#and i'm trying to draw a whole 12 page comic

[unicornmanfish]

Update: I'm drawing the whole crowd and I am losing my mind.

[heretherebeturtles-comic]

How long does the process take you to get one (or more) comic page done? I love the idea of making comics but i suck at structure, you know with the script and posting/layout. I was wondering if you had any tips or what you wish you knew before you started.?

Sorry if this had been asked before

OOOooooo a fun question for me!! I love talking about comic creation :D

I do my best to keep the full process under 2 days (or 12-14 hours of work) per fully coloured page. I'm trying to get faster, but speed comes with time and experience.

Hmmm as for tips and things I wish I knew... so many things... I should let it be known that I am an artist and not really a writer, but your questions are focused on script/planning/structure, so I'm going to focus the advice on that.

Start with something small - Learn about making comics and find a comfortable style through making a couple smaller comics and then try your passion project. Writing and planning smaller comics with fewer pages takes a different kind of puzzle solving and thought process. Smaller page limits can force you to try new things which you can then apply to larger projects to save time; limitations breed creativity after all. Every attempt made (even an unfinished project) is knowledge gained that you can apply again for future projects.

Study comics! - It's hard to create if you aren't feeding the mind and giving it things to learn and create from. Read comics made by professionals and study how they handle pacing. How many pages are they dedicating to each moment? What do you think of their pacing and what would you change? Take a sketchbook and make small rectangles and draw out the panel layout from that comic. What are they doing that works and what don't you like about it? How would you do that differently? ... I think this is me assigning homework... i am so sorry.

Set a hard page limit - Try to get your story told within that limit, and then add more pages if necessary. More pages = more time you have to spend working on it. Most standard single issue American comics are roughly 24 pages. I try to work inside that limit using a rough 5 page per scene structure.

Condense or Cut - I struggle so hard with this one, but comics aren't written in the same way as a novel is. They have a slightly different plot structure and a much more limited amount of pages to tell the story in. Obviously it depends on the story being told, and what kind of scenes are important to that genre of story, but in general, unnecessary scenes should be cut out. examples...

CUT! Having the characters go out to get ice cream is cute, but you don't need to show them each ordering their ice cream unless the flavour they choose is an important plot point. Skip to the last one receiving their ice cream and turning to the others who already have theirs and are having that deep discussion. OR skip that scene entirely and have a quiet panel of them sitting in the park at sunset, already holding their ice cream, before delving into the deep emotional conversation they will be having.

CONDENSE! You can combine two scenes if you need to. If you have one scene where two characters are having a casual conversation and another where they are sneaking into a building? Stick them together. They can sneak AND talk and now you've only used up 5 pages instead of 10.

Comics take a LONG TIME to make!! - you have to make peace with that _(:Ⅰ」∠)_ Comics, especially full colour ones, are an extremely labour intensive and time consuming way of telling a story. If one page takes 1 day (8 hrs of work) and you have 24 pages, that is 24 days of working on one comic.

Thumbnails! - Draw the pages small and rough first! It's easier to plan things and mess around with the layouts when you don't have an emotional attachment to how the art inside looks. Once you have a layout you like, you can then draw it again in full page size and work on it from there.

Page and panel layouts are my favourite part of the whole process, I could talk forever about it, but I do not have the energy for it right now. I'll save panel/page layout for another time.

It doesn't have to be perfect!!! - IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE PERFECT!!!! (shouted with excitement btw). Panels can be boring! A page can be extremely simple! The art can be messy! The dialog can be simple! The plot can go nowhere! In fact it is really really fun to make a messy imperfect comic on purpose. Destroy the perfectionist in you, because they will always and forever hold you back from actually creating things. "what if it's bad?" what if it's fun? what if you learn cool things?

Anyway, those are my tips/advice, idk if I actually answered what you were asking... sorry about all the time commitment ones, that is something I really wish I had figured out a few years ago lol.

Comics are fun to make and a lot of learning how to make them is just jumping in, encountering a problem, and then learning how to solve it.

[crabbng]

i actually got some in process shots for this #WebcomicDay ! they are of an episode 12 page, so this doubles as a sneak peek 🤣 you can see i forgot to take a pic of the finished lines before i started on coloring (whoops)

there are a few secret steps after finishing up backgrounds etc. (scanning, cleaning up) but since this is a sneak peek, i didn't want to put the Final Product out there.

I guess I'll ramble a little bit about The Process below the cut.

SKETCH: I don't plan out my pages as much as I should other artists do. I think about the next couple shots I want, what I can probably fit on the page, and then decide how tall the panel should be. after that I draw a big line across the page 🤣 sometimes the panel gets bisected, usually not trisected. I love it when people consider the whole of the page and make the paneling choices that elevate the art. I just don't do it lmao

luckily for me, I don't have a requirement to make every piece of my comic pages The Best. So, I focus on what I enjoy: expressions and conversations.

LINE DIALOGUE AND PANELS: For inking/lining, I ABSOLUTELY have to put in my dialogue/dialogue balloons first. Since I'm doing everything on the same page of physical paper, I can't really shift things around partway through to make the dialogue and art fit better together. I also have to make sure it all fits within the panel lines I have planned. I've gotten into situations where the WORDS fit in, but in order to make a word balloon with decent space around the words, I cross over a line. Sometimes it works, but for me.. it doesn't work most of the time. So, gotta plan ahead.

You can also see down in the final section, I handwrite my dialogue! So, if I mess up, I sometimes have to add in a few letter that I can substitute in during editing.

