I want to improve and I'm hoping your criticism can help me do so
created
Dec '22
last reply
Jan '23
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I want to improve and I'm hoping your criticism can help me do so
Your action scenes are really good! You are consistent, you use great angles, can make a proper narrative and a story seems interesting. I would say the art needs more polish though, it looks pretty haphazardly made and I think your comic will improves greatly if you would put a bit more time into cleaning the panels. Other than that I think you are on a path to something great and I am looking forward to see your growth!
May I ask what program you use?
It's not related to any critics I have but perhaps if I'm familiar with the program you use I could offer some helpful tips
Anyways, I think your lineart is rather messy and does little to back up the action. I do like the angles and foreshortening you use for said action. Try to take your time and erase any overlapping lines that shouldn't be there, it'll make the drawings look a bit more professional.
You also use a soft airbrush for the lighting which to put it bluntly looks amateurish. If I were you I'd consider using cell shading as well for the lighting, I think it suits your artstyle better
All right, let's see here...
The messy lineart has already been brought up by other people, so I'll skip over that. You might find that playing with the smoothing and pressure settings on your tablet or the brush tool you use helps there. Don't be afraid to undo a line and attempt it multiple times, or to go back in and clean up overhanging lines or tails of lines with an eraser tool; it can really bring the presentation up a notch.
Outside of that, the immediate thing that leaps out at me here is that this comic is aiming for a lot of style and vibes, which should be commended and encouraged generally, but in this case sometimes the style is getting in the way of clarity of storytelling, and sometimes feels like it's being used as a way to avoid drawing necessary, tricky or detailed panels that might not be as fun, quick or easy to draw, would help the storytelling flow better.
The comic uses a lot of extreme close ups. Like in the first scene, nearly every panel is a close up; so close that the characters barely have breathing space in the panels, and it whips back and forth between close-ups of the characters in the scene, but it lacks a panel where we see, for context, all the characters in the scene and where they are in relation to each other. We see this again in the panels of the fight. The closest we really see to a panel showing the impact of an attack is one figure and a little bit of the other person's head.
It might help if when you write your scripts and think about scenes, you write in some stage directions for yourself. It feels like at the moment, when you're writing a script, you'd writing dialogue and narration, and then putting pictures to it. So you're thinking about panels where people say things, but not thinking so much about panels where people do things or react to things so much, or where a location or scene is established. Currently, because we don't see panels that set up a clear physical relationship between characters in a space, it's confusing to follow what's going on with the main character and the blonde guy, who I assume is meant to be a sort of shadow or being only he can see, but can't be sure because even characters who physically sharing space with the protagonist aren't always shown in the same panel as him.
A good habit to get into is at the start of a scene, as usually one of the first few panels, there's a detailed wide shot establishing a location, the general tone, and who is where. Then whenever a new character enters a location, there should be a panel pulled out enough to show where this new person is in relation to the people already in a scene, and how they react to that person entering. In a fight, it's a good idea if when somebody or something gets hit, we see them reacting to it; reeling backwards or wincing, to give the blow more impact, and then to show the aftermath; whether it's the person running away, or the hero standing over the prone body of the defeated foe, or a monster disintigrating into dust. It helps pace the action and showing the results of a scene helps make the scene feel meaningful.
If you're feeling intimidated by drawing backgrounds, and that's why you're keeping them vague or pulling in so close to the characters, you might want to look at options like 3D models and stock photos to use as reference to help.
I like the vibe you're going for, it's really unique feeling and punchy, and the concept and world building are pretty solid. The main thing is just to tighten up the visual storytelling and presentation.