Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #17: Rescue

Here we go - a style change.

I was getting annoyed with how the last comic came out, so I looked back through the archives. It was then that I realised the only comic I really liked the look of was Celebrations. So I decided, ‘to hell with it’ and threw away all the greys.

I like the look of this one. It works really well and, considering it’s the first time I’ve done it, it looks halfway decent. I’m nearly happy with it.

Next week:

After the shocking revelation that Mikiko is pregnant with Jack’s baby from that super-hot threesome, our hero must come to term with himself. This can only mean one thing: a reunion with his ex, Kizuki! Tears, fears and blistering sexual tension: “The Way We Were” begins yesterday!

Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #16: Massage

Happy Tuesday!

Here’s a little something from the depths of my private life. One of those real “why would you even say that?” moments that only 2am tiredness can bring. Ah well.

As for the comic itself, it doesn’t look too bad, the greys came out quite well, still adding plenty of fun depth to the drawing. The only problem is that big white patch on Cohbie’s face in panel 2. What the hell was that about? Anyway, the style is getting kinda stale now, and the greys are hurting my eyes. I made this one several weeks ago and I still don’t know if the speech bubbles are white or grey. If you can see clearly enough to decide, please let me know. And now, for the original:

I drew the original to this months ago. It was one of those comics I liked the joke for, and was confident that I could make something good out of it, but I had no idea what was wrong with the layout and refused to work on it until I knew what it was. Then I realised that it looks really bloody stale and boring. Condensing four panels to three made the list of commands seem much more demanding, making the eventual snap funnier. Also, I was going to do this in chibi style, which clearly wasn’t going to work. It’s funnier if the final panel is all in chibi style, especially if the joke is as silly as the characters look. (Or you run out of space… that happens a lot to me.)

Tune in next time:

After Sixby’s stunning revelation, Jack has no choice but to reform the Super Kawaii Save The World Squadron,  but is it too late? With Morgotron’s influence spreading throughout the galaxy and the mighty Imperial Death Fleet heading for Earth, what chance do five teenage schoolgirls have? They aren’t even armed! New epic storyline “The Past Ends Tomorrow” begins next Friday! Don’t miss a second!

Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #15: Manly Beverages

Not much to say about this one. It was actually the first one of a batch I did (I have a tendency to draw about five or six comics in a row and then choose the best to ink and scan). I drew and grey’d it before Jack’s Rant and Debate, hence why it doesn’t look as good as those do.

I’m currently two weeks ahead on comics, so it’s pretty interesting to see how this comic inspired a change in art and style. I really don’t like how the first panel came out - the grey is too dark and I royally fucked up the eyes on Adam. Ah well.

Coming up next week: a change in style and the return of Jack’s arch nemesis: the Mangler of Savron IV! Don’t miss the epic conclusion to “Jack and the Monthronites”! Thrills! Spills! Chills! Grand revelations and the shock of the century: Who Is Sixby D’axonburg? Find out next Wedmoneusday!

Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #14: Debate

Another Tuesday, another comic.

This one is based on a real incident. For some reason, whenever Alex and I get together, the conversation inevitably turns towards the finer points of Star Wars/ Star Trek/ Batman/ Doctor Who/ Indiana Jones (delete as appropriate.)

The comic came out fairly well. I think the bubbles are okay for telling who’s speaking, which was a fun experiment. The grey colours are nice and clear too. Lots of depth from Mr Light Grey and Professor Dark Grey. More on Thursday. I have a thousand words to write (and I keep getting distracted by playing with Photoshop, to spectacularly awesome results.)

Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #13: Jack’s Rant

This actually happened a week or so ago. Jack got pretty worked up and started ranting… for about an hour. It was funny as hell. He’s been looking forward to seeing it in comic form, so here it is.

