How's Your Webcomic? /hyw/ #278

Share your comic with others!
Link your website and portfolio!
Comment and critique others work!
Previous thread:

Other urls found in this thread:

myscriptfont.com/
artists.pixelovely.com/practice-tools/figure-drawing/
quickposes.com/pages/timed
senshistock.deviantart.com/gallery/
shutterstock.com/
pinterest.com/characterdesigh/
tumblr.com/theme/39018
pastebin.com/kNR2W5mV
docs.google.com/document/d/1uwfOSHXfrgvcf--PkPz9jXL6p5RqIsrYvXYwgQpgT3k/edit#
youtube.com/watch?v=PQ0lck7oo4A
courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse456/07su/administrative/invisible_ink_part_1.pdf
courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse456/07su/administrative/invisible_ink_part_2.pdf
courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse456/07su/administrative/invisible_ink_part_3.pdf
chrisoatley.com/category/podcasts/
web.archive.org/web/20140625035030/http://paperwingspodcast.com/
blambot.com/
cienciasecognicao.org/rotas/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Robert-McKee-Story.pdf
miss-melee.tumblr.com/post/143483233951/
character-limit-blog.tumblr.com/post/144321455345/what-is-her-plan
vigormortis.co.uk
twitter.com/SFWRedditVideos

Scrub Authors GOODIE Bag

Here’s a short list of sites that any new webcomic artist or writer will find handy:

>*-Struggling to find that perfect FONT? Create your own using this link;
myscriptfont.com/

>*-Don’t forget to brush up on that ANATOMY:
artists.pixelovely.com/practice-tools/figure-drawing/
quickposes.com/pages/timed

>*-What’s a list without some reference STOCK IMAGES?
People: senshistock.deviantart.com/gallery/
Scenery: shutterstock.com/

>*-Here's a big fat compilation of CHARACTER DESIGN REFERENCE:
pinterest.com/characterdesigh/

>*-Finally, here are some links to get a rough WEBSITE started up:
Easy to use tumblr webcomic theme: tumblr.com/theme/39018
Do’s and Don’ts for starting a site: pastebin.com/kNR2W5mV

>*-Here’s the contact sheet if anyone wants to put information down, like their site and webcomic:
docs.google.com/document/d/1uwfOSHXfrgvcf--PkPz9jXL6p5RqIsrYvXYwgQpgT3k/edit#

>*-We also got a SKYPE CHAT room going on,
To join the chat, seek out 'starlinemike' or 'scribblehatch' and they'll add you in.

>*-We also got a DISCORD CHAT going on, ask for an invite in the thread.

>Wise words from John Cleese:
youtube.com/watch?v=PQ0lck7oo4A

>Invisible Ink:
courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse456/07su/administrative/invisible_ink_part_1.pdf
courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse456/07su/administrative/invisible_ink_part_2.pdf
courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse456/07su/administrative/invisible_ink_part_3.pdf

>Paper Wings
chrisoatley.com/category/podcasts/
web.archive.org/web/20140625035030/http://paperwingspodcast.com/

>Fonts for your webcomic on Blambot:
blambot.com/

>Writing Resources:
cienciasecognicao.org/rotas/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Robert-McKee-Story.pdf

>Guide to promoting your comic:
miss-melee.tumblr.com/post/143483233951/

Updated my comic today! What do you guys think?

Just make nudes of her already if your gonna dedicate a whole page of her wearing little clothing, and being super acrobatic and sweaty.

Woah that's good

>little clothing
>acrobatic, sweaty

did you know women sometimes exist as human beings and don't do things so that you can jerk off to them?

I've had an idea kicking around since 2009 that's kind of a parody of RPGs, but now I'm afraid I will be accused of ripping off Undertale.

If it's good, the controversy will only serve to attract more readers.

Her outfit seems a bit weird for gymnastics. Shouldn't she be wearing a leotard?
With the way the lines vanish into the shading in the full-body shot, I thought she was wearing a miniskirt until the third time I read through it.

shouldn't she be wearing a spandex bikini?

It's only afternoon practice so I opted for gym uniform in school colors, with the leotard being reserved for actual competition.

Let's call this a hypothetical question that's totally not based in reality.

Say I have a comic I've been doing for years. It's almost entirely a personal exercise in writing and art, but I still enjoy making it for the sake of developing the characters and story. The early art is horrible, and there's no proper "beginning," or even introductions for most characters.

Say that, at one point, I get wise and trim the fat of boring, uninteresting, or just bad character elements, and stories begins to form as I focus on the core personality traits and lives of the characters rather than "lol random" nonsense. My art finally begins feeling competent. I even start thinking my writing has developed into something that isn't completely awful. I get to a point where I actually want to share it.

