I'm about two weeks into my first strip, and anxious for some feedback that will either help me to improve the layout of the strip or the page itself. If you've got a minute, please drop by my site on Keenspace, and let me know what you think works, and what doesn't.
The strip currently updates every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with Saturday Splash pages (usually spoofing something), and my girfriend is doing a one panel journal comic every Sunday... just in case you get confused.
Japanimation Fist
Moderator: Moderators
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
Japanimation Fist
Check out this week's <a href="http://www.monsterhollow.com">Featured Creature</a>
-
Tim Mallos
- Understands reinventing
- Posts: 352
- Joined: Mon Apr 23, 2001 7:00 pm
- Location: Brighton, Michigan
- Contact:
Way to go!
Firstly, congratulations on jumping in to do a strip. So much of the battle is just starting. The other 80% is keeping it going!
My "helpful" observation springs from a personal compromise I'm trying to balance as I plan for a biggish project: How do I make something cool that doesn't take a year-per installment?
Balancing the effort / time between story, inks, color, and layout is a toughie!
I've been trying to decide on a "look" that lets me accomplish something in a timely fashion. Do I make very simple / color wash backgrounds and more detailed characters. Do I go monochromatic on panels, varying only tone, yada yada.....
I like your stylized characters. But, they seem to blend with your stylized backgrounds, both in color and line weight. I suggest (and it's just that) that you look at possibly making the backgrounds stylistically different than your characters. Perhaps trying things like a thicker line on your characters / focus of each panel and a finer line on background, more detail in background (meaning tighter lines, like bick work on bldgs or shading lines, to help your solid characters pop more), contrasting character and background color shcemes. (Maybe backgrounds or "not the focus" items have more of a monochromatic treatment, and characters get a little bolder and brighter)
All in all, a fun strip so far!
And keep creating!
Tim
My "helpful" observation springs from a personal compromise I'm trying to balance as I plan for a biggish project: How do I make something cool that doesn't take a year-per installment?
Balancing the effort / time between story, inks, color, and layout is a toughie!
I've been trying to decide on a "look" that lets me accomplish something in a timely fashion. Do I make very simple / color wash backgrounds and more detailed characters. Do I go monochromatic on panels, varying only tone, yada yada.....
I like your stylized characters. But, they seem to blend with your stylized backgrounds, both in color and line weight. I suggest (and it's just that) that you look at possibly making the backgrounds stylistically different than your characters. Perhaps trying things like a thicker line on your characters / focus of each panel and a finer line on background, more detail in background (meaning tighter lines, like bick work on bldgs or shading lines, to help your solid characters pop more), contrasting character and background color shcemes. (Maybe backgrounds or "not the focus" items have more of a monochromatic treatment, and characters get a little bolder and brighter)
All in all, a fun strip so far!
And keep creating!
Tim
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
-
losttoy
- Understands reinventing
- Posts: 429
- Joined: Tue Apr 02, 2002 2:00 pm
- Location: Ann Arbor, MI
- Contact:
I am slowly trying to read all these Hype posts, reading the comics, and critiquing them (since somebody was nice enough to critique my web-comic). So what do I think about Japanimation Fist?
I do like the art and style. The kitties are cute with crisp and clean art that I wish I could do in my comic (my line work could use some work). Tim was right about the backgroud/forground relations, but I could see improvement as it went along. The coloring ads a nice effect to the comic, however I might sugest adding a little texture. Now here is the bad part of the review; the story. It's just rather cliche'. You have all the players, the city, situation, but did not go too much further than that. There seems to be no mythology of who these characters are and how they got to where they are now. Heroes retiring and vigilantes taking there place only to do it in a more violent way and the ninja bad guys out to kill them has been done before. You need to either develop your characters more, or add a new twist to the story that has not been done before.
As for your girlfriend doing Sunday comics, it is cute, although I think it should be held seperate from your comic. You art is great, you have your story, anything else is a distruption. Either have a seperate page for her comics or get her on her own site. Just my opinion.