FINISH LINES & ERASING: All I have to say about finishing lines/erasing, is that erasing can be such a challenge lmao. JUST YESTERDAY... when I was erasing.. I tore a page a little bit. And I often accidentally crinkle a corner while erasing. The obvious solution, and what I know people do, is to sketch on one page, and then use a light table (or equivalent) to do a cleaner, lighter sketch on a new page, and then do lining on that. Which is a good idea, maybe someday I'll try it lol.

COLOR FIGURES: There's really no good reason I start with the figures, besides that I like watching them come to life with the colors. It feels weird when they're blank on the page. They're also generally the most important part of the page for me, and seeing them colored helps me decide on which panels I want to do flat color backgrounds for.

But! This means I can't go back and edit skin tones etc. to be in different lighting after the fact, unless it's to make them darker! So that's something I have to be cognizant of and plan for in advance.

I use Copics for most part of the figures, except when I know there's going to be several large areas to color, like Aoife's hair or her sweater and pants. I have character's hair planned in Copics, but I have several browns from other brands (Prismacolor, Blick, Winsor and Newton, Artist's Loft) that get pretty close to her hair color. Clothing that has large areas that need to be colored are planned as being from one of those other brands from the start. I don't want to use up all my Copic juice on them!!

Also don't you just love seeing the texture of the paper through the marker? I love it. I love the natural variation you get.

BACKGROUNDS & OTHER DETAILS: Color everything else! Backgrounds and shadows generally. For backgrounds I'm once again using my alternative brands. I've got a lot of space to cover, and those markers, along with being cheaper, are generally larger than my Copics. So it works out.

Sometimes I tend to go a bit wild with the single color backgrounds, to the point where I think it can get distracting. So I have to rein it in and leave some panels with white backgrounds, so the reader isn't just blasted with colors from every angle. My rule of thumb is to try and only have color on one panel in each of my lines of panels, and to alternate sides, if possible. I feel like that guides the eye easier.

Doing things traditionally means I don't really get any shortcuts when it comes to backgrounds, including just flat color backgrounds. Every square millimeter has gotta be colored purposefully by me. And maybe that seems like a pointless use of time and effort! But man, I love the end result. I'm all for shortcuts, it's just a lot of the ones I see floating around don't apply to me 🤣

I'll talk about my other steps here too, might as well.

SCANNING: After colors and everything, I scan the pages. They're too big to fit in my scanner, so I scan the top and bottom halves separately, and stitch them together (I use PhotoStitcher).

From there, I rotate it to (more or less) make it straight on my canvas, make a .clip version, and send it off to my iPad!

I got my iPad in a workplace raffle, and though there's a lot about the UI I don't love, it's been really convenient!

EDITING: Editing consists of: cleaning up things that should be white (like eyes, teeth, and word balloons), and then cleaning up marker that's bled over into areas it doesn't belong, and is distracting. I try not to overdo it on marker cleanup, because 1) it takes a while, 2) it can stress me out if I decide I need it all to be PERFECT, and 3) it feels slightly disingenuous, just TO ME, about my OWN work. I don't think 3) is valid, so I try to ignore that part, but sometimes in my head I'm like 'mm but Jacki can you say its traditional if you have to do so much work in post to make it presentable??' (said in a very snobby voice). I went from not really caring -> REALLY caring -> hopefully I'll get to caring a reasonable amount.

FINISHING: Last steps are to send it BACK to my computer, where I have two auto actions to size the page and to export it as a .png in a large and a small size. I should be rightfully criticized for how I size the pages lmao, it's 2647x3560 pixels. Why that number specifically? That's 1) how I've done it since the beginning, so they are all this very strange size, and 2) it's about the maximum area of scanned page I can consistently get.

I think that's it? I don't know why you would, but if you have any questions, feel free to hit me up and I'll answer them to the best of my ability. Hope someone finds this interesting or helpful LOL

bye 💕 happy webcomic day!

[zahri-melitor]

Okay a loose Recent Reads roundup:

Birds of Prey: Sirens of Justice: so I was lured (tricked) into reading this as Gail Simone wrote one of the stories, even though it, sigh, contains far too much Harley Quinn due to movie synergy. The Dinah and Helena banter is decent, but otherwise this felt...aggressively fine. The Helena story is very pat in terms of how people tend to write Huntress shorts, though I guess it wasn't 'Helena worries about a student' this time.

The Question: The Deaths of Vic Sage: very much in conversation with O'Neil's run, of course, and also clearly reacting to contemporaneous US racial discussions. Shifting Myra to be the Mayor's sister not wife definitely alters her position in the narrative, particularly in terms of her obligations and response to situations. It is incredibly bleak in places, but that simply reflects the run it is based on and is a tribute to.

Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen: This is definitely for the Silver Age fan. Matt Fraction manages to string together solving a complex assassination plot over 12 issues by telling the story in short, 2-4 page sections that wildly jump around the timeline and are framed by 'the many ridiculous things that have happened to Jimmy Olsen'. I have absolutely no handle on the canonicity of some of this, particularly the extended Olsen family, and not knowing probably makes this read more easily. Looking at it as a whole, I'm impressed how well Fraction stitched what was effectively episodic 2 page fills into a complete narrative. The energy of the story is relentless. Best read in small doses.

Batman: Pennyworth R.I.P: god this comic could have been so much better than it was. It’s fine and accomplishes exactly what it was intended to do - tell a story of how Alfred influenced and looked out for each of Dick, Jason, Tim, Damian and Barbara - and sets everyone up to be mildly pissed at Bruce. But just for one example, it would have been HUGELY more powerful if they’d been able to use Dick, with his memories just restored, facing the fact he wasn’t there when Alfred needed him and his last interactions were so impersonal and spent pushing Alfred away.

