You don't use it you lose it, gonna try to get it back.

[Black Spot]

Hey, your compositional skills aren't bad and that's really important in doing panels. Learning to simplify them is another ball game all together. Take that crying kid - now go back and see how far you can simplify it before it doesn't read.

[JFierce]

Hit page 8 apparently.
Working on low # values and black vs whites
for use in comics. Tough to get simplification with details =/


@Black Spot

Yeah, simplification is what gets me.
It's why Notan is so hard for me to grasp.
I see my favorite comic artists work in pure black and white
sometimes barely any gray at all. But they still can make amazingly detailed pages. It's what I want to achieve but never tried it.

Grabbing the details while simplifying is what stumps me.
I need to practice simplifying while working from life and my studies.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So I don't start the new page off with nothing (which I don't like to do in general in the thread)
I did a simple study last night in the dark in front of my computer.
Dramatic lighting is a bit easier.
But "Spotting the Black" I can never grasp it from my head or even just normal non dramatic lighting.





I'm just going to edit this post. I just bumped yesterday and it wasn't for anything substantial. Just trying to do some studies of scenes and "Spot the black" and work from light sketches. Though put a bit too much in on the left foreground.





I think I need to put these into another program to edit and clean up some more.

[JFierce]

Quick Study.




Edit: Don't like to bump posts for same day stuff.
But anyways was doodling.
Slightly referenced for the hair so other parts are a bit off
right eye is off kilter but it was originally supposed to be exaggerated. Doesn't fit though.
Necks a little weird with the hair too. But whatever, doodles aren't meant to be perfect.
Kinda drew the face then added the body without thinking. Think the face is tilted a bit too much compared to the body.
------------------------

Edit Edit:

Changed the face a bit. Wasn't very zombie like and bugged me.






The last one makes me realize if I'm going to work on another zombie comic I need to vaguely look at the muscle structure underneath. To get the gist at least. You can fake it to a degree and no ones going to be like "HEY! That's not how the muscle tissue looks!"... unless your in that field of study for some reason.

[andartarius]

pretty cool stuff, maybe do some more anatomy and you would be great! keep up the good work!

[Vritra]

The recent black and white works are looking great. Are you using Mangastudio by any chance? A friend of mine uses it and I've seen him applying similar brushes in the fine hatching bits. I personally don't like that brush too much. In hatching, nothing's perfectly even, and these brushes really take the human imperfection out of the equation, I feel. I hope I'm making sense.

Also, it should be 'Because you're worth it', not 'Because your worth it'. Minor correction, no big deal.

Keep posting these works, they're really beginning to show character. At least, that's what I think.

[Big Orange]

You're made big strides in the last four or so pages.

[JFierce]

@Big Orange and andartarius
Thanks!

@ Vritra

Haha, yeah actually surprised you spotted manga studio.
I've been experimenting with it awhile, kind of learning it's strengths and faults.
Got it for 5 bucks figure why not.
Which you actually hit a note I've been thinking about pretty hard right now.
The marks of Manga studio are vector and simply too clean. Been reading a lot of manga's recently and really looking at them and my comics are a bit too sterile.
Which sterile can be ok in some aspects but not everything.

I would do traditional then ink and manga studio, or maybe do a very light sketch in Manga studio print out the page and then draw with a guide.

But sadly I don't have a scanner anymore.
So have to stick to photoshop. My old version of painter I wanted to try
but when converting it turns to an extreme black and white copy losing all details making it unusable.
-------------------------------------------------------

Going to restart my zombie comic I did a few pages of ages ago. But it's still in an experimentation phase. There's no way to get the line quality of traditional digitally that I know of. Thought about it too late with this page. But I should midway after getting the basic lines and such down to go into another program for line quality. Since yeah vector loses a lot. Too clean, the lines lack variety

[Zephyrion]

that is really awesome. I like how dramatic the first panel is.

[JFierce]

@Zephyrion
Thanks!

-----------------------------------------------------


Figured some things out with this page.
Things went a lot more smoothly when I figured what I want to do in Manga Studio and what in photoshop. Since once again....
Manga Studio has limited line types with vectors. Not as much variety.
So tried to do most hatching and such outside instead.

That and god damn Onomatopoeia.
It helps to think of it as part of the drawing instead of text you tack on.
But it still always feels awkward putting it in.

