Share your story: How did you get into webcomics?

[patrickireland9]

I started out designing fan characters for my favorite properties. Mostly for He-man and the Masters of the Universe. Eventually I had over 100 characters and thought hey I should make a comic/story for these guys. SO I did. Here it is:

http://tapastic.com/series/A-Song-of-Heroes

[jacintawibowo]

But concept art appealed to me because I loved that "blue sky" vibe of it! Anything was possible! Continuity was something you needn't worry about because these are just ideas!

Ooh I see. I definitely admire Concept Artist's ability to creatively produce different ideas visually. Not an easy feat!
I agree with your sentiments on animation and illustration too. I remember being totally enchanted by the frames in animation- how even one frame implied life and movement was crazy cool to me!

I've expressed to my animation professors that if it were still the 90s, I'd probably be more interested in being an animator. Regardless, I like having a lot of control over a project. In animation, that's mostly done by directors and maybe even storyboard artists and designers. The latter two falls into the illustration/concept art category so it contributed to my "what do I want to be?" juggling.

I definitely miss the desire to experiment that was present in even the big industries back in the 90s. The thing that's less desirable is the lack of women in leading positions back then. It's nice that there's a revival going on in animation now, where smaller studios are combating the "disney/dreamworks/pixar" style with something completely different and unexpected.
I agree as well with the sentiment over liking the feel of control XD Working on little details instead of the whole story is not as rewarding to me.

Yes! I want to find someone who had their first comic be a masterpiece! Lol! : P

yes let's go on a journey to find... the "perfect first story" <(u_u)/

Thanks! That's just the nature of how I tell stories. I like seeing big worlds, dramatic character development, journeys... the more massive the stories, the more invested I find myself in the characters, and therefore, the more I like drawing and obsessing over them!

I understand. I made big epic stories back then too, but when it came to "practicing comics" I told mini-stories of those big epics: the best of both worlds :B
Ooh and I'm curious about this spin-off comic (now that I've read Suihara!) would this comic involve the main leads or exploration on side-characters?

Overall it's been mostly overwhelming, but the world of indie comics is just so amazing to me because of the lack of a "gatekeeper.

Heavens! I'm sure it must be overwhelming! We get some crazy off-the-wall stories on the web. Even the ones with a target demographic in mind are capable of twisting the reader's expectations.

To to put it short, when it comes to comic production, I tend to stick to my guns--for better or worse. Everything else I need to absorb and adapt to make my own!

Neat! That makes perfect sense. Make comics your own way, but promote and market your comic the way fellow webcomic-ers have been doing it. Webcomics are especially unique when they borrow from other mediums. I have a friend who draws for Ilse (ilsecomic.tumblr.com) she borrows directly from storyboarding with her comic style, and I think it's very effective with the style she's comfortable with and also accessible as a webcomic. I myself like borrowing from children's book illustrations and animation in Tales from the Well.
What do you feel are the different art mediums that influenced your comic, in particular? Does this effect your art style, comic format, or storytelling?

Yes! \o/ So far it's been really cool! And I'll definitely be popping in here and there!

Awesome~ I'm totally thinking of starting more forum topics that engage lots of discussion, hope to see you around these parts more

[jacintawibowo]

Mhm, yes. I feel the same. I know I used to look at webcomic's "links pages" back in the day, but I certainly don't do that anymore. Tumblr and Tapastic are ways (as you say) to naturally get exposed to new artists and comics. We kind of just bump into them in these communities, whether through the forums, looking through "popular" and "trending, or even the Daily comic Snack. Newer media is getting much better at getting people to "stumble upon" artwork.
Yes, I agree with what you're saying a lot. There's a growing change in how readers are getting their comics.

[jacintawibowo]

Reading this inspired a series of short lived fan manga that I had planned to publish on the internet, but never actually completed a single chapter for any of them.

Neat, so this fan-manga series got you interested and actually start drawing your own comic.

I began working on my first real project, Persona 3: The Awakening. P3A is now ongoing with the 3rd chapter on the horizon, and I believe it will be the first manga series I've ever completed.

Interesting! So in regards to the success in completing some chapters, what do you suppose you did differently in this comic as opposed to your previous projects? What really got your drive going?

I keep myself motivated by listening to music, playing the Persona games, and thinking about the friends that I've involved with P3A and their comments about wanting to see more of it whenever I give them something to read, even if it was just a storyboard for a chapter that would be scrapped in the future.

Great way to get motivated! I'm always pumped to work whenever I read through the comments on my comic. Do you see yourself working on original stories, or are fan mangas more of your thing?

[jacintawibowo]

What I.F. was a one off good-bye letter an Imaginary Friend writes to his human friend, however, it's gotten popular enough that Jeramy and his friend, D.J, are considering a second issue. The single issue achieved diamond distribution.

Decisions is a series through the publishing house Cosmic Times, however, Jeramy just worked on issue 3. And Joshua Black is a series through Con Artist Entertainment that he's signed up for issues 5 and ongoing.