Catwoman 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular: again, underwhelming. Tom King played shipper and wrote his version of how the Helena Wayne story should work; the Dixon story felt 90s appropriate but the art was dire; Brubaker’s felt like a missing scene to his run; Dini’s honestly wasn’t up to the standard I’d hope for from Dini. The art pieces were great though; a lot of good commissions.

Robin 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular: I cannot work out who chose the covers used in the issue, which swing between 'iconic' and 'reminding everyone ASBAR exists was unnecessary, DC'.

Generally: they did manage to round up fairly iconic lineups for most of the stories, with some chopping and changing for a few.

Wolfman got another run at trying to frame the 'Dick quits v Bruce fires him' debate; Dixon and Grayson both submitted literal fills (Dixon's is a scene immediately after Nightwing #19 1996 and before #20; Grayson's is at least just an extra story that fits into #1-12 of her Titans 1999 run on a day all the second stringers didn't come to work). I don't actually have a problem with any of these - they're nice additional material, but mostly more of the same. Seeley & King's suffers from the usual Seeley problem for me where it would be vastly improved by having a different focus; but it does feel straight out of his Grayson run, with everything that implies (down to the St Hadrian's student I wish was not present). All of the Dick stories are basically "we got the team back together" creative line ups.

Jason, in contrast, makes it really obvious that nobody can define a definitive Jason run, and so gets the tiniest story with Winick and Dustin Nguyen. I checked, and Nguyen did draw part of UTRH, but I wouldn't have associated him as a character-defining artist for Jason. The story's cute. Winick sidestepped having to commit to anything about his opinions on post-Flashpoint Jason direction.

Tim got Adam Beechen (which honestly makes me happy, I don't care about anyone else's opinion) and luxuriates in Tim having to play civilian; Tynion gets a Rebirth story that I can't quite work out his timing on (it's supposed to be a prequel, but Dick is already back in costume as Nightwing and talking to Tim, suggesting that several issues of the Rebirth Nightwing take place significantly before 'Tec #934) that is a classic 'Tim tells everyone how he feels about his brothers' story. I realise everyone boring has complained about Tim calling Damian a 'horrible gremlin' but the thing is you see I can only read nicknames like that as full of affection. The back and forth is an important part of their relationship, as shown by Damian snapping 'you're only listening to the insults'.

Steph gets her 71 days as Robin slightly padded out and Amy Wolfram manages to pick up Willingham's tone pretty well; I suspect she liaised with Damion Scott quite a bit on this piece.

Damian has a Super Sons piece from Tomasi, because it's the most lighthearted option available and it sells very well (it's sickly sweet). Which was probably the right call as the other piece is clearly written by Robbie Thompson to accompany his Teen Titans run and for the downward spiral going on there. Which is honestly a bit of a pity for Damian, given everyone else got feature pieces from favourite runs, and he got the 'this slots into your current story' piece.

[krislindbo]

2024 Comic Project

March Review | Weeks 9-12

Another month gone by, which means I'm officially one-quarter of the way through the project!

Over the past couple months, I've been joining up with a group of artists once a week while working on my comic, using the time to keep me motivated and on-track. Over all, I've received two very frequent questions:

Who are my main comic influences?

What is the story about?

Honestly, I don't have a set answer for either one! I understand where the latter question comes from; I kind of thought I'd have a better idea of that by this point. But I remind myself, the whole concept of the project is to not know. While I've decided to make it one continuous story, I do think of each week as it's own separate comic (even when the narrative and characters has been so consistent like they have been for March). I do worry I've built up so much exposition that I don't know how to pay off. But I must go back to my original point - trust the process, and just make what comes to me.

The first question was more surprising, mostly that I couldn't think of anything to tell people when they asked! The truth is, I'm inspired by much more than just comics. Lately I've been watching a bit of Moonminvalley, because I find Tove Jansson so inspiring, and her characters feel so sincere in a way I've rarely found in other media. I always fall back to Over the Garden Wall as well, both for it's gorgeous animation, and the way you can get a bit more out of it with each re-watch.

I don't think this comic will measure up in any way to those pieces of media, nor do I think it needs to. But with that question, I accidentally found a great way to help ground such a nebulous and undefined concept, by trying to see how my influences do shine through in the writing and drawing.

Whelp. That's all for this month! I'll return once again on Monday with another page. Catch you then!

[thephooka]

Every time someone asks for queer comics in the vein of OP I want to hold up a sign and yell I'M HERE. I'M RIGHT HERE. I'M RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU. I'VE BEEN HERE THE WHOLE TIME.

I make a comic called White Noise, and I've been making it since 2011. All the characters are queer. There's lots of monsters and trauma and people taking care of each other despite great hardship and places where I try to manifest the feeling of getting that first deep and steadying breath after you've been crying your eyes out for a few hours. Here are some pages I like from the last five-ish chapters.

I'm just getting to the end of the first arc--12 chapters plus an epilogue, about 500 pages, all for you to read for free on its own website. The art in the beginning starts a little rough and gets better as time goes on, because this is my passion project that I've been using to teach myself how to draw.

The story follows siblings Hawk and Liya, who get separated by civil unrest. Hawk goes on a journey across a world in uproar to find Liya, not even sure she's still alive; Liya tries to adapt to her new home on another plane, while being very sure that Hawk is dead.

