Looking for feedback on my collection of short manga

[okellymx]

The Mysterious Book Collection 1 | Tapas

I was going to stop posting my short 4 panel mangas here but I was wondering if anyone had any feedback on them. I only post an update when I get the chance. I mean the previous update was a year ago. With doing commissions this is the best I can do.

Also another thing I want to ask. If I make a let's say 6 to 30 page comic should I make a new series and just keep this one for the tiny for panel comics? Just curious.

[redmancomics]

Woah, these are great! Genuinely funny and interesting, and I've never seen the manga art style applied to something that kinda resembles a newspaper comic strip. It's cool! Favorite one is "Mysterious Neko-san"

[okellymx]

Thank you so much. Honestly Mysterious Neko-san is my favorite as well. It's hard to pump out funny things like this and it's good writing practice that doesn't take 6 months to do.

However, I'm no revolutionary. These comics are called 4-koma in Japan they are probably the most popular out of all comics in Japan. They even have daily ones in their newspapers. Quite a few anime are based off of them like New Game!, Lucky Star and K-ON!. A lot of popular action anime get comedy spin offs as 4 panel comics.

I appreciate the feedback.

[ISNEKO]

The humor is enjoyable and I really like the art.

Was happy to see another update.

[qwerty]

Wow, that's some really nice artwork, especially for something like a 4-panel comic. Most episodic comics (at least on Tapas) seem to tend towards simplistic art styles.

I'm also impressed with your ability to tell a "story" and create humor using brand new characters every time. Generally things like this rely on recurring characters, so this is pretty unique.

If you make a new comic it makes sense to put it up as a separate series I think, unless the new comic will be connected to this one somehow.

[okellymx]

Thanks. I find it much easier to get better at drawing and story telling if I'm not try to do a long running series or recurring characters. In a long running series I would have only practice writing the beginning once and the ending once and have less room for experimenting. Same for character design.

I forgot the format would be different so it would be weird to have it in the same comic.

Thanks for thé input

[JonRoydon]

Yes these are really great : ) the drawing is really tight, and the stories riff off manga conventions in a really satisfying way.

Personally I think the strongest one is the most recent, it sticks to the 'four act' asian storytelling format. The first one also hits the format but her pulling her head off is more of an emotive twist for sure!

For anyone interested in this four act storytelling method, it's a great thing to practice and applies to longer form comics too. It's a way to tell a story that doesn't rely on 'conflict' of one form or another. With Okellymx's 'Are You Okay?' comic:

Panel 1 (Introduction) setting scene and character - we see this girl and a boy and he is trying to talk to her.
Panel 2 (Development) developing the scene we just introduced - he asks if she's ok.
Panel 3 (Twist) something usually totally unrelated to the first two panels, although in this case it uses one of those characters - she takes her head off!
Panel 4 ( conclusion) tying the 3rd panel to the 1st two - she's answers and asks if he is ok.

In the middle two comics you messed with the format and switched the 'twist' into the final panel - nothing wrong with that, it still works - but it leaves no resolution/conclusion panel and we're just left on that final twist (I guess like a classic 'twist' ending in a western short story or something). Again, nothing wrong with it at all! Just wanted to point it out in case you weren't aware of it. For me those middle two comics just don't quite hit the satisfaction I got from the 'Are you okay' and 'Please' ones.

Uggh! Sorry for writing so much! Really love them, I'd definitely make a new series if you are releasing something with a different format, keep this one going for the four panel stuff. I'm bookmarking it at any rate : )

[okellymx]

That's super helpful. I appreciate you writing so much. I tend to forget a lot of things I've learned. So new series seems to be the best bet for anything different.

Thanks again.

[redmancomics]

No problem!
I see, never knew about 4-koma. Shows what I know about manga.
Still awesome though!