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Worst Unicorn, just popped in to say those pages look really neat! I look forward to seeing them finished!
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| # ? Jul 28, 2012 03:09 |
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:42 |
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I just did another 8 pages of this improvised comic in like 2 days in my quest to become more comfortable with inking. I think I'm getting a lot better in that nowadays I can just pick up my fountain pen and start impromptu sketching. I use three instruments primarily: a sharpie, a fountain pen, and a Rotring technical pen. Of all of them I most enjoy the fountain pen, the way it flows over the paper smoothly and creates these swift thick lines feels really luxurious to me.
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| # ? Jul 28, 2012 13:52 |
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It should, those are some tasty lines. Your inking kinda reminds me of Scud: the Disposable Assassin for some reason.
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| # ? Jul 28, 2012 14:03 |
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pw pw pw posted:It should, those are some tasty lines. Thanks! A friend of mine always said that my drawing style really bears the influence of Jhonen Vasquez. Also, wow, I'd never heard of "Scud" before, but Googling it, it sounds very much like my sort of comic. I think I'll have to check it out from the stores or something!
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| # ? Jul 28, 2012 14:09 |
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You'll have a hard time finding it, it was semi-rare even when it came out as it was an indie comic. I was one of its biggest fans at the time, though, even managed to get an interview with Rob Schrab.
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| # ? Jul 28, 2012 19:32 |
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This looks to be the whole thing for around $25.
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| # ? Jul 28, 2012 21:59 |
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What do you do when you're stuck between two story ideas? Do you just commit to one no matter what? Do you dedicate time to each?
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| # ? Jul 29, 2012 04:23 |
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DrSunshine posted:I just did another 8 pages of this improvised comic in like 2 days in my quest to become more comfortable with inking. I think I'm getting a lot better in that nowadays I can just pick up my fountain pen and start impromptu sketching. I use three instruments primarily: a sharpie, a fountain pen, and a Rotring technical pen. Of all of them I most enjoy the fountain pen, the way it flows over the paper smoothly and creates these swift thick lines feels really luxurious to me. Ooo, what kind of fountain pen do you use? It looks like something I'd like to mess with.
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| # ? Jul 29, 2012 05:15 |
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FlyinPingu posted:Ooo, what kind of fountain pen do you use? It looks like something I'd like to mess with. It's just a cheap Sheaffer fountain pen with the refillable ink cartridges that I bought for like $5, years ago at an office supply store. Medium-width tip, as I couldn't find a fine tip that day.
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| # ? Jul 29, 2012 06:30 |
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Saturday Mornings posted:What do you do when you're stuck between two story ideas? Do you just commit to one no matter what? Do you dedicate time to each? My advice is to start working on both of them. Devote about an equal amount of time to each one and before too long, I think one of them will come out ahead. You'll find yourself thinking about one moreso than the other or one will turn out to be much more fertile and inspiring. Then just focus on that one and put the other one back on the idea shelf.
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| # ? Jul 29, 2012 12:14 |
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Regarding fountain pens, it drove me nuts they smear and smudge under the tiniest amount of liquid and fade quickly. Thank heavens for Noodler's Bulletproof series of waterproof, light fast inks. I can't recommend any other brand.
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| # ? Jul 29, 2012 13:29 |
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So, do you guys ever get the urge to do something pretentious with your characters? 'cause I am considering doing some of my main characters as Tarot cards for some reason. Kili's a sure lock for Strength (she can be the maiden AND the beast!) and so on.
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 01:48 |
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Speedball posted:So, do you guys ever get the urge to do something pretentious with your characters? For reference, the king of this (along with pretty much every other way to get your audience invested in your story) is andrew hussie. Homestuck is almost nothing more than an bundle of archetypes that gain new meaning as they interact. snucks fucked around with this message at Jul 31, 2012 around 02:14 |
| # ? Jul 31, 2012 02:11 |
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Help! I'm awful with colors.  I've been trying to come up with a character design and am using the Color Scheme Designer to find colors that work well together...but I'm not sure if I'm using it right at all. I use darker/lighter/paler versions of a yellow-blue-green-red color tetrad and try to find some that match decently. Here's how I've been testing them: I have a bad tendency to go with dull/pastel when I need some boldness. Is that what's going on here? And do any of you guys have any advice on choosing colors that work well together and make for a pleasing, memorable character design?
