Speed Scanlating Guide - How to Scanlate Manga like Binktopia! [v2]

[zidane21ps]

Binktopia is recruiting. We are making this method public in order to gain new members. If you read this, please spread the message and consider joining us. PM me and ask permission if you want to use this tutorial elsewhere or post on another site. Thank you.

Some basic things:

You may, or may not still remember this tutorial thread, written by blud, the mangashare.com founder and former binktopia leader, a tutorial that helped a lot of newcomers to start scanlating (including me). Now, almost two years later, follows the updated version. I titled it "basic" since this is really the simple way which everyone should understand, and I wrote this for this school and new trainee's - once you join Binktopia after completing the school you'll learn our "real" cleaning way, including some more special filtering, adjustments and manual tricks, making the whole process a whole lot faster and better looking. But for beginners, the following is a really good and easy start, and not too different at all from what we do.


What you need:

• Adobe Photoshop CS and above, preferably CS3.
• Topaz Denoise [The keygen may get detected as a trojan, ignore it. If you need help with the installation, get on IRC.]
• A 2500px (height) HQ RAW from WSJ. (or higher, of course - resizing from smaller raw sizes will cause massive quality loss.)
• Some time and dedication, but most importantly the ability to read and follow instructions.

How it works:

We can do this really quick for those who know how scanlating works already, and more detailed for the real beginners.

Quick version:

Spoiler!

• Load this action.
• Rotate the image using the Ruler Tool
• Crop the black borders surrounding the page by using the Crop tool.
• Click F2 or manually load the first step of the action script which you loaded earlier.
• Level the page.
• Use the burn tool at 30% (shadows) to blacken the blacks.
• Click F3 or manually load the second step of the action script.
• Get rid of all the obvious dusts on whites, deactivate the level layer.
• Redraw borders, fill bubbles with whites and you are done

I realize that beginners couldn't really understand anything there, so let's go into detail now...

Download and watch this video: [replacer_a] or watch it on [replacer_a]

• Open a RAW Page.
• Use the Ruler Tool, Rotate, and then the Crop tool. (Watch the video tutorial for that.)
• Go under Image -> Mode and select "RGB Color"
• Dublicate the background layer.
• Go under Filter -> Blur -> Surface Blur... and apply the settings 18 /10.
• Go under Filter -> Topaz Labs -> Topaz Denoise and apply settings 1.15 for noise reduction, 0.25 for deblur.
• Drink a coffee if you have only 1gb of Ram (topaz takes some time).
• Convert the Mode back to Grayscanle, under Image -> Mode.
• Surface Blur again with 18 / 10.
• Dublicate the Background Copy layer.
• Set the mode of this layer to "Color Burn".
• Set the Opacity of that Layer to 20%.
• Level it slightly, and then merge it down on the Background Copy layer.
• You should have only a Background (RAW) and Background Copy Layer now.
• Go under Image -> Adjustments -> Levels... and level the page. Beginners often tend to overlevel the page in order to have less work burning. While underleveling is just as bad. Try several times to find a good result.
• Go under Image -> Image Size... and resize it to 1150px height with 72 resolution.
• Create a new Adjustment Level layer on which you completely overlevel the page.
• Create a new empty layer and use the Pencil tool to erase obvious (scanner) dusts on whites and blacks.
• Deactivate the Adjustment Level layer, and save your page as .psd.

You are done now, with the precleaning. What's left to do is treating details, like faded white lines, separating speedlines (sometimes they have dust inbetween that makes them look thick, use the line tool to fix that), erasing the text (on the layer where you erased dusts), and bordering the page.

[Rokudaime Sennin ™]

I'm very interested, but sounds like a bit of work. Is there any opening in the Naruto manga staff, cause that's the only one I'm interested in. And how many pages does one clean per week, or the whole chapter? I'll study the vid tho just to see if how much work it'll be per week.

[zidane21ps]

·Rokudaime Sennin· ™, Binktopia members work on all the projects we do, since we all want to support the team and the other team members which are friends. Sitting around while others work, because one doesn't like the manga, that's not a binktopia mentality. It's really not hard, and if many work at once, it's only little work for the whole team. That's basically the secret to how we manage taking up so many projects. That, and some cleaning machines in the team.

[Monz]

Just a little nit picking thing but you put dublicate instead of duplicate :p. This is for the most part the way I clean as well. I might join up if I have time, but between school and work I'm pretty busy right now. Nice tutorial by the way though lol. ^^

[merciless]

btw one question, do you need to learn japanese for this? xD

[zidane21ps]

If you decide to use a japanese version of Photoshop? Yes, you will. If not I don't see any reason why you'd need japanese knowledge for using Photoshop.

[merciless]

yeah but dont you guys translate the japanese text also?

[L0ki]

Scanlation groups usually have people called "translators" who translate things from moonspeak to english. Therefore it is not required for every member of the group to speak such language.

[Laf]

i made a try. tell me your opinion

raw:


mine:

[merciless]

Is Adobe Photoshop CS4 extended ok?

btw could you explain a bit , how do you guys work, like for example when a naruto manga comes out you divide 1 page on each guy and then put it all together at the end?

ANd banana you scanlate too? xD