How do you experiment?

[gmaximin]

This is a subject I'm really curious about. We all have our strength and weaknesses, and to move forward we have to train, and experiment... here by experiment I'm really more focusing on trying something completely different than what we're normally do. So, some directions I'm interested about:
1. when do you decide that you reach a point when you feel you ought to try something new (might it be a different style, medium, way of writing, etc.)?
2. when and how do you test it?
3. do you often experiment?
4. what are the pro and con of experimenting and how it impact your main work?
5...
99. and so on...

Personally, I often experiment. Either because I feel that I can't tell my story using skills I already master, either because I'm bored with my own style. I'm always curious about how other people tell their stories (format more than content), and I very often note some ideas I try later. It can come from comics, leaflets, books, museums, music, advertisement, fashion design, tax documentation, paintings... a Disneyland queue... any medium really... I'll study the way the message is delivered and try to get idea from that, and then experiment and apply to my work.

So experimentation is a way to keep things interesting and inspiring on a creative level for me, and a way to diversify my toolbox on how to tell a story.

However, pass the experimentation stage, I struggle to master the new approach. So I'll experiment a new medium, but never work on it to the point that I master it enough to really make it shine. So the results are either amazingly good (to my standard), or very very bad (again to my standard). I don't nurture the good one, and I don't rework the bad one, so ultimately, I feel that it's slightly pointless, but it keeps things going...

I generally directly apply my experimentation into my work, without testing them before. I don't share wip, I don't really explain my process, so it can be very confusing for people following my work. It is the case on a single project (episodes can visually and conceptually be very different), and even more so on an artist level. To the point that I have several pen names, because some of my audiences just can't or shouldn't cross (my projects go from kids recipe book, to heavy bdsm books... so yeah... shouldn't cross; but then I apply recipe story telling and format technique into bdsm stories...).

On the down side, it means that i have a very scattered audience, and the coherence can be lost without the big picture.
I generally try to limit the scope of experimentation I allow myself into a single project by framing it. For example, for Effy on Tapas, I decided to limit to comics / b&w / traditional / efficiency... and then, within that frame, all bets are off, for good or bad. It's the least I can do to respect people that appreciate my stories, a kind of moral agreement of sort.

So yeah... I'm slightly struggling now with this, on how to carry the drive to experiment with the ability to really turn these experimentation into better works, upping my creations level to the next level, so I'm really curious about other people's take on experimentation.

[paracosmosfiction]

I'll never forget the first time I tried writing in first person. Boy was that first draft a mess. It was genuinely shocking just how different writing a story in first person felt as opposed to writing in third. The sudden shift in perspective is so isolated it makes writing out scenes especially difficult. I felt like I was having to write with blinders on. I'd include an observation and then immediately have to delete it because "Hold one, how the hell would my OC have seen that?" It was really a challenge to begin with.

Yet the more I played around with it, the more I enjoyed it. As isolated as first person writing is, it's also a lot more personal. You essentially take on the role of your main character and that can be a lot of fun in of itself. Projecting their thoughts, their views, how they handle each and every scenario that comes in front of them. It was challenging, but I built something that worked. Now I feel like I've expanded my writing ability because of it.

The thing about experimentation, at least in my experience, is that if you go into it with the best intentions and in such a way that you can build off of what you've made, most fans will meet you halfway. There are a few out there that are vehemently against change, and that's fine. But ultimately, it's not their art, it's yours. You're the one piloting this ship, it's their choice whether they stay on board or not.

And while I wholeheartedly agree that certain lines should never be crossed. (You keeping separate pen names for the children's media vs the adult media is a very good call.) I say never be afraid to blend genres a bit. I personally love eclectic writing. I love when BDSM writers include everyday life aspects in their writing because THAT'S WHAT REAL LIFE BDSM IS! I've seen and read so much media where the kinky side of sex and relationships is romanticized to the point it becomes unreal, while completely ignoring the realities of everyday life or making them so grossly inaccurate they lose all inherent value or meaning. (See: Every Fifty Shades book ever written.)

Personally, I applaud your experimentation. You'll never know what you can accomplish without crossing boundaries and introducing your fans to new ideas. Will everyone like it? No. Will they hate it to the point that they dismiss your work? Doubtful. And who knows? It could just be that new idea, or that new style, or that new concept you bring to the table ends up being something that they really really enjoy. And that elevates your art to the next level.

Just my two cents anyway.

