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shots the owl
the_red_panda
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
this is a comic im kinda working on for some people i know. its about a vampiric owl who becomes a major player in a vampiric russian mob syndicate. i was hoping to get some comments before i ink this thing to make it more better.
also better names than "shots" would be helpful
i apologize for the terrible scan
also better names than "shots" would be helpful
i apologize for the terrible scan
im dumb as hell >_>
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any suggestions?
The best advice when it comes to design is to draw dozen's of variants and then pick one.
wii Number 0648 2052 0203 3154
Yeah.
I would suggest that you just make a new page for the "chase". Having the owl say he's hungry, and immediately finding a bat and just plucking it out of the air...is not only boring, but unrealistic. Real birds-of-prey have crazy food battles! Try to work in some dynamic angles...and change the size and shape of the panels according to the "intensity"...for instance, the last panel where he nabs the bat should probably be larger than the other panels, and should have an intense, dynamic feel to it...you should feel the "BAM!" when he actually grabs his food. Here, it's more like a "...~puh~". The little "crunch" sound effect doesn't help. :P
Your art seems pretty good though, despite the fact that you only posted one page. Good work on that! You might be able to thicken the feathers up a bit, though, on his wings and tail. They seem a bit thin.
Only other crit is that the blood pouring off of his wing is way excessive. Not the amount of blood in the puddle - that's fine and reasonable...but if the blood was actually pouring out of his wing like that, he'd probably be dead in a few minutes. Especially for an animal that size - a single drop of blood every second could count as "bleeding heavily"....even for a human being, having a wound where the blood is actually dripping out is usually a pretty substantial injury (ever see that show "Scarred"? I'm reminded of a few episodes :P)...I would think you could even get away with having NO indication of the blood coming off of the wing, and you'd be fine. The wing would still be covered in blood, and the blood in the puddle would still be there, and it would communicate that it's a bad injury. That's still a lot of blood....but more within reason...but pouring out like that?...eh. Seems a bit much.
One more thing. A lot is two words.
What? First of all there's only 3 text boxes; 5-10 seconds tops to read, how could you possibly find this excessive? Secondly where in the comic does it mention the bats feeding habits; it's in two panels then gets eaten. Finally I believe panda is looking for art crits rather than story crits; I like the concept but there really isn't much story to discuss with this - vampire owl is bleeding, it eats a bat. Telling someone to make something more interesting is one of the least helpful things you can say; at least elaborate a little.
I'm not trying to offend here but you're statement makes no sense.
wii Number 0648 2052 0203 3154
But then, I'm a bit of a sucker for frame breakage.
The last frame is a slight bit boring. try an new dynamic other than profile (since you already have a very similar profile shot earlier). He blends with the stalagmites you have there, making him blend too much. It actually almost looks like his head is poking out from behind one.
either that or give him a pure black profile, smaller and too the left or something. I dunno, I myself would have made this 2 pages.
OR a closeup of just the beak and wing hanging out of his mouth. crunch .... both ways can conjure different feelings/vibes.
First of all (LOL), don't talk for panda, you're not him, don't assume what he is looking for, he posted his work here, thus he is receiving critiques, be it on his visual, conceptual or textual art. If you have a problem with this, well, I guess you can just cry about it some more.
Since you seem a little slow, let me make a lengthy explanation of what I meant. I encourage you to read and re-read it.
Regarding the text and it's 'excessive'ness: I never said it was excessive, quit assuming, you seem to have a habit of assuming.
Generally one calls the visual/textual interpretation of comics 'reading', though it is a false, or perhaps a half-accurate term at best. Using this logic, I READ, not only the textual but visual information the_red_panda is presenting here. Would you feel more comfortable if I used some other term? Possibly one of these: perceive, assess, survey, would those make you feel more comfortable? Sorry, I digress. So given my PERCEPTION of what the_red_panda is trying to communicate to the reader, I gathered the following in several panels:
1. There was a fight between a hawk and an owl
2. The owl is bleeding and may die
3. The owl is hungry.
4. The owl needs to eat to regain strength.
5. The owl eats a bat.
This series of events, crammed into so few panels seems redundant. He announces "I need to eat something to regain my strength". What does the following 3 panels show? Why, its the owl pursuing and eating a bat. Sure, I get that its a chase, but the chase seems so forced and hastily given to the reader that it has little impact, it gives no sense of urgency, as I would expect a hungry owl to have. Especially since the first three scenes are so brooding and slow.
Thus, this whole scene feels forced to me, I don't know if the_red_panda intended it to seem fast paced or not, but that is how I feel when I read this. I believe at least the second half should have been lengthened or continued to another page.
There does that satisfy you?
a vampiric owl who becomes a major player in a vampiric russian mob syndicate
Made my day. Fucking gold.
but i do admit that i am an artist first and a writer second. so im still struggling with the story telling part of it, but im open to any and all advice.
MuttonChops - you found my reference for the bat
The story really isn't all that bad. Well. It is kind of strange, and I'm not fond of the concept, but it can definitely work, and it works fairly well here. The problem is getting both the ART and the WRITING to work together. I think as a first draft you did well, but revise, expand and improve what you have done.
While this is a good point, I dont think he should really go in with the mindset of Art and Writing, as seperate things, working together. I dont think thats what you meant Forbe, I just want to make sure he understands. Writing a comic is not Art+Writing. Its a whole different beast. The art will have to become part of the writing, and the writing will have to be a part of the art. The overlap here is incredibly significant. Evidence can be found when someone draws a comic with no idea what will happen to the text, and adds it in later- it almost never ever feels right.
Have you read Scott McCloud? If not, go to the library and get Understanding Comics and Making Comics.
i see what your saying, get the art and text to work together to make an illustrated story. revisions are needed.
(It was too far out of the way, so my eyes missed it when reading the panel...)
So I'd probably move that text so the eye is more likely to catch it at a glance.
Perhaps turning it into a thought bubble and linking the owl's head and the text via little white fluffy dots...
Damn, beat me to it. Anyways it looks like you might make a great inker. The story and few things that work in that page are enough to get me interested. I agree that the owl needs a new name though. Possibly some sort of archaic Russain name?
Don't know whether its actually a Russian name, but hell it fits in my head. Something about Ludwig the Owl hits my brain's pleasure-bits.
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Plus, if he "needs to regain his strength", then he really shouldnt be expending any more. I'd play up the desperity of the situation, and get him to eat some rubbish in order to survive. A dead/rotting fish or something from that pond would work well.
If the owl needs to regain strength, then hunting a bat down should be low on the priority list. There simply isn't enough meat on a bat to justify the energy expense. Especially if the bat is that small (one bite). Unless the bats been around for a while at this point (you alude to a back story) and has been an ongoing annoyance. Then I could imagine Shots taking him down just for some peace.
Some beetles, or grubs or even a spider or two. Still not much in the way of energy gain, but a lot less effort to catch.
Of course, you're not exactly doing a nature documentary here.
VAMPIRE BAT
shock!
horror!
storyline progression!
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maybe i'm just insane, but it was my impression the first few times i looked at this comic, and i had to look at it a few times to really get what was happening.
it will make more sense when i ink it... promise
I agree completely. If this is the way this owl becomes a vampire, then it needs to be more then just a tiny footnote. I don't have any pictures handy, but think of scenes from a comic book (or a movie of the comic I guess) where the hero gains his powers, like Spider Man or The Hulk.
**update; the owls name is Ludwig Von Blud, thanks to Fletcher