Cartooning - Should you use Shading?

Introduction

To shade, or not to shade, that is the question! I recently evolved Area 5.1 into X-Failes so that I could show more detail and produce a more colourful product, but recently I've been feeling that it's been taking too much time. Truth be told, if it had gained me loads more views and likes I wouldn't care, but it hasn't.

I do use the following techniques to speed things up.

• Re-use characters and objects.
• Trace pictures of items I'm unfamiliar with.
• Re-use backgrounds.

But although shading can look really nice, it takes time, even when re-using artwork. Just flipping the image over usually requires extra effort, negating the time saved while you re-work the shading. And I didn't help myself by giving him tattoos.

Cartoon with Shading

Moving to a Flatter Style

Looking at the new style, it looks like I just copied from the cartoon above, removed the shading and tweaked it. But those elements have been re-used a few times and the fact they line up is just by chance.

Cartoon with flatter colouring

The thing I didnt expect was the colours to look bolder. I haven't been 100% consistant with eradicating the shading so there's still a slightly 3D feel about it.

The biggest time saver is probably the background. It's not much more effort than roughing it out with pencil and adding a bit of colour with a large marker pen. I then reduced the saturation by making it slightly opaque. The softer background does provide some degree of separation from the foreground objects, it focuses the reader a little.

Link to latest cartoon : http://area5-1.webcomic.ws/comics/76/

Mend and Make Do

Inspired By The Goggle Box

I think I'm very guided by what I've seen on TV. Like most of us, I grew up watching it and I think we have expectations about how one show links back to another. A cliff-hanger gets revisited, replaying what had happened at the end of the previous show.

The cartoon world doesn't tend to do this much because it wastes a frame when you revisit an idea. It's all about being economical with your art. But when Mo, who's the amazing artist behind the Riddick Q Loss Tales cartoon read Drop the Anchor she made the comment, "Personally I think we are almost their slaves now."

That was all the inspiration I needed, but I broke those unwritten rules and built the first frame using elements from the previous cartoon.

Area 5.1 - Enslaved Cartoon

Plagiarise Yourself

Shiela and I have discussed re-using old artwork in cartoons a few times. It feels like cheating, but I don't redraw my logo every time (and that's OK), so surely everything's rife for pillaging. The notion of "Mend & Make Do" is an old wartime ethic to deal with shortages. It's still as relevant for most of us today, only these days it's time we're short of.
 
There's a lot of "recycled" images in use here, quite obviously that first frame's taken from the end of the previous cartoon. The TV mask has been used quite a bit now, I like the 70's feel about it, and then there's the sofa scene that I've used quite often. The hand holding the phone is reworked from the Funstreak cartoon You Have A Match, and mostly all I've done is alter the hand a little and change the screen contents.

Doesn't seem to bad from just a few hours work! (What do you think?)

The link to the cartoon -- http://area5-1.webcomic.ws/comics/63/