[teacup_creations]

Hmm this is a pretty interesting topic!
It's interesting to see how vastly different my approach is to yours.

For me I never consciously make the thought of "oh I should experiment more because my art is getting stagnant"; I'm naturally a curious person and I love trying new things so for me the point of experimentation is never self improvement but rather just fun. So I experiment the moment I see something fun I want to try out.

When I experiment I normally create a small project for myself, whether it being a short comic or a small game to code. I find that completing the project regardless of the outcome tends to give me enough of a feel for things and gives me new skills to encorporate into my future work or to put on the back burner in case I need it. For example: my first plot driven comic was an experiment. 10 pages to test the waters. I apparently liked it enough to make a full blown comic instead.

I guess that also helps on the audience side of things too. I don't touch the main body of my work but branch out with little side projects that act like bonuses rather than random changes to my work.

[LCT_m_a_d]

Pretty much every drawing I do now is an experimentation of something.
I never feel like any piece I work on should be without some sort of experimentation. Just as long as it doesn't abandon the things I consider foundational in my work.
Usually it's just about materializing some of my curiosity that comes up from looking at other art or reading about something.
The downside of experimenting (to the degree I do) is mainly time. You really can't predict when things will work out, or even what manifests sometimes.
The benefit is that making art is so much more satisfying now because I'm learning so much more about myself at a deeper level creatively and I find people enjoy what comes out a lot more now.
To me being a master is about the love of always being a student.

Disclaimer - I'm also not making artwork professionally, nor do I plan to

[Caro]

Honestly, I approach every single thing I do as an experiment of some sort and on top of that I’ll occasionally take the weekends to work on shorter 10-20 page short story comics just to play around with characters, colors, techniques or genres that I wouldn’t normally do.

It doesn’t generally interfere with my regular work too much because I’m currently full time in comics (liable to change at any moment!) and I usually put all of my waking hours into drawing comics and I draw really fast. That’s actually one of my main focuses when I experiment is trying to get to the best possible end result in the least amount of time and I’ve had a lot of practice in that arena and it’s really paid off so it’s more than worth it to spend a few extra hours a week on just experimentation and practice.

I also just have so many stories I wanna tell and have lists and lists of stories I want to get to and the more pages I can do, the more likely I am to get to it all, though I imagine I’ll always be chasing after the new things I want to work on til the day I die. But the more I can get to, the better!

I also feel like approaching everything as practice helps me not get too down on myself when I finish the project and its not 100% perfect (which honestly even if I labored over one book for years and years it would never be 100%) I can always look a it and think “wow that was a very good practice in [enter whatever thing I was specifically practicing here]” and its hard to be disappointed in something you learn from and can carry with you into future projects.

[gmaximin]

@paracosmosfiction Do you still write first person? And if not, would you be able to redo it now without facing the same issues all over again like Sisyphus?
One of my problem is to find that balance between experimenting and practicing on the thing I've experimented to really cement that new approach / skill. To, if not master it, at least control it enough to play with it whenever I want. Time is limited, so I can't find that balance between practicing / experimenting.

@LCT_m_a_d & @Caro How do you set boundaries to make sure the main body of work remain consistent / coherent?

@teacup_creations thanks... it's a very reasonable approach.

[LCT_m_a_d]

How do you set boundaries to make sure the main body of work remain consistent / coherent?

The thing is, I'm learning (trying) to be more comfortable and secure with my art's inconsistency.
Although ironically, my most recent works have had positive feedback in that those inconsistencies are improvement to coherency issues I've always struggled with.

There are a few pieces I've worked on of-course where that hasn't been the case but the core foundations of those ideas are intentionally experimental so I expect them to be incoherent.

If I really expect the drawing to be presentable, I only try experimenting with one or 2 integrative things at a time as an extension of a working proven foundation.

[nathanKmcwilliams]

I literally just try the new things I want to try in my currently running comic. If it doesn't work, oh well. My stuff here on Tapas is technically an experiment for later versions of my story anyways.

[MeltingCORE]

Experimenting is really important to me with my art and writing. I'm really passionate about bringing my worlds to life and as such, want them to read loud and clear through my art. I got bored of drawing my ocs in blank spaces/color spaces. So, I decided to seriously sit down and learn how to render backgrounds. It was pretty bumpy at first but I'm proud to say my experimentation paid off! I like the painterly style I have ended up with. Along the way I also got much better at anatomy. So now I can render my characters in actual spaces instead of having them float in a black or color voids like I used to do. (I was admittedly fairly lazy with my art compositions in the past. Same pose, same stiff expressions - yeah.)

