Flintstone Buddies

Thought I'd give the old Flintstones another go:

This one came out a bit better, I think. Again, I did it on the Wacom tablet, which gives me these raggedy, wobbly lines that I can't seem to avoid. I may be better off doing the outlines in Illustrator in the future (these are Photoshop). Here's how I did it:

Step 1: Pencil outlines. I sketch it in very rough on one layer with a pencil-like brush to get everything down.

Step 2: Inking. This is done with a more solid brush, with an attempt to clean up the lines and clarify everything. Thicker brushes for the larger forms, smaller brushes for the details and smaller forms. This is where I get these wobbly lines I mentioned earlier. Sometimes I'll use different colors for different parts of the outlines, but not here.

Step 3: Coloring. Separate layer. The nice thing about drawing with the tablet is I can place the layer under the lines, and not worry about layer blending options or how to get the outlines to show through the color.

Step 4: Backgrounds. Again, separate layer. I do solid colors first, then...

Step 5: Details. I use a different layer again to add shading and brushstroke effects. Here, I kept the characters flat, to preserve a cel-like look, but sometimes I'll add these effects to the characters as well.

Click on the image for a larger view.