I have Tuesday’s comic ready, but due to some computer problems, I might miss Thursday. We’ll see how it goes. *EDIT* Ha! Nope, won’t be missing that. I’m a week ahead on comics. My aim is to pull well ahead so that I don’t have to worry about crapping out during the summer. It’s nice to be ahead. If only my 5,000 word essay was finished. BAH.

Now run, the Great and Terrible Owl is watching you!

Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #12: Workload

Hyper shading +1. Told ya so.

Everyone, meet Alex. He’s a good friend, but he’s constantly overworked. Guy needs a beer. I really like how this comic came out. I’ve done two more after this, but I think this one looks better.

And now a brief history lesson:

This is my third attempt to do a webcomic. The first one is here. It can be found by clicking “Kreatives” then “comics”, then “Majinu”. It was something Jack and I worked on from Jan ‘06 to March ‘07. It changed a hell of a lot before those four comics went up and we ended up giving them to our friend Katja to put on her site. She would scan them in and add the text, then email them to the webmaster in Germany, who was very busy and took a month to actually upload them. I did another four, but I have no hope of them ever appearing. “Majinu”, in webcomic form, is well and truly dead. However, we’re working on several other ways to use it.

The second form is here. Note the equally pretentious comic title. The story with this one was that I just wanted to prove to myself that it was possible to get a comic online and so I did it. The reason I didn’t ever keep it up is mostly because I lost my login details, but also because of that fucking format. I hate it. There’s nothing I can do with it. 4×1 was a stupid choice. I prefer what I have here - if I feel like changing it, I will.

And the tags are still working! Seriously, this is a blog site. What do you hope to achieve by searching for “hentai” tags? I WILL TELL YOUR MOTHER.

Until Thursday, brush your teeth. The dentist is ALWAYS WATCHING.

Growing Up, Moving On - Episode #11: One of Them Days

Here we are. I really like how this one came out - decent ink art combined with a growing understanding of photoshop into a fairly good comic. And just to show you how much I’ve learned about drawing in just a few weeks, here’s the first version of this comic:

You can see how boring and static it is. Just by changing the view on three of the panels gives a much more dynamic feel to the whole thing. Also: shading is awesome. The next comic will have hyper shading +1.

Oh, and the tags? Turns out they worked very well at attracting visitors - mostly from Spain and Italy. Weird. So they’re sticking around for a while. Hola! Bonjourno!

Sorry.

Sorry for not posting a comic yesterday. It wasn’t because I was busy - on the contrary, I worked so fucking hard I got all my work done, plus both comics for this week.

What actually happened was that Cohbie managed to trip over the Internet cable and actually rip the socket off the wall. I’ve no idea how, but there you go. It means that posting requires me to go into Uni and use the net, a right pain in the arse.

Anyway comic sometime tomorrow.

Also, 34 hits on Monday! New record. Jack, stop linking me to Asian porn, thanks.

 

Growing Up, Moving On: Episode #10 - Rant

 

I’ll be honest about this one. I’m currently pressed for time and made a right hash of it. It’s the last time I don’t ink by hand and erase the fucking pencil. Gah, what a mess.

Anyways, yesterday, for whatever reason, thirty one people came to see my little page, breaking my previous record by about four people. Hooray! One of the visits was because someone searched WordPress tags for “buttsex” and ended up at comic #3. Hence the ridiculous tags I’ve added to this one. Thank you to the thirty one visitors yesterday, or to the one person who came back thirty times.

Also, Sophie, if you’re reading this, which font is best? I couldn’t decide so I’ll let you pick from the five I used here. Cheers.

I’m unsure if there’ll be a comic on Tuesday. I have a fuckton of work to get done and it’s due in next Wednesday. Energy drinks, here I come.

Growing Up, Moving On: Episode #9 -Frustrations

Here we go. I’m pretty happy with how this one came out - especially panel 3. Don’t really have much else to say. Maybe I’ll comment more later.#

EDIT:

Forgot to mention, this one is inked in Photoshop. I figured out how - I just changed the image mode to “Bitmap” and it worked like a dream. Hooray.