I work really hard on it, and if this sounds like something you might be interested in, please give it a shot: White Noise

(warnings for interpersonal and state violence, occasional drug and alcohol use, and non-explicit sexual situations.)

actually im just gonna make my own post about it: please read more webcomics. please try them. every time people make posts about “aw man i wish SOMEone would WRITE about FLAVOR OF QUEER THING/TRAUMA OR ABUSE BUT IN SPECIFIC WAYS I CAN RELATE TO/WHATEVER” and then it gets reblogged into a giant thread of people agreeing with it and demanding Content i die because whatever it is is definitely being painstakingly created by an indie author who would really like for people to consume it and every time i point this out people suddenly can’t read lmao

it is out there it is free it is being made from firsthand experiences by people who care very very deeply who would be DELIGHTED to hear that it’s resonating with anybody at all, please throw some of that enthusiasm and support at people who will actually appreciate it

if you’re an indie comic person and any of this applies to you i encourage you to reblog this with a link to your comic and a short synopsis so people can browse the notes and find shit they’re looking for. or make your own post on your own blog if you don’t want to fool with other people i don’t care this is a sign from the universe that you should be louder about what you’re working on because people can’t fucking find it apparently.

i’ll go first i make kidd commander and it’s about an ensemble cast of queers on their way to kill god, they live on an airship and they’re all too pissed off to die. it’s free to read and it’s in the middle of its third arc right now. it lives here http://kiddcommander.com/

go go go

[batbaffle]

totally not trying to stop the fun or make it a thing, I just know I like it when people let me know, that pic from Grayson #12 is actually Dick and Tim, not Dick and Jason! It's a recreation of their first meeting in Batman 441. That's why the kid looks so small, Tim was somewhere under 7 at the time (probs more like 2-4). It is super confusing that they referenced that scene in the N52 when it was out of continuity? Yes, totally, but the issue does a lot of pre-reboot references haha

inserting the full page for reference:

is it really tim???

hypothetically, if that was supposed to depict tim's first meeting with dick, dick would have to be in the circus!robin costume. nightwing costume is out of place.

not to mention, dick looks like a proper adult there, rather than 13 or younger. (13 is the oldest that dick could've reasonably been when he met tim, depending on which timeline you follow). lonely place of dying didn't draw dick super consistent to his age, but i don't think they did the same in grayson.

you're correct about the age range tim would've been in when he met dick though! they definitely implied that tim was around 3 years old.

pics from a lonely place of dying:

plus the kid in the grayson pic has a strong resemblance to davis and neary's art of young jason. 12(?) year old jason is legitimately just like that. tiny lad.

pics from detective comics #569:

i'm personally not convinced that it's supposed to be tim in the green sweater there, anon :/

(it's entirely possible that they intended to have tim there but made it unclear? kinda a stretch though. not very likely.)

looking at that grayson page as a whole, dick is reminiscing about both tim and jason as his brothers. he'd be showing heavy favoritism towards tim if there weren't any depictions of young jason present, yknow?

[flowerchildwren]

2023 Art Recap

Every year I like to look over an art piece from each month and go over what I like and don't like about it as well as how my art has changed over the year. Also I consistently posted my art on tumblr for a whole year which has never happened before I think

January

It's weird seeing SVO stuff after making the decision to reboot it like a month later. I don't know what is going on here perspective and anatomy wise this piece is just bad.

February

The only piece of Tome art I drew this year, SVR has kept me busy. After doing so much character design this year I look back on some of these designs and think about ways I could make them better but that will have to wait. I don't have to much to say considering this is just a sketch page.

March

I still really like this, It's not my favorite but I like the motion. I think the design and anatomy could be better but I'm just glad I made something considering my biggest issue this year was just not making things.

April

Nothing! Actually it's all just beta designs for SVR most of which are outdated at this point and contain spoilers so I don't want to post them, sorry.

May

Mermay art, Idk what to say, its fine. The shadows on the skin look more like light which doesn't look awful but It's a pretty obvious mistake

June

I'm a big fan of bright cool colors if you couldn't tell. I wonder if next year I'll play with Aria's design more, I feel like I nailed her design pretty early. I hope to have the comic up next year though so I might not.

July

I had not original art here's a study that I did. It doesn't look much like the original and kinda sucks but the point of a study is to get better so it's fine I guess.

August

Where's that Gordan Ramsey "wheres the light source" image I think it really applies to this image. Idk why I decided to draw an image with so many light sources when I already struggle with that.

September

I joked about how the shading on this sucks but honestly I kinda like how it turned out. I have no idea how I ended up doing this and have been trying to figure out how to redo and have failed every time.

October

Backwards hands. Well not really but they're in a really uncomfortable position. I had a lot of fun with this piece but I think that's just because It's Saph and I love her.

November

PFP redraw, I don't actually draw wren that much which is why their design hasn't changed in years. This piece also has the shadows being way to bright because I really wanted to use purple. My brand I guess.

December

This piece destroyed me, I started it during finals as a way to de-stress but it escalated. I do love it though (probably because I spent 12 hours on it) I said last year that 2023 was going to be the year I worked on backgrounds and I just decided to cram all of that into this one piece.

Goals for next year are to start publishing SVR (I'd like to finish act I but knowing me that isn't going to happen)

[moonlightperseus]

That's fair that does sound bad, I'm sorry

I read Gideon because it's one of my friends favourite books but I think that's the only example I have. And there's not, no. I always feel like I'm wasting my time for doing certain hobbies that I love, so it's harder to take free time for someone else's hobby, so that makes sense.

I'm just so bad at watching television, I really wanted to watch it once Babs came in but I couldn't ever get through season 2, it's not even a comment on the show it's a comment on my inability to pay attention.

I am VERY glad I did!! I just finished reading hold still on Libby with my library card which is very rewarding because it was a book I'd wanted to buy AND I'm currently listening to the Graceling Audio book so it's definitely paying off. And I don't usually guess plot points due to the whole "head empty" thing. The first book I ever annotated was the Bell Jar and there's just no highlights until the very end (in which I had to physically resist the urge to highlight every single thing to do with Dr. Nolan) so I'm really not you're gal to tell you if anything was shocking. (Granted I did tell my friend I thought a character had bad vibes and I was right and she was impressed, so)

I personally think Harrow would've fucked me over if I had to listen to it. I already go in and out of paying attention to audio books and Harrow was so confusing for the first like 90% I would've been screwed. Audio books are harder for me because I *can't* do anything else- I have three hobbies, reading, writing, and drawing. I can't do two words at once so my only option if I want to listen to an audiobook is draw and especially since I just loan them from the library there's a lot of stress to draw for like 20 hours in two weeks.

