How do you fix a comic that's had a bad start?

[gh0stcr33p]

hi, so I made this webcomic called Mirror Monster, but the art and writing wasn't too great (in my opinion) up to a certain point, and I feel like it's kind of a bad first impression. I don't want to start over, since that would throw off the readers and it would be too much work for me. is there any way to fix it to be better from now on? (also constructive criticism would be nice)

Mirror Monster | Tapas

[Tulmut]

You need to redo the pages or restart. It's alot if work sure. But that's what it takes to make it. Personally. If the plot points are fine then just redo the pages.

[dawgofdawgness]

I have this problem too. If it's just the art in general you feel could use improvement, don't change it. People love seeing the improvement of a webcomic overtime (art evolution!) and when you look back, you can see how far you've come.

If it's a really big problem with the story structure or a continuation problem, then I guess a last-resort decision to make is to edit the stuff if you can. Best case scenario, your readers won't even notice.

If it's a reaaally big problem with the story, then yes, redraw it.

[LordVincent]

The approach depends. I won't refer to your comic specifically but rather speak in very subject general terms as I have had to fix mistakes post production in various ways...

If the problem is central and makes the entire plotline different to tell or if you screwed your story up royally writing-wise, then you should reboot it entirely. Going further will just dig your grave deeper until you end up giving up or rebooting anyways.

If the problems are smaller, say some information has been misrepresented or a character hasnt been portrayed properly, then you can change this in current writing. You could have a character find out that a previously believed "fact" was wrong and then inform the audience of the real truth, you could have segments that further explain an issue that hasn't been explained thoroughly. You could have the character experience things or learn things that change them to the character you intended to portray them as or you could add scenarios that show off traits that have been unrepresented thus far. This will all add to character development and might actually make your character more believable as a person than if they started out one way and remained the exact same throughout.

If the problem is only art related, then 9 times out of 10 you should NOT REDRAW OR REBOOT. You will always hate your old art. If you give in to the temptation to redraw you might get lured in and stuck in the neverending cycle of rebooting your comic until noone cares anymore and you never finish it because you never get past the third chapter without starting all over again.

[Mari]

Ignore it. Finish the comic if you like it, then go back and redo bits you don't like. Restarts are only necessary if there is no saving the comic (I.E you've completely overhauled the plot and the start clearly contradicts events you've planned for later). If you think "Well, it's a bit cringy / not up to standard" the best resolution is to just keep going until you're done.

[DiegoPalacios]

While it's important to improve and make your work the best thing you can, obsessing to make it perfect may sabotage your work. There are cases of people who get too stuck trying to make the first pages perfect and they don't advance in the story.

In my opinion, you have a good beginning, but if your beginning doesn't make sense considering how are you planning the story, then change it. If that is not the problem, at least if i were in your place i wouldn't change it.

Changing a start takes work. You must have a clear idea about how exactly you want to change your beginning. Or else, it will feel tedious and meaningless.

Hope this helps.

[BraniAndNess]

I have a motto for my art: finished, not perfect. It's impossible to make something perfect especially when we keep improving, but the important thing is to finish something. That being said, with on-going projects like webcomics people have to start from the beginning and if we later realize some things may turn off the readers, it's important to think about what we could do to improve it so the current comic can thrive as well. But there are many solutions possible that don't always involve redoing everything. Think about it and find where the source problems are.

For example, in our own comic we've noticed that a lot of people stop reading after chapter,,, and we never knew why. We love the first chapter and think the plot is well made. But we recently got some feedback on it that suggest the world-building is a bit much to take in all at once and can overwhelm casual readers... However, changing the world-building would mean re-making the entire first chapter which took half a year! After some thinking, we decided that we're going to try making a small prologue for the comic to explain some of the world-building, so people can then sit back and focus on the story in chapter 1. This is a relatively easy thing to fix that we feel will improve the reading experience without completely overhauling the work we have done, which we wish not to touch anymore not matter how tempting it can be to go back and change things Try to see if you can fins a compromise like this for your comic!

[joe_galindez]

Finish what you're doing and just make the next one better.

It's more important to finish things than it is to make them perfect.

EDIT: Be a finisher. Don't be an eternal rewriter.

