The mysterious changing hairstyle.

[Godoftarot]

I've set my comics for an update every other day. What I mean about the hairstyle is that the main character's hair is never quite the same length or style in each page. Usually this is not a problem for me, but for some reason I cannot nail this hairstyle. It's driving me nuts! I mean, generally the character is recognizable but...it still annoys me to no end. So is it just me? Am I the only one plagued by this problem?

[ZOMBIE USER 17021]

But I'm not currently. Drawing stick figures has its advantages. So does not drawing the same detailed character more than once.

[Godoftarot]

Yeah, I can see how that would make things easy on you

[MixedMyth]

I used to (and sometimes still do) have that problem with the shape of the face. Luckily, my characters' hair styles are distinctive enough that even if they vary a little bit, they're still recognizable. I mean, Aidan's got hair that you could impale yoursel on, Tamit's got that pseudo-Egyptian thing going on, and Keeva's got the really long tail and the overly pointy bangs. In the beginning, though, it took me forever to really get Tamit's face down, and I still have trouble sometimes reconciling her dual quadraped/bipedal nature.

[Godoftarot]

Eee, that sounds complicated. O.o
I guess the problem is that I've been drawing the character so many ways and stationary is just not one of them. It lengthens, shortens, straightens, or curls depending on how I'm drawing. I know hair does some of that naturally but this is getting a little out of hand.

[MixedMyth]

So he has Amazing Elastic Hair(tm)! Can he use it to bungie jump?

[ZOMBIE USER 17021]

But you can use Max's skull for that, it's latex you know.

[Phalanx]

Hahaha.

No, we all have trouble nailing down how we want out characters to look. Some characters just pop out right the first time you draw them, some resist depiction until six months of frustrated drawing later. (Lysanne and Juno are two of these irritating buggers, BTW)

I wouldn't worry too much about it. After all, practice makes perfect.

ps: godoftarot, I've had a look at your comic(s). Your drawing skills aren't bad, but you need to work on your anatomy. Your porportions are off, and the lines are a bit stiff and limbs are unaturally lanky.

(At least yours are long though. In my early art everyone looked like midgets thanks to their stubby legs and arms)

Back to the topic...

Try drawing by reference (The mirror and fashion/swimsuit magazines are your best friends). Also study geometry. The human body can be broken down into basic geometry shapes and that simplifies porportions to no end.

I like the way how you are adventurous with your poses (i.e dancing, stretching, showering, instead of sitting around, hands in pockets all the time). I don't like the way you draw eyes. They don't look right. They're what Digital War calls "lame-manga eyes".

Not bad so far. Keep updating!

[ZOMBIE USER 17021]

Aye. I agree with Phallic about the eyes.





Sorry . . . I just had to call you that at least once.

[Phalanx]

*looks up the meaning of 'phallic'*

*promptly spits out the milk she was drinking*

[ZOMBIE USER 17021]

You've never heard of phallic before? I knew the definition of phallic BEFORE phalanx. Which is why I was rather surprised when I first read your name all those months ago.

[Phalanx]

Nope. Phalanx was the name of my first Diablo character back in 1999 ( I think), named after the military formation, which summed up my playing style nicely.

Somehow the meaning of the word 'phallic' eluded me all this while. I guess you er... learn something new every day.

[ZOMBIE USER 17021]

I try to learn several things a day. It's tough sometimes, but never tough enough to stop me.

[Rhea of the Runes]

*giggles* I must admit I've always though of "phallas" (or is it phallus? Can't spell >.-) Whenever reading your name Phalanx *tries to pull her mind out of the gutter, fails* Eee! My brain it's lost! Oh well nothing I can't recover from I'm sure ^^;;; *is far to sleep depraved at the moment*

[ZOMBIE USER 17021]

Sounds like you need an . . . <b>OPERATION!</b>
Is it water on the knee? *gets shot*




^{Damn . . . no one likes my singing either.}

[Jaster!]

My characters differ from each other on such extreme levels that I really wouldn't need to have any sort of consistency at all and people could still them all apart. That being said, I still try fairly hard to keep everything about the same.

[Nishichi27]

It's not just the hair, I have this problem ALL THE TIME. It's mostly a way of developing your style first.

Actually, I've been having trouble with one particular character; I redesigned her like 10 times in 2 weeks, and I finally settled on one design when I drew it right into my comic. But, her and the others still seem to change face shapes often. *sigh*

I guess you just have to keep drawing and wait it out; it'll stay one way eventually.

