Tracing Anime and other things in Flash - Page 3

Outlining Major Strokes

Then we will draw the outline of the major parts of the subject. There are many different ways to do this, and here are a few:

Select the Pencil tool. You have the choice between Straight, Smooth, and Ink.

1. Using the Smooth Pencil is the best way to get cleaner lines if you are not a particularly talented artist. The smoothing depends not upon pixel size but on how closely zoomed in you are to the drawing. If you areviewing the whole picture, the smoothing pencil might smooth to much for you. Zoom in and use the tool for better definition and accuracy.
   
2. Using the Ink Pencil will allow those of you with very precise drawing techniques to get exactly the line you have drawn. The Ink is also good for getting more jagged edges. It is however good to Modify>Curves>Optimize when using Ink to get a better quality drawing.
   
3. When working with long smooth curves, it is better to use the LINE tool and draw a straight line from one point of the curve to the other. Then select the ARROW tool and curve the line by cliking and pushing on the middle of the line, until it matches the curve that you want to use.
   
4. The BEZIER PATH tool in version 5 is really popular for those who know how to use it well. Even if you are skilled at using it, I have found that #3 works best for long curves and #1 works best for short curves. The bezier tool can be too tempermental I think when outlining because you are not always making perfect shapes. The Bezier tool has a tendency to fill the areas with unwanted color also, which is annoying.

I choose to use a pencil stroke of 1 for the Major lines, and a pencil stroke of .5 for minor strokes. This helps to define the areas better in the end when you are coloring and cleaning up your drawing in the last stages. Example of this on the next page...