Non-Competitive Comics...

[Ilaekae]

I'm starting this stickied thread for you guys who have comics you're proud of that are already done, or for items that are FINISHED but weren't done in time for one of our polls. You can also post competitive B&Ws that were in competition if you went ahead and colored them after the competition. It's open to anyone who is a member of CA...

Treat this section like the sketchbook section. Open ONE thread for yourself, and post your comics in that one thread as updates.

[Ilaekae]

I have all the competitive comics so far in some stage of completion, and as I get them done, I'll post 'em here. I'm making a special effort to be as experimental as possible so my posts will be pouncing all over the place style-wise and technique-wise.

This is POW! Number 7 in Black and White--Illustrator, litho crayon, and Photoshop.

[Hannes]

This I did for school and the subject was a typical or more generic girl comic, so I did some YAOI-stuff. I have a habit of making all sort of things so I dont have a certain style, I think... Anyways, I'll upload something more when I have anything that could fit in here.

[Kmadden2004]

Here's a little tribute to both the Peanuts comic strips and my recently departed dog (the coolest black labrador there ever was!)



Here are a few more of these 'one sheet' strips;





Here's the latest comics strips;




Here's a short story I put together for a competition run by a UK newspaper;

[zephyri]

i've always loved looking through this section of the weekly events, and one of these days I'll find the time to take part. For the meanwhile, here's a couple of comic type pieces I've done to date. Maybe posting these will give me the kick I need to come and join in!

[zephyri]

Ilkalae.. I love the style of the comic you have posted... is it shapes cut from a scanned texture or two? And Kmadden, the paris hilton strip gave me a giggle.

[Ilaekae]

Heeheehee...I see we're getting quite a collection of rather nice stuff together in here.

Zephyri, the art is a bastard form of frottage/collage that I sometimes use. The primary simple shapes are created in illustrator, then copied to PS where i use them as selection areas to create masks with the selection wand.

The texture comes from a set of scans of various patterns I create with litho crayon (as here), scraped paint on textured paper, and any other texture I can come up with. I simply copy parts of these pattern sheets out and trim them to fit with the "selection masks" and INVERT-DELETE on sep layers in PS.

You can do some remarkable things very quickly like this, especially using colored samples and different layer transparencies.

Before computers, I actually did art like this with torn paper glued down as collage and shot as hard ortho line images. (see really oooolllldddd example below--done around 1970± if memory serves)

[Cuervo]

Zephyri, your last panel with the 'Jumper' is amazing. the style and layout is stunning. Anymore like this??

Ilaekae, your first post, ultimate power made me laugh! took me a minute to realise the ending but quality stuff! lol

[Mydrim]

really happy there are panels runing on CA! I have to do some comics for magazines and actually not really did it before, so this are the test pages

[yoitisi]

Myrdrym: That is cool. After seeing the first page that you showed on IRC is wondered what it was all about, but I like the style and flow of the story

[Mirana]

Mydrim: Really digging the style! On page two I would have reordered the first three panels: |#3|#1|#2| to give maximum impact to the action. I do love the gurgle at the end, but part of me wanted to hear the answer to to riddle too... Love the way the creature speaks.

[arttorney]

I finally finished Nathan Long's comic (although now I see another little place I forgot to paint black).

[Ilaekae]

Nicely done! I still have...ummm...only 14 more to go...

[NathanLong]

Well done, Arttorney. Thanks for finishing it. I has a good flow to it, and is cleanly told.

[Grief]

Jesus & Joe
2003-2009
here's some from the newer 'seasons'

ps: i'm joe.

[arttorney]

These are funny, Joe. Do more. Watch the misspellings (e.g. magnet, hideous).

[Grief]

These are funny, Joe. Do more. Watch the misspellings (e.g. magnet, hideous).

you want to ruin my fun by making me proofread these?
i personally find it to be hilarious* that i leave the quality so low. yep, its part of the concept that you don't understand. you see, its too deep for you. jesus & joe operates on a level of thinking that states that there are no typos, and that every other usage of a particular words is in fact the incorrect spelling. and i totally didn't just directly rip off david rees and his copy/paste clip-art-esque formula... i uhh... y'know was super original and did it way before anyone else.

...yeah, or MSPaint doesnt have spellcheck and i'm not very smart.



*a lot less effort

[arttorney]

I thought about recommending "Get Your War On" to you, but I can see you are way ahead of me.

I was recently researching syndication and self syndication because I found I enjoyed the editorial cartoons. King Features Syndicate had said in Artists and Graphic designers market that good writing would make up for bad art far better than good art would make up for bad writing. At the time, I took their meaning to be that if it's funny the characters can be very simplified but if it's not funny then you don't get syndicated no matter how great an artist you are. I imagine they are sticklers about the spelling though.

