INTRODUCTION   
  
Contest Submission section is about  
sequential manga, things to prepare for a 
magazine submission or contest.  
Here, I show the steps to the photoshop cel work to your right. (Click on image for full size) 

SOFTWARE  SUGGESTION 
Photoshop 4.0+ or above.  

IMAGE SIZE  
Up to you.  

MY CASE  
My files are bigger, since I would like to output them later on in print, for my next book. 

I don't like the soft pastel, airbrushed look. 
The cel format with its crisp-cut, sharp edges suits me very well. 
 
 

First, I flip through my sketchbook, and find a rough sketch I like to finalize. It's too ugly to put here, so 
I put it on another link.  ROUGH SKETCH 

My lineart is inked on 11"x14" marker layout. 
That way, you can trace ove the rough sketch beneath it. 

Cel works are inked with quil pens. 
I ink mine with quil pens. The G-pen nib for main lines and maru-pen nib for fine details. 

Roting and technical pen lines are too mechanical and even. If you don't want your artwork to look like it's done by an engineer, you should use quil pens. 

PHOTOSHOP TIPS 
1) Scan the image in. 
2) To isolate the black lines, utilize the CHANNELS palette. 
3) Prepare the image by: IMAGE>ADJUST>BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST. Make sure the black is really dark. 
4) Open CHANNELS palette.  
5) Copy the CHANNELS b/w layer. 
6) Go back to LAYERS palette. 
7) Paste the channel layer.

Due to the need to conserve disk space, I've deleted several intermediary steps. 

The pic to your right, is the basic deal of filling in the basic colors. You can either do this with the bucket tool or whatever is convenient. 
 

In Photoshop, you can utilize the EDIT>DEFINE PATTERN feature. 
1) Scan your favorite pattern 
2) Select an area of your pattern 
3) EDIT>DEFINE PATTERN 
4) Now to fill in the pattern: 
5) Select the area you wanna fill in. 
6) EDIT>FILL>PATTERN 

* Above is just a tip. Just fool around & you will discover your own favorite shortcut. 
 

There are basically 3 color skemes in a cel parinting. 

LAYERS - MULTIPLY FEATURE  
All my shadows & base color are the same color. 
The LAYERS palette, each layer can be set to MULTIPLY, LIGHTEN, DARKERN... the layer beneath it.  
 

Name: "Searcher in the Snow" 
Nickname: Snowdrop, Dragon Tears 
Personality: elusive, shy 
Feature: always dragging around a security blanket 
 
 

The costuming should reflect the character. 

THE GESTURE 
I am big on gestures. 
I like the way the hand is tucked in, like in a warm muffler.

The file size, at this point, with all the layers is 13.0 MB. Too big. I then flattern all finished layers. 
 

The hair treatment takes again, 3 layers, to color, shadow, highlight the hair. 
 

THE HIGHLIGHT 
The last step is to add the highlights. 
 

COMPARE THE ONE BEFORE 
Compared with the image before this one, 
doesn't this one just come alive?

For character design, I prefer a white backgound, 
since you can see the flow of lines, shapes better. 

But for display purposes,  
a background helps a pic stand out, and also to 
further define a character's setting. 
 

So here it is, the completed image. 

Aren't you exhausted yet? 

I know I am, when I finished this pic. 

The character is bombarded by powdery snow, and with here comes a lift of wind, blowing a cloud of snow dust behind the character. 

^0^ It's so Kung-Fu-ish. 

Anyway, I liked this pic without the background. 
I can't seem to find the perfect background for this. 
And where is the feet? 

I've reworked this pic WITH THE FEET ON. 
See below.

THE HAND-PAINTED VERSION 
 
This one is sold at SHOUJOCON 2000. 
I've reworked the cape element into a dragon motif to match the year of the Dragon. 

This is rather a hurried job. 
Since oh no, no, no, I've used MARKERS. 
I never use MARKERS, for its obvious inferior quality. But I was in a rush, so hum..hum... 

The actual original looks much better than this lousy scan.  Due to the transparency of markers, it tends to look blotchy. All the work goes into the ragon tattoo in the cape. It's hand-stippled with .18mm Rotring. 

MATERIALS 

This pic looks better when it's big. 
(Open the image for full size)