Starting a parts file

You start a parts file with the New Parts command in the File menu. This opens an empty parts window that displays a panel where basic information about the file can be set.

Type of parts file

The first thing to do is use the selector control at the top to set whether the parts file will contain a character or backgrounds. This determines whether it will be shown in the Central Casting tab or the Scenery tab when you add it to your catalog . It also determines whether the file’s color set will include five common colors used in characters, but not in backgrounds.

Name and artist

Next you can use the text fields to set a name and an artist for the parts file. The name is the name of the character, if it is a character, or the name of the background. It is not necessarily the same as the name of the file, especially while it is under development, as you might want to save different versions of the file under different file names as you go along, depending on your workflow. The artist field is for your name, and is automatically filled in with the user name you are logged into the Mac with. It may be appropriate to put multiple names in here or a company name, if the file will be a collaborative work.

The name and artist are combined in the program to provide an ID for the art. If you have two different files with the same name and artist, and you use them both in a comic, the comic will merge the color sets of the two files. (If the two files have colors with the same name but a different color definition, colors of objects may change when imported into the comic.) You should take advantage of this if you want to make a new parts file that extends an existing one: use the same name and artist. Otherwise you will want to avoid color conflicts by using a unique combination of name and artist. This use of color tables for characters and backgrounds is explained more in Choosing and using colors .

Initial color set

If you have chosen to create a character parts file, you will be asked to choose initial settings for five standard colors that are usually used by characters. These colors are named Hair, Skin, Top, Bottom, and Shoes. The name Top refers to the item of clothing the character wears on top, like shirt or blouse or sweater. Bottom is also for an item of clothing worn below the waist, like pants, skirt, or shorts. We recognize that these items may need multiple colors, or you may want to supply multiple “tops” or “bottoms” for a character, and that you may want to use more specific names. You can edit the color names and add more colors at any time (after you close this panel).

Next to each of these labels is a color popup button, which displays the current value of the color. You can change the color value to any other color by clicking this button, which will display a color editing popup. For convenience, we have included shortcut color lists for possible colors for each of the color names. We recognize that is it not possible to represent all human skin colors in 13 samples, but we got these colors by sampling people of different races in photographs. You can take them as they are or treat them as a starting point by choosing one and then editing the color. The clothing-related colors are completely arbitrary, but you can always pick your own.

When you are done naming the character or background and artist, and choosing colors if it is a character, you can click OK to get your initial, empty parts document window to work in.