Critique?

OnyxSerpent · Post by **OnyxSerpent** » Mon Apr 12, 2004 7:39 pm

Well, since it's spring break for me, I'll probably have a bunch of time to work on my comic, so I figured I should get comments on what I've already drawn so I can put any usefull comments to work in the next pages. Sorry there aren't that many up at the moment, but hey, at least I'm not going off schedual at the moment ^^;

Things I already know:
Page 1 has crazy shading because my friend shaded it.. My computer was being evil after I flatshaded it. Sometime when I'm bored I'm going to shade it myself.
Page 2, Jyran looks funny because I didn't draw his face right. And "Fool" is not centered right in the text bubble and I didn't notice it until just now.
Page 3, bottom pannel, Jyran looks funny because I couldn't get his face right (again -.-;; ) or something (I forget now exactly why I couldn't get it to look right).
Page 1 of Chapter 1, the text is small because I didn't save the colored file, and realized I originally made it 600 pixels wide instead of 500. It's still legible though. (It's another thing on my list of things to do when I'm bored)

Other then that, though, feel free to beat me with a spiked club for not inking or other such things, as I'm open to any good advice ^^; The link is the banner in my signature, just in case you didn't know.

Post by **Mercury Hat** » Mon Apr 12, 2004 7:44 pm

Backgrounds. That's all I have to say.

DGC · Post by **DGC** » Mon Apr 12, 2004 11:26 pm

I agree on the backgrounds. The pencilwork is pretty solid, but with so much white space, it makes things feel sort of incomplete. Usually people who don't ink need to at least darken the image a little, but I'm not sure that's what you need to do here. I think if you added backgrounds in the same pencil style, it would look cool. Kind of like the "Aria" (black and white issues) or Christian Gossett's "Assassin". The April 8 comic still has too much negative space for my taste. As you go, the little pastel splashes of color may or may not work out, it's a little early to tell.

I'm having a slight problem telling the characters apart. Honestly, I have that problem a lot when it comes to manga style, so it could just be me. Also, going from only five or so comics, that's an issue that could clear up.

Overall, I'd say backgrounds really are the main issue. You should be able to see that they live in a desert world. It's a good start, but so far the thing that intrigued me about your comic was the "about" page, and not the comic itself. But like I said earlier, it's too early to say much about the story.

Gage Kronos · Post by **Gage Kronos** » Mon Apr 12, 2004 11:35 pm

I love your artwork! I don't think you need to ink it, honestly, it looks just fine with the pencil shading. I'm not sure you could get the same look with inking.

I echo Mercury's comment: Backgrounds. It will add a lot. It looks like you started to draw establishing shots on page 3, that's good. I think you should also include them for the larger panels as well. The smaller ones can do with a minimalist background if you have already drawn something to establish the scene.

On the Page 3 funky face...the reason it looks funky is because his right eye and eye brow are actually levitating half way off his face. Follow the line you made for the face from his chin up to where it should be if the hair wasn't in the way and you'll see it. As it is, I think his face was drawn a bit too narrow. That may be part of it.

Yeahduff · Post by **Yeahduff** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 12:26 am

You should ink. You have beautiful lines and they'd be even better. You could probably continue pencil shading if you wanted to, but really, since the line work is central to your style (usually how it works for manga), you want the lines to be crisp, destinctive and powerful.

This world intrigues me. I want to see what it looks like. Granted, you're not giving us much to go by, but show us more of this place.

The initial exchange was nice. Keep doing that. Nice to see that even if these people, some with blue skin tones, are in a strange land inhabited by monsters, they're still people.

Christwriter · Post by **Christwriter** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 3:50 pm

I would suggest backgrounds purely from a writer's point of view. Worldbuilding is a major part of any fiction, even if all you're doing is telling a story about you and the boy next door. Without backgrounds, you can't show the differences between your world and this world. You can't show it's limits, either.

As an artist...backgrounds are sort of like the black velvet a jeweler uses to show off his best pieces. A background ought to draw the eye towards the area. You seem to want a slightly spartian feel to your comic...the light use of color in the last one is very appealing. Your artwork is so wonderful you don't really need a lot of color. I would lean towards using very detailed backgrounds when your characters are moving from place to place...for instance, start each page with a detailed background, and then using very spartian, simple backgrounds whenever your characters are having a moment that doesn't involve what's behind them in the slightest.

I could be wrong.