Cool, so it's a mix of some scrapped work and some ongoing work! That's a very healthy start, I'd think :B

Yep, most of my graduating class felt it. Some never drew again even though they now what degrees in art. :B

dang! Tough stuff. Makes me want to suport my animation buddies to continue their dreams!! Don't leave me friends :'D

What The Flux Comics, we were hired to fully animate a 60+ minute 2D movie about mutant monsters in Chernobyl, just the two of us.

ouch, harsh on a lot of accounts :b it's cool how the routine work and challenges get us out of our drawing ruts. Part of the reason I look froward to art school sometimes- challenging me with weird assignments I never would have thought of on my own.
It's interesting how you gradually got yourself back on your feet before going on a project like Oops.

Their reason are mainly just small nit picky things, like maybe a tangent is off on one panel or line weight on a hand needs to be more thoughtfully considered. Stuff I don't even think about while drawing my cartoony stuff, and crazy enough, since my style is cartoony they'd excuse things that they'd call him out on since he's more realistic.

Hmm, I think I'd agree. From what I've seen of Oops, line weight could be more considered.
I think I see how you think that way for your cartoony stuff. Animation doesn't use excessive change in line-weight (otherwise it would be visually incoherent), but comics as a still image art requires finer thought behind line work. It can often get pretty nitpicky in comics over the inking style because of that.

We have a great voice actor friend. He voiced most of the monsters in our terrible Chernobyl movie. lol Whenever I can, I would like to use his talents as a trailer narrator. ^_^

Ah a trailer narrator! I hadn't even thought of that for some reason XD cool idea~ very cool.

Whoa! O.O That's so different from American comic conventions. Well...(etc)

Yeah my comics professor had a little culture shock when attending the conventions too. The Hong Kong environment doesn't encourage a lot of interaction between strangers (a very hustle-bustle city!) so meeting people is often short and sweet.
I'm blown away by people's ability to speak multiple languages too XD I speak English fluently but my local-language has deteriorated a lot, so I'm not great at speaking it. Multi-language envyyy

lol Frederator is now Senpai! Yeah, Craig and Frederator have been around ever since I was in art school. I admire Craig for leaving CN after they were trying to transition to "CN Real" (oh goodness, dumb).

NOTICE MEEEEEEEEE
Oh man is that why Craig's working for Disney now? Dang! I remember the CN Real ages...did not like them :b

[jacintawibowo]

It wasn't until after going to school for game animation that a lightbulb went off in my head telling me to try my hand at webcomics.

Fascinating! So was this just an idea to start webcomics, or were there webcomics you read that got you juggling with the idea of doing your own?

I spent most of 2012 looking into how to make and publish webcomics. For the next two years I would start developing my new comic.

What kind of resources did you look into? Were you observing how other webcomics managed themselves, or did you take up classes/reading about it?

By Dec 2014, I was preparing to upload to Inkblazers on New Years Day. Sadly, I discovered Inkblazers was closing and that was when someone on deviantart pointed me to Tapastic. I'm actually much happier on tapastic then the short time I spent on Inkblazers.

Mhm I heard of the unfortunate shut down on Inkblazers. What was the community like on Inkblazers? Does it compare to Tapastic?

my drawing greatly suffered and I've been spending the past year trying to improve and get back to form, but so far I'm happy with my experience and things are only getting better.

That's good! Comics gets artists improving two-fold from the constant demand the media requires. Once you're done, you'll be a much better artist from when you started!

[HayateTsujimoto]

Yep, although before I began, I already had an original manga series in mind that I wanted to do, but I decided to put that off so that I could develop it more. What I did differently is that I actually planned the story out from beginning to end, and began writing drafts for the first chapter right away, and it took about 3 drafts for me to produce something I was satisfied with. I had also confirmed that people had an interest in the idea before I started writing it, unlike the other fan manga. A lot of things got my drive going- wanting to produce art on the same level as Shigenori Soejima, knowing that my friends who I involved with this were counting on me to make something good out of this, and just a burning love for the series the manga is based on. After P3A is done, I do plan to work on the original manga I mentioned, but first things first, I need to get better at writing things I'm satisfied with and I need to flesh out my story, characters, and overcome the mental blocks I've placed on myself.

[jacintawibowo]

Haha, thanks! I couldn't give up either, and they're too sides of the same coin

The best of both worlds! I like it. That's me with illustration and comics.

and that just was not enough time at the time, especially without a buffer. In hindsight, I'm kinda glad it didn't last too long; not enough time to build a fanbase to disappoint! I think we all dodged a bullet there!

Whoa, really rough! No buffer and 3 days a week updates? Hardcore. Intense first experience, really gives a good idea of the pace of webcomics.

You guys are at SCAD?! That's awesome! What major? I'm assuming "sequential art," but well, "assume nothing!" How far are you, and are you liking it? Me, I got out a while ago (Nov2013, but "continuing Thesis" until this year). The thesis is unique to the graduate program, but its essentially a senior project with a research paper tacked on. Not as big as the college would have you assume.