[Godoftarot]

ps: godoftarot, I've had a look at your comic(s). Your drawing skills aren't bad, but you need to work on your anatomy. Your porportions are off, and the lines are a bit stiff and limbs are unaturally lanky.

For me, it depends on how I'm drawing, or what I'm drawing. If it something I've done a lot before (and pretty much none of the stuff in the comic is) it tends to look better. Because my drawing style is more manga, the porportions don't worry me too much. My strongest influence is Naoko Takeuchi and all her comics tend to be weirdly out of porportion, but works because it flows quickly. Her actual drawings are better, which is the same case for me.
Actually, I have fine motor skill problems. That means that doing small, precise things are extremely difficult for me. It took me forever to learn to tie my shoes, I have horrible writing, and I can't work a combination lock to save my life. The fact that I can draw as well as I've learned to is pretty astounding from that point of view.

Try drawing by reference (The mirror and fashion/swimsuit magazines are your best friends). Also study geometry. The human body can be broken down into basic geometry shapes and that simplifies porportions to no end.

As I've said before, I am more a writer than an artist. While I like drawing, I know that if I'm never all that good at it, it's not too big a deal. Don't get me wrong, I'd like to be (which is why I DO use quite a bit of reference), but it's not likely to be my career so I don't feel it's too urgent.

I like the way how you are adventurous with your poses (i.e dancing, stretching, showering, instead of sitting around, hands in pockets all the time). I don't like the way you draw eyes. They don't look right. They're what Digital War calls "lame-manga eyes".[/qoute]

The one problem with my adventurous poses, as you'll see over time, is that I never really learned more than stationary poses, so they look awkward. As for my eyes...again, something that tends to look better in an actual drawings. They're my own, sort of a cross between Clamp and Naoko Takeuchi, and I've discovered that I really can't do them any other way. They've been changed and modified as I've gone along, so probably they will be changing.
Someone once told me my work looks like Rumiko Takehashi's, but I think that's just bullshit. What do you think?

[Nishichi27]

I can definitely see those influences in your comic; I also think that (especially in the 2nd actual page) your work also resembles Yu Watase's (of Fushigi Yugi).

Another thing: it's always a good idea to use a straightedge! Straightedges are your friend! Even another piece of paper is fine to use! Trust me, it looks a lot better in the end.

Also, if you have some sort of complex editing program (Photoshop and all that) then you might want to adjust the brightness/contrast of your images. Since you're only doing the lineart and no shading or anything, you're free to make it completely B&W or at least to make the lines sharper. Plus, your text looks odd, being completely black against sort of a gray-lineart style.

One more thing: Your speech bubbles look a bit wierd. They look sort of like little japanese ghosties. There should probably be one specific shape to them (like the traditional oval, maybe) where the text goes and then one small section that points to where the voice is coming from. And, remember, there are really nice, free comic fonts at blambot.com, it's not necessary to use the computer's default fonts .

I'm only being critical because this is what I have learned. Use it well. ^^

[Godoftarot]

Most shading I've learned with colored pencils, so shading with normal pencils makes me a bit uncomfortable. Usually my pictures are majorly color, and these are majorly black and white, which sort of flips things around. I've always had a trend of improving and trying more things as I become more comfortable with what I'm doing.
I've started assigning colors to the characters (although that appears a few pages down the road), but for Santana I intend to use black, because she is both the main character and the narrator. I have found a few useful fonts, and I've switched the narration font when I did page 7 last night, which I intend to keep changed. I am considering using a little bit of color to highlight the black and white, so that will pop up eventually, and if it works I'll stick to it.
I use a ruler, but it's a case of those damn motor skills again, I have trouble holding it still. Of course, I've greatly improved over the years in all ways, but that is still a rather large barrier for me.
As for the bubbles, well, not too much I can do about those damn things. They may not be permanent, I may decide to use something else, but for now they'll have to suffice.
So I am slowly working on improving and changing, but you won't see it yet as those pages aren't up. I'm keeping the updates spaced by 2 days to give myself time to do more, and I have no intention of commiting to a set updating time, cause that's just asking for trouble. I guess this is really an experiment and an adventure for me, and I somehow doubt I'm the only one who feels that way ^^
PS I've noticed that some of my art looks like the art from Utena, which is just darn strange, because Utena wasn't one of my influences when I was learning, and I've only just started watching it.