Drawing Backgrounds

[drumlug13]

Pretty broad question but what is your approach to drawing backgrounds? I know there are a million different ways to make backgrounds so I just want to read about the different workflows you guys use, especially if you are combining software.

For my next few cartoons I have in mind I plan on using Clip Studio for the backgrounds, so the very first thing I tripped over was conflicting line weights. I just assumed that each software used their own specific widths but it looks like if you are using the same canvas size in Moho and CSP that the lines and brush sizes will be the same. So yeah, drawing a scene with a brush line width of 12 in CSP doesn't look that awesome when you throw that behind your character you drew with a 6 in Moho... So I learned that one today.

Anyway, what are your tips, tricks and some of the other little obvious pitfalls that you routinely mindful to work around?

Pretty much everything I've made so far was made just to get a laugh out of a few friends so I was never really concerned about where my horizon was or if I stuck to a specified perspective and it shows. I would like to take these next couple a little more seriously so I'm brushing up on some of the basics I should have paid more attention to all along. This book is supposed to be really good and it's available to read or download at the Internet Archives. "Animation Background Layout" by Mike S. Fowler. If you've got some more recommended reading, throw it out there.

https://archive.org/details/animationba ... l/mode/2up

[slowtiger]

Thx for the link, I didn't know that book before. It's very on the technical side, I wouldn't recommend it to beginners.

OK, my approach to backgrounds.
- Do I need a background at all? Many of my jobs just require some gradient or colour card.
- How important is the background, which part of the story does it tell? I'm a fan of those old TV ads from the 50's to the 60's where only the bare necessities were drawn. I tried that approach here myself: https://vimeo.com/enigmation/hire-me. You may have a look around on my vimeo page, different projects have different styles and backgrounds. This one https://vimeo.com/660961896 needed a more complete and realistic look. It all depends on the story you want to tell.
- What's the overall style, and do we want animation and background in the same style (Simpsons, Family Guy), or clearly different (like in traditional Disney fashion of cel animation over watercolour BGs)?
- Do BG elements need to move, do they interact with the characters?

If you need some inspiration about different styles, have a look at animation short film festival sites. Some of them nowadays have short clips of each movie online.

I recommend to storyboard your story first, and do it with pencil on paper. Only small thumbnails for the first pass. Decide where to use long shots, close ups etc. Decide about possible camera moves. Try to think in film language, not in theater language (much of today's animation does only the latter). Have some dynamics in the sequence of your shots, not only with camera view, but also with amount of detail, colours, brightness, etc. Then do some real compositions and layout. Don't just aim the camera at your characters, make it important where in the shot your character stands and where it moves to, how much of it is visible etc.

All this is part of storytelling and much more important than perspective or all the other technical stuff. But you're already on the right track to tackle these as well:
- if you use lines, which ones? Rough, clean, which colour or thickness? Do some tests in Moho and render a HD image (1920 x 1080), then import this into Clip Studio Paint and find a corresponding line width. Take notes: it's helpfull to have a project diary so you can look up certain settings.
- Test your colours. There's a shortcut in Photoshop to automatically adjust levels so the image uses all available contrast. I tend to work too flat, so doing this test reminds me where I need to add depth in my artwork. Also my Cintiq is quite old now and a bit dark, so images I paint there will look too bright elsewhere. I'm importing back and forth until everything looks balanced.
- Always have one layer with the characters of your scene when creating a BG. Only then you know you have the correct size relationship and perspective, and that BG's colours don't clash with character's.
- Think of enough empty space to place your characters in front of. On a BG which is busy everywhere your characters will vanish.
- Programs: any will do. Some people do their BGs in Moho. Most will use some bitmap software, like Clip Studio, Photoshop, etc. I use TVPaint. Often I combine elements from TVP and Moho, like having a shape in Moho with a bitmap fill from TVP.
- Dimensions: for static shots I just draw in HD or a little bit larger. For zooms I need a higher resolution, but for practical reasons I avoid working larger than 4K. Long pans can be split into several parts.

I think this is already enough. Would be nice if you could show some of your designs.

[drumlug13]

Thank you very much Slowtiger. I was hoping you would post. Those animations are excellent as always.

So for what I'm working on now, and I swore I would never ever ever do politics but here I am. I think it will be funny to see these guys thrown into funny situations together. The two characters are mine but the background is a drawing from a Depatie/Freleng "Dogfather" cartoon. It's just one that I'm using for inspiration so I tacked it onto this example. I know this is a very busy and maybe even distracting style, but it's my favorite. I'll definitely tone it down a bit and end up somewhere closer to the Pink Panther series.

I'm not quite finished with the characters, I think some of those stars need to come out, so haven't done any rigging yet. But I'm shooting for this late 70's kind of thing.

[MrMiracle77]

Most of my hobby animation involves replicating backgrounds from a movie, so the process is simpler for me. I can use screencaps as a guideline for the background.

There have been times when I want to make an original background, though. For that, I have a set of background perspective vectors that I can re-shape in Moho as a guide, then draw the background behind the perspective lines. If you prefer to make backgrounds in CSP, you could place your characters, choose your perspective lines, then just render the lines with png transparency and draw your background underneath it.

This will also help you figure out just how much of your background really needs details. If your characters are blocking off a huge chunk of the scene, maybe you don't need as much detail as you think.

For your sample image, it may be beneficial to move the characters closer to the camera so their feet aren't visible. If you see a characters feet interact with the ground level, you have to account for that point of contact with a shadow, or some grass breaking the base of the feet to create some sense of depth for the viewer. Actors are rarely filmed in social interactions with their feet visible, so that's a helpful workflow shortcut.

[drumlug13]

For your sample image, it may be beneficial to move the characters closer to the camera so their feet aren't visible. If you see a characters feet interact with the ground level, you have to account for that point of contact with a shadow, or some grass breaking the base of the feet to create some sense of depth for the viewer. Actors are rarely filmed in social interactions with their feet visible, so that's a helpful workflow shortcut.

Totally true Dave. This isn't an actual scene, I just wanted to show Slowtiger where the overall design was heading

[SuperSGL]

My animation backgrounds usually created in Moho, but I've used painter for mountain background big enough to pan across a little in the scene. CorelDraw helped me create a city in the background (much quicker then moho could have) I've also applied effects to some of my 3d images to make them look cartoony.
If you need a busy background you might try de-saturating your color a little, then brighten or darken the image to fit the scene.