[Izene]

Love the Loreal poster! haha

And also your ass kicking lines!
Keep em coming!!

[Ambiguity]

Lol'd at the Loreal concept. Also, I agree with Big Orange, definitely see some improvement here.

[JFierce]

@ Izene and Ambiguity
Haha, thanks. I was just doing a random picture, then decided to do a zombie. Then realized the random face I drew from my head was in a pose like in one of those Loreal hair product posters. Thought it would be funny =p


-----------------------------

Page 3.
This one was different. Setting is extreme light vs dark. So trying to get details by chipping away at the black was interesting. It'll be more fun in upcoming pages where it's not zoomed out shots. Right now can't really tell what any of that stuff is in the room either way.

Was trying to not go overboard in unnecessary detail or rendering for once. Just make it readable. In all reality a viewer would only pass over this kind of page in an instant.

[FenixN]

Hey man, appreciate you looking at my sketchbook and thanks for the advice. Just taking a quick look through your sketchbook and seeing your improvement is also a nice little bit of motivation.

[JFierce]

@FenixN
Yeah man, just takes a bit of dedication to draw and time.
Me I'm in all honesty casual about drawing and I feel I've improved
Who knows if I actually really put an effort into it every single day.
Keep practicin
------------------------------------------------------


It's been awhile since I literally just put marks down for fun and see what comes out. Kind of zoning out. This went from a native american, to a pointy knight helm to somehow what looks like a fat samurai skeletor.

[Clur]

Thanks for stopping by my sketchbook! :3

I love the liney, angular quality your art has, it's got a lot of power. Also the atmosphere in that last comic page is great! It feels kind of tense to me.

I'm definitely going to paying attention to your comics as I'm trying to learn them myself.

Keep up the great work!

[midknight523]

Cool Spidey pic on the previous page. I made this to help you out. Hope you don't mind. You're headed in the right direction. My advise to you is to try looking at action figures and put them at weird angles. That always helped me in the beginning. Also block in the figure. It's easier to get the proportions and anatomy correct this way. Do a lot of anatomy studies, it will make things easier, you'll be able to grasp how muscles connect and flow into each other. Hope this helps. Good luck.

[Umbravita]

Hahaha, fat samurai skeletor... he's got a certain character about him that reminds me of Brain from Pinky and the Brain. "No, Pinky, tonight we TAKE OVER THE WORLD!"

How do you find Manga Studio? This is the second time today I've seen someone mention it so I figured I'd ask.

[JFierce]

@ Clur
Thanks! Yeah I saw some of your comic pages which looked good.
Hope you do more!

@ midknight523
Naw I don't mind at all. I never thought about using an action figure before. I'm probably going to give that a shot to get a rough but still better idea on poses I can't grasp. Especially with comics because getting refs for crazy angles is fricken impossible.

@ Umbravita
I already mentioned it in your SB but found Manga Studio on Amazon for 5 bucks when I read a thread in the lounge here about it. It's worth it. It's only 5 bucks and it's an interesting program. I like the pattern brush more than anything. Fun to use.


----------------------------------------------

Page 4. This one was a biiiig pain. That last panel I redrew 5 times completely without finally settling on this. Key word settling in that I'm still not completely happy with it but it does the job of relaying what's happening despite some issues. Really wish I had our camera to ref myself but mom took it and misplaced it. Still trying to find it.

But it is what it is. Moving on. Spend ridiculous amounts of time on every frame and you get nowhere. Learned that on past comic attempts.

[JFierce]

Stressful week. #5
Might need to edit this later but I'm done for now.

[Umbravita]

It's hard to tell what's happening in that panel. Is she rushing to attack him? Is she falling in because the door's opened? It's not very clear. If she's attacking him, having her arms up would help portray that, and a more confused look if she's falling in would make that clearer.

[JFierce]

@Umbravita

lol that's the main problem with posting comic pages 1 at a time.
When you do one panel alone things may not make sense.
Together it shows a narrative.

Spoilers I guess?:

The person is falling. Next panel will show the person hitting the floor past the main character. The panel is supposed to give a bit of a "Wait? What's going on here. Is that a zombie? Is the main character going to be bit already?" before finding out what actually is happening.

