Just looking for some feedback/advice. [NSFW]

[wrentemple]

Firstly I've gotten to a panel in my comic that involves a gigantic snake deity/spirit snoozing atop a mountain.
Close by lives his human tailor friend who makes snazzy clothes out of his shed skin for him to wear when he occasionally takes human form, but I digress.

I've drawn him mostly in human form up to this point, so I admit it's not been thought through as well as it could have been. Eventually I settled on a Green tree python as the snake i'd base him off of (Hence the little floating snake in the sky looking different)... but the way they sort of drape themselves over a branch like a saddle doesn't really translate well to a mountain. It kind of ends up looking like a mountain with a poop emoji stuck on top.

I threw a trace of a tree-line in to break up the mid-ground a bit but it all still feels off to me.

Incidentally when I flipped the image the composition felt a lot stronger to me

Just looking for some advice on how to make it more convincing/compelling, despite the fact that no one will look at it for more than 2 seconds. Problem solving it here might help me down the line.

[The NSFW Part]

I've gotten to the part where I'm sketching out secondary and tertiary character designs and upon reaching a settlement of trolls/half-giants I came across an issue.

On account of spiny growths, constant fighting and a relatively hardy constitution in a forgiving climate... Clothes are kind of a non-factor for males and females alike.
Aside from the occasional trophy-cloak or hodge-podge of armour it's pretty much a nudist colony up in there.
And this tribe is a part of the story for 4 chapters early on... which in web comic terms translates to months/years :')

I know for sure that on Webtoons I'll have to censor the holy heck out of everything but how forgiving is Tapas with non-sexual full nudity?

Obviously I'll try and tastefully censor things so that it's not gratuitous, but how likely am I to get the ban-hammer for a slew of monster dong?

[vothnthorvaldson]

Although it indeed doesn't look like the usual posture of a tree python (and it can't!), I think it looks very natural. I actually find it very snakely elegant and satisfying to look at. I don't see how you can improve it, because I don't think it needs too.

I don't know about the NSFW part, I have no idea what's acceptable or not, all I can say is that if this is not acceptable, this is an extremely sad, hypocritical and damaging attitude. I can't even start to understand what's wrong with nudity.

[silverraven0]

Based on the Guidelines it probably okay, but let me tag @ratique since they probably know better.

Content and Community Guidelines

Oh and btw, the snake looks okay. If it is colored maybe made The color different or something

[wrentemple]

@vothnthorvaldson
Maybe I'm just being a worry-wort then. I'm getting closer and closer to actually releasing stuff so maybe that's making me more critical.

@silverraven0
I consulted that some time ago, and whilst It does seem to fall within the guidelines I'd rather hear from people who have personally done it.
I can't remember exactly where, but I read a couple of posts that said despite having things censored their pages were flagged anyway (though they managed to get them put back up after review).
I could be confusing a post about Webtoons with a post about Tapas though.

Thank-you both nonetheless.

[xabelmind]

Yeah, there's a post here asking about the adult scenes in Webtoons and it trully had been people there whose work has been taken down, but it's only because Webtoons established a politic of "no-nudes" this last year

I didn't hear of any problem of the kind in Tapas, they don't seem to have any problem as long as the explicit content is part of a story and not a bad excuse

"Gratuitously graphic content" usually refers to explicit content without a story/plot, with the only intention of arouse people (aka: Porn)

But novels and comics usually have a story behind that scenes, the characters have personality, feelings and show'em to the reader. That's what makes the difference, not the work being or not censored

[joannekwan]

For the nudity part specifically:
Since it's non-sexual you don't need to censor it (blur, black bar, etc.).
As for marking the page Mature, it depends on how zoomed in it is. If it's a far shot and the genitalia are no more than a couple of tiny lines, I wouldn't bother marking the page. If it's a closer shot with some detail, then mark it M.

And if Tap finds something wrong with it, they'll usually contact you and ask you to fix the pages.

[ratique]

I highly recommend using the mature tag. Not just for Tapas' sake, but also for your readers. It is fair to warn people that they may not want to open something in front of their teachers, parents or co-workers.

Other than that, you should have no issues with your art from experience with my comics.

[nostalgicroxas]

I agree with using the M tag.

And, likely not the answer you were looking for, but I've seen it in a lot of art where people just draw characters so their naked boobs and genitalia are covered. By plants (and plant vases), random animal anomalies (Gurren Lagaan, I'm looking at you), and just moving legs and postures in certain ways. It's just "creative" ways to censor without really putting in a censor bar of any sort. And generally the results are either SFW, or non-offending and end up comical.

[wrentemple]

@joannekwan & @ratique
No question, No question. I've fully intended to apply the mature filter/tag.
It'd be against guidelines and unfair to readers not to have the mature warning present.

Thank you both for the feedback.

@nostalgicroxas
Tasteful censorship is something I've already been applying in my thumbnailing/story-boarding process since day one.
Just because some one is naked doesn't mean that their genitalia has to be on display 100% of the time.

I do kind of feel that nudity is too often played off as sexual, violent or comedic.
I'd just like for things to make sense in a natural way. One too many potted plants, swooping swallows or crossed arms and crossed legs leaves things feeling... A little stagey? Idk.

[Now you've got me thinking about Gurren Lagaan and I'm sad]