I do like the art and style. The kitties are cute with crisp and clean art that I wish I could do in my comic (my line work could use some work). Tim was right about the backgroud/forground relations, but I could see improvement as it went along. The coloring ads a nice effect to the comic, however I might sugest adding a little texture. Now here is the bad part of the review; the story. It's just rather cliche'. You have all the players, the city, situation, but did not go too much further than that. There seems to be no mythology of who these characters are and how they got to where they are now. Heroes retiring and vigilantes taking there place only to do it in a more violent way and the ninja bad guys out to kill them has been done before. You need to either develop your characters more, or add a new twist to the story that has not been done before.
As for your girlfriend doing Sunday comics, it is cute, although I think it should be held seperate from your comic. You art is great, you have your story, anything else is a distruption. Either have a seperate page for her comics or get her on her own site. Just my opinion.
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
Thanks for reading David. I had sort of given up checking for advice here, because I think this is one of the lower traffic threads (I think most people are too busy to be hyping). I really appreciated your comments. Most of what people hav had to say has been fairly positive on the whole, and the places where you saw holes are where the holes currently are.
A few months ago I had no intention of starting a webcomic. I was just doing a favour for my brother to help cover for him after his wife gives birth, but while I was working on the strips I got carried away and signed up for my own Keenspot. To tell the truth, I convinced him to start his own comic a little more than a year ago, and i was a little jealous, but too lazy to take it on myself.
Now that I have a strip, and deadlines, I am doing it, but as you pointed out, there isn't much depth there yet. The main problem is that I haven't put a lot of thought into either the character of the story yet. I hadn't drawn in years, and I had never drawn on the computer (with a mouse) before, so the last month or so has been mostly about keeping up with deadlines, and learning to draw effectively with the tools I'm using. I'm hoping to sit down and really start doing some serious writing over the next few weeks, and I hope that you (and others) will check back from time to time, and let me know if I am still missing the mark.
As for Sundays, I know that it seems a little out of the continuity, and it is sort of distracting, but I had picked up the format from my brother and his partner and crime Matt Shepherd. They only do the strip on week days, and then they do weird stuff on the weekends. I think we will eventually move her strips to her own site (off of Keenspace), but right now it's kind of fun to share the space.
Now that all of that's out of the way, I wanted to say that I have actually been reading your strip for the last month or so, since the controversial one a few weeks back that everyone seemed to be arguing about. I didn't feel like tossing in my two cents because I felt like you had every right to express your opinion, regardless of how other people take it (this is the internet after all), and I didn't really see what all the fuss was about.
I like the art-style, particularly the Fire/Alarm episode. I think you have a knack for picking out background details to draw the eye, which is something I really need to work on. Personally I find those strips where you are telling some sort of a story like the Fire/Alarm, or the current one (neat to see it in its various levels of completion btw) are much more engaging. The single-panel, one shots tend to be hit or miss, which I think is the problem with political cartoons in general. You've got one panel to tell it all, and sometimes that is hard to do, if not impossible. They're sometimes funny, but risky, and they don't give you room to breathe (drawing-wise) the way three or four panels do.
I'm having some panel problesm myself, namely deciding how to break up my page on a regular basis, and whether or not I need a standard page division. It's tricky stuff, and I know that there is an art to it that I am trying to understand. I can recognize it in other strips when it is done well, but I have a hard time reproducing it yet. My feeling is that you need to let yourself spill out a little, and take enough panels to set things up, even if they are opinion pieces, like the more political ones you have. I'm no expert here, but that was my but reaction.
I also read the blurb underneath the latest comic. I know how you feel. I haven't bothered putting a counter or anything up yet because I am afraid to find out that there only three or four people reading the strip every day, and they're all related to me in some way. It's hard starting out, but i think you have the right idea, getting out and posting, and contacting other people in the same boat. When my brother and Matt started doing Man Man a year and a half ago they had the same sort of problems, but they've been plugging away, and now they are publishing in Keenspot print comics, doing fill-ins for strips like GOATS, and having guys like BoxJam's Doodle do fill-ins for them. It just takes time, and the will power to keep doing it even though no one seems to be reading. My brother still freaks out and says no one is reading, and they get more than a hundred hits a day!
