Low angle picture of a computer keyboard
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Switch Tools Temporarily With Your Keyboard

Here’s a neat little keyboard trick you may not have ever realized.  Let me line up the situation.

I’m drawing something for Inktober.  One of the lessons I learned from Klaus Janson’s book on inking comics is that you should draw through your line. Don’t just pick up the pen when you get to the panel border. Draw past it to get a more natural line You can go back in afterwards to erase the part of the line that went into the gutter.

In some situations, it’s best to do that erasing part after you’ve done all the inking.

Sometimes, you might want to erase as you go.  That’s annoying, though, because you’re going to be constantly hitting your keyboard shortcut for your drawing tool and then the shortcut for the erase tool.  

In my case, that would be “P”, then draw, “E”, then erase, “P”, then go back to drawing.  Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

I can save you half that typing. Here’s the trick:

If you hold down the keyboard shortcut, you’ll have access to that tool until you release the key.  So you can keep drawing with your pen tool, hold down the “E” while you erase, and then take your finger off the “E” to get back to the pen.  It’s super useful and super easy.  After you need it once or twice, it’ll be muscle memory.

With the short video above to see this in action.

Effective use of the keyboard is a crucial step in becoming more proficient with Clip Studio Paint. It will unlock a load of automations, speed up your process, and make drawing just plain more fun. For more tips, be sure to check out “8 Keyboard Shortcuts to Clip Studio Paint Happiness.”

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One Comment

  1. This was one the handiest things I discovered. If you’re using a Wacom with a radial menu, you can use that too but I still use this one the most.

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