I got to 12. I just keep forgetting it's there. You just like,, click too far into the next issue (page 1) and you're like... "well fuck since I've started-"

I saw that when I looked I just didn't know but fair!!!

I might try!! (I might even do a better job since I have the physical comics)

That's fair, I get that/ Hopefully you like year zero then! (when you get to it) I've never been able to complete sudoku, I know how it works I'm just stupid lmao. And that's fair, my laptop fucking sucks, I need to buy a new one before I start school again but God I don't want to pay for it who cares if this one can barely open the internet.

I imagine it was his phone but I didn't ask. He was kind of sketchy. At one point he tried to give me candy and I said I didn't trust him and then his coworker took a piece and asked if it was weed because "it wouldn't be the first time"

I am!! I just went to my local comic-con (very little comic anything- it was very disappointing. 90% of it was anime which was frustrating because we also have a yearly anime convention, but that's not why I'm telling you) I didn't notice a lot of the cosplays (due to the "oh god why am I here this is terrifying" feelings and the need to not get separated from my big brothers) but as I was leaving I DID see (or my brother pointed out to me, more accurately) a VERY good cosplay of Black Canary. I did not ask for a picture because we were leaving and I am shy but I have been thinking about it since lmao. She alone made me want to just like draw Black Canary for the rest of my life.

ok sorry for the delay in response life’s been busy and when i’m not busy w work i’ve been consumed by a rewatch of a silly tv show from like. eight years ago.

i will say s3 of titans (the season babs was in) definitely felt like the lowest point of the show imo. it was too doom and gloom gotham. but seeing an actual disabled person cast as babs was so cool, she was a fantastic babs she just wasn’t given a whole lot and a good chunk of it just felt like she was just there as a love interest for dick which was very frustrating to me :/

yeah i definitely think there are probably some small bits i missed with listening to the locked tomb books but a good audiobook is my favorite thing for a long drive.

i did read year zero and it was fun. loved seeing harley and ivy be gay and do crime. (and ivy beating up the joker!!)

still haven’t started injustice2 however i’ve been bouncing around reading some current dc runs (hawkgirl, powergirl, wonder woman and the amazons attack comic) and some older stuff (i read an old zatanna special because i was in a zatanna mood) i keep telling myself to read injustice2 and then getting distracted 😔

ooh a comic con that’s cool!! i’ve never been to one, i kinda would like to go to one but also they sound so overwhelming so idk if i ever will. maybe if i find someone to go with. LOVE that you saw a black canary cosplay that’s so cool i love that also you SHOULD draw black canary for the rest of your life (maybe just not. only black canary. variety is good!)

sorry that my response is a little short this time my brain is made of spaghetti tonight but i really wanted to respond bc i feel bad that this ask has been sitting in my inbox for several days. hope you are doing well!! (and hopefully i will actually start on injustice2 soon so i can share my thoughts with u!!)

[cafemagie]

For the highest patreon 1

What does

A monthly exclusive illustration

And

A monthly drawing log book (digital magazine)

Mean?

Thank you for your interest :D I will try to answer clearly, and also make a more detailed post about the Patreon project before November:

•About the drawing log book (or digital magazine):

- There will be an art dump/sketch dump section, little comic strips, doodles, unpublished artworks. At this tier, you'll also be able to access to explicit art : 1 spicy comic strip + doodles (fanart and original art).

- "Blue Camellia" will be separated into 2 (1 non-explicit .pdf and 1 explicit/spicy .pdf). The whole thing (2 .pdf combined) should be about ~10 - 12 pages (you can access to both).

-> To summarise it's like a Comic Yuri Hime - a GL japanese magazine featuring GL artists art/news- but with my artworks (*)

•About the monthly exclusive illustration :

- It's a monthly ship illustration that will be published on Patreon only. You can suggest ships/themes and vote via polls. It can be released months after publicly, but if it's spicy (for higher tier) it will stay on Patreon, I'm too shy to go all public for now

(*) For example :

There is a lot of Diakko concepts and ideas already sketched to celebrate Halloween/Christmas. One illustration will be published publicly for these events, but the other one(s) and sketches/spicy will be published on Patreon, and/or featured in the monthly drawing log book.

Lastly, a Patreon will help to support/further my art journey of course, but making my supporters have a great time with my art and adding value is one of my biggest priorities too, so if you have any suggestion or question about memberships/contents or other things I'll be glad to answer!

(You can message privately /ask anonymously if it's more comfortable than replying in a comment or reblog ^^)

[kitausuret]

Venom Reading Recommendations

I'm creating this list for @she-grulk but if anyone else wants to use it go right ahead! This is basically going to be categorized by each little story arc, and I'll give a bit of a descriptor for each and then you can decide if it's worth your time or not.

Like all comic characters, Eddie Brock has had some really great moments and then some not-great moments. There's characterization changes here there and everywhere, both for him and the symbiote so that's something to keep in mind.

I'll be starting with just a few issues since Tumblr limits me on number of images.

- You may come across a miniseries called Venom: Dark Origin but I implore you for the love of all that is holy to just skip this one. No offense to Wells but it's got some of the worst Eddie Brock characterization I've ever read in my life. I don't think it's even considered 616 canon in most readings.

- Before you get started, I would actually recommend Web of Spider-Man #1 by Louise Simonson.

