Camilla DErrico - Pop Manga: How to Draw the Coolest, Cutest Characters, Animals, Mascots, and More

Copyright 2013 by Camilla dErrico and Stephen W. Martin

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Watson-Guptill Publications, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
www.watsonguptill.com

WATSON-GUPTILL and the WG and Horse designs are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
dErrico, Camilla
Pop manga: how to draw the coolest, cutest characters, animals, mascots, and more/Camilla dErrico and Stephen W. Martin.
Pages cm
1. Comic books, strips, etc. JapanTechnique. 2. Cartoon charactersJapan. 3. Figure drawingTechnique.
NC1764.5.J3 D47 2013
741.60952 2012042393

eBook ISBN: 978-0-307-98551-4
Trade Paperback ISBN: 978-0-307-98550-7

Illustration credits appear on
Cover design by Jim Massey
Cover illustrations by Camilla dErrico

v3.1

CAMILLAS DEDICATION

To the tallest man with a plan: Without your watchful eye I wouldnt be the artist I am today. And to my true love, you are this girls best friend and dragon slayer.

STEPHENS DEDICATION

For Lola, my true love. Without your watchful eye, sentences would remain like this one.

When I was a kid, I loved Saturday-morning cartoons! Every Saturday, my sister and I would wake up at the crack of dawn, grab a bowl of Lucky Charms, and bask in the wonders of eighties cartoons. Whether we were defending Eternia and the secrets of Grayskull or the streets of Manhattan with Spider-Man, we could not get enough! But that was nothing compared to when we discovered Tekkaman Blade, a Japanese anime series. It had everythingamazing action, steamy romance, cute boys, and giant robots! We were obsessed! This show sparked my love of Japanese animation, and then, in the mid-nineties, the show Sailor Moon aired; this cemented my passion forever. To this day, I still have a small crush on Tuxedo Mask. (But who doesnt!)

When I hit my teens, I discovered manga. Dont get me wrongI love Peter Parker, but American comics just didnt set off my spider-sense like manga did. The characters in the stories were just like me: They had everyday struggles with friends and parents. They laughed, loved, and even cried. It wasnt just about fighting or saving the world (although there was some of that); it was about internal struggles and personal tragedies. Plus, the girls were prettier and the boys were way cuter! Manga stories like Sailor Moon and those from Clamp, the all-female artist group, inspired me to start drawing comics.

A handful of my paintings, drawings, and panels are sprinkled throughout this book. I included these not only because I love to share my work with others, but also because Im hoping they might inspire you to keep creating and encourage you to find your own artistic style!

Im often asked in interviews where I find inspiration for my art. The answer is rather simple: all around me! Sometimes I like to wander the streets armed with my iPhone so that I can snap pictures of anything that catches my eye. It could be a broken toaster in the garbage or a bent pipe on the streetyoud be surprised where some of my helmet designs come from! What Im getting at is, dont wait for inspiration to come knocking on your door. Get up and go find it. Finding inspiration is about being active, constantly challenging yourself, and opening your mind to new creative wonders, be they music, movies, books, art, or even random things on the street. Trust me, you never know what will spark your imagination and lead you to your next great creation.

where I do all my drawing, painting, and plotting.

Just like a samurai has his sword, every manga artist has an arsenal of Pens, paper, and Photoshop are my tools of the trade. With these mighty weapons, I do battle every day with the evil blank page, creating characters and backgrounds. Before we get started, Im going to tell you a little bit about some of the tools I cant live without, starting with my favorite pens, which are, in fact, mightier than most manga swords.

My first weapon of choice is a run-of-the-mill, find-it-on-the-floor, top-probably-chewed-off classic black Bic ballpoint pen. These are cheap and amazing! Every time I go to Staples, I buy a box, and I have literally thousands of them. Why do I love these pens so much? Well, they produce a smooth line and are comfortable to hold while drawing. They have the feel of a pencil in your hands, but unlike pencils, they never smudge. Another fantastic feature of this pen is that it lets me alter my lines from thick to thin, from subtle to hard, just by adjusting my grip or by putting extra pressure on the tip. I cant live without them.

When I want to make my lines superthick or superthin, I use the Faber-Castell Pitt Black 199. I find that the tips on these pens are very delicate but sturdy. The B brush tip is especially good for drawing hair because it allows me to draw a thicker or thinner line, depending on the characters hairstyle. This is also what I use to fill in any solid black areas I want on my drawings.

I do all my initial, or base, drawings with a Pilot Color Eno mechanical lead pencil before moving on to my final black ink. The color I use is called soft blue. (Its actually a teal, or light turquoise, shade.) The soft-blue pencil is amazing because when you scan your image in grayscale, the scanner will not pick up the blue lines. Its like an invisible ink. All the step-by-step drawings in this book were done with this lead.