At this stage we're starving for feedback, and most people's feedback is going to be somewhat negative because we haven't been doing it long enough to be really good at it. I don't know that I am going to get really good at it, or that I am going to engage that many readers, but it is kind of fun, and it feels kind of good to be able to tell people I am doing a regular strip, whether anyone reads it or not.
Anyway, feel free to email any time with comments or opinions, and I'll try to do the same. We newbies have to stick together
A few months ago I had no intention of starting a webcomic. I was just doing a favour for my brother to help cover for him after his wife gives birth, but while I was working on the strips I got carried away and signed up for my own Keenspot. To tell the truth, I convinced him to start his own comic a little more than a year ago, and i was a little jealous, but too lazy to take it on myself.
Now that I have a strip, and deadlines, I am doing it, but as you pointed out, there isn't much depth there yet. The main problem is that I haven't put a lot of thought into either the character of the story yet. I hadn't drawn in years, and I had never drawn on the computer (with a mouse) before, so the last month or so has been mostly about keeping up with deadlines, and learning to draw effectively with the tools I'm using. I'm hoping to sit down and really start doing some serious writing over the next few weeks, and I hope that you (and others) will check back from time to time, and let me know if I am still missing the mark.
As for Sundays, I know that it seems a little out of the continuity, and it is sort of distracting, but I had picked up the format from my brother and his partner and crime Matt Shepherd. They only do the strip on week days, and then they do weird stuff on the weekends. I think we will eventually move her strips to her own site (off of Keenspace), but right now it's kind of fun to share the space.
Now that all of that's out of the way, I wanted to say that I have actually been reading your strip for the last month or so, since the controversial one a few weeks back that everyone seemed to be arguing about. I didn't feel like tossing in my two cents because I felt like you had every right to express your opinion, regardless of how other people take it (this is the internet after all), and I didn't really see what all the fuss was about.
I like the art-style, particularly the Fire/Alarm episode. I think you have a knack for picking out background details to draw the eye, which is something I really need to work on. Personally I find those strips where you are telling some sort of a story like the Fire/Alarm, or the current one (neat to see it in its various levels of completion btw) are much more engaging. The single-panel, one shots tend to be hit or miss, which I think is the problem with political cartoons in general. You've got one panel to tell it all, and sometimes that is hard to do, if not impossible. They're sometimes funny, but risky, and they don't give you room to breathe (drawing-wise) the way three or four panels do.
I'm having some panel problesm myself, namely deciding how to break up my page on a regular basis, and whether or not I need a standard page division. It's tricky stuff, and I know that there is an art to it that I am trying to understand. I can recognize it in other strips when it is done well, but I have a hard time reproducing it yet. My feeling is that you need to let yourself spill out a little, and take enough panels to set things up, even if they are opinion pieces, like the more political ones you have. I'm no expert here, but that was my but reaction.
I also read the blurb underneath the latest comic. I know how you feel. I haven't bothered putting a counter or anything up yet because I am afraid to find out that there only three or four people reading the strip every day, and they're all related to me in some way. It's hard starting out, but i think you have the right idea, getting out and posting, and contacting other people in the same boat. When my brother and Matt started doing Man Man a year and a half ago they had the same sort of problems, but they've been plugging away, and now they are publishing in Keenspot print comics, doing fill-ins for strips like GOATS, and having guys like BoxJam's Doodle do fill-ins for them. It just takes time, and the will power to keep doing it even though no one seems to be reading. My brother still freaks out and says no one is reading, and they get more than a hundred hits a day!
At this stage we're starving for feedback, and most people's feedback is going to be somewhat negative because we haven't been doing it long enough to be really good at it. I don't know that I am going to get really good at it, or that I am going to engage that many readers, but it is kind of fun, and it feels kind of good to be able to tell people I am doing a regular strip, whether anyone reads it or not.