Here's the question: How should I go about sharing it? Do I tell people to begin from the "start," and just say "look, the early stuff isn't all that good. Just please stick with it, I think it improves a lot as times goes on." Or do I start people off where I feel the comic finally picks up and becomes readable and actually visually pleasant? Even if it means some early characterization or development in the less-than-good old stuff is left out as a result?

Almost every webcomic out there started out with worse art than they have now. I've found that people tend to stick with it.

>Or do I start people off where I feel the comic finally picks up and becomes readable and actually visually pleasant? Even if it means some early characterization or development in the less-than-good old stuff is left out as a result?
I think that you should at least accommodate newer readers who don't want to slog through all of the old stuff, by having characters explain things that happened in the early days when it's referenced, rather than expecting the reader to already know.
You can have the early strips in a separate archive so that people who want to read them can do so.

How many pages do you have, dude? My webcomic is kinda the same way, it starts slow and it sucks to introduce people saying "it gets better", BUT, in my case the first pages aren't that bad, me and the writer still think they are ok, and there are only a few of them before the story picks up anyway.
If the first pages of your webcomic are as bad as you make them sound, maybe you should just redo them from the start.

Very true. Suppose I'm just worried about first impressions.

I tend to try and make sure motivations are clear. Or at least as much as I can with snappy dialogue, as I try to avoid walls of text.

However, I have been thinking of making "chapters" that focus on particularly important moments in characters' early development. Could always do that and have some kind of "New Reader" section with links to each chapter.

Would rather not separate the early stuff from the new stuff entirely. While I'm growing attached to writing its stories, the comic's primary purpose is and always will be about its development; I'd hate to push the old stuff aside as though I don't want to remember where I used to be in comparison to where I am now.

Uh, I have about 440 strips, give or take a dozen based on ones that even I don't want to look at anymore (And weren't important to anything). Like I said, been doing it for years. Though, I have been considering going back and doing a visual update of the old stuff without color. With all the settings already figured out, it'd be pretty easy to update them, though it'd probably take a while on its own since it'd be so many old strips to update.

>440
i don't believe it. are you counting sloppy stick figure doodles?

Nope. The accurate number is actually 439. Would actually be more if I didn't hit a bad episode of depression in late 2014 that lasted to mid 2015; the preferred schedule is at least 4 strips a month, though it used to be twice weekly before college and more detailed character designs/backgrounds happened.

Been doing it since 2010. Actually earlier than that, but that's as far back as I felt comfortable uploading to my site. And yeah, I pay for a site no one looks at (I put it all elsewhere online too, of course).

wtf, have you been publishing them? Maybe you could throw away stuff that is irrelevant to the plot, and don't flesh out characters. The best I can suggest is a reboot of your comics, but then again, I don't know how bad your comics are... I particularly can't stand going through a gigantic archive of bad strips to get to the good stuff, but I know there are people here who don't care, maybe the majority of the public won't mind as well

>it's already online
whyd idn't you say so my amigo, post liink

Nah, I'm definitely with you there. I can handle a couple issues of sub-par art if the writing is good, but two hundred+ pages before I can get to something that looks interesting and I'm probably gonna nope out.

I have a theory why she is into gymnastics...

shutup fag, we already know she wants to be a teen hero

Pathetic as it may be to say, I'm not sure I'm comfortable sharing it here just yet. I think, over the weekend, I'll work on gathering the various stories into their own respective chapters so that it's easier to navigate through everything, both old and new. I also need to clean up and reorganize a few things so information is clearer and less hack-ish. Some details need to be clarified and whatnot.

Thank y'all for the information. Hopefully I'll post here around Monday. For better or worse, I have to shove my work into the open at some point.

Pathetic. Just never share that garbage here

Just post Wojacks talking about how sad you are at the state of your comic and then clam up when people ask to see it.

Done with this for now. Still gotta come up with a title for it really.

Thoughts and opinions welcome

It's a little weird that she follows a blood trail to the dead guy, but there's no blood visible near him.

I know, but I'm just getting a sexual vibe off of this.

oh shit.......I knew I forgot something. Left a layer turned off.

Quit being such a pervert.

one thing you can do is change or modify the title, like.. if this is when it picks up, this is when it's a brand new series.
you guys are both making it really hard for those of us who get sexually aroused by how non-sexual this situation is. just to be able to see raw natural animal health in action is a novelty nowadays.

there you go

Yeah, that's more like it.
>bleeding out of the eyeslot
Eesh, that's rough.