I would suggest inking...with a very fine pen, and not erasing anything that you've shaded. .01 or smaller would be the right width for your comic.

Very gorgeous. I'm defenately going to keep reading this one.

CW

OnyxSerpent · Post by **OnyxSerpent** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 3:51 pm

Yeah, I figured that people would probably comment on me slacking on backgrounds. At least in the prologue, the setting wasn't really important (at least in my opinion)...

I went and colored this Thursday's page.. and added a little more background to one of the panels.. But it's got a bunch of blank space too, and I couldn't do much to remedy that one that well...

And one vote for inking, one for not inking... I'm still not sure whether I should or not, because I'm always worried I'll mess it up and never be able to draw it again. Besides, I work on it at school usually, and it's a lot easier to work with pencils because I'll get confused if I keep a pencil and pen out on my desk at the same time (For math and such).

Glad you like what I've got so far, and again I'm sorry I don't have much up yet ^^;
Anything else anyone wants to point out?

Edit, to respond to CW: Hm. I have a .5 inking pen.. and it kind of gets unhappy at me a lot. If I get to go to Michaels' soon I'll see if they have any smaller ones (I'll look at Office Max too, since I think I'm going there today). I think the smallest I saw was .25.. Not sure though. (I didn't know that they made pens that small)

Post by **Mercury Hat** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 3:58 pm

If you're worried about messing up while inking, start off by inking a few doodles before moving on to doing your comic. You can also do that whole "lightbox" thing I've heard people go on about but I'm comfortable enough with my inks that I never looked into those.

Alaina · Post by **Alaina** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 4:04 pm

I used to do the lightbox thing, and it worked rather well.

But what works best when inking is just to white out mistakes. When you scan the drawing in, you can't even tell there was white out there.

OnyxSerpent · Post by **OnyxSerpent** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 4:17 pm

I tried working with my dad's lightbox for doing a couple of pages for my other comic (which I'm redoing for a 7th or 8th time now), and yeah, it works, but I don't own the lightbox... And yes, sometimes my dad does need to use it (oh the horror.). Besides.. As I said, I usually draw at school, and dragging a lightbox around all day would not only be distracting but awkward. And I have not the slightest idea where my white-out pen went to.. It disappeared sometime freshman year and has not been seen since, and it didn't work well anyway.

Hm. Maybe I should trace a page via lightbox, darken the traced part, and put it as a seperate layer on the comic itself? I'm also hopefully going to be getting some darker lead for my pencils, so maybe if I outlined in it, that'd help.

Alaina · Post by **Alaina** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 5:02 pm

Well, before I pinched a lightbox from the art room, I used to turn a light upside down, tape a sheet of clear glass onto it, and then use that as the surface of a makeshift lightbox. Of course the glass would slide around a bit and cut me, so I suggest taping the edges of the glass, something I just thought of while typing this sentence dear Lord I am stupid.

And go out and get another white out! I suggest the sponge-brush kind, it works best for me.

[AlmightyPyro] · Post by **[AlmightyPyro]** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 5:35 pm

I feel stupid asking this, but what is lightbox?

Phalanx · Post by **Phalanx** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 5:51 pm

A lightbox is basically a transparent drawing board/box with a strong light source underneath. If you put a drawing underneath a blank sheet of paper, the dark lines of the first drawing show through, allowing you to trace without using tracing paper.

A halogen desk lamp underneath a clear glass table/plastic makes a fairly cool DIY light box.

Yeahduff · Post by **Yeahduff** » Tue Apr 13, 2004 11:52 pm

OnyxSerpent wrote:Yeah, I figured that people would probably comment on me slacking on backgrounds. At least in the prologue, the setting wasn't really important (at least in my opinion)...

The opening shot of your comic, which we are to base the rest of your work upon; the establishing moment where you introduce us to your world? Yeah, I think that's probably important. You should probably pull out a grand background shot sometime really soon.

OnyxSerpent wrote: And one vote for inking, one for not inking... I'm still not sure whether I should or not, because I'm always worried I'll mess it up and never be able to draw it again. Besides, I work on it at school usually, and it's a lot easier to work with pencils because I'll get confused if I keep a pencil and pen out on my desk at the same time (For math and such).

Yeah, it's scary, but trust me, the results will be well worth it. You're young, so now would be the perfect time to start. You'll suck at first, but you just need to keep working at it. As Mercury suggested, just practice on random doodles before using it for your comic if you're that worried about it. The lightbox suggestion is also a good one. But particularly for your style and your strengths, you should be inking.