Anyway, feel free to email any time with comments or opinions, and I'll try to do the same. We newbies have to stick together
Check out this week's <a href="http://www.monsterhollow.com">Featured Creature</a>
-
losttoy
- Understands reinventing
- Posts: 429
- Joined: Tue Apr 02, 2002 2:00 pm
- Location: Ann Arbor, MI
- Contact:
I admit I have not been keeping track of this site. We traded links and I stopped reading it. Today I looked at my refering page statistics and found I am getting more hits coming from Japanimation Fist. This is because "Friends of Fist" now on the main page. But I decided to take a look back and read what I have missed in the last month.
Guys, if you haven't checked out this site lately, you should. Bill has really improved on his pacing and story telling. I absolutely loved the Abe plot-line and think you should focus more on it. It has that "Touch of Silver" feeling to it and it added much more depth and feeling to the story. Bravo and keep up the good work.
Guys, if you haven't checked out this site lately, you should. Bill has really improved on his pacing and story telling. I absolutely loved the Abe plot-line and think you should focus more on it. It has that "Touch of Silver" feeling to it and it added much more depth and feeling to the story. Bravo and keep up the good work.
-
Alexander D.
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 177
- Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2002 7:00 pm
- Location: MA
- Contact:
I just checked out Japanimatin Fist for the first time today, and I have to say, it really took me by surprise! The early strips were all very cute, with their superhero cliche send-ups rendered in Hello Kitty art style. It was fun, but really just fluff.
[Spoiler]The story grows tremendously in one quick movement, when it is revealed that the superhero story is really a framing device for a much more emotional plot line. And with today's installment, I suspect that even the framing device is about to get much more intriguing.
[/Spoiler]
And the artwork itself, which was pleasant to look at from the start, is getting progressively more sophistcated, to match the developing story.
I plan to keep reading this one -- Thank you, David, for recommending it!
[Spoiler]The story grows tremendously in one quick movement, when it is revealed that the superhero story is really a framing device for a much more emotional plot line. And with today's installment, I suspect that even the framing device is about to get much more intriguing.
[/Spoiler]
And the artwork itself, which was pleasant to look at from the start, is getting progressively more sophistcated, to match the developing story.
I plan to keep reading this one -- Thank you, David, for recommending it!
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
Wow! I really appreciate your kind words. The last few weeks have been something of a revelation to me, and as anyone who has read the comic, things have changed. I hope that I can continue to develop along these lines, and that people will continue to discover it. Thank you both.
- Bill
P.S. The tablet I ordered a month and half ago is finally in, so I'm hoping the art will continue to improve from this weekend on (unless I can't figure out how to work the darn thing).
I would encourage you all to check out David's strip at the link in his sig line, and I will definitely be checking out Alexander's site, which sound suspiciously like something I would like to submit to (something other than Japanimation Fist, that is).
Actually, if you're passing by this way, and feeling curious, I have six pages of another ongoing project up here, which you might enjoy. It's in a very different style, and is meant to be somewhat humorous. I hope you'll enjoy.
- Bill
P.S. The tablet I ordered a month and half ago is finally in, so I'm hoping the art will continue to improve from this weekend on (unless I can't figure out how to work the darn thing).
I would encourage you all to check out David's strip at the link in his sig line, and I will definitely be checking out Alexander's site, which sound suspiciously like something I would like to submit to (something other than Japanimation Fist, that is).
Actually, if you're passing by this way, and feeling curious, I have six pages of another ongoing project up here, which you might enjoy. It's in a very different style, and is meant to be somewhat humorous. I hope you'll enjoy.
Check out this week's <a href="http://www.monsterhollow.com">Featured Creature</a>
-
Alexander D.