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 05:39 |
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I would ask in the other thread, but I'm scared of making a faux-pas... Is it okay to post a link to your own comic in the Webcomic Reader's thread if you don't talk shop in there, or is that frowned upon?
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 05:46 |
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pw pw pw posted:I would ask in the other thread, but I'm scared of making a faux-pas...
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 06:27 |
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Speedball posted:So, do you guys ever get the urge to do something pretentious with your characters? I too am using Tarot cards for characters. I'm doing a futuristic thing where the heroes acquire tech that gives them suits that fit their archetype/tarot card. I haven't been spending too much time on it though, focusing more on a joke comic strip to just work up my strength as a writer. Making Comics: Post Now For Your Free Tarot Reading.
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 07:02 |
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Wildeyes posted:Help! I'm awful with colors. I am by no means a color expert, but these look very washed out and muddy to me. Here are some things which helped me: Neonnoodle made a color mixing video here which I have found to be a thousand times more useful than color scheme designers. There is a basic color theory tutorial here on Deviant Art. This helped me figure out where to put colors once I had the a palette. James Gurney also wrote a book called Color and Light. Even though it focuses on traditional media, it's full of useful stuff. I'm gonna summarize some stuff from his book which would have been invaluable to me from day 1. Color theory says that when you mix opposite colors they cancel out into a neutral color. This is true, but if you know about as much about color as I did, you don't actually know what colors are opposite to one another. A lot of stuff will introduce you to a color wheel which looks like this  This is what I would call a painter's color wheel. The color relationships here are what happens when you mix pigments. However, you're digitally coloring so you are not mixing pigments. Basically you are mixing light. So if you mix blue and yellow, you don't get green.  You get gray. The kind of color wheel which you want to look at is a "yurmby" wheel.  So if you want to paint something with lots of greens you need to mix from a cyan and a yellow. Blue and yellow will just laugh at you. None of the above means that the painter's wheel is useless. I think that what it shows are kind of aesthetic relationships between colors. For example, contrasting colors from the painter's wheel are much more eye-catching and interesting in my opinion. We have a whole holiday built around red and green. But red and cyan together are kind of eye-searing. Speedball posted:So, do you guys ever get the urge to do something pretentious with your characters? I don't think this is pretentious at all 
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 16:02 |
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It's not pretentious to make pictures of your characters based on the tarot. It's just a huge hassle because there are like a zillion of those things. Save yourself the headache and get more page views by making pictures of your characters as the various TF2 classes.
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 16:22 |
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thousandcranes posted:Color theory says that when you mix opposite colors they cancel out into a neutral color. This is true, but if you know about as much about color as I did, you don't actually know what colors are opposite to one another. The easiest way to remember which colors are opposites is to remember that the opposite of one primary color is the combination of the other two primaries (yellow + blue = green // opposite of red, etc), and by mixing all three colors together you get a nice muddy grey or brown. When you're mixing paints you never want to mix more than three colors together- you use two colors to get the hue you want and you can add a third to adjust the saturation or brightness, but anything more than that and you'll end up with a mud pit.
