Drawing pens

[Klartekst]

No doubt the good old drawing pen is superior, but would-be cartoonists 
should not be discouraged if they find it difficult to use a pen. It is 
possible to cheat. Even Frank Cho of Liberty Meadows admits that he uses 
felt-tipped pens.

I draw a comic strip for a local newspaper, and this is how I do it:

1) First I type the text on my PC, using a comic book font. I have a 
template with panel borders that I type the words into.

2) I print out a sheet with the panel borders and text and put them on my 
light box. Then I put a blank piece of paper on top.

3) Then i pencil, using a blue pencil to block out the layout and a black 
pencil for details.

4) Then I switch the sheets around so that the template with borders and 
text are now on top. Then I ink using a Pilot Fineliner felt-tipped pen. 
The good thing about this pen is that you can vary the line thicknes by 
varying the pressure. For really fine lines i "ink" with a hard pencil (4H) 
sharpened to a fine point.

5) Finally, I scan the whole thing and use my PC to add blacks and greys 
(and correct any mistakes). Before I send the strip off to the paper, I 
reduce it to the size and resolution that they use - to make it easy for them.

... and my 26.000 readers will never suspect that I don't use professional 
tools (unless they are on this list).

Nils From Norway