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 177
- Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2002 7:00 pm
- Location: MA
- Contact:
Cool! We're looking for self-contained one-shots rather than continuing series, but that aside JF (particularly Abe's part in it) shows elements of what we look for -- an emotionally driven and broadly accessible story.japanimationfist wrote:I would encourage you all to check out David's strip at the link in his sig line, and I will definitely be checking out Alexander's site, which sound suspiciously like something I would like to submit to (something other than Japanimation Fist, that is).
How very odd -- cool, yes, but very very odd. A lot of people do a very poor job of making this sort of rhyme work without the lines feeling stilted. But you've kept the lines flowing surprisingly smoothly.japanimationfist wrote: Actually, if you're passing by this way, and feeling curious, I have six pages of another ongoing project up here, which you might enjoy.
I was just looking through JF again, and I have to say, the more I look at your artwork, the more I like it. Especially the past few installments -- i really like your use of color.
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
I've been trying to develop a style that is somewhere between color collage and some sort of imitation of lino-print or wood-cut. I'm not sure why I've been so attracted to that lately, but it seems to be working right now, so I guess I will just continue to pursue th muse, and see where it leads me.
I have a few ideas I would like to get to, and when school calms down a little in a week or two, I should be able to get to one of them. When I have something I would like to send it your way for feedback, and perhaps your consideration.
I have a few ideas I would like to get to, and when school calms down a little in a week or two, I should be able to get to one of them. When I have something I would like to send it your way for feedback, and perhaps your consideration.
Check out this week's <a href="http://www.monsterhollow.com">Featured Creature</a>
-
Alexander D.
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 177
- Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2002 7:00 pm
- Location: MA
- Contact:
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
Thank you Alexander. I read and responded to your post this morning.
I am still very keen to submit something to the magazine, and have actually devoted the month of November (I will taking a brief break from a number of other projects) to penning a graphic "novella" which I would like to send your way (when is the deadline for the next issue, by the way?). It's National Novel writing Month, and I thought I would celebrate it by following suit, in a slightly different vein.
P.S. I didn't mention it in my response, but you were spot on about the glasses. They're off in almost every one of the two colour panels - which were also my big breathers, because they took almost no time to draw
I am still very keen to submit something to the magazine, and have actually devoted the month of November (I will taking a brief break from a number of other projects) to penning a graphic "novella" which I would like to send your way (when is the deadline for the next issue, by the way?). It's National Novel writing Month, and I thought I would celebrate it by following suit, in a slightly different vein.
P.S. I didn't mention it in my response, but you were spot on about the glasses. They're off in almost every one of the two colour panels - which were also my big breathers, because they took almost no time to draw
Check out this week's <a href="http://www.monsterhollow.com">Featured Creature</a>
-
Alexander D.
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 177
- Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2002 7:00 pm
- Location: MA
- Contact:
Please do! Submissions are always welcome. I can't make any promises until I see the final work, of course, but whether I can use it or not, I would be quite happy to read it. I would like to have content for the next issue finalized by the first week of December, but in reality the issue stays open until I've got two confirmed pieces of graphic fiction. This can happen early or late, and it's always a surprise to me. The issue will be posted on Jan. 1, either way, and I currently don't have any GF confirmed, although I did start making solicitations this week. And if you don't make this issue, there's always the next one.japanimationfist wrote:I am still very keen to submit something to the magazine, and have actually devoted the month of November (I will taking a brief break from a number of other projects) to penning a graphic "novella" which I would like to send your way (when is the deadline for the next issue, by the way?).
-
japanimationfist
- Consistant Poster
- Posts: 152
- Joined: Thu Mar 21, 2002 6:59 am
- Location: Canada
- Contact:
No I didn't mention. I was trying to allow for the passage of time somewhere between the midnight trip to the bathroom and the panel with the Japanimation Fist shirt. He would have gotten them repaired in between. I should have probably tried to work that in somewhere, but I was having fun with the dream stuff, and just never got around to it again.
He's got'em now, at any rate. Stick around though because things are about to get ugly.
He's got'em now, at any rate. Stick around though because things are about to get ugly.
Check out this week's <a href="http://www.monsterhollow.com">Featured Creature</a>