Defilers are not welcome

>That feeling when your webcomic is getting linked in threads and people are calling it cute.

I don't have a face that can describe this feeling.

nice

because you're not wearing that face, because that never happened.

>implying anyone cares about your comic

Good on ya, user.

I'm making up two pages in order to give Lucky lotus and Lous more character. I probably going to be finish at the end of the day.

First draft! Full of Grammar mistakes and misspelling.

>The eternal lotus. A dangerous bandits of plant people that thrives on stealing treasures from kings and monsters.
>I can’t believe I meeting one of them. A dumb idiot that selling me something that doesn’t exist.

Also Tumblr link: character-limit-blog.tumblr.com/post/144321455345/what-is-her-plan

I really like how good you are at creating lush environments and backgrounds/settings that don't feel "standard" for lack of a better term.

Or maybe I'm just a sucker for overgrown ruins.

>>The eternal lotus. A dangerous bandits of plant people that thrives on stealing treasures from kings and monsters.
>>I can’t believe I meeting one of them. A dumb idiot that selling me something that doesn’t exist.

"The Eternal Lotus*. A dangerous group of bandits, plant people who thrive on treasures stolen from kings and monsters."
"I can't believe I'm meeting one of them. And I can't believe she's this stupid, trying to sell me something that doesn't even exist."

*I'm assuming "eternal lotus" is a proper noun.

>TFW I'll someday be able to make a living on comics

W-We're all gonna make it, right bros?

the customerbase isn't large enough, so no. but it's okay. your goal should be being known and liked

Most of the art for my first page is done, second onwards might be a little lighter on backgrounds and more focused on characters.

That moon is a bit too yellow imo, but good job otherwise.

The page is pretty small. Is this the same resolution it will be on the site?

No not really, I just took a print from the photoshop screen, the actual page is much bigger than that.
I'm trying to go for an arstyle that has lots of contrasting colors so the yellow is sort of intentional.

Too many panels for nothing

Thank you user.

I am sorry for using you as my proofreader.

>Implying he isn't doing just to appeal the waifu fags.

that's how cape comics work though.

>Sweat smelly girl feet and armpits

dammit we're all thinking that but we're trying to be less crude about it and not drive the artist away.

the artist knows what he's doing

yes, and he's being classy about it. so follow that lead. 'read the room' as the young people say now

I want to cum on her lewd stinky feets, put her shoes on her without cleaning up, and then watch her walk around in semenshoes all day!

...

the irony of how difficult it is right now for me to use my computer to find an image of someone being hit with a rolled up newspaper is palpable.

Hello strange man

...

>reddit filename

WIP of the next page.

Had to make it a little bit bigger than usual though, for story purposes.

fifth panel you're*
7th their* and i assume as* perfect, not ad
hhahaha, crack stash. well this explains a lot about poor pongel
someone* one word
ahh so that's who those little neon outline guys are.... riiiight i remember now

ugliest comic posted here

sixth panel "I mean I" one "I" is different from the other... one is capitalized and the other isn't. It's common to have upper case "I"s in comics, but here they are too inconsistent. It's specially weird when you have an "I" be capitalized after the end of a sentence, like "If he makes you" on the fifth panel, but then the text on the fourth panel starts with a lower case "I".

Don't be rewd.

Page 08 of Chapter 06 done.
I HOPE it'll come across well enough with dialogues that the middle 5 panels are a flashback about "last night"
Anyhow, now that the setup is done things can finally take a turn for the worse!

I think it's a STANDARD to expect webcomics to start off kinda "ehh... it's okay" before it actually gets good. Most webcomics have their latest update in the front page, so at least people new to your work will know that it gets better latter on; which also gives you a bigger incentive to do your best since each page is intended to peak some viewer interest at first sight. Obviously there'll be "duller" dialogue pages here and there, but you do with what you can.

the scene where she'll meets up with her mom in costume and ask to be her sidekick should be fun

Those are some very nice backgrounds you make. I have a bit of an issue with the values as, even if it's different foliage, more saturates elements will "jump" to the foreground while the less saturates will recede back; but overall it's still a great looking page, keep it up.

Same, ever since Crash Bandicoot I've loved Overgrown Ruins in video games

Looks like it could be the intro to a 3DS game, it's really pleasing to look at.

So you've been doing this for 2+years now right? Why do you think have $0 on patreon, and no readers (not counting when you force this shit on the thread)?

Please don't start a conversation where Dewd makes lame excuses. We've had enough of those.

that is a neat way to do flashbacks but it works

Ok, uh, shitty art and shitty writing, and I'm a hack, there you go.

