fla's and png's and psd's, oh my!

I was thinking I haven't posted any illos for a long time, much less a how-I-done-did-it. I've been using Macromedia Flash quite a bit lately as a sort of drawing tool. It makes nice clean lines and shapes, which I am dreadfully slow doing freehand in Photoshop. (If you're wondering why I'm not using Illustrator, Flash is ten times faster and easier if you are doing simple outline drawings like I have been.)

So here are a couple backgrounds for a computer game I've been working on. I started with a rough sketch in Photoshop. Save that as a .jpg and import it into Flash.



From there I start making all kinds of layers. I use the line and pencil tools and draw each *thing* on a separate layer. For this activity, I had to be able to put objects in front and behind the bushes, rocks, etc, so there are a bit more layers than I would have needed if it was just a flat illustration. Each layer is shown in the sample as a different color.



Then I save out each layer separately - exporting as a .png to keep the lines on a transparent background. I open the .png's in Photoshop, and then arrange all the layers into one big ol' .psd file. Below each line layer, I have a fill layer of the area of the object. Once the object is all shaded how I like, it's a toss-up what to do with the line layer. Sometimes I delete it, sometimes I turn on the preserve transparency for the layer, and shade the line to blend in with the shading of the filled area. I don't really have any good logic to back up when I do one or the other.



So that's basically it. It's a fast way to get a tight final drawing and nice crisp edges in the painting, if that's what you're looking for. Sorry this isn't too super in-depth and technical, but I'd be happy to explain more details if people want.

Another example:



There are lots more line layers, but it was a bit too confusing, so just the basics are in the above sample. The checkered floor, stones on the walls, patterns on the pennants, etc. were all done in Flash as well, and then exported over to Photoshop.



I did the same deal with all the objects that fill up these scenes. I don't always follow the imported lines exactly, but they make a nice place to start. Here are a few:





I still have two more backgrounds I'm working on - I'll post them when I'm finished: an Egyptian tomb, and a Chinese courtyard, which got crazy complicated. These have been pretty fun to work on, as well as make all the zillions of little objects that go everywhere in the scenes.

And there ya go! Whew! Hope there was something useful in all that.