It's an excellent primer for understanding Peter's relationship to the symbiote without pawing through the whole Alien Costume saga.

- Venom: Seed of Darkness (one-shot)

This one is part of the "Flashback" series and takes place a number of years prior to anything Venom - it's hands-down one of the best Eddie Brock stories and I feel one of the most phenomenal characterizations. Len Kaminski also wrote Venom: The Hunger and is probably my second-favorite voice for Eddie, after David Michelinie. Also Eddie is pretty and sad.

- Venom: First Kill

So, this story is actually a B-story that is in the following issues:

-- Amazing Spider-Man Annual Vol 1 #26

-- Spectacular Spider-Man Annual Vol 1 #12

-- Web of Spider-Man Annual Vol 1 #8

My favorite thing about First Kill is that it takes like 3 pages for Eddie (and the symbiote) to get distracted from their plan to kill Spider-Man to try and save their neighbor, it's just very funny. They're so bad at villainy!

- The First Appearances of Eddie Brock

-- Amazing Spider-Man #298-300

So, for #298-299 it's just cameos at the end of each issue, but of course #300 is the Big Reveal. #300 is actually not a favorite of mine at all because I don't like how McFarlane draws Eddie but Venom is so dramatic they don't even get around to killing Spider-Man and I find that hysterical.

-- Amazing Spider-Man #315-317

This arc has the (in?)famous return of Venom and their fight with Black Cat. Like personally the brutality of their fight with Felicia rubs me a little wrong but #317 is a really great issue and addresses the symbiote's lingering attachment to Peter.

A bonus is Eddie helping Aunt May with her laundry.

-- Amazing Spider-Man #331-333

Venom saves a baby! The first real indication of the Lethal Protector persona here.

Once again the last issue is the best here, or it is at the very least the appearance of the symbiote's death. It's important because this is right before Carnage, as you'll see in...

-- Amazing Spider-Man #344-347

Mark Bagley on pencils!!! is probably the main reason why I recommend these haha. I love the way he draws Eddie, it's just such a glow-up. Anyways, #346-347 have the whole "Spider-Man gets kidnapped to a remote island and fakes his death" which is fun.

NEXT: Carnage and Lethal Protector!

[sunnetrolls]

1, 2, 6, 8, 12, and 22!

im doing urs first. just for fun

my god holy moly this got so long readmore time

1. Show your most recent wip

pspspspps [waves the prospect of ship art in front of you] if you do artfight i'll draw concordia ex machina next

2. 5 favourites of your own work?

FIVE? i don't draw that much!!! hold on i'll go browse

In no particular order! Veylin's bust painting is my fav ive done of any of those, i'm still rlly proud of nohope and planhz's sprites, i reaaaaaally love how i did the color and overlays on that abby headshot, and the dogy is an artfight attack from last year that is everything i love about my older lineless art style!!!

6. Which artists inspire you right now?

Alright buckle up folks this is a longer one

So I'm gonna answer this in two parts basically. The first part is artists that inspired me to start drawing what I like, especially fantrolls-- so a lot of my friends really!! Wanting to be in this community is what made me start actually doing art as something I was passionate about!!!!! The second part is actually twitter artists that inspired me to actually renovate my art style, try new things, and actually grow as an artist in ways that I really just never did here before.

I know I'm gonna forget a lot of people but the ones that come to mind right away for people who had an Impact on me back in the day are !!U!! gabriel 8bit-mau5, newt indig0trolls, my friend max who's no longer in the community, my friend lumiet who doesn't even do fantrolls but is really cool, and god a lot of old blogs whos muns are just gone now..................... wistful sigh :(

BUUUUUT as for artists who made me want to actually grow again in my. Wait hold on

[sets out a sign that says CRINGE WARNING -- I LIKED DSMP IN LATE 2020-EARLY TO MID 2021]

Okay now that that's out of the way! Some of the artists who made me actually want to learn and change and GROW again are giraffeleggos, mielzy_png, and WolfyTheWitch on twt :3 Mielzy especially is an art streamer who has a huge focus on being introspective and taking criticism and wanting to grow and always be improving in a direction they want. Hella cool to see someone be like, never satisfied in a "i love art and drawing so i want to grow and do it as well as i can as a respect for the craft" type of way. I don't think any of these guys except for Wolfy are actually into dsmp anymore but when I got into their content they were all dsmp fanartists so.

Okay this is really long actually so I'll quit there. Wait no actually here's a list of a handful of folks whose art inspires me to keep learning nowadays (also mostly all my friends)-- nero ramgodd, roe roetrolls, dami ask-the-troll-boys, greg lordtonic, and an extra special shoutout to chase sasster for making me want to write again. I just wanna do the cool art stuff like my really awesome friends so bad yall

8. What do you like most about your own work?

Hrmmmmmmmmmmm okay this one is tough bc both I wanna say "nothing bc I have a lot of strengths" and "nothing bc there's always room for me to grow and improve so even my best strengths aren't as good as they could and will eventually be"

But like. I really like how I paint actually

12. Show your favourite drawing from this year

FROM THIS YEAR.... ok let's comb thru my art tag

Oh wait easy simple. The whole fuckin aliquid ex nihilo comic. That took me so goddamn long but it was a labor of love and I desperately want to do more 1-page song comics like that but unfortunately they take me like 2 weeks if I do full lineart and that shit sucks

There are a lot of things I want to redo on it that are also things I redid in the process of making this comic but as is the nature of being so used to drawing sprites I forget how to draw people in actual poses and also interacting with things. I still think overall just because also of how funky I got with the coloring, framing, the fact that this is the first comic ive ever planned and fully completed ever, etc. that this one's my fav thing I've drawn in 2022 thus far

22. When is your prime time to work on your art?

Nighttime and also whenever I'm medicated LMAO I can NEVER focus on drawing if I'm off my meds idk how I did it before

[theninjazebra]

21 things for 2021

Under a cut because shit is boring to people not me.