...And when I do occasional void background pieces, I still try to make them fun to look at!

For writing, I experiment by trying out different povs!

[ninjashira]

I usually do most of my experimentation with little one-shot comics or class assignments where there's little to no pressure or consequences if I royally fork it up. I've also done a comic in the past where every page was done in a different style and/or media just to play around with new materials and techniques, and that was fun for me to figure out what tools and styles I like.

[paracosmosfiction]

I do still occasionally write first-person, yes. I find it helps to go back and reread my work whenever I set a project down for long periods of time. Admittedly, this is relatively easy for me because I'm slightly neurotic. (I always reread my work from the very beginning whenever I reopen a new project.) By going back and looking at what you've already built, it helps you get back into that headspace you were in when you made it in the first place.

As far as time goes, I understand feeling like you're on a crunch. I have a job with a twelve-hour work-shift so my free time feels very valuable to me as well. The thing is, even at work, I can still go over whatever project I'm obsessing over in my head. I find it helps with some of the tedium and stress to do this. You mentally go over everything you've been working on, and you write in your head. Even if you can't get exactly what you thought about down on paper right then and there, it'll still give you a better idea of what you want to do with that project when you do have the free time again.

[DiegoPalacios]

When i make a new comic, i experiment on it.

I once did a comic in a more simplified art style and a different color pallette....the humor was kinda surreal and worked as a gag a day......got surprised when my nephews loved it and started doing fanart of it.

[Kelheor]

I am bad with experimenting, because I am somewhat cautious and shy about my art But just as my writer is creating a different story every time, I try to change the art for each story somewhat.
As for my ongoing comic, I try not to deviate too much, so I am just changing small things, like the way I draw backgrounds trying to find The One Background to Rule Them All, or the way I do shading or light effects, or line width, or the way I draw hair, etc.

[LWriter]

t and writing. I'm really passionate about bringing my worlds to life and as such, want them to read loud and clear through my art. I got bored of drawing my ocs in blank spaces/color spaces. So, I decided to seriously sit down and lear

I like to experiment with my writing in any way i can think of, sometimes that means trying a different kind of character, with a motivation or background I haven't tried before. A ore broad example might like the latest chapter of my novella here, where I wrote what is basically a parody of smut lol. I hadn't written smut before, but I consider this my first foray into, even if it was in a humorous way. I found a way to play with that through my main writing, so that was fun ^^

[allenT]

I experiment on manga formating. I don't use their specific manga papers or dimensions, i make my own. Try to get close to how a commercial manga page would look + my preference. Once decide the template, i'll just stick to that .

These are the templates, I'm using the 6th version currently. A 1mm gap can change how the page looks, especially on print size.(a bit number OCD on this ) Screentones can't be too small or too big-- for web and print.

Upon testing, I change my texts & speech bubble to be larger for mobile view. Speeches are simplified to fit the bubbles with enough spaces (this may be a drawback). If i want to print I can just reduce the size of the texts down to 87%.

When i want to draw slightly bigger page size in the future, I will revise my template again.

[gmaximin]

Ok, I'm trying something quite out there for my next episode, I've never really saw that anywhere in comics, but I'll give it a try:
Telling a story using accounting entry only...

Accounting is a language, it's just that not everyone speaks it.
I made the whole story already, concept, draft, entries, and some panels already), but I'm still trying to find a way to make it more understandable for readers.
Maybe an introduction to explain how to read? Or some "subtitle" under the accounting entry (but that'd be kind of breaking the experiment though)? Any ideas' welcome at this point...

[VibrantFox]

Probably wouldn't hurt to have subtitles or a translation in the A/N to make it easier for readers to understand

In the same way creators who come up with their own language for their stories have some kind of guide on how to decipher it, having a way for folks to better understand the numerical language will go a long way. Plus as a person whose brain can kind of shut down when it sees complex math I'm sure there will definitely be folks who will appreciate it in kind.

If you are hard set on people figuring it out then this:

an introduction to explain how to read

will be your go to. Don't leave your readers in the dark.

[gmaximin]

Thanks. The problem with subtitles is that one accounting entry makes very long sentence, eating up a lot of space, while narrowing the nuances (like any translation does). I’ll try to do an introductive section about acc. without being boring... and maybe adapt from T presentation to something easier to understand.

Edit: I tried to make it as clear as possible:

And here's the episode on tapas for curious people (and accountants)