For a self published internet 'zine there is freedom to mess around with the English language, and I think that would be actually in keeping with a very irreverent comic. Don't be discouraged by me. I'm just some old clod who gets his writings critiqued so much it costs me a box of paper before I have a demurrer my boss will let me file.

[zimfin]

I really like the work in here guys. Keep it up.

[Dadaist]

What a wonderful thread.

Mydrim and Ilaekae, I loved your posts.

[Ilaekae]

Zimfin and Dadaist, thanks for the comments. There are more coming. Many of us never got our comics finished in time for the polls, so were finishing them a bit at a time to post here. I have 16 coming myself, and I know there are others doing the same.

[GHill]

Here's a little comic (my first attempt) I made as a present for my very special lady friend. Our dog, Punkers the Dog, loves her some eggs, and this is one of the many adventures she had (we think) before she was found by the shelter we adopted her from.

[qbertp]

That is horribly cute.

[TheGnoll]

'ello!
i should definately pop around here more often!

just wanted to post some pages here, get some feedback
more are on their way.They were done during the last 6 months, and are in chronological order

what i think: in the first few pages i didn't yet get the whole "black is frickin' black, not infinite shades of grey" thing, but jee, thats hard.
I've gotta find a way to avoid stiffening up the pencils after each pass.

[arttorney]

I like the drawing here. To a certain extent you can let the inker worry about the "black is black" thing. Don't sweat the small stuff.

The one guy with a head like a cigarette butt reminds me of Cylinderhead. I can't find an obvious link using Google but Cylinderhead was a character in a Slave Labor Graphics work from the 80s, and of course his head was a cylinder. I thought it was pretty weird until I saw Chairface Chippendale.

[TheGnoll]

updated with the latest finished pages

thanks arttorney i found out only after a bit it looks like a cross between a rat-headed character from metal hurlant (can't remember his name) and earthworm jim, just less funny

i'm really sorry i've posted these with italian text but coudn't be half arsed to translate them, actually :/ type in the last pages came out weird for some reason.

so no feedback, snarky comments, crits and suggestions, i was really looking forward to read some, i can take it!

ciao

[yoitisi]

TheGnoll: Wow dude, that's a crazy amount of work right there. Are the scripts your own by the way? It's quite a lot to attempt to critique on individually though, so I'll attempt to give some general thoughts on it then You know where you can find me if you want more in depth stuff.

I must admit I'm not a huge fan of the very defined borders many european comics use, though an overly manga-style panel layout is overkill too I guess. You lean more to the clear borders and panels, but in a way that isn't hurting the eye too much -which is an achievement in itself However, on some pages I think the panel layout can be a little more dynamic, especially battle scenes such as in the last comic. In case of the western dual however it works well to create a slower pace to the scene. It's a choice I guess, but don't let it slip by unnoticed.

The compositions within the panels are overall very well done I think, they make the panel layout work even better in most cases I think. Some minor issues here and there (like the last panel on the first page of the last comic, the sideview of the kings throne and a head of the love-interest suddenly appearing in front of it is a bit of a cheap trick and it shows there imo).

Story wise, and I'm refering to the L'ultimo Concerto and the one above it appeal a lot more as the characters actually have interaction rather than a 1st person view as the last one, which has no dialogue whatsoever. Dialogue immediately drags the reader into the story, while the last comic really looks very distant and although looks like an interesting plot, it's hard to symphetise or become that character as a reader as he doesn't interact with us/other characters. Again, it's a choice I suppose.

Hope this made some sort of sense...

[TheGnoll]

thanks a lot Guido, really appreciated!

the scripts are mine yep
i definately see what you mean about the very "standard" borders, and altho i'm not a fan of "extreme" page layouts (i'm trying to get the simples stuff right first) i agree with you and will definately try and play with it some more.

i see what you mean about some "lazy choices" in the pages as well, and in the panels you mentioned even just a 3/4 view instead of a flat frontal7side view would have helped indeed

the dialog thing makes sense to me as well actually, i just found it really hard to write some dialogs for the last story, probably cause it was already cheesy enought hehe, plus, i still really find writing dialog really really tought!

thanks again!

[Choob]

I love zephyri's jumper comic, makes me feel all tingly inside.

Loving Greif's jesus and joe strips as well, the random stuff is best.

"Shut up, hold on a second. Pretty close now."
"...?"
"LEVEL UP!"

[arttorney]

Page 4 of POW 35 ... not finished in time.