[XzynderVexymous]

It’s up to you. You should like you want to fix it. I’m redoing my Comic because I found out a bunch of amazing things about art. So, decide when ever you’re ready, fellow creator.

[SynCypher]

Salutations!

Being a person who has done some reworking, I can tell you from experience that it's a lot of work! Now, I'll say this: I didn't rework my entire comic. In fact, I only reworked a hand full of the first pages because, like you said, first impressions are important. So, I remade a few of the opening pages and explained in the description that I'd edited them and linked back to their originals. That way, I wasn't abandoning my original work and, when the style changed back to what it was, people weren't confused.

The reason I linked back to my original artwork is so people could see my progress as well. The thing is, progress is part of what builds the voice of your webcomic. Your watchers are along with you on your journey and as someone who reads webcomics, I love watching an artist progress and hone their skills. I feel proud of them for all their hard work and appreciate what they have to do to share their story with me. Never underestimate the power of your progress and the connection it can help form with readers. If you ever rework pages, just let people know you're doing it and the good thing is you don't have to change everything. Lots of webomic artists do this too, so you're not alone if you want to make changes here and there.

Your artwork reminds me a little of Steven Universe. It's got a fluid cartoon style and your characters are very expressive with their eyes, which is a good thing! Wanna know what else? Steven Universe now versus when they started making the cartoon is way more fluid in terms of style and it's style has changed a lot since they started. We got to watch the progress of the characters and the artists as they honed their craft. It adds to the adventure, so even if you cringe at your old work, don't forget how important it was to getting you where you are now.

All of that aside, on to some constructive criticism for you! (As per what you asked originally, lol)

Like I said before, I like your artwork and your dialogue suits your tone and doesn't feel awkward so, kudos on dialogue! The only thing I can really suggest is more in terms of artwork. You've got a good color scheme going and I like how you've been able to make your foreground characters pop. The only thing I notice is that proportions are fluid. Some scenes Josie will be tall and have longer legs to suit her longer proportions where other times, her legs will be shorter and her arms longer. In some scenes her head is very large and in others it's proportionate to her shoulders. This isn't unique to just the Josie character, either. Xenor also has fluid proportions. Now, when you pop back and forth between Chibi and the normal character design, it's expected that in Chibi form the proportions get shortened and more impish so, there's nothing wrong with that.

I would just be mindful of head size in relation to the body and here are some models to show how measuring that work. (Cartoon, More Realistic) I hope these are helpful to you, it never hurts to have a guide nearby. (I can neither confirm nor deny having several sitting on a shelf next to my head right now. ;>.> ) You've still got an interesting story here and your work is very crisp, you don't have too much or too little going on and I think that, since you're always going to be progressing anyway, that it's going to do just fine.

Don't worry about having to go back and change pages before adding new content. I'd let that simmer for a bit as you continue forward and if you still want to change anything in the beginning, maybe redraw a page here and there, you can certainly do so! I wish you all the best and hope that the links I gave you can be useful to you as you go along. Cheers!

[TimCaloweh]

You can redraw anything, but if it's plot you'll cause some confusion.

[wander_creature]

In my personal experience, it's better to keep going and just bring in new change as it happens. The original artwork for Outer Spaces is really amorphous and crappy, and gradually over the months the characters and style has become a lot more defined. It may not flow as nicely, but people can see how far it's come, and the progress I put into furthering the story will be a lot more appreciated than retreading its early moments.

As far as actual changes in-story, my favorite approach is to add explanations in-story for the changes that you're making. For instance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, early on the Infinity Gauntlet was shown to be in Odin's vault on Asgard, but later shown with the villain Thanos. Because there's no way to go back and change things in a hollywood film series, they later had Hela in Thor: Ragnarok explain that Odin's was a fake designed to inspire some respect in his subjects - which both explains the difference, but also tells a little bit more about the character of Odin, and helps establish Hela as someone who's peeling back the veneer on his reign. Adding a little more information in the present can change what we know about the story's past. Just food for thought, anyways.

Constructively: I love your art! And the character design is great. My only critique would be the speech bubbles; just making sure words are centered and even in the bubbles can go a long way towards upgrading your look. Other than that I like what I've seen so far!