1. Got engaged at 00.01 am, 01.01.2021. Have now spent a year Being Engaged. It was mostly a lot of fun!

2. Also got pinterest for the first time for wedding planning reasons, and marvelled at how rich some people are, and how expensive even a standard Traditional Western Wedding is (thank fuck for family with big back yards, and kiwi chill). I also now want to learn how to crochet.

3. Didn't draw as much as I wanted. Probably my biggest regret of the year?

4. Didn't listen to enough music either. '22 needs more art and more music.

5. April (and May) was the Medical Drama Month. Would like to avoid Wellington hospital for another 5 years, thanks.

6. Also started studying again! Fucking hate it, but that's life. Fun thing about being An Adult is that you can study and hate it without it being an existential thing.

7. Said goodbye to second of the 3Bs. As far as putting down pets goes it was as close to perfect as you get. She was ready, but not suffering too much, and we were all in agreement and ready to say goodbye. 16 yrs is a good life for a cat.

8. Also said hello to Merlin, my awful, violent, filthy monster kitten. He's actually grown into a really lovely cat, but oof. Was rough going for a while there.

9. Belle isn't well though. She started the year with Big Allergies, and ended it with and ear infection and being (kind of, she wouldn't be xrayed) diagnosed with heart valve disease. So 2022 may be a really shit year.

10. I've been growing my very thick, very unreasonable hair long this year because I want long boho hair for my wedding. It's the longest it's ever been and I sort of love it but mostly hate it living with it and will be chopping it all off asap post wedding. Nice thing is I can donate it and still have a decent haircut.

11. The things with the lack of art is that there was so much life happening there kinda wasn't room for it in the same way as before. A pretty big reason for wanting to ditch freelancing - if I'm going to draw I want it to be for me.

12. Having said that I did knock out decent 18ish page comic draft this year. Still need to finish the art tho.

13. And after going round and round I think Wake Up, Check Phone needs to be a weird prose/comic hybrid. It's such a lonely, close story, and I don't want to lose that atmosphere to the more explicit image, or the big scenes to clumsy descriptions.

14. Still trying to work up the courage to finish Peace Day. There's a new little interlude I want to add. Just moments and details to really make the world hurt.

15. Now to actually finish any of these projects. Haha.

16. Also post-30 health fuckery. A lot of which was stress and the general decay that waits for us all. With my trusting walking companion now arthritic and with a dicky heart I'll need to get serious about making time for extra exercise. Use it or lose it, ay.

17. Home life has been weird. People leaving, lock downs, etc. Looking forward to getting some quiet and stability next year (cut to some kind of unforeseeable 2022 drama here)

18. I don't like the fashion of doom and gloom of social media this year. Not because I think life is roses or some shit, but because that unrelenting apocalyptic thinking is something I still associate with the deeply selfish myopia of mental illness (whole fucking story in that, not the time or place for it tho). General boo to all forms of social media this year. Distracts from life and actually useful pursuits. A sort of synthetic, substitute socialization and achievement.

19. But despite not seeing my friends in person much it was actually a pretty good year for keeping in contact and having good communication? Like, proper chats and ph calls etc. Going to try for more in person socializing now that covid restrictions have changed.

20. Going to also try to be more proactive about managing stress and anxiety. Simple acknowledging a problem is not the same as dealing with it.

21. 2022. Incoming. Probably a lot of more-of-the-same. Hopefully less bullshit, less drama, less freelance. More art, more music, more people. Definitely some hard times ahead (not looking forward to putting down my dog at all), and still a whole fuckin wedding to go (going to be great! But so exhausting!) And probably a honeymoon??? Covid/general unknowns willing??? And study (boo). And married life ( ❤❤❤ )

Happy new year everyone.

[confusedbluecactus]

I posted 123 times in 2021

20 posts created (16%)

103 posts reblogged (84%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 5.2 posts.

I added 61 tags in 2021

#fanart - 11 posts

#transformers - 8 posts

#tfp - 8 posts

#cactusink - 7 posts

#hollow knight - 6 posts

#hollow knight fanart - 5 posts

#autothotsrollout - 5 posts

#tooquirkytolose - 4 posts

#transformers g1 - 4 posts

#adorable! - 3 posts

Longest Tag: 105 characters

#just like loki i believe the show can be better and the writers and directors have a chance at redemption

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

A simple comic for practice. I don't do comics a lot, I kinda want to try to make more. This is like the second one I've made and it's just to figure out how. I have no idea why the bigger pieces tend to come out blurry, but at least the last panel is clear.

The context behind this is that I usually die in the most avoidable ways. I don't jump high enough, I forget I can run, etc. etc. I play Hollow Knight mainly because I enjoy the lore and exploration, but in order to explore you gotta fight through a lot of enemies and bosses.

The backgrounds are just blurred googled pictures of in-game locations.

12 notes • Posted 2021-07-22 03:27:05 GMT

#4

Here is page 2 of 3 of my little comic. I'm sorry that's it's been a whole month since I posted the first part, I am currently attending college and forgot to bring my tablet with me when I moved in. I've also been distracted by schoolwork lately, things picked up by the 2nd week lol and I really want to do well. Thank you for anyone who was waiting for being patient.  ...and as always click on it for better resolution.

13 notes • Posted 2021-09-21 14:01:07 GMT

#3

Found an old drawing from earlier this year. I cleaned up the speech bubbles since my handwriting is very messy. Mythology!Loki trying on MCU!Loki's helmet. The rest of the page will follow this one.

