Rasputin Barxotka

Just For Fun

Here is the process of what all happens in the creation of Rasputin Barxotka.  Sometimes, a single staff member may be responsible for doing every single step, but in a best case scenario, there will be a full team with a penciller, inker, colorist, flatter, color holds person, painter, cleaner and shader.  In this case we’re low-budget, so it’s just me and the always efficient, Paul Haskell for flats and holds. Click on the image to see the evolution of this week’s page and read below for what the ideal process should be.

1. The penciller sketches out the page.
2. This step is optional, especially since the flatter usually lays out the colors for the inker to work with. However, since color line holds are involved, the inker the draws the page out beforehand.
3. The colorist adds dots as guides for the flatter, and if necessary, the holds person.
4. The flatter masses out the colors so the inker or painter have an easier time finishing the page digitally.
5. The color holds person marks boundaries between body parts, backgrounds and objects to speed up the workflow for the inker/painter when dealing with colored lines.
6. The colorist decides on the final colors that will go into the composition and places them as flat colors, using the flatter and holds person’s work as guidelines.
7. The inker/painter will go over the image.  This staff member may change line weight, erase and redo lines, move or add color masses and work towards finishing the composition.
8. The cleaner will make any final corrections.  The shader, (painter or, colorist) may add shadows, highlights or special effects if the color work is dimensional rather than flat.
9. The letterer will add text to the word balloons.  This sometimes happens concurrently with the coloring process for the sake of speeding things up.