So Week 2 is going to build off last week, and since you guys have been asking for harder tuts Odin has found some good ones. I'm gonna just say it now, if you don't put in the time to learn these, by doing several attempts and listening to cnc, you will have a hard time getting much further in this class.
- by duck
ResourcesHopefully you've at least seen the word so you know what we're talking about, its pretty much anything you use in a signature. It can be a stock, a c4d, an effect, a texture or whatever else you want. Resources are the meat and potatoes of most tags (excluding digipainting) and having good quality resources is important. If you have an idea for a signature in your head that involves a certain render, don't just look for 10 minutes and saw screw it, you're gonna have to really look for things sometimes to get good resources. Also make sure you understand that while one image might not fit perfectly, you can cut it apart and make it fit better and this allows for some creative effects.
High Quality vs. Low QualityWhat makes something high or low quality? Well, all resources are different of course and explaining LQ in just words isn't the best way but I'll try to explain.
Some stuff to avoid are resources that are blurry, pixelated, very small in size. It takes time to learn which resources are LQ and which are HQ, but do try to think about this when you are picking resources, how will it look in the end.
If someone tells you a signature is LQ they are referring to the resources and how you used them. If you muddle a signature by using textures too strongly on the top of a tag, that can cause an unappealing LQ look. Also make sure when sharpening you don't have a lot of pixelated edges because that will lower quality. A great way to see HQ signatures is to look through some of the inspiration links I will show at the bottom.
Where To Find ResourcesResources are every where on the internet and can be find as quickly as google image searching, but that isn't always the best option. Lots of graphics sites post up collections of resources for others to use (such as Creative Elegance at the bottom of this class) and some sites like PlanetRenders have galleries of renders to look through. There are positives and negatives to both of course.
Resource Packs are generally good for a few reasons: they usually have good quality resources, they have a variety to choose from, its fast. The negatives are: most packs include resources that are popular often to the point that they are whored (used by so many people it becomes bland), they also won't always have exactly what you are looking for and you will often still need to look on your own for specific resources.
Single Resources are best for: when you know exactly what you want or have certain poses/characters in mind that are uncommon, when you want to find something less common you will generally find these best as single pictures, as you search you will often find other things you like that you can save. The negative side of it is: you will gather good resources slower in most cases, you can sometimes spend an hour and end up with nothing that matched your idea so it can be hit and miss.
DeviantArt is also a good place to download resources but make sure you read the posts, some people do not want their stuff being used without asking, some want at least a mention, and others dont want it being used at all. If you are going to use DeviantArt make sure you understand this because as I said last week, ripping is a very bad thing to do in any field and taggers are pretty observant about this stuff.
- by zoomah
InspirationInspiration refers to an unconscious burst of creativity in a literary, musical, or other artistic endeavour.
Since being inspired is more about feelings than anything tangible, it might be strange to write about, but it is pretty important to keeping interested and to improve in tagging so I want to try to help you be inspired!
Help Getting InspiredThere are threads here on JSP that are made to help inspire you, whether it is the Music Inspiration thread or the Graphic Inspiration thread, both can help you get inspired.
Personally I almost always listen to music while making a signature and I generally look through Graphic Inspiration threads on a regular basis, not only in the hopes to get some burst of creativity but to see what other people do and learn from that alone.
There is a thread at PlanetRenders that I really want you all to look through and it is called "Most Inspirational Signatures You've Ever Seen" and the link is
http://planetrenders.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=144076&st=0 . This thread has over 3 years worth of great signatures all in one location and is possibly the greatest source of tagging inspiration I've been able to find. I cannot stress upon you enough how useful it is to look through this and see what some high quality tags are like.
Thats the end of this weeks class, and its time to make signatures with what you've (I hope) learned. Odin and I have decided that for the first tutorial we want you all to please use the same render for the first tutorial and try to use resources from the pack to help you complete it. The second tutorial is for you to show us you know how to find and use resources on your own and I hope you will put the time in to find and make some cool stuff. Below I have added links to all the files and sites discussed to make it a bit easier for you guys, how nice of me.
Links for this week:
http://forums.d2jsp.org/topic.php?t=34184703&f=105 - JSP music inspiration thread
http://forums.d2jsp.org/topic.php?t=27517453&f=105&o=0 - JSP graphic inspiration thread
http://planetrenders.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=144076&st=0 - "Most Inspirational Signatures You've Ever Seen" (slow internet connections be wary)
Files for this week:
http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/9186/anime2n.png - render for tutorial 1
http://browse.deviantart.com/?order=14&q=signaturetutorial#/d489c3v - tutorial 1
http://browse.deviantart.com/?q=signaturetutorial&order=14&offset=24#/d48f5xv - tutorial 2
http://imageftw.com/uploads/20110509/8CEpack1.png - preview of resource pack
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=UQ3IV7VO - resource pack (Creative Elegance May Pack)