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| # ? Jul 31, 2012 21:00 |
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I don't really think 'dull' colors are always a problem, things with strong hues attract the eye, but, it I think considering the composition of the page as a whole is more important. I guess it depends on what you want to do though. If you're looking for a more cartoony feel, just make bold, simple color choices. While Blue and Yellow mix to a grey, keeping the indvidual colors true will create a pretty loud look. I've always enjoyed the Dragon Quest color choices, because they end up being pretty bold and vibrant. This is probably because it comes out of a history of 8-bit gaming with very limited color palettes. Here's an example of how yellow/blue can look vibrant.  The hero from Dragon Quest 5 has a very saturated purple robe, with a nice one color dominance, like:  I think your value is fine, just don't desaturate your hues as much, if you want a louder look. Of course, be careful to not go overboard, or it can be hard on the eyes. Edit: Also, this is pretty straight forward and helpful for basic color theory. Once you have that down, the sky is the limit. Space-Bird fucked around with this message at Jul 31, 2012 around 21:59 |
| # ? Jul 31, 2012 21:41 |
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While we're on colour-tips, be conscientious of the relationship between hue and value. On an RGB display, pure yellow is the lightest hue while pure blue is the darkest, and that creates big differences in how they affect the weight of a composition. Spectrums of pigment follow similar sorts of patterns. Space-Bird's first example, in addition to the hue contrast, does a good job using yellow/blue to create a good light-dark balance. Supercar Gautier fucked around with this message at Jul 31, 2012 around 22:14 |
| # ? Jul 31, 2012 22:11 |
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Supercar Gautier posted:While we're on colour-tips, be conscientious of the relationship between hue and value. On an RGB display, pure yellow is the lightest hue while pure blue is the darkest, and that creates big differences in how they affect the weight of a composition. Spectrums of pigment follow similar sorts of patterns. If you look at the value it's basically fine, but also a reason as to why they all seem samey.  The value is the same in all 3 pictures, mostly. Which may be a reason why it's hard to pick. If you change the contrast, you'd definitely open yourself up to more options... I tested what Supercar Gautier said, i completely forgot about the yellow-blue light/dark thing. Here's a little test I did to check it out.  Definitely good to know when you're working with both color and value! Also, it's important to remember how surrounding colors effect the colors you pick. I apologize to everyone with eyeballs, but..here's a good example, the colors look very different (totally the same colors) but the value looks the same. When colors meet other colors weird stuff happens. (Also a very strong argument to not just go crazy with hue and saturation) 
Space-Bird fucked around with this message at Jul 31, 2012 around 23:31 |
| # ? Jul 31, 2012 23:07 |
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Hey fellas... I just finished the first page of a comic I am making. It is my first comic. I plan on doing a buffer of ~5 pages before I actually release it so I guess this is a sneak preview? 
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 02:51 |
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You'll probably want a larger buffer.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 03:14 |
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It depends on how long the pages take you to make. I can reliably do 3 pages a week, and I launched my comic with a 20 page buffer. The thing is, you want your buffer to grow, so try to update 1 page less than you know you can draw in a week. The feeling of treading water with comic updates - you're only drawing as many a week as you publish - can really mess with a person. Being only 5 updates away from the end of a buffer would probably give me a seizure.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 03:42 |
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Oh man, I do 1 comic a week and I only have 3 buffers. Am I really that crazy? edit: I'm also generally writing comics the same week/day I draw them.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 03:59 |
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Writing off the top of your head's possible, but you've got to be good at anticipating problems. When I started writing In Bone, Svata was going to hide his vampire teeth with his scarf and tell people he was scarred. Later scenes kept making it super obvious he was lying, but I couldn't have anyone call him on it so I had all these little plot holes piling into a mega hole. You can always explain some stuff away, but buying revision time with a buffer's easier.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 06:10 |
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For what it's worth...whenever I work up a buffer, I somehow manage to completely blow through it. When I have a buffer it's like 'oh, I can spend more time improving and working on pages!' and then, the time is gone. Time, where did you go? 
