Hello, I have a question? Would you happen to know why animators draw certain parts of characters in red or blue? Like in rough or uncolored animation, for instance?
Excuse me, I need a minute to pull my decrepit bones out of the grave they reside in. Ok. Gather round, kids, for a tale of the pre-digital world, where everything was hand drawn and photographed or photo-copied. The “blue” you refer to is called “Non-Repro Blue” or “Non-Photo Blue” and in comics and animation it would not Reproduce when copied in Black & White. So you could use it for all the sketching, and then inkers would ink over it in black, and only the black would reprint, and you don’t have to go back and erase all your under sketching after you ink.
Some artists still prefer to use blue (and, as an alternate, red, or any other color) in the modern world even in a digital workflow because then those colors are easier to select all at once after they’re scanned in and different areas might want to be separated later (foreground, mid ground, background, etc). They’re also not as reflective as graphite, so it’s easier to scan in without breaks. Some people also like the waxier texture of how colored pencils glide across paper. You could use any color to do this, but blue & red pencils are the most common and the furthest apart on the spectrum, so easier to separate.
And now I shall shuffle my bones back into the coffin.
—Agent Negative Space
