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I've been lurking this thread for a few months now, and I just ave to say it has been tremendously helpful in terms of both webcomic and general artistic advice. Anyway, I recently started a webcomic of my own, and I think I finally have just enough content on there to justify posting it here. Not a whole lot of content, though. But it'll get there. Anyway, Buffet of Lies. http://buffetoflies.com/ If anyone has any advice on the comic or the site design or anything, then that'd be appreciated muchly.
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| # ¿ Mar 18, 2011 06:05 |
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| # ¿ May 24, 2013 04:05 |
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Andy Pandy posted:I totally like this! A nice variety of styles and humour in the few strips that are there. I added you to twitter so we're now internet friends! You might want to make the text and links stand out a bit more against the background maybe? Thanks! And yes, we are now best twitter buddies for life.  And I am not gonna lie I enjoy your comic a lot too. Keep it up!
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| # ¿ Mar 18, 2011 18:23 |
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I feel like you also need to work on the backgrounds a bit more, which is to say, put in some backgrounds. A lot can be inferred about Lucy's job, the kind of world she inhabits, and the nature of the character herself through simply visual means. Right now we don't have a lot to go on. She says works in some sort of "treasure hunting" department, but we do not know what that entails. Is it an exciting place to work? Is it sort of a mundane office environment that you can play for laughs? You can get a lot said, wordlessly, in a few panels that you might have otherwise stated later with lots of bland text bubbles. Comics are a visual medium, gosh darn it, and there is a lot of interesting stuff you can do with this premise! FunkyAl fucked around with this message at Mar 19, 2011 around 05:55 |
| # ¿ Mar 19, 2011 05:50 |
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I hope you folk might get something or another out of this article. http://www.austinkleon.com/2011/03/...nobody-told-me/ On the subject of brush preservation-Scott McCloud said something about putting a little bit of paper tape (I've been using masking tape) at the base of the brush in Making Comics. I haven't been using a brush long enough to truly vouch for its effectiveness, but it is supposed to elongate the life of your brush by a few months, at least.
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| # ¿ Apr 1, 2011 04:27 |
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Mine were going fine until the act of printing them began. I could not for the life of me figure out the layouts and then my printer ran out of ink.  I'll post the comic if anyone wants to see it, though.
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| # ¿ Apr 10, 2011 05:55 |
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The Worst Unicorn posted:I want to see it. If you got all the way to the printing part then I think that's a success. Well, alright then. Mine was a comic starring a pair of characters of myself and a friend. It didn't turn out great art-wise, And it might not make a whole lot of sense, but I'm pretty proud of it considering how quick I did it. And for reference, Eclipse cannot talk and his superpower is altering his personal gravity. And their ship is called the Flying Fish, a pun I did not fit into the comic.         Also, I would like to see all you got done Worst Unicorn, complete or no. If it's not too much trouble.
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| # ¿ Apr 10, 2011 06:57 |
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oldyogurt posted:Yeah same here. The ones posted look great. FunkyAl I liked the story--but I was a bit confused when they made the phone call because why would Eclipse make a call if he can't talk? Well, it was an attempt at a joke, but maybe it was a bit too absurd. Glad you liked it, tho.
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| # ¿ Apr 10, 2011 17:16 |
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Not to mention, scrolling is also incredibly tedious on laptops. I don't think comics navigation are in need of an overhaul, but wouldn't a better idea be to add the option of clicking on the image to get to the next comic? It's not uncommon or anything as it is, but making it standard might make it an easier read on tablet devices.
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| # ¿ May 3, 2011 23:22 |
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You should also really consider doing something different with the colors. Right now, it looks like the colors are there simply for the sake of there being color, not really creating contrast or unifying the image, which isn't to mention the fairly generic cel-shading you've chosen. Experiment with colors a bit, find a style all your own! I recommend http://nedroid.com/2009/05/color-me-surprised/ As a good darn guide. It's a great starting point and will help you with familiarizing yourself with useful stuff like blending options. Although its usefulness might depend on whether or not you have Photoshop. Does Gimp have layer masks?
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| # ¿ May 7, 2011 07:33 |
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I use Master Colors, which is a great way to measure the contrast of your drawing, but also helped me a lot with creating unifying palates for my comics, something I struggled with a lot before.