13 notes • Posted 2021-09-08 14:01:26 GMT

#2

MCU!Thor gushing over double the Loki's while Mythology!Thor's deciding he done with everything right now.

16 notes • Posted 2021-09-09 14:02:25 GMT

#1

Because it's been almost two years since rejoining the fandom and because I'm pretty sure no one is going to see this (at least, not for a long while) I'm going to do what any person on tumblr does: ramble about a character they really like.

I got reminded that Robots In Disguise (2015) was indeed a show after seeing one of Emperor Kumquat's latest videos. I barely remember anything beyond the first season besides vague feelings of childish enjoyment, okayness, disappointment, and random bursts of anger. And before I begin to ramble about something other then what I planned to (and most likely just re-state things that have been said a hundred times) I'm just gonna get to it.

I have really mixed feelings about Starscream's RID re-design.

On one hand, there are certain aspects of it that I do like. I thought it was kinda cool that it looked like they took some of G1 Scream and TFA Scream's characteristics and at least kept a little bit of his heels. I kinda also liked his wings, and the "avenging angel" look they gave him as Emperor Kumquat said. But, sometimes his design kind of feels not so nice to look at. It's weird.

I honestly don't know how to explain it. Sometimes he just looks off to me.

I'm also not a fan of how they re-did his claws. I don't even know if these pictures help illustrate the point, I just picked the two that I thought looked closest to how I felt off of google.

Yeah, I don't know how to explain it other than it feels off. It feels like Starscream, but not at the same time. I really loved his old design and it's one of the reasons I was always drawn to him whenever he entered a scene. He was intimidating in a more subtle way and had a somewhat regal, knightly appearance. Everything about him was expressive. His wing movements, his facial expressions, his giant pointy eyebrows, the way he moved. And single thing about him caught my eye, made me want to keep watching him.

I was excited when they brought him back because I missed him and was glad that he wasn't dead like I thought was, but I couldn't help but feel disappointed when I saw his redesign. I was even more disappointed with how they took him out, but this post isn't about that. This is just me talking into the void that is the internet about how I felt about a character's redesign from a show that's like 4 years old. This was also a surprisingly short ramble, which I guess is good for whoever is reading this. This probably would have been a lot longer if I talked about the show itself, but I'm pretty sure I would just be re-stating points that other people have said before.

36 notes • Posted 2021-05-24 02:21:35 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[hansoeii]

I noticed you don't have an 'about me' page on your blog. I'm really impressed by your art and would like to know more about you! Like, how did you begin doing art, what are you doing now, etc.

Well, I can add an about me page at some point, haha. But well, my story isn't that interesting honestly?? I'm Han and I've always been interested in art. But back when I was little I always wanted to become an archeologist until I rEALLY discovered my love for art. I actually even started with fanarts. I started with small portraits for german youtubers, then I went for chibis, haha. So yeah, I was around 11 when I realised that I wanna spend my whole life with art and I'd do whatever it takes to achieve my goals. So, since I was around 11 I've been drawing and painting non stop. School kinda hates me bc of it, cos I spend way more time on art than I do on studying. I couldn't care less tho. I got my first graphics tablet when I was around 12 or 13. I still own the same one (Wacom Intuos) but I'm finally gonna buy the Wacom Cintiq next year!! I've always been trying to draw comics or at least have a more comic-y style, but I gave up at some point. Realistic art is just more my thing, haha. I think I really started discovering my own style when I started painting fanarts for TWD. Through that I also achieved some of my first goals. Like having my fav actor actually notice me through my art. And I also got to meet him and he immediatlely recognized me! That was great. I'm 16 now, I'll turn 17 on the 29th October, I'm in 11th grade and well, I got my first ever job. I currently work over summer break as a graphics designer, which is fucking awesome and a great step in the right direction. I want to study art after school and my biggest dream is to be able to work as a character designer for movies and tv shows!

[nabulos]

I posted 4,286 times in 2021

71 posts created (2%)

4215 posts reblogged (98%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 59.4 posts.

I added 2,979 tags in 2021

#lol - 795 posts

#transformers - 785 posts

#video - 407 posts

#art - 210 posts

#destiny - 176 posts

#comic - 167 posts

#dishonored - 124 posts

#monster girls - 111 posts

#optimus - 106 posts

#g1 - 98 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#the idea that the vex are effectively melodic viruses sit well with my literary analysis of how they are functionally the stripped down vers

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

bruce calmly tells the rest of the avengers about how he attended a protest as Hulk SPECIFICALLY to scare the shit out of every cop within eyesight and make them too scared to even think of trying something and Steven just nods and goes 'NICE'

LOL the idea of Bruce doing that is pretty fun, though I feel like he’d be a bit too ... i dont want to say timid, but he doesnt like to prod the hornet’s nest either, right?

14 notes • Posted 2021-01-03 05:32:05 GMT

#4

Gears of War... is a franchise based on the idea that... Oil is Evil and Killing The Planet???? WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME THIS!?

17 notes • Posted 2021-01-08 03:29:14 GMT

#3

Every time someone draws a humanformers Rescue Bots Blades as a white dude, i lose a little more patience.

21 notes • Posted 2021-08-06 04:06:43 GMT

#2

Saw this Jojo page and knew exactly what to do.

36 notes • Posted 2021-12-04 05:14:30 GMT

#1

UMM??? EXCUSE ME??? Was anybody going to tell me that Elsie (and possibly the whole Bray family) were Muslim?? Because she uh, definitely said "inshallah" to her mom!!!

Like, based on all the info, the Brays are Black Carribean Muslims??? I'm losing my mind.

253 notes • Posted 2021-10-22 15:11:41 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →