Now, I won't lie. My drawing style is inspired by manga and anime. I am thinking about making a webcomic. So I am pretty much a dime a dozen, an artist wannabe who is unlikely to amount to anything art-wise.
But I have these stories in my head, and I dearly hope that one day I will find the resolve to put in the time needed to either write or draw them into life. Now, I am not that much of an artist. I would show you some of my work, but I aint got any easily available and either way I cant ink for crap. Proportions and anatomy are hard, as are realistic backgrounds. I can do them well enough, but I lack the artistic inspiration to fill in the gaps. I lack the vision to create a brand new hairdress or a magnificent city without some kind of visual stimulant.
So what I need is reference material, and to be frank I have no full time hired model to use. I need comics drawn in an ambitious and professional way. And to be frank, I have found few manga of quality that I really want to use as reference. And then I go to "How to draw manga" books and think meh, I can do better than that.
So what are your favourite comics art-wise? Fantasy stuff would be great, but as long as there is decent stuff there I am willing to take a look at it
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Any way - I don't have much to offer you on your question. I read few comics online (PA, OotS, XKCD, SMBC, and A Softer Worlds are it for me).
My Website | My "photo-a-day" 2010
Well, here's a start.
I think this might be better off in the Questions thread.
Secondly, if you don't have the confidence or desire to work hard to become a good artist, then get a good artist to work with you and stick to writing good stories. Because if you write a good comic and illustrate with half-assed manga, it won't get noticed, and it will most certainly be resigned to living out life as one of those dime-a-dozen strips.
However, if your story is decent and you find a good artist, you can really get noticed.
If you are dedicated to learning the style, then absolutely, get one of those how to draw manga books. They are going to explain the core elements of the style. You can't exceed the current standard of art until you can reach the current level, and drawing the basics over and over and over are the best way to do that. Trust me, it's not like buying a car where you are stuck with this one thing you draw. Just because you practice one style doesn't mean you won't ever be able to expand beyond it. Well, it might mean that, but if it does, you're not a good enough artist to get there.
And the most important thing is that no matter what style you choose to draw from, it all stems from a core foundation, things like composition and tone and value and proportion that is essential to master before you can really master anything else. An exaggerated style only works if it is exaggerated convincingly, and if it still is recognizable.
I must have misunderstood the rules thread, as I was sure it mentioned "to participate in forum discussions ranging from art techniques, tutorials, and art supplies to just simple social chatter in the chat thread" and never mentioned "opening post must contain original art". Will read through it more carefully. Nevertheless, thanks for the backseat moderating.
If I am wrong, of course, I apologise to the real moderators.
Interesting advice NotACrook. Working together with another artist is an interesting idea, and one I have considered. In the end though, I find it hard to imagine that I could find a person on the internet that I could bond strongly enough with to work together creatively in this way. I dont intend to make a regular gag webcomic but rather a slightly overambitious attempt at graphical novel. Visuals will be as important as scripting to the reader, so I can hardly just turn over five lines of dialogues to an artist and expect him to "get" which direction I want him to take artwise but neither can I stand behind his back holding the pen for him.
I appreciate the advice, but I am afraid that both those comics are prime examples of very unambitious art style and mediocre quality. I am not saying I can draw better, its just that they are not art styles that I wish to emulate.
*awaits locking*
I didn't like where this thread was going anyway.
Yes, use either the Chat or Questions thread.