Today on our Making Manga series, we talk about screentone for shading a manga panel.
A screentone is a sheet of sticky see through paper with a pattern on it. They usually come in packs as a set. There are background screentones, and ones for skin tone and shading. The traditional way of applying the screentone is done directly on the drawing after it is inked or it can also be done in the computer in programs like Manga Studio. The screentone sheets that I use when doing it the traditional way are manufactured by Deleter and called Deleter Tone Sets. I have not bought screentones in a while so there may be more manufacturers now. You can buy the sheets on Amazon.
Screentones can help to make an image more dynamic. I have been watching podcasts on youTube recently about screentone and how to apply it. With the traditional way you draw the image and ink the drawing. Then determine what area you want the tone to be on. So for example if you were making an image with someone with dark skin you could apply the tone to the skin on the illustration. Since the tones come in many different patterns you want to be consistent on how they are used across multiple pages of a manga.
Once the drawing is inked and you determine what you want to tone. You will take the screentone sheet, you might need to cut it to fit over the entire drawing and then remove the sticky back and place it over the entire drawing. Smooth the tone down so it is flat and it sticks. You will be using a xacto knife to gently cut around the area that you want the tone to be applied to. So for example if you have a person’s face with hair on top the head you will cut the outline of the face, cut out the eyes and cut the hair out of the screentone. Then you will lift the screentone over the parts you don’t want it and only leave it applied to the part of the face that needs the tone. Be careful not to cut through the paper. This is one of the issues that I have sometimes. Gently peel off the tone from the unwanted areas lifting it slowly with the blade of the xacto knife.
I have some screentone sheets and know how to apply it. I have tried screentone a few times as practice only to date but I will hopefully use it for the “Rogue” manga that I will be starting soon and “graphic noise” manga so then I can write another blog post with examples.
There are ways in Photoshop to add patterns like clouds if you want a background but I am also not too familiar with that. If I look into it for Manga Studio I will post again on how that works.
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