I guess it technically worked if your asking yourself if she's attacking or falling though no? Since that was what I was aiming for. Was hard to even kind of get that feel. Was a pretty frustrating panel. (Like most panels beyond simple face talking panels lol) It could be better though.


--------------------------------------

No new page yet. So the confusion will stay for now lol.
Been neglecting any observation sketches even quick ones.

So here's a quick black and white of ... well..... trash in my room.
Trying to simplify and do sketches as fast as I can while capturing
details to make it readable.





Edit: Was bored and couldn't sleep
So I messed around with my crappy old version of painter.
Was fun at least.

[JFierce]

Been awhile. All sorts of shit happening. Managed to squeeze 2 pages in. Though I call it 1 and a half because the first page was just filler bullshit I rushed through because I couldn't transition well enough.

The transition still isn't as smooth and seamless as I'd like but I can't think of a better one.


Been reading up, trying to like always learn as I go along. Realize I need to play more with black and white to describe form and set the mood, use it more in a graphic design sort of way. Which is a very different train of thought. But it's interesting to try to figure out.


What's funny is I realize I haven't even set the scene yet I'm going to later have to go back and draw a page or 2 just to set the scene lol.



-------------------------

Realizing also I'm going to once I reach enough for a chapter. Go through every page. Re-look everything over and make changes and fix some errors/make things better. This one the white and black for the arms and hands needs fixing. But spent too much time on this one figuring things out. Need to move on. Gonna come back when it's not fresh in my mind.

Anyways. Page 6 and 7






Then I just found it funny the ridiculous first rough sketch. That face.... .... terrible lol.

[JFierce]

Realized I have a giant ass mirror one room away which I never thought "Duh. Use it to draw with you idiot!"

So sketching around with that in my room and a bit more nonsense doodles.

[Black Spot]

Looks like you're getting to grips with the line weight just when I was going to suggest Dogwaffle.

So that's a SP in the last sketch using the mirror? You have a loose back muscle there - might want to get that seen to. Looking forward to more updates.

[Natalia Soleil]

i like those bold shapes...
though i think you should really watch your anatomy even if its comics...

[JFierce]

@Black Spot
Haha yeah. There was a slight indent in my shoulder area. Then a shadow cast around there. I didn't guess the form right and I agree now I can really see it. Big ol Back Flap lol.

@Natalia Soleil
I agree. Biggest issue with anatomy comes to me when I can't find a reference. I put a mirror in my room finally so hopefully can draw more with that and fix these errors that come up =/


-----------------------------------------------------------------

Back to sprite works
Put our old game on hold until we get a bit more experience in the process
It was way too big of an attempt. Starting small with a simple plat former.
So might be off my comic for a bit too lol.


Also found out the old resolution we were working on is outdated
So might not even be able to use my old sprites.
Working on new ones. The higher resolution is weird too.

Trying to figure out repeatable tiles and matching things to the characters is hard. But it's fun. I pretty much bounce between comic, sprites, making the RPG I've been messing with for years.




Still a WIP though. Animating at a higher resolution is going to be a difficult task. Since I'm pretty new to animation period.

[iven]

I really like the spider man sketch from you, and the first black and white post is also
very well done, it does look like computer generated what program was it !!

HANDS UP for your thought full sick ZOMBIE Shampo girl totally agree that most of
our beauty products make us sick, ECO HOLIC is an amazing book you might be
interested to read.

I like the sprite/ MR EGG

[JFierce]

Been completely out of it. Haven't drawn in ages. Life is getting real tense and stressful right now. Might be having a mental breakdown just from all the stuff going on and the world kind of flipping upside down.

Trying to draw again to release some of that anxiety and keep my sanity a bit. So I'm doing fun stuff. Whether it's quick or not. I don't care if it's a masterpiece just having fun.

Some Adventure Time fanart


Then this little joke comic I thought of one day.
Tempted to take it further but not sure where to even go.
There is no happy ending obviously lol.







Hopefully things will clear up some but until then no clue when I'll be posting or drawing. Cheers.

[Black Spot]

This will not put me off eating salads. This will not put me off eating salads. This will not put me off eating salads.

Fun art is always there when you need it. Hope life gets back on track soon.

[Pete Hidalgo]

Really loved the comics ha ha. Some of those were intense! Great job over all.