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 06:39 |
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When I started I had a two week buffer, after a year I had a one week buffer, then that was stable for three years, then I got a full time job, a year later I'm submitting uncolored pages and fixing them after work. It really is a college student's game.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 14:28 |
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Book prep and freelance ate a big chunk of my drawing hours-- this is the first time in ages that I haven't had next week's pages already done a week ahead of time. (I usually work 4 to 5 weeks ahead.) I've got a small buffer for later on, since I work slightly out of order, but ugh, this is making me itch. Maybe a little early, but anyone else going to Small Press Expo? vvv woah, cool! I was sad to miss his show at SXSW this year. bigbigtruck fucked around with this message at Aug 1, 2012 around 21:49 |
| # ? Aug 1, 2012 17:45 |
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I have the same problem as Space-Bird, when I have a buffer built up I lose that sense of urgency...somehow three weeks with pages in the chamber feels as quick as one week without a page ready. Hey bigbigtruck I saw you getting shouts from Jesse Dangerously, a dude I rap with sometimes. props and small world haha
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 17:50 |
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I'm having trouble making a story decision, and I'm wondering if any of you folks have an opinion. here's my comic, if y'all don't remember which one. Magic in my comic is performed as a bit of an amalgam of traditional Dungeons and Dragons rules and Shadowrun. (having the modern influence of shadowrun helps me figure out how magic works socioeconomically, as well as fleshing out conjuration pretty significantly.) So Ęthan is a conjurer, and I've decided I want him to adhere to the 3rd Edition DnD school specialization rules - that is to say, there are some schools of magic he cannot perform. I am trying to figure out what story-wise is the best thing for him Not To Be Able To Do. To become a conjurer, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from one of the following choices: (1) Evocation; (2) Transmutation; (3) any two of the following three schools: Abjuration, Enchantment, and Illusion, or (4) any three schools. I'm currently learning toward Evocation or Transmutation, but I can't figure out which is a better limitation, story-wise. Is he a more interesting wizard if he can't shoot lightning, or if he can't turn stone to mud? I will also accept pitches for the other options, if anybody cares.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 20:24 |
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pw pw pw posted:I'm having trouble making a story decision, and I'm wondering if any of you folks have an opinion. Oh yeah, the comic with the neat Domovoi strip! Hmm. Let's see. Well, what I prefer in a story, is "potential". I have always been more fascinated with concepts than with characters, so if there's an idea that I particularly like to toy around with in my mind, I'll keep reading the story. That is to say, to me, the most interesting thing storywise is to have concepts that can keep playing out and remixed and expanded upon. To keep my interest, a concept should be grounded enough in rules such that there's a stable reference point relative to the rest of the story for understanding what's going on, and open enough such that it provides room to add new variations. Take, for example, the elemental bending system in Avatar: The Last Airbender. Working from a general base of people being able to manipulate one of four elements through martial arts forms, the show demonstrates a wide variety of variations on moves possible, including "advanced forms" that exploit some core principle or abstract aspect of the element. So I would advise you, in general, to go with whatever seems to have the most potential for expansion and variation. Don't restrict yourself to the D&D rules, since they're created for the purpose of playing a game, not necessarily to serve as a foundation for a story. Create some set of rules for the magic system and ponder upon them. Speculate on what could be done within that framework, and see where it takes you.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 20:35 |
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pw pw pw posted:I'm having trouble making a story decision, and I'm wondering if any of you folks have an opinion. I know next to nothing about D&D but the way I see it, is make it analogous to irl majors/careers. Transmutation sounds paticularly blue collar, like, you'd need an apprenticeship in transmutation and then get into the construction business. I bet it's all like, man, I can't even believe you didn't major in Abjuration...that's big business these days...you know, with Obama as president and all. Or the enchantment school could be all smug Comp Sci libertarian type kids, are all about Magic Enchantment Optimization. All you need to do is figure out what the Liberal Arts Major of Magic is..probably Illusion or something. Like "oh good manifestation of a unicorn....but that doesn't pay the bills!" I'm not entirely sure what Evocation is, is it like summoning spirits? Is it the English Major of magic? Where you summon a ghost that has strong opinions on Wuthering Heights... Edit: I guess the primary conceit you're working with is taking something super awesome and cool like magic and bringing it to the real world where it is either useless, mundane, or both. I mean, really, like..computers are super cool but most people don't figure out to program them with their arcane and strange logic based computer runes. What I am saying is, you need some neckbeard wizards who use the wizardly equivalent of unix and insist on I don't know...browsing the aether in opera. Space-Bird fucked around with this message at Aug 1, 2012 around 20:48 |