Yes! We're Sequential Art majors and Animation Minors :] I'm pretty deep into my major (I might be a senior? I'm actually not sure :b)
Ooh I didn't know that! No idea if I have to do that for sequential art, but at least now I have a rough idea of it :B

I want to see the Crimson Fly get old, and how that affects him, his cast, the readers that grew up with him, or are just being introduced to him, and of course, yours truly. Of course, "all good things must come to an end, eventually" and you can't begin a journey without having an end in mind, so I try to write to reach an acceptable stopping point if I should ever grow tired or the comic (even though I hope I won't, but you never know. Hopefully I'll have enough sense to stop before then)

Ooh that's actually really interesting. Seeing how a community grows around a comic like that would be fascinating. The idea of a character aging as people read it is a cool concept. It's definitely going to be a challenge (Spiderman had to be de-aged because readers couldn't relate to him after he got too old), but I'd like to see where that idea goes. Do you have concrete plans for your character's future, or is it still vague enough for you to make things up as you go along?

How about you guys? How did you get into webcomics and/or comics in general? (I haven't skimmed the comments enough to see if you've already answered)

Oh! I haven't really answered that yet! We've always had a passing interest in art and storytelling, but it wasn't until we found webcomics that we'd realized we could make stories on our own if we wanted to. I was a fan of a handful of webcomics and supported lots of creators while practicing on some one-shot comics every Christmas on the side. Last quarter we had a webcomics class (mentored by a very A+ professor) where we had to pitch, create, and launch a webcomic by the end of the course. That's pretty much how Tales from the Well came to be, and how we got here now (:

[jacintawibowo]

Whoa that's tense dude! I can relate to the desire to be defiant and wanting to prove someone wrong through sheer determination, but dang I didn't realize you could go on a literal fight!

Has your opinion on webcomics changed since then? I'm assuming since you're in a webcomicchat/community that there's something about webcomics that's enough to have you come in? That's me assuming though. Just curious.
If you still make things up on the internet, what's keeping you going?

Those opinions on webcomics was actually the reason I was reluctant to admit I enjoyed webcomics. I was afraid people would call me a "fake" for not reading "real comics." Thankfully my comics professor didn't think like that at all, and calls out the whole "fake comics" myth as a seriously uninformed opinion.
I actually agree that a lot of webcomics aren't good, since anyone can make them it doesn't guarantee an amazing life-changing story. The lack of an editor is both a strength and a weakness in webcomics- we have crazy untold stories that publishers would never dare to do in this time, but we also have a lack in refinement of the craft that an editor would have called the creator out on. Still, there's a TON of top-notch webcomics I'm so grateful to have read, and they're getting easier to find.

[jacintawibowo]

Oh wow. You're tough! What software do you use for your comic? How had the transition between hand drawn and 3D been for you? Did you struggle with the art style?

[jacintawibowo]

Neat! I always wondered how fancomics keep their momentum going. I'm not a fan-art motivated to create artwork, I get more hapy feels when I draw original stuff.
How was the transition for you to go from fancomic to original? Was it difficult? Did any of your fans from your old comic follow you into your new projects?

[jacintawibowo]

Wow that's a lot of improvement! The decision to become both a writer and an artist is a pretty intense decision! What made you decide to draw your stories yourself? Did you find any other artists who were willing to collaborate?

[jacintawibowo]

Whoa that's cool! A little project ended up blossoming into becoming a webcomic! What got you interested in telling the stories of these characters? Did you see potential in their characters? Or was it a "for fun" thing?

[jacintawibowo]

That's actually a really smart way to go about it. What you're doing is pretty much lots of editing and an informal "screen test" and gauging for a target audience for your comic, which is an oversight for some people.

[pedro_de_matos]

Thank you very much! =)
At first I asked my girlfriend (a talented and experienced artist) but back then she was flooded with school projects, so it wasn't possible. Then I decided start drawing myself expecting getting some readers, maybe among them, a better artist (easy) willing to collaborate (not so easy).
But I was bitten by the drawing-bug =p

[jacintawibowo]

You're welcome!
haha, aww that's cool! I'm glad you've found a love for drawing =D

[BraveHeartTatsumaki]

Same, maybe mostly because the feel of "I created this and none else" thing xD
It wasn't that difficult actually, the fancomic was slowly getting stuff that you wouldn't actually see in the usual one, but the fancomic helped me in the composition of the story, and since I already was working with original characters, it made things easier.
Actually yes xD they still follow me in my new comic, they became good friends of me and they come to read the comic and they're interesed in more things I do too.

[Jrej]

Before 2012 I had no idea webcomics were a thing.
I met a guy at work who had a plan. Make his own webcomic!
It inspired me to get started. I had always worked on stories but after novels, and short films, I was looking for another way to share it!

Webcomics gives me full control on my story telling.
And the immediate feed back keeps me going!

[jacintawibowo]

Yeah something like that XD
Cool! That makes sense. Glad to hear it wasn't too difficult to switch gears.
That's such a good thing to hear! It's sad when fans don't cross over to original work after fanart, but looks like you were successful in that regard =)

[jacintawibowo]

That's cool! Did you support each other when making webcomics?
Yeah the full control you have on webcomics is both daunting and exciting! It's great having such a personal project.
True!