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| # ¿ May 7, 2011 23:50 |
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Crisco Kid posted:Someone a while back complained about the size of Family Man, and since we just discussed ideal buffers, what might be considered the ideal width for a webcomic page? I'm not too confident about the code involving browser sizes vs page sizes, so I'm curious as to what other readers prefer and why creators chose the page dimensions they did. I usually just put them somewhere between 800 and 1024, because I want to make them big as I can without creating any severe monitor size issues. Because let's face it, nobody uses 800x600 monitors anymore. For a comic of that format, I'd say just about consistent Gunnerkrigg Court width would work. Though speaking of that comic specifically, I don't think the problem is the size so much as the wasted space on the site. The blog area is so full of stuff that it makes you notice the blank space on the sides all the more.
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| # ¿ May 12, 2011 03:18 |
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In the last week or so, I started my first project wonderful ad campaign, and it being my first attempt (And garnering my first "real" pageviews) I was hoping to find out whether or not the results were good, and what works in ads in general. I had a few ads running at once, which didn't really garner a lot of attention, so I'll focus on the main ad I had running on Gunshow for the past 6 days. In that time it received 182,850 views and was clicked 279 times. Now, the ad space was cheap, which was nice, but the ratio seemed just a mite underwhelming. Is this manner of traffic common, or was the ad just not cutting it? For reference, this was the ad:  I tried to be sort of subtle with it, as I'm sick of seeing project wonderful ads that completely oversell the comic, (oftentimes referencing the fact that it's a webcomic even though it is very clearly a webcomic I mean come on guys) so I decided to just present a scene from my comic (this) and see how that worked. Was this too subtle? What strategies have worked for you guys? What shan't one ever do?
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| # ¿ May 16, 2011 05:03 |
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Dabbo posted:but doesn't like her 'crude' personality. I have to make her more 'sweet' and 'warm' (even though she's supposed to be a fighter who watched both her parents die in front of her wow deep) Perhaps the best situation here is to respond to this suggestion with a drawing of the rabbit in question being less-than-amused with that suggestion, as a sort of "funny" way to change his mind. The upside, of course, being that if he's adamant about the character remaining as he sees it, you can avoid a whole big situation by just going, "ha ha yeah that was a joke now lets make this fine female demure as poo poo." In any case, as bad as the plot and characters of this story are inevitably going to be, it might be prudent to accept that the character designs your friend prefers will be a lot sillier than you'd like, and use the time making the comic to really focus on honing your skills in the departments of environments and experimentation within the medium. Fun with layouts is fun for everyone.
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| # ¿ Jun 15, 2011 09:23 |
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Dabbo posted:episode of Lucky Star Seeing how he appears to be trying to emulate terrible media, perhaps the best course to action is to share with him...better media? So, like, get him to read Cheap Thrills (which is a very good comic that would probably appeal to him in some tangential furry-related way) and whenever you have a dispute over characterization or pacing or somesuch, you have a mutual barometer of quality you can fall back on, which may improve the comic in general a bit. I'unno. Just a thought. As an aside, I have a friend who consistently enjoys terrible anime/manga who has professed to me just how awful Lucky Star is.
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| # ¿ Jun 16, 2011 08:33 |
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Comics Shop Talk - The First Name in Debt Etiquette
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| # ¿ Jun 16, 2011 16:54 |
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If the sequence itself is confusing in nature, it's probably best not to worry too much about how you're presenting it, so long as the artist is asking questions about it. That way, the artist gets a better hold on it than they would a well-worded but still potentially confusing bit that they don't feel they need to over-analyze with you.
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| # ¿ Jun 16, 2011 22:27 |
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Ryan North is a fun, silly guy, and adding achievements to Project Wonderful is a fun, silly thing to do! That's all there is to it.
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| # ¿ Jun 19, 2011 07:29 |
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Another thing you might want to keep an eye on is line thickness. In the third panel on the first page your characters have this weird sort of popping effect, like they're sort of removed fro the environment themselves because the environment lacks the depth and character you gave your characters, at least in a superficial sense. Your backgrounds are detailed, but better linework could help "establish" the environment more than it is currently, if that makes any sense.
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| # ¿ Jun 23, 2011 06:31 |
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At the very least, don't start an IRC channel until everyone gets to post their designs.
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| # ¿ Jun 25, 2011 04:20 |
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Grantaire posted:Maybe there should just be a comic about a group of mean raven girls who tell people their moms are dead, and everyone who has contributed a raven girl could draw their own character. And someone else can do backgrounds I guess. The comic takes place on the back of a very large raven.
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| # ¿ Jun 25, 2011 07:56 |
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I just sit down with some bristol board and a blue pencil and draw until a comic comes out. Planning is for sissies and smart people! But then I do a gag comic so I am probably a bad person to be discussing this.
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| # ¿ Jun 28, 2011 03:51 |
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Fortis posted:Started doing color in BSF today with Page 80. Does it take less time to do the lettering in Manga studio? Because it looks fine there, and I wouldn't worry too much about your balloons being done in illustrator, unless you have a reason to do so. In any case, the color looks good. Makes it pop.