OnyxSerpent wrote: Edit, to respond to CW: Hm. I have a .5 inking pen.. and it kind of gets unhappy at me a lot. If I get to go to Michaels' soon I'll see if they have any smaller ones (I'll look at Office Max too, since I think I'm going there today). I think the smallest I saw was .25.. Not sure though. (I didn't know that they made pens that small)

Yeah, that's way too big. The .25 is OK, but the .1 will work best. You should have a variety anyway, as varying line thickness is an important issue in inking. You're already doing it in pencil, so you understand the concept.

Gage Kronos · Post by **Gage Kronos** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 4:22 pm

Phalanx wrote:A halogen desk lamp underneath a clear glass table/plastic makes a fairly cool DIY light box.

That's what I use.

If you want smaller width pens, you should look into the pigma micron pens. They have witdhs ranging from .005 to .05 I think. You might want to get a few of the .005 width pens if you choose to try them...as I find my being heavy handed ruins the tips fairly quickly.

They're like a $1. or so each, but they work well and don't bleed too much, even if you ink on printer paper like I do.

Post by **Mercury Hat** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 4:27 pm

You can get sets of inking pens, I've got Staedtler brand in widths of .01 .03 .05 and .07. I only really use the former two, .01 for eyes and other facial detailings and .03 for everything else. The other two are just way too thick for my personal tastes.

OnyxSerpent · Post by **OnyxSerpent** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 9:10 pm

Well, from the looks of it, I'm going to have to order the inking pens online (if my parents will order them for me, that is) unless the no-name hobby shop in the next town over randomly has them. All that the Michael's website says they have is a set of .25 to .7... which I think is a bit too big. So until then, I think I'm not going to ink, but instead carry around a very dark pencil.
Even then, I'll see if I can find a good enough pen that I can sort of ink with in the meantime. I've got about 25 or so character sheets to do for my other comic because I made the cast massive and I like confusing people with the surplus characters.

Next page will be up in two hours.. Can I get some comments on it when it appears?

Edit: Well.. After poking around with the 2B lead I got for my pencils, it appears that it might work as well as inking for a while. It'll be up in next weeks page that way (not the one that's up in an hour). I might post a sample of it tomorrow just to see if you people think it'll work.

Edit, the next morning: I uploaded a small part of the page I was working on... And wanted to see if it looked more like it had been inked.. And comments on the background, since those are the two things people mentioned.

New page is up to.. If people want to comment on my lame 2-second landscapes there.[/img]

Christwriter · Post by **Christwriter** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 2:55 pm

I would suggest you do a search for art supply shops. I went to one during my vacation (which is still ongoing) and the sheer selection they had was incredible.

By "Art Supply" I don't mean Hobby Lobby, Micheals, Jo-Anns or anything else that remotely resembles a one-stop crafter's department store. The art suppy shop I went to sold paint, pens, pencils, rulars, erasers and simi-obscure drawing and painting tools...easles and a very good supply of art and craft books. There were no beads, fabric, faux flowers, bad plastic yarn, marbles, bad desk ornaments, ready-made t-shirts, caps or aprons, no model airplanes, trains, boats or animals, no unfinished wood projects and no party supplies. Just the stuff people use when they're putting the pictures in thier head down on the paper, canvass or wall in front of them.

If it sells EVERYTHING, I promise you it's not going to have what you need when you get beyond "Intermediate."

CW

OnyxSerpent · Post by **OnyxSerpent** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 3:21 pm

Well, I looked in the phone book... The only things under "art supplies" are the hobby shops. If there are any in this area, they're 1+ hour away without dealing with traffic, and therefore out of the range of the phone book and my parents' will to drive me. Besides, if there was any good art stores in the area, I'm fairly sure that my art teacher (whose classroom I hang out in at lunch) would have at least mentioned it in passing. It's kind of ironic in the fact that we've got so many art galleries here, but no art stores if you don't count hobbyshops and the like. We used to have a very nice art/hobby store that I remember having a LOT of painting stuff, but it went out of buisness and is now CD's Pet Garden.

Do you happen to know of any online art stores that I could order stuff from?

Post by **Mercury Hat** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 3:52 pm

In the picture you posted, the darker lines do make it look better, as do the background.

But, uh, why is the panel so...tilty? Both the panel and the guy looking over his shoulder are leaning. Are they supposed to?