Also started doing Character Design for Chapter 7 & 8; there's actually a LOT of characters to design for these two chapter who recur throughout the series. I liked how they came out; I was hesitating whether to have the fox knight walk on his feet like Nick does in Zootopia or to have him stand like when you command a dog to "walk", but thought the latter looked cooler.

I think I also finally managed to get chainmail to look good, found a really clever way to draw them quickly from an illuminated manuscript kinda like what CGGuy showed me

plantigrade animals are lame, you chose right

To be fair though, the amount of money you make on patreon doesn't speak much about the quality of your content... Miss Melee and The Sisters for example look pretty good, they are popular around here, yet they only make a few bucks on patreon... So... In any case, what does it take to get a fanbase that contributes on Patreon?

that's how you know that's trolling, user, and not legit criticism

Clearly it's just bullying, but I legit want to know if anyone has any ideas on how to get patreon followers... I mean, besides catering to feminists like the Questionable Content guy.

>Miss Melee and The Sisters for example look pretty good, they are popular around here, yet they only make a few bucks on patreon
Both of those comics are relatively new. Success doesn't happen overnight, although they've both been around for less time than West Tree and they're still making more.

buhumps

That's a fox? I thought it was something else at first, probably the helmet fucking with his fox ears.

dead thread, dead comics

i ran outta ideas. sue me.

I made up a comic about an eel that randomly shows up and gives random but practical advice.

i like it

kind of a mameshiba vibe. i dig it. you're cool teagreen.

bump

just let the thread go jim.

Oh, I just can't let this thread die!
Here's the finished page!

i had nearly forgotten she used to be yellow. yay continuity

Digitigrade tends to look better for manimals, especially lithe ones like foxes. Good choice.

>from an illuminated manuscript kinda like what CGGuy showed me
Man where do you think I stole it from in the first place? Looks good.

There's a few things that I'm curious about, though;

Why are there no shield bosses on any of the shields? To the best of my knowledge, round shields that weren't center-gripped were more of a classical (Greek Hoplon) or mid-renaissance (Scottish Targe and the Italian Rotella) idea, which seems at odds with the general feeling of dark-age-knights that these guys are giving me. Obviously you're not constrained to history (and you did have Richard comment that he wasn't used to a center-grip shield back when he got his), but why not give them all kite shields?

Those spurs look a little advanced compared to everything else. I don't believe the star shaped thingies on the point ("rowels") were a thing until the late 13th century at the earliest.

What's with the square on the front of the fox guy's chest? I've seen them on a lot of modern illustrations, but I don't recall ever seeing them on period art or archaeological finds.

I'm a little sad nobody's wearing surcoats, but I guess that's not the fashion back in wherever these guys are from.

These threads were a mistake.

There nothing but trash.

...

It's just like the bass in Courage.

i added to this some gradient shadows, some blue hue and also lazy shading

it looks good but it needs to be darker and feel damper to better portrait that its jungle.

WHY IS IT JPG MAN

...

jpg - 768KB
png 2.38KB

Gee I wonder why jpgs are used

>Like really short stories, no longer than say 15 pages.
Thanks for the tip! I took that into consideration as well.

> fiddling around with the saturation and figure differences

That and the shading really helps. Brings out the best of it. A feast for the eyes.

Fantastic! I love that girl. I like Issue 2 a lot more than the first one so far.

>I literally don't know what is going to happen on the next page
I honestly thought you planned chapter 1 out thoroughly, as it reads and flows really well. Looking forward to chapter 2.
btw. You're probably already aware of it, as your panel boarders in the late chapter 1 and your gag strips are cleaner, but just in case I'd like to mention that as pleasant as your art is to look at - it gets confusing sometimes if you use a mid tone value grey background with unclear panel boarders. I'd say you don't need to outline them, but change the BG to either black or white and cut 'em sharp.

>scabbards were designed to be tied to or slipped on to your regular belt
That's really cool! I might go with that design. Thanks for the inpiration!

>alarm bells
>Not cutting out the "cool" stuff that doesn't actually contribute to the core story
Sorry, I probably wasn't articulating myself well enough. Let me rephrase it:
I don't see the story as set in stone and neither do I try to fit in every character or story idea. It is more like a tree that branches out. As I set rules for the world or bring in a new element, the tree changes and I have to consider a lot, as it's all coherently connected.
In short: The more refined the story gets, the larger it gets (content wise). And even if I don't show the content directly, I at least have to take it into consideration when writing, to properly showcase the world and foreshadow upcoming themes. I want it to be worth re-reading.

Your comic looks pretty good, I will give it a read!

What brush are you using?

Noice.

Blood and guts and stuff.

vigormortis.co.uk