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| # ¿ Jul 8, 2011 20:34 |
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Here is a terrible thing I did almost exactly two years ago. Here is a better thing I did a few minutes ago. This improvement posting is great, by the way. I absolutely love seeing people's stuff getting more solid and their style more refined.
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| # ¿ Jul 12, 2011 06:12 |
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The passing of a life is always a terrible waste. I sincerely hope he has found comfort in whatever comes next.
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| # ¿ Jul 15, 2011 20:28 |
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KingKalamari posted:Ugh, I feel rusty and like I am going backwards improvement wise. I need some help I think your biggest problem is coming form the disparity between Ol' Lucy and the environment she's inhabiting, which is to say, it doesn't feel like she's inhabiting it. You're re-using the same background image for every frame (which is a big yuck-o no-no in my book, but I don't want to speak for everyone here so) and she not only is constantly changing in size, but is also changing the stance in which she stands. For example, in the first panel she's planted solidly enough on the ground, but in panel two she's standing in a way that seems to imply the ground is...flatter? She's certainly not standing on it the same way. I hope I'm being clear. Also, adding a cast shadow would help "ground" her more where she stands. Finally, I'm not really sure where we are here! The stone head implies some manner of temple, but it would help supremely to have some establishing shots of the place, and perhaps also to include some close ups of Lucy's face as she's concentrating on the throw. Six panels of the same shot is not a thing I would advise! In any case, keep on improving and what-not!
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| # ¿ Jul 22, 2011 07:08 |
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McGravin posted:Could you somehow depict the heat death of the universe? That would be pretty cool. Piece of Cake. 
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| # ¿ Jul 23, 2011 04:12 |
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So lately, and out of necessity, I've been using watercolors instead of coloring digitally. I've been mostly pleased with the results, but when I scan them in, they fade like you wouldn't believe. Does anyone have any tips on how to prevent this? For reference:  The rocks are far redder and the sky is far bluer, but you'll just have to take my word for it.
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| # ¿ Jul 23, 2011 18:10 |
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Thanks, that helped a ton! VVV Done and done. And I'm glad you like it! FunkyAl fucked around with this message at Jul 23, 2011 around 23:42 |
| # ¿ Jul 23, 2011 18:58 |
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^^^ My good man, I believe at least part of your post belongs in a different thread!Tesseraction posted:To be honest it's mostly the problem of wasted space between panels - if you have space between panels then open the borders and make the images bigger. Obviously this isn't a hardline rule but more a guideline, but freehand lines and white space really makes it feel like we're looking at the wall of a dormitory (and through its windows) rather than a sequential group of pictures making a comic. I appreciate that it feels a little hollow since Penny Arcade does it and it works fine, but with the art style you're going with I think that freehand lines but no white space between would work better. Effectively a plus symbol with a box around it. I think the problem might come here from the fact that the site's background is also white. With other comics, like Penny Arcade, your eyes are drawn to the white space around the panels and register it as a comic because the rest of the website is some darker color. What's happening here is that both the site and the comic are white, which makes it difficult for the comic to stick out. But that could also be guessing since Kate Beaton does all white space and that looks fine. Anyway, I thought I might share this piece the talented Evan Dahm wrote about webcomics. Stuff like this always makes me feel warm and inspired, and I hope it does the same for all of you all! FunkyAl fucked around with this message at Jul 26, 2011 around 08:48 |
| # ¿ Jul 26, 2011 08:41 |
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thousandcranes posted:Does anyone have any advice or resources about costume design? I've been trying to look at fashion magazines but they are so terrible. Well, what is your comic about? If it isn't about high-stakes world of fashion, then that is probably not the best place to start. The role an outfit plays is almost entirely dependent on the type of story you'e doing. If it were, say, a ditty about warring factions from places in history, it'd probably be best to look at clothes from the time period and assign different color motifs to each, or something, but if you're doing a comic about regular folk then you should probably just draw some regular-folk clothes! Basically we can't help you until we know what all is going to happen.
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| # ¿ Aug 1, 2011 02:37 |
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I think, with all the art blocks going around, it might just be the right time for another thread-wide 24 hour comic type event. What say everyone else?
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| # ¿ Aug 3, 2011 20:03 |
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In addition to the brush's lower opacity, it might also help to lower the flow of the brush as well. And on the matter of coloring outside the lines, the lasso tool is your very best friend. In fact, you should refer to this color tutorial for some help with effects, and maybe even coloring in general. (This goes for everyone in the thread, I cannot recommend this tutorial enough. Anthony Clark is a beautiful person.) VVV There has been writing talk in the past, and this is probably the best place to discuss it, as writing and art in comics do a unique sort of tango. VVV FunkyAl fucked around with this message at Aug 9, 2011 around 07:02 |
| # ¿ Aug 9, 2011 06:50 |
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FactsAreUseless posted:Chris Hart's Guide to Drawing Manga. Bah! An amateur compared to Bill Connoly, cartoonist extraordinaire! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjme6FmPI3c Ha ha ha we kid, but as long as you're in the book buying spirits then Making Comics is an absolute must. It really digs into things you may not have otherwise thunk, and it inspires me every time I read it again. (Also, I'd recommend Understanding Comics as sort of a primer to Making Comics, but it's not required if you only have so much cash or something.)
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| # ¿ Aug 12, 2011 07:32 |
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Posting here can actually do you a fair bit of good, too. While none of my numbers are anything to write home about, I have gotten a relatively good amount of visits to my site that have come from SA, and I personally have read and enjoyed a number of goon-made comic products. That, and be sure to use Social Networking sites to your advantage. And of course, like Fortis and Grantaire said, be patient. FunkyAl fucked around with this message at Aug 18, 2011 around 02:51 |
| # ¿ Aug 18, 2011 02:47 |
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I once got the following comment in response to this comic.Comrade posted:...what Which, by itself, was nothing to write home about. But then someone replied to that... jaminspoon posted:How dare you “…..what” this you petulant poo poo! Clearly the gentleman, devilishly opulent (as promulgated by 1. length and jaunty tilt of polished black top hat 2. monocle 3. manservant 4. old and white 5. lavish beveled yellow atmosphere), has, by wont of such opulence, purchased a breakfast cereal composed entirely of diamonds. The very existence, and subsequent purchasing, of this item is so outlandishly absurd to the sensibilities that to then conceive of it as such a mundane item as to be had while breaking one’s fast simply endeavor’s ones mind to conniptions! The final stroke of the executioner’s sword however, you must understand, is that this priceless meal, upon which the hemorrhage of the world’s hunger could at last be staunched, has a date of freshness which has, by one day’s time, expired!!! The gentleman is vexed by this, as displayed, but only to a minor degree. His vast fortunes have robbed him of a sense of proportion.. of true value! This defining quality is the very thing which will, with nary a nod or a shake of his head, to ruin or even destroy the lives of countless people while on his endless quest to secure more riches. The inherent humor is subtle and clever; a coup d’etat of irreverent cartoony wielded as though a dagger’s blade to the throat of the bourgeois! Beautiful.
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| # ¿ Aug 20, 2011 03:12 |
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Dabbo posted:I long for death Just imagine you're writing an episode of the Rugrats where Chuckie and the dog accidentally get combined in some Fly-esque science experiment. That way it won't seem like writing about baby furries, it'll just be the episode that got you fired from writing the Rugrats.
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| # ¿ Aug 23, 2011 01:10 |
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Dabbo posted:Thankfully those were two of the worst, but I've still had to draw some crazy poo poo that made me want to kill myself. Yeah, you should probably stream it. It sounds like you could use some support.
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| # ¿ Aug 23, 2011 23:54 |
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al-azad posted:Do the best of both worlds: get a free wordpress account and install the comicpress (or any other webcomic) theme. You have your own personal website to customize and it's free. This doesn't actually work. Comicpress, Webcomic, etc. are all plugins. From the wordpress site: Wordpress posted:Plugins are tools used to extend the functionality of the WordPress platform. However, they are only applicable to privately-hosted blogs and web sites using the WordPress.org software. Plugins are not permitted on WordPress.com for various security reasons. So unless you are cool with just a blog with comics, it's probably best to do a free hosting site if you are strapped for cash.
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| # ¿ Aug 27, 2011 03:58 |
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al-azad posted:Aren't there two components to comicpress, a theme and a plugin? I don't know what the theme does specifically but it should facilitate a better reading experience than just having a blog and posting images. Different themes can be applied after the plugin is installed, but free wordpress blogs do not allow plugins, so you will not be able to install themes meant for the comicpress plugin. Plus, you wouldn't have navigation buttons or anything like that even if it did work.
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| # ¿ Aug 27, 2011 19:09 |
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| # ¿ May 24, 2013 04:05 |
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This one time a fellow named "Drew" left a comment about how my art was great and my writing sucked, and his solution was to email him for some ideas. Anyway, is the threadwide 24-hour comix day still happening this weekend? I am looking forward to some fine panels with pictures in them.
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| # ¿ Sep 1, 2011 19:48 |
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