental, by any means, just some projects I would have liked to have taken on that I never made the time for.  Every success manual you ever read says that you have to have goals and you should write them down, to make them real and remind you of your intentions, but it would seem that whenever I do that, it never turns out quite the way I want.  If I’d held firmly to many of my goals over the years, it would have been self-limiting, because it would have meant saying no to opportunities that drastically changed my career for the better.

I’m an obsessive planner and control freak even for things I know are uncontrollable (which is most things).   Just ask anybody who knows me, spontaneity is not one of my strong suits.  But it’s something I do want to change a little because the alternative takes a lot of effort and energy.  It’s really exhausting and not one of my finer qualities.  About a month ago, my wife and I were in Calgary to do some shopping on a Saturday, and out of the blue, I suggested driving home to Red Deer instead, (another hour each way) to shop there so we could hang out and have lunch with my folks.  Called them up, and they thought it was a great idea, so we headed north on a whim.  The fact that it shocked both my wife and my parents was a bit of a wake-up call for me, that something this minor had become completely out of character for me.  Planning, looking ahead, mapping things out and trying to see all of the variables is a great asset to have when working on projects and deadlines, but it’s an undesirable trait for living life.

I’ve been working my ass off for the past ten years trying to get my business and career to a point where there is enough forward momentum, so that every foot of ground gained, is not simply held because my fingernails are dug into the dirt far enough.  These days, I’m finally able to let go a little without sliding backward, which is giving me a chance to look around and figure out what to do next, without an overwhelming sense of panic.

So what have I got planned for 2012?  Well, there are a few things I know for sure.  First, I’ll be painting.  Animals, people, maybe an experiment or two, but always painting.  I am fortunate to be filled with a deep satisfaction that, right now, that’s the work I’m supposed to be doing and it gives me the most joy.  Editorial cartoons are another given.  Despite what I thought a few years ago, that part of my business is still going strong, and while following self-important, overpaid, blowhard politicians around with a shovel all year annoys the hell out of me on a regular basis, I do like drawing cartoons and the bills must be paid.  There will be at least one more DVD from PhotoshopCAFE coming in 2012, maybe even two.  I’ll definitely be selling my wares at the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo in April, and depending on how that goes, I might book another trade show for the Fall as well.  And so that I am free to say ‘Yes’ to whatever right opportunities show up, I’ll be saying ‘No’ a lot to those I’m certain are the wrong ones.

Of course,  I’ll work long hours, will still plan a little too obsessively, and will continue to work hard all year.  After all, as the scorpion said to the frog, “it’s just my nature.”

When it comes to the rest of 2012, however,  I’m just going to take deep breaths, keep moving forward, and see what happens.