| # ? Aug 1, 2012 20:43 |
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Oh, no, I've thought about that. Conjuration is the least useful school of magic by far, and the one most similar to my own animation degree. There's just nothing you NEED summoned monsters for. I've established over the next few buffer comics that Divination is the stockbroker's school, and that's where the money is. Conjuration is used mostly for security and entertainment. Thinking about it, transmutation is probably more of a stable money-making job than evocation, which would mostly just be used in war. So maybe I should prohibit him from transmuting. I mean, the whole comic is about him being under-employable.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 20:55 |
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pw pw pw posted:I'm having trouble making a story decision, and I'm wondering if any of you folks have an opinion. As a huge D&D nerd, let me explain to the uninitiated. Conjuration is summoning stuff, monsters, or food. Evocation is direct effect stuff. Things like fireballs or lightning bolts. Transmutation is changing things from one to another. Abjuration is divination, basically, seeing beyond. Enchantment is making people change attitude. And illusion is pretty straightfoward. IF you're going do D&D stuff, I'd say Evocation, because that's really Conjuration's "opposite", and its the most stereotypical "wizard" thing, so excluding it will make you think more about what the character can/cant do. Honestly though, your comic *isn't* D&D, so you're really probably best off just having him not able to do something when the right situation presents itself.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 20:55 |
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Also a valid point! But abjuration is actually protective magics, wards and purification charms and whatnot. Divination is its own school. I don't want to discount the possibility of magical combat later on, though obviously it's not going to be the focus of the plot. In that sort of case, I do think it's more interesting if he has to fight without traditional lightning-and-fire sorts of techniques. I'm taking inspiration from DnD for a lot of things (bigby's crushing hand is a reference I am planning on bringing back occasionally, for instance) But I'm also cribbing from real mythology and other games and ideas of mine - don't worry, I'm not going to follow the rules to the point where it detracts from my storytelling options. I just think the core of the traditional school system works for me in this case. the full school list is as follows- divination - telling the future - the stock market is a big divination shitstorm, with everyone trying to tell the future better than each other. abjuration - zones of protection - used for high-end security, as well as superstitious 'feng-shui'-esque applications. illusion - makes illusions - used for entertainment & fine art. The only thing that might be arguably less marketable than conjuration. conjuration - summoning spirits & monsters - kind of a luxury. also sometimes used for security, or entertainment. enchantment - altering people's minds / ensorcelling objects - lots of industrial application to enchanting objects, or you can be a creepy PUA with it. transmutation - changing one substance to another - Mostly used in industrial context, but not particularly cost-efficient for most substances. evocation - channeling energy, fireballs and whatnot - mostly just soldiers. necromancy - mostly used in the medical field to prolong life / preserve the dead, as there are no currently known techniques for true resurrection. Something of a taboo. Ignite Memories fucked around with this message at Aug 1, 2012 around 21:13 |
| # ? Aug 1, 2012 21:01 |
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It sounds like however this shakes out this guy is still going to have a shitload of of powers. Not being able to throw fireballs really doesn't seem like a huge limit for a guy who can turn lead to gold, and see the future, and summon monsters (who I bet can throw their own fireballs).
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 22:00 |
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| # ? May 24, 2013 22:42 |
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I mean, he's not going to be very great at any of those other things. It's just s difference between something he feels like he can fake (like when I do graphic design work) and something he just can't do at all. (like, say, calculus) Thanks for the help, though, I think I've decided on Evocation.
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| # ? Aug 1, 2012 22:13 |
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